Kingdom Hearts on Steam breakdown

[Robofish]

Alright so a lot of you Kingdom Hearts fans have been asking this question "When is Kingdom Hearts coming to Steam?" and you will get all sorts of answers like "It will never come to steam" or "lol gay ass buy it on egs" so I thought I'd put my two cents into this discussion.

First off, no it's not permanently exclusive to the Epic Games Store, otherwise they would have said so. Most epic games exclusivity only lasts around a year.

I have been scouring through the internet and couldn't find much of anything related until I found a reddit post that talks about how the latest update of the Kingdom Hearts games seems to have traces of code relating to the Steam Deck (Reddit post: I noticed Steam Input Strings in KH3 i didnt notice it before was that recently added?). From what I have read from the comments this has been confirmed by the SteamDB team.

This to me makes me believe that Square Enix is working on a Steam release but are wanting to make it Steam Deck compatible first before making an announcement. As for why they're taking so long when other games such as Final Fantasy 7 and Twewy didn't take as long... well, it's a collection of games.

Kingdom Hearts 1.5 includes Kingdom Hearts, Chain of Memories and cutscenes of 358/2 days. Kingdom Hearts 2.5 includes Kingdom Hearts 2, Birth by Sleep and cutscenes from re:coded
Kingdom Hearts 2.8 includes Dream Drop Distance and Birth by Sleep 0.2
Then you have Kingdom Hearts 3

That's like 7 games to get working on the Steam Deck as opposed to one so it's obviously going to take a lot longer to make each game compatible with the Steam Deck.

[Tiberius]

Whatev you think abt epic is still not gon change the fact that KH will remain in EGS indefinitely

[Roy]

Escrito originalmente por Raging Panda:

Escrito originalmente por mazewaliztli47:

It's now on sale in epic with 60% plus the coupon if you want it, Am really for sure the saga will never come to Steam, I still refuse to purchase it on Epic and on top of that, it has always online DRM which can be skip with mods

Nah, I ain't buying on Epic. Already downloaded the games. When they come to steam, square will get my money. Because that means I can easily install them on steam deck, no putting EGS on there, and all my games are in one place. I don't even care about DRM. EGS just sucks, and I refuse to split my library between two stores when one is vastly superior. Square can have my money when they realize that giving people what they want provides more money than forcing exclusivity to make your fans buy the game over and over.

See this is the problem, they are getting your money anyway no matter how long they make you wait so why not take epic games money first and then take your money too because us as a fanbase will buy these square titles thrice over as well as entire new consoles.

[Msooby]

yes should bring kingdom hearts to steam, its already on the microsoft store too

[Raging Panda]

Escrito originalmente por Elfezen:

yes should bring kingdom hearts to steam, its already on the microsoft store too

This just proves my point. Epic is not signing exclusivity deals. They are signing deals that specifically exclude devs from bringing their games to steam. It's obvious to us that this is done because Epic hates steam, because steam is their big competition, but how can you call this anything but anti-competitive when their deal attempts to keep devs away from only one store.It's the dumbest ♥♥♥♥ ever, and I can't wait for it to cripple EGS. Not because I hate EGS specifically. I love the idea of competition, just let me buy my games where I want. If the store does a good job at ACTUALLY competing as a launcher on a fair playing field, I'd probably be buying KH on Epic rn. This isn't competition, it's anti-competitive. It'd be like Apple coming in from computers to buy out all the raw resources to make steel, so only they could make steel. Doesn't matter if the steel is ♥♥♥♥, you could only buy steel from Apple because they bought out the supply of resources to make it, so US Steel can't produce any real quantity of steel. Buying out devs that make games into exclusivity contracts is the same thing, and it should be illegal.

[Aya]

Escrito originalmente por Elfezen:

yes should bring kingdom hearts to steam, its already on the microsoft store too

Are you sure that's not just the Xbox One version?

[Raging Panda]

Escrito originalmente por Aya Shameimaru:

Escrito originalmente por Elfezen:

yes should bring kingdom hearts to steam, its already on the microsoft store too

Are you sure that's not just the Xbox One version?

Yeah I looked for it and only found this... My mistake. Still it's just dumb

[sumolagann]

epic was a mistake

[Aya]

I assume the concept of a necessary evil is foreign to most people?

[Raging Panda]

Escrito originalmente por Aya Shameimaru:

I assume the concept of a necessary evil is foreign to most people?

Except it's not. It's not competing well against steam, and it's only become a vehicle to set back PC adaptation with pointless exclusivity PC users never wanted. It's a pain for those who's games try out epic exclusivity, and, on the whole, it doesn't pose any real threat to steam. When it first started, it was scary, but the business practices epic has used have clearly just proven to be a money pit, and steam has generally relaxed. The thing is, Steam is great. It just needs competition to avoid complacency. Epic isn't competition though. It's a failed attempt at undercutting steam to get itself a monopoly on pc game distribution. I bet you, if they did get a large following, that 12% cut would be long gone.

[Aya]

When I refer to the EGS exclusivity of KH3 as a necessary evil, the events leading up to the announcement never really gave me the impression that Square-Enix were all that confident with their PC support, considering that during the late 2010s and early 2020s, some games were skipping PC entirely, while Trials of Mana actually flopped on Steam.

Hate to break it to you, but KH3 on PC really only happened because Epic Games commissioned it. Yoshi-P saying "buy a PS5 lol" also has me wondering if FFXVI will also follow suit

It would be nice to have these games on Steam, but I'd rather an EGS exclusivity deal than for a game to never receive a PC port at all. It is possible for evil to do some good though it rarely ever happens tbh

[sumolagann]

Escrito originalmente por Aya Shameimaru:

When I refer to the EGS exclusivity of KH3 as a necessary evil, the events leading up to the announcement never really gave me the impression that Square-Enix were all that confident with their PC support, considering that during the late 2010s and early 2020s, some games were skipping PC entirely, while Trials of Mana actually flopped on Steam.

Hate to break it to you, but KH3 on PC really only happened because Epic Games commissioned it. Yoshi-P saying "buy a PS5 lol" also has me wondering if FFXVI will also follow suit

It would be nice to have these games on Steam, but I'd rather an EGS exclusivity deal than for a game to never receive a PC port at all. It is possible for evil to do some good though it rarely ever happens tbh

I honestly believe thats not the case and they just wanted epic money and to milk the series with double/triple dips. Square releases shoddy ports without much care on steam all the time (chrono trigger, chrono cross, ffxiii-2)

[Raging Panda]

My guess is, based on some of the longest lasting exclusivity, it'll be moved over in april or may or june of 2024, which would set it at a 3 year exclusivity. Here's hoping

[Aya]

Escrito originalmente por Raging Panda:

My guess is, based on some of the longest lasting exclusivity, it'll be moved over in april or may or june of 2024, which would set it at a 3 year exclusivity. Here's hoping

A factor I forgot to consider regarding Tony Hawk, wasn't that release more or less tied to Microsoft's acquisition of Activision?

[Raging Panda]

Escrito originalmente por Aya Shameimaru:

Escrito originalmente por Raging Panda:

My guess is, based on some of the longest lasting exclusivity, it'll be moved over in april or may or june of 2024, which would set it at a 3 year exclusivity. Here's hoping

A factor I forgot to consider regarding Tony Hawk, wasn't that release more or less tied to Microsoft's acquisition of Activision?

This is the other end of it. But I feel like we'd see a lot more hype from Tim and his idiotic face if this was supposed to be permanent. He'd make a big stink of this. And with that big deal of permanent exclusivity in exchange for six months, no one of note took it. Plus, Square has seemed to be moving away from Epic store, so I feel like they'd be ready to re-launch on PC on steam when they are able to, rather than wait. As for launching when KH4 comes, that seems rather silly. KH4 is basically a myth. While I'm sure it's being worked on, there's 0 news for it, meaning it's gotta be at least a few years out. Why would they wait 5-6 or even more years to release this game on steam?

[Haruspex]

Escrito originalmente por Raging Panda:

Escrito originalmente por Aya Shameimaru:

I assume the concept of a necessary evil is foreign to most people?

Except it's not. It's not competing well against steam, and it's only become a vehicle to set back PC adaptation with pointless exclusivity PC users never wanted.

Can you imagine if Epic took a different approach? Forget the exclusivity deals, stick with the 88/12 cut, encourage sellers to pass the savings on to the customer with a lower price, and build up a store with features that actually attempts to compete with Steam. Then maybe a few sweetheart deals to attract customers, like the free games have proven popular. (If only to attract users. Not necessarily paying users.) Address a few known pain points that Steam users complain about, like a lack of store curation. The sheer amount of positive good will they would have generated... they potentially could have really been a contender.

Before Epic I was personally feeling a bit shaky about having "put all my eggs in one basket" so to speak with Steam. I was considering migrating over to using GOG as my "main" store. Then after all the anti-consumer, anti-competitive crap Epic pulled I entrenched myself a bit with my loyalty to Steam. After the Steam Deck released I just wanted everything on Steam because I love that device so much and it's just so damn convenient to have it on Steam rather than anywhere else. I don't think I was the only one feeling a bit shaky in my loyalty, and Epic really could have taken advantage of that. Instead they drove a lot of people away and made enemies.