Kingdom Hearts III
Square-Enix 1st Production Department
Square-Enix
PS4, Xbox One
A voice actor may have just pulled the rug out on Square-Enix and Disney as far as Kingdom Hearts III is concerned. Bill Farmer, who voices one of the franchises central characters, Goofy, tweeted earlier today that the game would have a 2015 release.
The exact quote, which has since been deleted, claimed that he and several other voice actors had been recording dialogue “for the last few years” and that Kingdom Hearts III was “supposed to come out later this year”. When pressed by fans he asserted in a follow-up tweet that “I am certain that this is what I know and have been told.”
For the legions of fans of Square-Enix’s secondary pillar franchise, this is potentially huge news. The last proper Kingdom Hearts title, Kingdom Hearts II, was released a mind-blowing 10 years ago as of this spring. What has followed has been a series of increasingly side-tracked and meandering titles that have artificially extended the series for years over several mobile and handheld platforms.
The release of 2 HD collections over the last year and a half have prompted a lot speculation that Kingdom Hearts III was finally on the horizon. Though Square-Enix milking one of its flagship franchises is hardly enough for speculation in and of itself, Farmer’s tweet seems to confirm that the game is on its way much sooner than initially expected.
Square-Enix, however, issued a very carefully worded tweet shortly thereafter which suggested otherwise, opining that there had been a “goof”, and that the Kingdom Hearts III release date “remains unannounced”. Take a moment to soak up the cryptic nature of that tweet for a second, and notice that it doesn’t actually deny either of Farmer’s claims.
Here’s hoping for the release of a proper console iteration of the franchise sooner rather than later.