Following the recent D23 showcase full of Kingdom Hearts IV information, Kingdom Hearts series director Tetsuya Nomura and co-producer Tai Yasue revealed new details about the upcoming RPG in an exclusive Famitsu interview. Thanks to translations from Final Weapon staff writer and translator Ryuji, we can further glean into Nomura and Yasue’s comments and insights into Kingdom Hearts IV, including very strong links to Kingdom Hearts Union χ (Cross) and the mobile game series as a whole.
According to Yasue, Japanese voice-overs for Kingdom Hearts IV have already been recorded, and English/overseas recordings are still ongoing—about 60% to 70% done. Nomura vaguely added to this, stating that Kingdom Hearts IV has a script that is nearly double the size of Kingdom Hearts III.
Kingdom Hearts IV’s worlds are some of the biggest created for the series, and the Coco trailer from D23 only revealed a very small portion of that world. Nomura didn’t comment on how many worlds will be in the game, but there were some slight implications that there could be a lesser amount of worlds in quantity. Nomura plans to showcase the Coco world in detail at a later date. In Quadratum, Sora will join the other Keyblade wields in the Dandelions, who work with the Quadratum government.
A staff member from the Union χ team has been meticulously organizing and summarizing the past lore of the Kingdom Hearts series into an easy-to-understand format. They’ve incorporated diagrams and other methods in order to explain the lore as clearly as possible, which has been well received by Disney. Their internal role is scenario proofing to ensure there are no discrepancies between past lore and the current scenario. The Famitsu interviewer jokes that the team is compiling a true “real-life version of Jiminy’s Journal.”
Continuing with Union χ, it’s abundantly clear that the mobile game series is important to the events of Kingdom Hearts IV. Further into the interview, Nomura says that Kingdom Hearts IV is a story that exists within the flow of the greater χ (chi) series in a way. Fans who’ve played the mobile games to the end will recognize Vali and Sigurd, but those who haven’t will still be able to catch on to exactly the kind of people they are based on how the game depicts them.
As for when we can expect more information, it’s hard to say since there will be a slight gap in new information. Development is progressing smoothly into its final stage, and development for this title might be the smoothest in the series yet. This is why Yasue was very confident about no delays ahead of the game’s launch.
Kingdom Hearts IV will launch in late 2027 for Nintendo Switch 2, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC via Steam and Epic Games Store. What’s more, the Kingdom Hearts: The Series anime was announced for Disney+ and Disney Channel with an all-new story by Tetsuya Nomura and Square Enix.
The series is also coming to Nintendo Switch 2, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S in Kingdom Hearts Collection [I~III] on October 8. A demo for Kingdom Hearts III + Re Mind and pre-orders for Kingdom Hearts Collection [I~III] are available now. KINGDOM HEARTS HD 1.5+2.5 ReMIX will be available natively on Nintendo Switch, too.
