Kingdom Hearts 3 will be the pinnacle of the series' action so far thanks to the power of the PlayStation 4, according to a Conversations with Creators interview with series creator Tetsuya Nomura.
The game is the final chapter in the Dark Seeker Saga, Nomura said, the story of Sora and his group of friends. Kingdom Hearts 3 will wrap up the storyline presented through the franchise titles over the past ten years, suggesting that more stories set in the Kingdom Hearts universe could be coming down the line.
Nomura explained that in order to bring the series to the "height" of action for this latest installment, he wanted to take advantage of the PS4's wide field of view and graphics capabilities. Sora's movements have been given an upgrade — jumping, climbing, flying and dodge-rolling have all been fine-tuned — and are now more fluid, and some environments will crumble around players as they move through them dealing damage to opponents. Nomura explained combat's heightened fluidity and "sharper" companion AI — in this case, Disney staples Donald Duck and Goofy — are possible with the power of the PS4. The creator also explained that the development team went for a photorealistic look for Kingdom Hearts 3, aiming to make it the best-looking game in the series to date.
"We wanted a photorealistic representation of each Disney world, as well as match the tone of each world," he said.
Nomura didn't share details on what specific functions of the DualShock 4 controller Kingdom Hearts 3 will utilize, but noted that the Final Fantasy 15 team is "farther into development" than the KH3 team; this suggests that final decisions on how KH3 will use the PS4's features will come at a later time. He stated that Sora's newfound mobility and the range of action were not possible with previous generation consoles.
"I think [we've been able to] make full use of a variety of actions in a wide space, and allow [Sora] to fight a larger amount of enemies," Nomura said in response to a question on the PS4's capabilities, noting that the console is the most powerful hardware he has worked with. "It's made possible by the power of the PS4."