Kingdom Hearts III

 PlayStation 4
User Score
8.0

Generally favorable reviews- based on 2513 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,827 out of 2513
  2. Mixed: 328 out of 2513
  3. Negative: 358 out of 2513
Buy Now
Buy on

Review this game

  1. Your Score
    0 out of 10
    Rate this:
    • 10
    • 9
    • 8
    • 7
    • 6
    • 5
    • 4
    • 3
    • 2
    • 1
    • 0
    • 0
  1. Submit
  2. Check Spelling
view
per page
  1. Melopahn
    Feb 14, 2019
    4
    Story - Oh man, I can’t come up with a proper way to explain how bad this story is! The easiest way to describe it is, this game was never intended to have a story this long when it was first made the writers weren’t expecting to come back a dozen more times with story updates, and it is obvious. The game has a great mechanic for this in the “Disney” franchising as they can just have theStory - Oh man, I can’t come up with a proper way to explain how bad this story is! The easiest way to describe it is, this game was never intended to have a story this long when it was first made the writers weren’t expecting to come back a dozen more times with story updates, and it is obvious. The game has a great mechanic for this in the “Disney” franchising as they can just have the disney element of any given world add a new chunk of story and dialogue that is self contained and will be solved within that same world. The problem with this is that the story is heavily reliant on a movie that many players have probably scene. Its best described by “Video Game Dunkey” as “Watching a Disney movie where someone fast forwards through the story and stops at a few select scenes, but the in game characters tell you what you missed”. Im going to go so far as to say this game is the absolute “Worst Video Game Story Ever”. - Straight up 0/10

    Game Play: Side - We will be splitting this in to two parts, side and main content. For the side content I am talking all things not combat and story involved. The game has a major amount of things to do that come off as mini games or optional events. The returning champion here is the “Gummi” ship, a portion that plays like a starfox style rail shooter in SPACE… Vastly improved from the previous games, this is now a free exploration shooter similar in feel to bring the classic “asteroid” into a modern 3D game. Exploration, leveling, bosses, missions and hidden secrets (not all that secret) it’s more flushed out, but its also “required” if you want the Ultima weapon and a Platinum trophy. I know this will effect some people but im fairly neutral to this, it features the hardest boss fight in the game and is not bad but its just not Kingdom Hearts and it kind of impacted the level of immersion you could feel with the actual game. The smaller side and mini games are vast but not as flushed out. You have; Cooking with Remy from Ratatouille, snowboarding in Arandell, Playing Superman 64 in SanFransokyo (who would try to replicate Superman 64 what were you thinking). Dancing with Rapunzel, Mech combat in Toy Story, bejeweled in 100 acre wood, Sailin the Carribean. They range from tedious to fun with the most personal joy coming from being a pirate and the gummi missions. Sadly they were all a little too easy and had some simplistic and one dimensional mechanics and just lacked substance.

    Game Play: Main -
    No major complaints, it is quite enjoyable, flushed out, and involved despite using almost 2 buttons exclusively. The effects and flow of the combat is nothing to scoff at and many developers are far behind KH3 when it comes to fluid combat. The issue is… it’s too easy. Playing on “Proud”, as hard as it gets, i ran into no combat issues. It wasn’t until the very end i realized i had never died in the game. You have two things that trigger before you die that prevent death and full heal your character. It makes everything just a little too easy. In previous titles there was a plethora of Post game bosses that got quite difficult and even when playing the remakes they stayed hard. Despite this in KH3 there is one secret boss post game and he is a laughably easy event. I clicked through the warning window and came out victorious on my first try with 0 preparation and 30 levels below max level of 99. I wasn’t using the ultimate keyblade and still didn’t even use have to use both of the life saving options the game hands to you. 6/10

    Sound/Music - The majority of the songs are popular Disney songs that you’ve probably heard a billion times. You also have the characters saying the same 2 or 3 lines constantly while exploring and within an hour of being in any zone i resorted to turning the sound off in favor of something less repetitive. The Classical pieces from Square Enix were nice and usually only used for one scene giving some redemption. 3/10

    Level Design/Graphics - Beautiful and flushed out, most every level was a wonder to explore and quite beautiful to look at. The promise of the levels being giant and sprawling seems true at first glance but the mini map dictates to you that it’s not actually much larger than the previous titles and with the update to the speed at which Sora can traverse the levels it ends up coming out pretty equal to KH2 in just how big it actually feels. As a whole this may be the truly best part of the game and i hope the design team gets some praise internally cause their hard work shows and it was worth it. 9/10
    In the end, everything felt unfinished. The vast array of mini games and change ups in game play were ok at first but by the end everything was kind of a let down because there was no challenge or substance. it was like they put everything into expositing the story at you and it just wasn't a good story.    … Expand
  2. Arkeden
    Jan 28, 2020
    4
    I’d honestly give Kingdom Hearts III a 5.5/10. Definitely wait for the Final Mix to come before buying this game as it’s like FF15, half completed and hella easy. Sure, KH3’s graphics and scenery are absolutely stunning. And sure, the music is absolutely amazing! However, beyond that it is an honest let-down and disappointment in the story, in character development, and in playability. ItI’d honestly give Kingdom Hearts III a 5.5/10. Definitely wait for the Final Mix to come before buying this game as it’s like FF15, half completed and hella easy. Sure, KH3’s graphics and scenery are absolutely stunning. And sure, the music is absolutely amazing! However, beyond that it is an honest let-down and disappointment in the story, in character development, and in playability. It just feels rushed and uncompleted (ironic for a game 5 years in the making). For starters, Square Enix cut MANY things from the game. Tetsuya Nomura stated that there would be well over 90+ hours of content, when in actuality; it’s closer to 35 -45 hours of content. You literally spend 2/3's of the entire game traversing Disney worlds and goofing around which none of it matters in the slightest and doesn't really do anything at all to progress the plot or the characters (Note: you can clearly tell which worlds they spent far more time and resources on than others. Some worlds, only get one tiny little area). On that note, the worlds that people actually wanted to fully explore in all their 4K HD glory were basically reduced to just backgrounds for cut scenes and for the plot (Realm of Darkness, Land of Departure, Keyblade Graveyard, The Final World, Scala ad Caelum, and to a lesser extent, Twilight Town). Then, all the major plot points and major stuff happens quickly and almost back-to-back in the last 1/3 of the game. Before you know it, you're fighting the final boss out of the blue and the games over. Heroes and Villains fly in and out of the story so quick that you just might miss them if you blink. The reunions of 1) Aqua, Ven, and Terra; and 2) Axel, Roxas, and Xion; are completely rushed. Basically, they are brought back at the last minute for fan service and to make sense of the plot before moving on. Hell, don't even get me started on the characters. The dialogue exchange and voice acting is good in certain places, but is often just cringy and awkward. Any many of the characters don’t even have much of a personality *ahem*…Kairi *ahem*. Speaking of which, the characters: Kairi, Lea, Riku, Aqua, Ventus, Terra, and King Mickey are now weak and useless. In fact, the Disney characters in the worlds you visit are significantly more powerful than they are. Minigames are another problem. Minigames are supposed to be fun and enjoyable challenges that offer additional rewards when added to a game for optional playability. However, that's not the case when multiple minigames are pushed into the main story and are required to progress said story. Furthermore, Square Enix made the game insanely easy, even on hard mode. Fights required little-to-no planning or preparation. I never even died once on hard mode or had to retry an encounter. Going to attractions, I understand that attractions were supposed to be cool and epic, but not when you get like three prompts for an attraction every single bloody fight. It got annoying and boring rather quick. I only used the meals once, in the final battle. I didn’t even need to use the meals because everything was too easy. Lastly, the game mechanics are still clearly broken. You can still easily button-mash X/A to win the game. Also, a player can obtain 99 Moogle Post Cards within 1 hour for only 5,000 Munny; they can easily obtain level 99 within an hour; and they can easily and quickly get 999,999 Munny.

    *sighs* Look, it’s an okay game. It’s fine to like a game and it’s fine to dislike a game. There are many people who liked KH3 and many who didn’t. It has good and bad qualities. However, you do have to recognize and realize all of its flaws and shortcomings. Because many of us who are long-time hardcore KH fans and who grew up with the series will tell you, KHI and KHII were are significantly longer and better than KHIII.    … Expand
  3. cas514
    Feb 22, 2019
    4
    KH3 makes me so scared for the Final Fantasy 7 Remake. This game is just so awful and thats coming from someone who loved Kingdom Heart 1. The writing is awful, the story is so messy and confusing no matter how much exposition they cram in to explain this convoluted plot. The worlds were boring and repetitive and i didn't even care to return to any of them. I struggled to get through this,KH3 makes me so scared for the Final Fantasy 7 Remake. This game is just so awful and thats coming from someone who loved Kingdom Heart 1. The writing is awful, the story is so messy and confusing no matter how much exposition they cram in to explain this convoluted plot. The worlds were boring and repetitive and i didn't even care to return to any of them. I struggled to get through this, not because it was difficult but because i just wanted to stab my ears off anytime someone mentioned hearts or the importance of friendship. The attempts to modernize the game by adding twitter like load screens and the gummiphone were so half baked and so lame, if they wanted to modernize KH they should have spend more time updating the story telling and gameplay to todays standards. Also where was the sound effects department when it came to the cut scenes? i noticed this in the trailer and thought it was just a stylistic choice, but no there is simply no SFX in the cutscenes which makes this game feel even more hollow and empty like the Nobodies or what ever tf they are called. The combat was flashy and varied for those who didnt just want to button mash to get through a level but the one thing that angered me to no end was the disney attraction summons, they were so frequent and annoying, that i felt someone strong armed Square to put them in to promote the park which didnt work and they were not fun to use. Also WHERE THE HELL IS LEON and the rest oft the FINAL FANTASY CREW. Did KH forget that FF was the reason alot of gamers bought the game in the first place?

    Yes the visual and animations were great and the gameplay is solid and pretty to look at, thats why i cant give it a 0, but pretty graphics don't make a game great. I know the kids that play wont understand this concept because all they care about is graphics. I never thought i would say this about a KH game but I really hate this game, it was so hard to get through this. Tetsuya Nemura should not go anywhere near FF7 remake. Im afraid this man is an amazing character artist but a hack video game director.    … Expand
  4. camaro123
    Mar 9, 2019
    4
    I've waited 13 years for kingdom hearts 3. I have to say it disappointed. The story is crammed into the end few hours of the game. The Disney worlds seem so utterly useless to the overall game other than to retell the story in most worlds. The voice acting / direction is actually horrendous. The anime sounds mixed with the long pauses between lines made me want to hit the skip button onI've waited 13 years for kingdom hearts 3. I have to say it disappointed. The story is crammed into the end few hours of the game. The Disney worlds seem so utterly useless to the overall game other than to retell the story in most worlds. The voice acting / direction is actually horrendous. The anime sounds mixed with the long pauses between lines made me want to hit the skip button on many cut scenes. The game play was fun, but overly convoluted. I would have liked a tighter combat system. it was almost impossible to perform any sort of block move against the heartless when there was so many on the screen. The bosses at the end of the game should have been spread out throughout the game with a final conclusion at the end, but manly of the worlds leave you to usually fight a large heartless as the boss. After it got exhausting and unexciting. Returning characters seems like huge plot hole. but its more like the director just decided i want all these characters back so their back with some dumb reasoning behind it to justify their return. While i guess they did resolve Xehanort's story-line; i was left with more questions than answers at the games conclusion. It just simply wasn't a satisfying end to a game I've waited so long for.… Expand
  5. Zytarc
    Jun 9, 2019
    4
    80% filler 20% rushed bad writing. All the hype all that build in preparation to this game was sent down the drain to appeal to Disney worlds which are boring bland and have no soul
  6. Trabanto
    Mar 7, 2019
    4
    It's not the game everyone was waiting for. There is so much interesting things, but everything seems unpolished. Gameplay overall is just frustrating. Combat system is unresponsive and limited to clicking X and Triangle or using magic which is basically OP, while it COULD BE so much more. The decent part of it is "flow" and airdashes but it's just worthless in most cases.
    Most of the    It's not the game everyone was waiting for. There is so much interesting things, but everything seems unpolished. Gameplay overall is just frustrating. Combat system is unresponsive and limited to clicking X and Triangle or using magic which is basically OP, while it COULD BE so much more. The decent part of it is "flow" and airdashes but it's just worthless in most cases.
    Most of the game is cutscenes. The funny thing is that you basically move forward 2 steps and you get a cutscene. Then you fight aaaaand another cutscene. Storytelling is awful - unnecessary complicated without any straight goals. Feels like a mashup of scripts written by different people. Even if you are up to date with KH story you will feel uncomfortable.
    The good part of the game is climate and well-representation of disney/pixar worlds. Characters looks and feels like they came from these famous animations. Graphics changes according to the world you are in. Above that you have some really well designed levels as well as really bad ones. Either of them have a lot of unused areas, like it wasn't even finished.
    I would rather wait 2-3 more years for this game to came out than play it in this state.    … Expand
  7. SexyMango
    Feb 1, 2019
    4
    This last chapter Is just really underwhelming, the dialogue is cringy and the acting less then uninspired, especially the non-Disney bits. The audio is sub par with sometimes characters talking for minutes with no background sound effects or music. And the cutscenes .... every 30 seconds a cutscene lasting forever. I’m getting MGSIV flashbacks.

    The costumes and items you get are again,    This last chapter Is just really underwhelming, the dialogue is cringy and the acting less then uninspired, especially the non-Disney bits. The audio is sub par with sometimes characters talking for minutes with no background sound effects or music. And the cutscenes .... every 30 seconds a cutscene lasting forever. I’m getting MGSIV flashbacks.

    The costumes and items you get are again, very uninspired. Who approved the toy story skins?

    The enemies are out of place. In the last main games they were following a theme. You go the Agrabah, all the heartless are going to be Arab looking and using fire or something like that, you go to visit Jack Skeleton and the monsters are all spooky and **** KH3 just keeps throwing random **** at you 80% of the times.

    And the worlds ? They are just tunnels for you to pass through and never look back. No place you cannot reach without a new ability or some thinking. Even opening the chests feel like a letdown... both in appearance and content... great, other items that I will never use since the game is way to easy.

    The gummy-ship mini game that is forced upon you every time you want to reach a new location , while not my favourite bit in the past, now is just a tedious mess. The couldn’t have used a worse perspective for it even if they tried. You have no idea how distant the bullets are from your ship but again, just keep going up and down randomly and you can proceed, no skills involved.

    Most of all there isn’t enough Disney.

    And lastly, I think the new art style is just bad compared to the old, hand painted one. Sure, you didn’t get fancy lights and shaders but if you play the remasters they still look fine after many years and they are still quite charming. This one is already looking less the ideal at times, like Mickey Mouse face looking like a cheap 3D cartoon made for the Tv

    Sorry for the wall of text but no of my friends play games and I needed to vent    … Expand
  8. ZeroSigma
    Feb 6, 2019
    4
    Boring story without any conclusion, lame worlds, stupid dialogues, silly mini games, awkward dumb jokes, no FF characters,long unnecessary cutscenes and the game lost its charm.
  9. khfan
    Feb 2, 2019
    4
    As someone who has played previous entries in the series more times than I'd like to admit, I have to say that I am sorely disappointed in this game.

    I tried to write an in depth review in here offering my critiques, but apparently 5000 characters is no where even close to enough to cover it, but I've done my best to shrink my massive list to 3 general catagories. First, and the    As someone who has played previous entries in the series more times than I'd like to admit, I have to say that I am sorely disappointed in this game.

    I tried to write an in depth review in here offering my critiques, but apparently 5000 characters is no where even close to enough to cover it, but I've done my best to shrink my massive list to 3 general catagories.

    First, and the smallest, is the lack of any difficulty whatsoever. Barring the final battle, not a single fight in this game was memorable. They were so easy in fact, that I'd even go as far as to say it was a disservice to certain villains. Enemies who we fought throughout the series and who required some strategy or forethought in previous entries are complete pushovers here. This unto itself isn't necessarily game breaking however, as this could potentially be remedied in a later patch with the inclusion of critical mode.

    The second issue however, is a more complicated issue, and it is that of the gameplay itself. Some mechanics are unbalanced, and I frequently felt as though the game was registering my inputs way earlier than it should (for example, I would stop attacking in order to dodge or block, and Sora would continue with his combo for up to 3 strikes! This didn't prove to be too much of an issue given how easy the game was overall, but if the game had actually been on the same difficulty level as say BBS, this would make gameplay needlessly irritating). Other abilities, namely the attractions, are ridiculously overpowered. It is essentially an I-WIN button that pops up every 10 seconds or so, and cannot be turned off. Fortunately you can choose not to use them by cycling through your proc abilities with the L2 button, but adding an 'off' button would dramatically improve the quality of life for players who feel they make the game too easy.

    The third, and most glaring issue for me, and the one which ruined it for me, was the complete lack of narrative cohesion throughout the game on both the small scale (the individual Disney worlds), as well as the large (the over arcing story). I won't go into too much detail here, as I don't want to include spoilers.

    The individual Disney worlds have awkward moments that you will not be able to follow unless you've seen the movies (Tangled, Frozen), and are overall simple and lazy copy-and-paste versions of the movies.

    Even more troubling and game-breaking is the over-arcing story, which is rushed and crammed in to the last few hours. The writers do a poor job of explaining what exactly is happening, to the point where it seems (and I still believe they did) break their own world rules.

    I don't know where the game I've waited to play for so long is, but this certainly wasn't it. And were it not for the fact that I made the mistake of purchasing a non-refundable digital copy, I would be seeking a refund- something I have never done in my entire gaming life.    … Expand
  10. ukas121
    Feb 2, 2019
    4
    I started playing Kingdom hearts when i was 7 i have played all the games 2 or 3 times. I waited for this game for so long as did many other superfans but its sad to say its a mediocre game and awful compared to KH 2. The main problem is that this game was made for pure fanservice. Other problems include character motivation are changed, dialogue is horrible and wonky, game doesnt know itsI started playing Kingdom hearts when i was 7 i have played all the games 2 or 3 times. I waited for this game for so long as did many other superfans but its sad to say its a mediocre game and awful compared to KH 2. The main problem is that this game was made for pure fanservice. Other problems include character motivation are changed, dialogue is horrible and wonky, game doesnt know its own lore, gameplay is boring mainly because there is no challenge you can just spam X and triangle and you will win every fight even on proud. Only good things in this game is the graphics, the voice acting and the worlds are beautiful. I love this game series and its sad to say that Kingdom hearts 3 was a failure in my eyes and it makes me very sad. I know some people wont agree with me but that is okay. You have the right to have your opinion and at the end of the day im just some random guy on internet who is very disappointed and sad. Please Nomura dont let this series die.… Expand
  11. Stoikil
    Feb 12, 2019
    4
    It only works if you have the factor of nostalgia, the conversations are horrible, the exposure of the story is horrible.
  12. Finn95
    Feb 18, 2019
    4
    Pros:
    -Outstanding OST, as usual.
    -Visually breath-taking. -Aesthetically very pleasing, especially in certain battles. -Playability is alright. Not excellent, but still good. Cons: -Game's too easy, even in Hard mode. Sora is OP from the very beginning. -Small number of worlds, and many of them are terribly SMALL or unbalanced. Twilight Town isn't half as big as it used to be.    Pros:
    -Outstanding OST, as usual.
    -Visually breath-taking.
    -Aesthetically very pleasing, especially in certain battles.
    -Playability is alright. Not excellent, but still good.

    Cons:
    -Game's too easy, even in Hard mode. Sora is OP from the very beginning.
    -Small number of worlds, and many of them are terribly SMALL or unbalanced. Twilight Town isn't half as big as it used to be. 100 Acre Wood is a worse joke than it usually is. And most of them are plagued with minigames that feel like they're filling the empty space the world should have.
    -Lack of keyblades to choose from. There are just a few and they all come from Disney worlds, except from those you receive from pre-orders and the sort.
    -The treatment some characters get is HORRENDOUS. I want this review to be spoiler free, but to name a few: Kairi, Vexen, Roxas, Vanitas, Xehanort, Saix, Xion and Naminé are either inconsistent, invisible or completely forgotten throughout the whole game. Which is supposed to be a game that brought them together.
    -The final hours of gameplay are horribly written. Seriously. It's all pure eye-candy and fan service. Most things happen without an explanation. Kingdom Hearts has had plot and storytelling issues before, sure, but this one takes it to a new level.
    -Maybe too many cutscenes. I'm not complaining, though, but they also add to that "filling space" feeling.
    -No Final Fantasy characters. Not a single one.
    -On the whole, the game feels incomplete.    … Expand
  13. BarelyLewd
    Mar 13, 2019
    4
    Game left me wanting more, after all these years with an almost unlimited budget with literally hundreds of employers at there disposal I thought this game would be ground breaking, maybe it's the nostalgia glasses from years ago, (haven't played the original kingdom hearts since they was new) but the game just felt lazy, unmotivated, and lackluster, story was awful, FF characters wereGame left me wanting more, after all these years with an almost unlimited budget with literally hundreds of employers at there disposal I thought this game would be ground breaking, maybe it's the nostalgia glasses from years ago, (haven't played the original kingdom hearts since they was new) but the game just felt lazy, unmotivated, and lackluster, story was awful, FF characters were virtual non existent, voice acting was okay, story was confusing AF, and Donald and Goofy are beyond cringe worthy, my little nephew even got bored, feelsbadman.… Expand
  14. Mburestam
    Mar 3, 2019
    4
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. As a long time die hard fan of the series, this is one ot the worst installments to date. What was supposed to be the epic end of the Xehanort saga turned out to be a very cheezy, happy and cheerful rush to get this story out of the way in order to further the later added lore and build expectations for the next game.
    The game consists mainly of cut scenes, some of which look horrible and were probably made for ps3 while others are stunning but long.
    KH3 is way to easy, features absolutly no fun boss fight, no extra boss fights, some final fantasy characters but not to the extent that we would like to see ( im talking moggles but no sign of cloud, sephiroth etc. ) The end boss fights were bundled together with no regard to the individual stories of the org. XIII members and the hardest "extra boss" is just a heartless with extra steps.
    I am very disappointed as i expected a way darker kingdom hearts with a thought out story, instead i find myself annoyed with countless pointless minigames and frustrated with the way such a story is built and hyped for 13 years only to be shrugged and rushed off like this.
    The Kingdom hearts story never made sense but it never made sense in a way that makes sense. Kh3 just doesent make sense even with kingdom hearts logic.
    The fighting system is good but not great, the way magic flows out of Sora looks stunning.
    Form changing keyblades are a great idea and fun for a few minutes but i miss the drive system of KH2 and the option to control myself when and how i would like to change my form. The excessive use of **** disney rides shoved down my throat is just annoying.
    The worlds look good but many follow the original disney movie to the letter making you sit through just a remake of the movie rather than original fun story and where there are many options to present a boss character from the disney world, kh instead gives you another heartless boss fight.

    In short, Disney probably **** this game up the way they did with Star Wars and other franchises by breathing down Nomuras neck. It looks great but plays horribly. I was a fan since 2002 and have loved every game up to this point. Never again, i am very sad.    … Expand
  15. Donut_Addict
    Mar 8, 2019
    4
    This game feels like a game that no one wanted to make. While the entire kingdom hearts storyline is confusing on its own to end things like this feels more like a push to remove older fans to bring in the newer fans.

    In KH1 and KH2 you traveled to a bunch of Disney worlds to fight of the ever increasing threat of the heartless. This spans multiple games and each one had a unique story    This game feels like a game that no one wanted to make. While the entire kingdom hearts storyline is confusing on its own to end things like this feels more like a push to remove older fans to bring in the newer fans.

    In KH1 and KH2 you traveled to a bunch of Disney worlds to fight of the ever increasing threat of the heartless. This spans multiple games and each one had a unique story with some of them following the story of the movie (In KH2) in KH3 they continue to follow this formula but do so in a way that seems to ignore Sora. I felt as though the game wanted to showcase the best that Disney has to offer, but by making sure they and only they can be in the spotlight.

    The gameplay itself is the most refined part of the game with fighting feeling really good and whacking bad guys over the head feeling even better. I just never felt a good reason to be doing it. The story was lackluster, the character's motives were dull, the music and voice acting all took a huge nose dive.

    I started this review by saying this feels like a game no one wanted to make. The absence of squareenix characters seems to make this more of a Disney project than a combination of Square and Disney. It just didn't complete the experience that many people were waiting for it. They gave us a decade of backstory and build-up to end with this that feels more like "Your time is up. Make way for the new." This is idea is even reflected in the games when Disney classics are basically trying to be pushed away and out of the spotlight for the new ones like Frozen and Tangled (two of the worst worlds because of issues earlier stated.)

    This game accomplished what the greatest threat in the game series has been trying to do this entire time.

    Kingdom Hearts 3 is heartless.    … Expand
  16. reinventingwed
    May 24, 2019
    4
    I'm a huge fan of the Kingdom Hearts franchise, that's why I was so upset when this lead to disappointment. Clunky controls, repetitive combat, extremely long cut scenes, and nonsensical objectives. The plot in this is a mess. I'm 30 plus hours in and feel compelled to finish it, even though, I really have no desire to.
  17. fox_zer0
    Jun 10, 2019
    4
    I'm a big fan of the original 2 games. I had high hopes based on the reviews. Yet I was left very disappointed. It has turned fully into a Disney game instead of a Final Fantasy x Disney.

    Game pacing is incredibly slow with its long cutscenes after cutscenes. Combat is repetitive and full of yet again long animation combos & summons. None of the keyblades look cool and made me want to    I'm a big fan of the original 2 games. I had high hopes based on the reviews. Yet I was left very disappointed. It has turned fully into a Disney game instead of a Final Fantasy x Disney.

    Game pacing is incredibly slow with its long cutscenes after cutscenes. Combat is repetitive and full of yet again long animation combos & summons. None of the keyblades look cool and made me want to chase them. I also got bored with the needlessly confusing storyline.

    I'm barely halfway into the game yet I can't bring myself to finish it. Truly disappointed.    … Expand
  18. Sephiroth89
    Jun 13, 2019
    4
    I played 2 previous main instalment of the game so I might call myself a kind of a fan. And maybe because I was hyped to play the newest Kingdom Hearts, I was left somewhat disappointed.

    The game left me baffled. On one hand you have a very complex story which you only completely follow if you played all the previous parts of the series. Me myself playing only the main title was quite    I played 2 previous main instalment of the game so I might call myself a kind of a fan. And maybe because I was hyped to play the newest Kingdom Hearts, I was left somewhat disappointed.

    The game left me baffled. On one hand you have a very complex story which you only completely follow if you played all the previous parts of the series. Me myself playing only the main title was quite confused at times and wish I played more parts to get the small things which make the game probably more enjoyable. That said you would think this game is for long waiting fans and it will be challenging and intelligent...but it's not
    On the other hand the game is directed at new player especially children as it's a one button smash fest to get through the game without any real challenge and full of quite ridiculous colourful attacks. The dialogues are very dull, cringy and slow, making me think that it's for a younger audience to be able to follow.
    I hope ff VII remake will be made better as nostalgia alone cannot keep the fanbase going    … Expand
  19. WLovecraft
    Dec 21, 2019
    4
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Kingdom hearts 3 should only be played by fans of the series. Anyone else will be lost even if you listened to that character with an annoying voice tell you a short summary of the story.

    The story was really bad in a lot of the game but I liked that it was closing all the loops in it. Almost all of the Disney worlds were badly written and didn't have any flow.

    In the Hercules world, the Danny Devito character doesn't talk and just smirks and smile while he was always the talkative one which was so weird to see. Also in the Hercules world, after you save the little girl, she bends over like she's bowing as a thank you. To me the people who made the game did that because of their asian culture. I personally feel that one shouldn't change the way a western movie is, they should just be trying to imitate it the best that they can.

    The toy story world is also really bad. It felt like someone wrote the script for the characters without actually watching the movies. And, they were all written really badly. The levels were pretty bad game design wise and they didn't feel real. And a lot of the toys were so asian influenced with mecha dinosaur things and anime-like plushes and dolls.

    Tangled was really good, I must say.

    Frozen was just "Let's just put the 2 songs that everyone likes and were basically done with this story." The pacing of the story was really bad for this one as even I was lost at what was happening.

    Why is pirates of the carribean in the game? And, why is it one of the last Disney worlds? And, collecting crabs to upgrade your ship??? Are you kidding me??? I kept telling myself when playing this world "wtf am I playing, this is a kingdom hearts game? Collecting crabs?" The ship part was pretty cool but it felt like that was the only reason why they had to make this world to play. Also, Sora has bigger problems to worry about but all this guy wants to do is go on an adventure and be a pirate. Inconsistent writing yet again. Unrealistic writing for a character, especially for a main character.

    Big hero was done probably the best in my opinion. The only real problem that I had was that a lot of the lip sync felt like it wasn't matching. It felt like they didn't even try and just kept the asian lip sync animation and just put the dub over it. But this is actually what happens a lot in the game.

    I want to talk about the good things. I liked the gameplay as it was fun to play. I liked a lot of the models and the design of the worlds. The music was also really good.

    I would like to talk about the bad stuff.

    The story could have ended with these characters but they clearly want to milk the series. The problem that I have is that they couldn't save Kairi when they were all around her so what makes Sora think that he can save her? All the bad guys ever do is teleport and take people. It's absolutely ridiculous.

    Too much teleporting lore dumps. That's literally all they ever do in this series since kh2 I believe. It's bad writing, stop.

    The models are inconsistent with some models looking near perfect to their movie counterpart like Mike from monster Inc, where main characters like Donald and goofy having noticeable sharp edges of the model. It's bad. Just look at some of the characters that you meet and you'll see. Like why does Sully look so bad? The hair on him is laughable. Also the witch from the sleeping beauty looks so bad and she did nothing the entire game. Waste of characters and her and Pete are absolutely useless.

    Too much of Sora saying how friends can do anything and stuff. Its gotten to the point where I am so tired of hearing him say those cheesy lines. I'm so sick of hearing him just trying to be friends with everyone and being like all we need is friends to save the day when it never actually does.

    Models look weird in general for a lot of the characters. Sora looks fine as in next gen but Riku looks weird and a lot of the other characters do as well. The design of the models in dream drop were perfect. How could they not have just done the same thing but make them appear older? Also, I don't like their clothes design. It's stupid.

    And that reminds me. Sora questions Donald and goofy on why they look like monsters. Bad writing 101, cause we already went through this before in the past games where it was explained that their magical clothes changes them to fit in the other worlds.

    The voice acting was bad in a lot of areas of the game.

    All npcs sound quiet. Also there was no option to increase dialogue voices, music, or sfx.

    The link system is dumb and the characters look holographic which is dumb too. When I use stitch or Ariel, I expect them to be accurate to their original design. Because these skills are linked to mp, the entire link skill is useless.

    I used the 1st gummy ship the entire playthrough.

    They should have ended the series.

    I'm never going to buy another KH game again. I'm done with the milking of the series.    … Expand
  20. Flexosuarous
    Oct 28, 2019
    4
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Spoilers ahead!

    I'd like to start by saying I'm a long time kh fan, I've played and enjoyed every game except the phone game. This is the worst entry, other than 358/2 days.

    Pros:
    -its pretty
    -good music
    - Terra reveal made a lot of sense and was actually very cool to me
    -I get to stop waiting for it to come out

    Cons:
    - terrible irrelevant story except maybe the last few hours. There should be a feature that let's you skip to the very end, as nothing worth noting happens before the keyblade graveyard.
    -unrecognizable characters: Sora is as dumb as a bucket of rocks and goofy is the smartest character
    - poorly implemented, unbalanced, and op combat distractions
    -Twilight town is one whole room
    - Pooh should have been scrapped, his world has 3 of the same minigame with only slight variations
    - Leveling keyblades had so much potential but fell flat
    - Sora had the power of waking all along... seriously... seriously?
    - worlds are a chore, and not a fun one
    - the dialogue is just plain awful
    - Kairi pretends to be a keyblade wielder and then pulls a Kairi and needs saving again
    - Combat is boring because its too easy and lacks cool combos and finishers and overall gameplay variety like kh2 had
    - way too easy, no I haven't tried playing it blindfolded yet but I've heard its slightly harder that way.
    - absolutely trash post game, some mini games, some battle gates (with a single post game heartless) and some synthesis (why bother?) Kh1 had super bosses that took a lot of prep (making synthesis meaningful), and at least kh2 had a coliseum and Sephiroth fight pre-final mix. Getting the platinum trophy for this game was just plain agonizing.
    - The game game wastes too much time trying to explain past events
    - Watching kairi and axel talk about nothing in a random field from time to time was refreshing (not) aren't they supposed to be training? (not that it will pay off anyway)
    - should have sprinkled organization fights throughout the game, as they were supposedly the antagonists. Instead, they are just all thrown together at once. ( I know it was because the whole keyblade war thing, but we could have fought them and not killed them before the final fights)
    - everyone comes back except for all of the FF characters because Nomura added too many characters before the final chapter of the dark seeker ark to fit them all
    - playing as riku was a big deal pre-release, and a big disappointment post-realease
    -Characters begin to fly in left and right with little in-game explanation
    - I could go on, but I'll stop now.

    ...This game gets a four from me for the music and graphics, virtually everything else is awful. I knew KH3 likely wouldn't live up to expectations, but I didn't expect it to stray so far from what made the other games good. I legitimately enjoyed playing Aqua's 0.2 more than KH3, I'm being as honest as I can be. Hate to say it but i'm out, deuces Kingdom Hearts fandom - I really don't care about KH4 and I'm not going to wait until 2030 to be disappointed again after the train wreck that is KH3.    … Expand
  21. PochoEpic
    Feb 23, 2020
    4
    Mejoró mucho la movilidad de Sora y la capacidad de realizar diferentes comandos y combos y el apartado visual es una joya, compromete muchos detalles que no se veían en las entregas anteriores, el diseño de la mayoría de los mundos parece monótono y repetitivo y la cantidad de abrumadora de enemigos no presentan un desafío mayor. El juego es demasiado fácil en comparación a las entregasMejoró mucho la movilidad de Sora y la capacidad de realizar diferentes comandos y combos y el apartado visual es una joya, compromete muchos detalles que no se veían en las entregas anteriores, el diseño de la mayoría de los mundos parece monótono y repetitivo y la cantidad de abrumadora de enemigos no presentan un desafío mayor. El juego es demasiado fácil en comparación a las entregas anteriores, lo que a mi gusto arruina mucho la experiencia, posee contenido oculto el cual es algo poco interesante comparado a sus predecesores, los mapas son enormes pero no premian la exploración de niveles, en sí no es un mal juego, pero estos detalles marcaron la diferencia, la música por parte de Yoko Shimomura es siempre un agrado de escuchar dentro del juego y la historia cierra todos los cabos sueltos que venía dejando la saga, a mi gusto las historias Disney rescataron la esencia de sus películas sin embargo la inclusión de Sora y compañía en estas se sentía algo forzada y con poca relación con la trama principal del juego… Expand
  22. JumboJenkins
    Apr 30, 2020
    4
    An absolute mess of pacing, story-telling, writing, character-development and every other skill required to communicate an idea. Few worlds stand out as charming (Toy Story and Big Hero 6) and when the game forgets to talk to you about hearts/light/darkness/vague metaphor device 4 and just lets you run around and hit things then there is fun to be had. While the Pirates of the Caribbean isAn absolute mess of pacing, story-telling, writing, character-development and every other skill required to communicate an idea. Few worlds stand out as charming (Toy Story and Big Hero 6) and when the game forgets to talk to you about hearts/light/darkness/vague metaphor device 4 and just lets you run around and hit things then there is fun to be had. While the Pirates of the Caribbean is an unwanted revisit when it allows you to explore islands with Goofy and Donald I found myself wishing that was more of the game. Worlds are all visited and left in one sitting with no narrative reason apart from "Sora you are weak get stronger" (that's the plot btw).

    Sora controls very awkwardly, the first thing I noticed when playing the game was Sora can even run in a circle with stuttering and skiing all over the place. Gummi ship has been expanded into an ugly semi-open world map. There is a lack of content and most of your playtime will be filled with endless upon endless cutscenes. Most of which are boring. I skipped the second half of all of the Frozen cutscenes because it was just a retelling of the movie with no bearing on the rest of the game. When it's fun, it's quite fun. But when it's not, which it very often isn't - it's awful.    … Expand
  23. DevilSurvivor
    Nov 19, 2021
    4
    Massive disappointment for a game so awaited as this. I had just come off of playing the collections as well to get me hyped for it.

    In the end what I got were some of the worst disney worlds to date, the complete removal of all final fantasy characters which to me are more interesting than disney ones, awful gameplay mechanics filled with minigame sections and mindless photo    Massive disappointment for a game so awaited as this. I had just come off of playing the collections as well to get me hyped for it.

    In the end what I got were some of the worst disney worlds to date, the complete removal of all final fantasy characters which to me are more interesting than disney ones, awful gameplay mechanics filled with minigame sections and mindless photo collection...

    The music was by far the worst soundtrack in the series. There was only ONE good song and it was in the final world, everything else felt like generic orchestrated rehashes of old ones or new ones, and you can tell so easily that most of this work was given to Yoko Shimomura's assistants and not her.

    There was no passions, and only in the final stretch of the game can you feel some semblance of character development and story progression, but too little too late, by then I had already bored myself to death. No amount of Roxas and Xemnas story fulfilments will make up for how bad the game is.

    And the other problems that started with Birth By Sleep? Still present. Combat is floaty, you're better off spamming attraction flow than you are actually using your keyblade, the transformations just make everything feel like a button masher rather than a skill based game, bosses continue having random revenge values where they just instantly counter you out of your combo... Infuriating game, and truly a huge disappoitment compared to 2. They should've ended the series after 358/2 Days.    … Expand
  24. Zer0xl
    Nov 20, 2021
    4
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Combat for the entire game is trash it's just slow but it gets better after the game ends and you get the new combo modifiers. the delivery of the story is meh-to-ok.
    Bosses are, for the most part, bad.

    In the end i would prefer ddd or even worse, KHUx over this in my tier list.    … Expand
  25. SideOrderoLemon
    Dec 2, 2022
    4
    With an amazing and exciting beginning that draws you in, Kingdom Hearts III quickly dives into squandered opportunity and monotonous gameplay that zombifies into just mashing the X button until you win. What it gets right with visuals and spectacle it flops with ridiculous one-dimensional characters and an over-arching plot that ultimately leads to nothing. The writing devolves into basicWith an amazing and exciting beginning that draws you in, Kingdom Hearts III quickly dives into squandered opportunity and monotonous gameplay that zombifies into just mashing the X button until you win. What it gets right with visuals and spectacle it flops with ridiculous one-dimensional characters and an over-arching plot that ultimately leads to nothing. The writing devolves into basic plot devices and constant repetition of "hearts," "darkness," "light," and not much more than that. Traversal has gotten a huge upgrade with way more methods of movement, and the worlds themselves feel way more alive than previous entries, but inevitably falls flat in certain areas. A disappointing finale to the "Dark Seeker Saga" of the series that most definitely will lead to just another dark void of repetitive nothing.… Expand
  26. Poiter_23
    May 2, 2019
    3
    Stilted Dialogue, Convaluted story that is honestly just ridiculously bad. Combat is not challening and there is no point in a levelling system if the game never actually presents a challenge. Look stunning, but it just has no depth. Could not play past the 3rd world as I found myelf incredibly bored and dissapointed. tgd
  27. jim-bob
    Jan 29, 2019
    3
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. -GAMEPLAY-
    *combat*
    let's start with the combat.
    Kingdom Hearts 3 has the most dumbed down & insulting system I have ever experienced. What they did to the combat system is absolutely disgusting. instead of having a proper command menu, 80% of your options are all locked behind "Situation Commands" which are spoon fed to you at the games discretion. All that's required of you is that you press triangle. It's a mindless streamlined system designed to take away your freedom & play the game for you. Players choice, responsibility & resource management have been stripped away to accommodate incompetent & less intelligent players at the cost of competent players as there's no way for them to get control. Situation commands are unreliable, cheap, limited free garbage the game gives you and many of them are random. You have no drive gauge & they removed drive forms. Some of the new transformations are good but again they're held back by the casualised situation system which I assume was put in the game so toddlers could complete it.

    Soras new attack animations are wonky & all over the place. not clean, quick and focused like KH2's. this results in worse combat feel. standard attacks over all just feel like a cheap imitation of KH2's attacks when they should feel better.

    Combat is flashy but not flashy in a functional way. The game values flashiness over substance. Many of your "attacks" in combat are just glorified cutscenes now. limits in this game have been neutered. For example Donalds limits in KH2 were gameplay. They had timing depth, combo potential & required smart use.
    In KH3 Donalds limits are cutscenes that have no gameplay value at all. you just press triangle and the cutscene plays out. there's also far less variety in combat. KH2 had 14 partner limits. KH3 only has 11 and a bunch of them are just cutscenes.
    Summons in this game are not really summons. they've essentially been reduced to single limits & the majority of them suck & have no viable use.
    instead of reaction commands we have a handful of big, out of place Disney rides. they suck. it's all obnoxious, goofy looking garbage that interrupts your gameplay.

    This game has serious balance issues that need to be fixed. There's no critical mode and every other mode is too easy.
    lvl1 proud mode is almost unplayable and was clearly never tested by the devs. yet they still put it in.
    there's no proper level scaling & enemy placement & behaviour is not solid or well thought out.
    *movement*
    There's more platforming now which I wanted but Soras basic movement hasn't been improved from 2 and now he has more clunky moves. at no point in the game does platforming flow together well. it always feels really disjointed.
    *camera*
    The camera is a nightmare to deal with. constantly fighting with you for control, will often get stuck behind things & will often zoom off so Sora isn't even on screen.

    -BOSSES-
    Bossfights range from serviceable to down right terrible.
    Kingdom Hearts 2 had 60+ bosses & the quality of those fights was higher
    KH3 has a measly 28, including the secret boss & 4 of those are the same heartless swarm again.

    -WORLDS-
    Twilight Town? It's only 2 areas.
    100 Acre Wood? more like 1 Acre Wood. it's 1 minigame at rabbits house.
    Yeah a lot of these 'worlds' aren't even worlds. they're 1 or 2 rooms. there's only really 7 worlds (KH2 had 15)
    they're fairly big but filled with invisible walls and the art direction is ruined by the obnoxious white shine on walls, polls ect that you can't turn off.
    Shorter & less content. a lot of what inflates the hours is the cutscenes & super long loading screens. which brings me to the performance. framerate is unstable with regular frame drops thru out the game (and due to some sort of weird optimisation many characters animations often go all choppy).

    -STORY-
    The story is as poorly written & stupid as ever. It's such a tangled mess of bloated, unnecessary nonsense now, the writers can't even keep track of their own characters. The usual incoherent gibberish of "darkness, hearts, darkness, friendship" is all there but now it's more repetitive than ever.
    The dialogue is still poorly written. World endings are usually the worst.
    The 'humour' in this game consists of characters laughing like morons at something thats not remotely funny as the camera pans out.
    The story is so phoned in, even the characters start phoning it in.
    Characters go from being total powerhouses to complete drooling potatoes in cutscenes.
    There's one cutscene in the final battle where Sora actually gets knocked unconscious from another character stumbling & falling over on him. I'm not joking. The ending is complete fan service trash & the main villain completely does a 180 on his character in the end and it's laughable and not not believable.

    it's hard to believe KH3 has been in development for 7 years. it has a plethora of design problems & is a stripped down, lacklustre experience & a bad sequel    … Expand
  28. Pepper1110
    Jan 29, 2019
    3
    Not what it used to be at all. Way overrated. Too much hype and all the fan boys dont care.
  29. OBrien1510
    Nov 24, 2020
    3
    This is a game made for children. This is clear but it's also for this reason that I'm not sure whether I have any right to get angry about it. I loved the old KH games, and those were games made for kids.

    However, regardless of the target market this is just a plainly bad game. I'm not even going to mention the story (The story revolves around the idea that Sora has inexplicably lost    This is a game made for children. This is clear but it's also for this reason that I'm not sure whether I have any right to get angry about it. I loved the old KH games, and those were games made for kids.

    However, regardless of the target market this is just a plainly bad game. I'm not even going to mention the story (The story revolves around the idea that Sora has inexplicably lost all his powers and needs to spend 30 hours of gameplay to get them backs so he can fight Xehanort. Great.) because 1. It's KH so it's not going to make sense anyway and 2. I couldn't even bring myself to finish the game which is what makes me to saddest of all. When I was a kid I had a piece of paper with the countdown till the release of KH2 and I would mark off the days every single day until the game finally released. To this day, KH1 and 2 are 2 of my favorite games of all time but KH just feels so far removed from the core series that I don't even feel any sense of nostalgia when I play it, it's just unrecognizable and unfortunately not in a good way.

    My absolute number one issue with the game is the combat, or lack thereof. KH1 and 2 didn't have incredibly deep combat systems but they worked, they posed a challenge on higher difficulties and overall they were just fun. I played KH1 and 2 a couple of years ago and at age 20 something, I can still enjoy the combat. The combat in KH3 is insulting honestly and this is where the target market of the game really shines through. If you want it to, 80% of combat boils down to waiting for a command prompt, then you press one button and get a mini cutscene or weak mini game and suddenly everything on the screen is dead, and there isn't nearly enough variety in these mini cutscenes so they get stale after about an hour. I refused to use these special attacks at all after a certain time. Even without the special attacks, I didn't die a single time during my 10 or so hours on Proud difficulty. I'm an experienced KH player but certainly not some KH prodigy. The game is just too damn easy and it's clear the game was balanced for children.

    I have similar issues with some of the world and platforming. Half of the time it barely feels like I'm doing anything. I'm stuck on a rail system and I press a button or move a stick once every few seconds. It's incredibly brain dead. But that's what the game eventually boils down to, once you strip away all the visuals the game is a essentially just a series of glorified qte's, from the combat to the platforming. Even the cutscenes are a qte because you can believe I'm trying to press the skip button as fast as possible.

    Visuals. Look fine I guess. Again, the visuals went in a different direction from the originals (which is to be expected between generations of consoles) but Sora's character model has some weird plasticy look to it, almost like you're constantly stuck in Toy Story and you're still using Sora's toy costume. He doesn't quite look like Sora anymore.

    Plenty of other people have mentioned this also, but there are no Final Fantasy characters. They've just been simply stripped from the game, presumably because kids in the 6-15 range have no idea who Cloud or Sid is these days. Ok that's fine whatever, the game is made for kids. What does bother me, is that this decision more than any other is a complete middle finger to OG fans of the series. The only reason to remove the FF characters is because they require resources and kids these days won't recognize them so why bother putting them in the game? Screw the OG fans right?

    Positives: I genuinely find it difficult to find any positives. We actually finally got a KH3 so I guess that's a positive right? Even if they KH3 we did eventually get is a pale imitation of legendary games from the PS2 era.    … Expand
  30. DarkCrowI
    Feb 6, 2019
    3
    Too much Disney is the best way I can describe the game, most of the fans of this series are probably in their 20s or 30s and this panders to pre-teens to late-teens, there are almost no worlds compared to previous games, the game is too easy, the cutscenes are too long, the dialogue is painful, and the game feels like several steps backwards.
prev
Page:

Awards & Rankings

23
#23 Best PS4 Game of 2019
11
#11 Most Discussed PS4 Game of 2019
89
#89 Most Shared PS4 Game of 2019

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
83

Generally favorable reviews - based on 88 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 81 out of 88
  2. Mixed: 6 out of 88
  3. Negative: 1 out of 88
  1. TheSixthAxis
    Jan 30, 2020
    80
    Kingdom Hearts III doesn’t go in the direction some RPG fans will no doubt have been hoping for. It’s unashamedly over the top in just about every way, from its barmy story and stunning presentation to its huge cinematic battles. There’s plenty of depth here too, though you’ll need to find your bearings first.
    Read full review
  2. Gamersky
    May 31, 2019
    85
    There is no doubt that Kingdom Hearts III will make long term fans moved or even cry. As for those new to the franchise, I believe they also can be satisfied because of tons of classic Disney elements and solid combat system, even though they could barely understand the main story.
    Read full review
  3. Riot Pixels
    Apr 20, 2019
    73
    If you like animated movies from Disney and Pixar, and you want to relieve some of the key moments, welcome to Kingdom Hearts 3.
    Read full review
See all critic reviews »