Kingdom Hearts III
"Kingdom Hearts III" was released for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on January 25, 2019 in Japan and other Asian countries, and is scheduled to be released on January 29, 2019 elsewhere. In July 2017, at D23, it was announced that the game would release in 2018. Almost a year later, at an additional performance of the "Kingdom Hearts" Orchestra World Tour in Los Angeles, the game's North American release date was revealed to be January 29, 2019. Nomura spoke to moving the game's release date outside of 2018, stating the development team had been told the original release date they had considered was not "good timing in the year" to release the game, especially considering "differences in holiday lengths and how stores behave in different regions". In addition, Square Enix requested the game be released as simultaneously as possibly between Japan and the rest of the world, and not wanting to move up the release at the expense of development, resulted in the January 2019 date being chosen. The game's epilogue is planned to be added to the game on January 26 for Japan and January 30 elsewhere, while the secret film content is planned to be added worldwide on January 31, 2019. This was done in order to help prevent them from leaking beforehand, since Nomura called them "the biggest spoilers" in the game.
Kingdom Hearts III
Sora returns as the main playable character, once again joined in the party by Donald Duck and Goofy, with the ability to have two additional characters join the party for a total of five-player parties. This is an increase from previous main entries in the series, where players were limited to two additional party members at any given time along with Sora. Certain parts of the game have Riku and Aqua as playable characters. Describing the gameplay, Nomura called the action "pretty frantic", as well as "really flashy and exciting. The enemy AI is a lot more intricate, too, and I think the gameplay will reflect that new dynamic balance." Sora can perform magic, with a new, powerful tier of each spell available to him, similar to what Aqua has available to her in "". Magic performs differently in underwater sections of the game, with "Kingdom Hearts III" introducing a new spell, Water. Team-up attacks are also featured, which combine Sora and various party members into one attack. Players can equip various abilities for Sora and his party members, with the system to do so "an evolution of sorts" from the system used in "Kingdom Hearts II". Character summons make a return from previous entries, this time known as "Links", where an additional character joins the battle to assist the player with specialized attacks.
Sora faces Heartless, Nobodies, and Unversed in the game, with new variants of these enemy types appearing. In addition to these traditional "smaller" enemies, the player faces giant bosses, which give "Sora greater freedom of movement and room to experiment with attacks—including the new theme-park-ride summon attacks," known as "Attraction Flow". These attacks are inspired by the Disney Parks attractions Mad Tea Party, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters, and Grizzly River Run, and generic pirate ship and carousel attractions; these attacks draw visual inspiration from Disney Parks' Main Street Electrical Parade. Sora also has the ability to jump on certain enemies, such as ones shaped like a vehicle. Regarding traversal, Nomura noted the new mechanic, called "Athletic Flow" in Japanese, was refined from the Flowmotion mechanic from "Dream Drop Distance", which players felt was "a little too free... and it was kind of hard to control on their end." "Athletic Flow" allows the player to utilize the environment to access previously unreachable areas. Co-director Tai Yasue stated this mechanic was created "to try something new" and "radically change the gameplay" for the "Hercules" world, which led to its use in the other worlds. As a result, each world was able to have "more height, scale and sense of discovery."