Three and Out: Take Two – ‘Kingdom Hearts III’

Kingdom Hearts 3 is hard to stomach. A game with unrivaled potential falling drastically short of its own legacy. The writing feels slipshod and hamfisted, as if all Sora needs to do is feel a certain way to unlock the story or make something incredible happen. A glaring example of this is freeing Sora’s newfound pirate ship from its thick, rock-walled, island cove prison; Jack Sparrow tells us to follow our heart and Sora is moved in some way which then causes a chunk of the island to crack apart and fall into the sea. We didn’t do anything to earn it and Sora only closed his eyes for a moment and let his heart guide the experience. Our hearts are our guiding key is a vague notion the story revolves around that fails to deliver an interesting, logical, or believable story. Disbelief can only be suspended so much without any justification or explanation. The writing in Kingdom Hearts 3 doesn’t make sense to a reasonable audience.

Poor writing makes for lazy storytelling. The story feels forced and meaningless. Otherwise interesting and unique story events in the Disney worlds – where the opportunities for compelling crossover integrations are at peak potential – are ruined by overly dramatic or tropey presentations. Many events are saturated with unnecessary grunts and gasps from the entire cast instead of meaningful dialogue or character development. When we do finally get a bit of dialogue or character development, it comes to us not in cleverly crafted, heartfelt scenes but instead from clunky, awkward ones. Take, for example, when we’re battling Organization XIII members late in the game. We are actively engaging two to three members at once, but each time we strike one of them down, everything stops for a dramatic final moment with them. Nevermind the raging battle around us, we need to stop everything for that special moment to separate properly.

Kingdom Hearts 3 is flat. Sora is more immature now than he was in the first game. Where younger Sora seems reasonably optimistic with warranted and understandable innocence and naivety of youth, older, more experienced Sora seems strikingly daft and incomprehensive with no drive to understand the significance of what is happening around him. The trio travels from world to world without much purpose, and squares off with the villain of the week. Nothing breaks this rinse and repeat formula, there are no peaks in lackluster storytelling, and it all grows stale very quick despite the nostalgia.

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