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.

[Andrei]

Escrito originalmente por OnionAnt:

almost the 30th, is it coming to steam chat ?

Maybe Wednesday. Nobody here knows what is written in the contract. I personally wouldn’t even believe Epic is paying for KH so much to have it 3 years exclusive on their Store front 😅. I would have imagined 1-2 years max exclusivity and it has been 3 years and still not on Steam. As far as I know all other SE arrived by now on Steam which were exclusive Kingdom Hearts is the last and only missing game which haven’t arrived on Steam yet. Since Nomura is a Epic Fanboy at least it looks like it I think all games where he was involved were Epic Exclusives? Haven’t personally checked it just saw some people on Reddit saying it. Since Kingdom Hearts 4 is using unreal Engine 5 and Epic gave them great support and probably for kingdom hearts 4 too the relationship is still on going so I would guess it has something to do with that and the exclusivity is based on that point ??? We will see.

[Raging Panda]

Escrito originalmente por Andrei:

Escrito originalmente por OnionAnt:

almost the 30th, is it coming to steam chat ?

Maybe Wednesday. Nobody here knows what is written in the contract. I personally wouldn’t even believe Epic is paying for KH so much to have it 3 years exclusive on their Store front 😅. I would have imagined 1-2 years max exclusivity and it has been 3 years and still not on Steam. As far as I know all other SE arrived by now on Steam which were exclusive Kingdom Hearts is the last and only missing game which haven’t arrived on Steam yet. Since Nomura is a Epic Fanboy at least it looks like it I think all games where he was involved were Epic Exclusives? Haven’t personally checked it just saw some people on Reddit saying it. Since Kingdom Hearts 4 is using unreal Engine 5 and Epic gave them great support and probably for kingdom hearts 4 too the relationship is still on going so I would guess it has something to do with that and the exclusivity is based on that point ??? We will see.

What makes you think Nomura is an epic fanboy? Because he used unreal? It's about the only thing I'd say epic has truly going for it. Everything else is just gimmicks. Can't wait for that company to die. I doubt KH 4's usage of UE has anything to do with it. It seems epic usually keeps engine and launcher seperate, and hasn't chosen to monetize the engine usage to get more epic only releases. Not to mention Epic seems to have greatly cut back on them, as they have lost a LOT of money, the new shift in hiring paridigm leading to layoffs as well, and together these have resulted in a lot of trimming of expenses, and that tactic wasn't working so it was probably greatly defunded. It seems more likely this is a holdover than an ongoing deal.

[Andrei]

Escrito originalmente por Raging Panda:

Escrito originalmente por Andrei:

Maybe Wednesday. Nobody here knows what is written in the contract. I personally wouldn’t even believe Epic is paying for KH so much to have it 3 years exclusive on their Store front 😅. I would have imagined 1-2 years max exclusivity and it has been 3 years and still not on Steam. As far as I know all other SE arrived by now on Steam which were exclusive Kingdom Hearts is the last and only missing game which haven’t arrived on Steam yet. Since Nomura is a Epic Fanboy at least it looks like it I think all games where he was involved were Epic Exclusives? Haven’t personally checked it just saw some people on Reddit saying it. Since Kingdom Hearts 4 is using unreal Engine 5 and Epic gave them great support and probably for kingdom hearts 4 too the relationship is still on going so I would guess it has something to do with that and the exclusivity is based on that point ??? We will see.

What makes you think Nomura is an epic fanboy? Because he used unreal? It's about the only thing I'd say epic has truly going for it. Everything else is just gimmicks. Can't wait for that company to die. I doubt KH 4's usage of UE has anything to do with it. It seems epic usually keeps engine and launcher seperate, and hasn't chosen to monetize the engine usage to get more epic only releases. Not to mention Epic seems to have greatly cut back on them, as they have lost a LOT of money, the new shift in hiring paridigm leading to layoffs as well, and together these have resulted in a lot of trimming of expenses, and that tactic wasn't working so it was probably greatly defunded. It seems more likely this is a holdover than an ongoing deal.

All games he was involved in were first Epic Store exclusive : Kingdom Hearts, Neo the world ends with you, Stranger of Paradise Final Fantasy Origin, Final Fantasy 7 Remake.

Maybe just a coincidence. With Crysis Core Final Fantasy 7 Reunion SE has stopped doing Epic Store Exclusives at least it looks like it. We will see where SE releases their upcoming titles like Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth and Kingdom Hearts 4.

[ROFLpwn01]

May is here and there's no update. Seems like either the games are permanently exclusive to Epic or SE is waiting for the ideal time to drop them on steam

[Mars]

Escrito originalmente por ROFLpwn01:

May is here and there's no update. Seems like either the games are permanently exclusive to Epic or SE is waiting for the ideal time to drop them on steam

That would be SE, Epic doesn't have any rights over the KH games. There's also definitely no permanent exclusivity, they would've mentioned that otherwise.

[Aya]

Escrito originalmente por Mars:

Escrito originalmente por ROFLpwn01:

May is here and there's no update. Seems like either the games are permanently exclusive to Epic or SE is waiting for the ideal time to drop them on steam

That would be SE, Epic doesn't have any rights over the KH games. There's also definitely no permanent exclusivity, they would've mentioned that otherwise.

You'd be playing Kingdom Hearts 3 on Steam right now if it were temporary.

[Reaper]

Escrito originalmente por Aya:

Escrito originalmente por Mars:

That would be SE, Epic doesn't have any rights over the KH games. There's also definitely no permanent exclusivity, they would've mentioned that otherwise.

You'd be playing Kingdom Hearts 3 on Steam right now if it were temporary.

Kingdom hearts is also owned by Disney so it's not up for SE to do a steam port.

[Reaper]

Kingdom Hearts 4 may be coming sooner than expected, with a reported release year of 2025. Since Tetsuya Nomura is done with final fantasy 7 remake part 1 his focus should be on KH4 100%. And since final fantasy 7 remake part 2 is released, SE focus should be on the next big game which is KH4.

Link:
https://screenrant.com/kingdom-hearts-4-release-date-report/

[Raging Panda]

Escrito originalmente por Reaper:

Kingdom Hearts 4 may be coming sooner than expected, with a reported release year of 2025. Since Tetsuya Nomura is done with final fantasy 7 remake part 1 his focus should be on KH4 100%. And since final fantasy 7 remake part 2 is released, SE focus should be on the next big game which is KH4.

Link:
https://screenrant.com/kingdom-hearts-4-release-date-report/

This is cool to hear, but frankly, Idgaf about KH4. I got so many games to play before that, and they won't release them on steam. I don't want them to wait for KH4 when all the work has been done already.

[LAA]

I don't know anymore. It's crushing to keep waiting for the next milestone and potential contract end date and nothing come of it.

I don't think it's a permanent exclusive because you'd think Epic would have made that crystal clear and it's not.

My only guesses at this point are:
- Simply they don't care
- They don't have the resources
- Disney aren't allowing it
- Waiting for the most opportune time
- Contract length is longer than we can guess/predict.

Unfortunately even then, most of those guesses don't make total sense.

-They should care if there's potential for money to be made and potential to grow the audience for relatively minimum cost.
- Resource wise they've had 3 years to allocate and again it should be minimum resources needed.
- Disney haven't blocked other Disney games coming to Steam.
- SE have had plenty of opportune times, it's been the quietest period for KH now.

Longer contract time is possible but we haven't seen another game with a longer exclusive period so far. I guess the worst fear is if it's a 4-6 year exclusive. 1 year per game? What a blunder if they agreed to keep the whole KH series on Epic for that long though, even now I'd say its a blunder.

I think it will come eventually but it's past the point of being a reasonable wait now.

[Raging Panda]

Escrito originalmente por LAA:

I don't know anymore. It's crushing to keep waiting for the next milestone and potential contract end date and nothing come of it.

I don't think it's a permanent exclusive because you'd think Epic would have made that crystal clear and it's not.

My only guesses at this point are:
- Simply they don't care
- They don't have the resources
- Disney aren't allowing it
- Waiting for the most opportune time
- Contract length is longer than we can guess/predict.

Unfortunately even then, most of those guesses don't make total sense.

-They should care if there's potential for money to be made and potential to grow the audience for relatively minimum cost.
- Resource wise they've had 3 years to allocate and again it should be minimum resources needed.
- Disney haven't blocked other Disney games coming to Steam.
- SE have had plenty of opportune times, it's been the quietest period for KH now.

Longer contract time is possible but we haven't seen another game with a longer exclusive period so far. I guess the worst fear is if it's a 4-6 year exclusive. 1 year per game? What a blunder if they agreed to keep the whole KH series on Epic for that long though, even now I'd say its a blunder.

I think it will come eventually but it's past the point of being a reasonable wait now.

I feel this. It's kinda at a wall. It's really any one of these equally unlikely scenarios. Realistically, the only reason that any of them are still possible is because stupid SE hasn't already brought it. I mean, ♥♥♥♥ it at this point. Just release it on steam and THEN get it deck verified. I don't care anymore. I just want this ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ game on the store I play on. It baffles me how they can see how bad epic is for their business, and yet continue to let these games rot in obscurity on that ♥♥♥♥♥♥ store. I wish Epic just never got into stores. Their store sucks, and has only achieved one thing- fragmenting PC gamers into stupid console war style groups. And the best part is, no one is "pro EGS" They just fail to see why it's bad and are apathetic towards it. There are anti-steam people, but these people are usually pro GOG or other stores without ANY drm. There are, naturally, a bunch of vehemently pro steam users. But no one is rushing to say "No, epic is better." The BEST case they get is "Yeah more studios should give 12%" Personally, I disagree. Steam has used that money to fund some great things (like the steam deck) and I think devs will start seeing more money when they stop shortcutting to maximize profits and go back to taking bigger risks and trying new things to stay competitive,rather than just taking the safety net of re-releasing old games and expecting gamers to put up with rampant DLC and and overpriced games. $70 for a game with ♥♥♥♥ tons of DLC and NO physical copy. Yeah, you can take your complaints of steam's 30% and shove it up your ass. Steam's 30% has done far more for gamers than the 70% devs end up taking. And I don't hate on the devs here. But the devs just work. They don't get paid more when the company gets more. The company (chiefly, the publisher) gets more, and I'd argue they don't really do anything. They just assume risk. Grow some balls and start taking risks. Otherwise, we're in for a long trudge of stagnation.
I don't want to see this closed, because frankly, having a place to chat about it is important. So take my profanity as a sign that I'm tired of seeing this nonsense. I want more from game devs, and they should see that and respond. Especially when it's just a matter of submitting the already finished game for approval.

[Andrei]

Escrito originalmente por LAA:

I don't know anymore. It's crushing to keep waiting for the next milestone and potential contract end date and nothing come of it.

I don't think it's a permanent exclusive because you'd think Epic would have made that crystal clear and it's not.

My only guesses at this point are:
- Simply they don't care
- They don't have the resources
- Disney aren't allowing it
- Waiting for the most opportune time
- Contract length is longer than we can guess/predict.

Unfortunately even then, most of those guesses don't make total sense.

-They should care if there's potential for money to be made and potential to grow the audience for relatively minimum cost.
- Resource wise they've had 3 years to allocate and again it should be minimum resources needed.
- Disney haven't blocked other Disney games coming to Steam.
- SE have had plenty of opportune times, it's been the quietest period for KH now.

Longer contract time is possible but we haven't seen another game with a longer exclusive period so far. I guess the worst fear is if it's a 4-6 year exclusive. 1 year per game? What a blunder if they agreed to keep the whole KH series on Epic for that long though, even now I'd say its a blunder.

I think it will come eventually but it's past the point of being a reasonable wait now.

The question for me is just why would epic pay so much money for kingdom hearts 1 -2 it makes literally no sense. For kingdom hearts 3 I can understand a long exclusive deal but KH 1-2 are old games and I think something else is behind the contract i personally think it’s not just money. Why would epic pay so much money for KH 1-2 when there are newer games where they could do it. Also people were thinking it can come this month to Steam because of Tony Hawk which is no proof at all. Also the Epic Store requires a internet connection which is also strange it was reported back and they said they are looking in it but haven’t anything done yet. Next big game from SE is Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth so we will see if it will be a epic exclusive as Final Fantasy 7 Remake or day 1 steam release.

[Raging Panda]

Escrito originalmente por Andrei:

Escrito originalmente por LAA:

I don't know anymore. It's crushing to keep waiting for the next milestone and potential contract end date and nothing come of it.

I don't think it's a permanent exclusive because you'd think Epic would have made that crystal clear and it's not.

My only guesses at this point are:
- Simply they don't care
- They don't have the resources
- Disney aren't allowing it
- Waiting for the most opportune time
- Contract length is longer than we can guess/predict.

Unfortunately even then, most of those guesses don't make total sense.

-They should care if there's potential for money to be made and potential to grow the audience for relatively minimum cost.
- Resource wise they've had 3 years to allocate and again it should be minimum resources needed.
- Disney haven't blocked other Disney games coming to Steam.
- SE have had plenty of opportune times, it's been the quietest period for KH now.

Longer contract time is possible but we haven't seen another game with a longer exclusive period so far. I guess the worst fear is if it's a 4-6 year exclusive. 1 year per game? What a blunder if they agreed to keep the whole KH series on Epic for that long though, even now I'd say its a blunder.

I think it will come eventually but it's past the point of being a reasonable wait now.

The question for me is just why would epic pay so much money for kingdom hearts 1 -2 it makes literally no sense. For kingdom hearts 3 I can understand a long exclusive deal but KH 1-2 are old games and I think something else is behind the contract i personally think it’s not just money. Why would epic pay so much money for KH 1-2 when there are newer games where they could do it. Also people were thinking it can come this month to Steam because of Tony Hawk which is no proof at all. Also the Epic Store requires a internet connection which is also strange it was reported back and they said they are looking in it but haven’t anything done yet. Next big game from SE is Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth so we will see if it will be a epic exclusive as Final Fantasy 7 Remake or day 1 steam release.

It's really whatever agreement they reached. As for why EGS requires online. It comes down to they don't know how to make a store and don't care enough to listen when users say "WE DON'T ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ WANT THIS." They've made it very clear their audience isn't the end user. It's the dev. They, well more exactly Tim Sweeny, firmly thinks he can win solely by getting all the games people want to play only on his store and then the users have to come. Ask EA how that worked with Origin. Ask Ubisoft how that worked out. They came back, only to leave... I'm sure they're back to making no money again. Ask ANYONE how that works out. Even Blizzard is abandoning this. It DOESN'T work. PC gamers will just not play your game, or pirate it, because we can. You want to avoid piracy, especially on PC, the solution is bring the games to the players. Do that and you can make ♥♥♥♥ tons of money here. If you expect the players to come to you, you will lose. It's been proven SO MANY ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ TIMES. I don't know how they keep making the same damn mistakes.

[WolfEisberg]

Should be noted:

Nearly all games on EGS work offline, not needing an internet connection to play the game. But some publishers, like Square Enix, decided to put an always online DRM, either created their own or they are using a third party DRM system, onto their games for some reason.

[Paratech2008]

Aren't the "modern" tomb Raider games (sans trilogy) always online and tied to Epic ? For online play or something?