Kingdom Hearts 4 Needs To Course Correct From 3's Big Combat Mistakes
I’m currently replaying Kingdom Hearts 3 for the first time since it launched in 2019. It’s the only Kingdom Hearts game I haven’t played through multiple times, and I feel like I owe it to the series that has meant so much to me to give it a second chance, since my first impression of Kingdom Hearts 3 was one of contempt. I have a lot of problems with Kingdom Hearts 3, which you can read all about in my debate with superfan George Foster. At the time, my chief complaints revolved around the game’s ‘style over substance’ approach to combat, an issue Kingdom Hearts has maintained, even beyond updates made in the Re:Mind expansion. I want to hop aboard the Kingdom Hearts 4 hype train with the rest of the fans, but I have a lot of trepidation about the direction the series is headed in. I hope the next game tones down the flashy commands, combos, and gimmicks and brings back the skillful combat that made me love Kingdom Hearts in the first place.
At the start of Kingdom Hearts 3, Sora has failed his Mark of Mastery exam and lost almost all of his power after nearly being taken by the darkness. If Sora is meant to be weaker here than he is in previous games, you wouldn’t know. During the prologue in Olympus, Sora can already unleash lengthy ground and air combos, dash around enemies effortlessly, and propel himself off walls and poles to unleash screen-clearing Flowmotion attacks. His magic may be the only thing noticeably weaker, since you only start with the base versions of Fire and Water. Other than that, Sora is practically in an end-game state right from the start, and only becomes more unstoppable from there.
Related: The Great Debate: Is Kingdom Hearts 3 Bad?
There’s a ton of gimmicks at your immediate disposal in
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