Credit: Unsplash
The games are accompanying Sora to the platform.
Yesterday, it was announced that Sora, protagonist of the Kingdom Hearts series, would be making his way to Super Smash Bros. Ultimate as the game’s final DLC character. It was quite the hot button topic, and rightfully so; people have been asking for Sora in Smash for about as long as both series have existed, and apparently Sora actually won the Fighter’s Ballot for the fourth game. Since he’s partially owned by Disney, though, obtaining him was a bit of a logistical headache for Nintendo, which is why they were only just able to get him.
In addition to Sora joining Smash, however, there was another announcement made during Masahiro Sakurai’s presentation. In honor of Sora receiving this prestigious place, every game in the Kingdom Hearts series is making its way to the Nintendo Switch. To be specific, the platform is receiving ports of the two game collections, Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5+2.5 ReMix and Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue, as well as Kingdom Hearts III. Previously, the only game available on the platform was Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory, so this is definitely a welcome addition for fans.
"Like, is any of this for real or not?"
🌟 Cloud versions of Kingdom Hearts 1.5+2.5, 2.8 and 3 (+ Re Mind) are coming to Nintendo Switch
🌟 KH Union χ[Cross] Theater Mode
🌟 The final chapter of KH Dark Road
🌟 Brand-new merchandise
🌟 A 20th anniversary event pic.twitter.com/jzqPXz0nAU— KINGDOM HEARTS (@KINGDOMHEARTS) October 5, 2021
However, there’s a caveat: these will not be full-on ports to the Switch hardware. Rather, in a similar vein to Control or Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey, all of the Kingdom Hearts games will be available in cloud streaming form. Rather than being stored on your Switch as local downloads, you’ll need a constant internet connection to stream the games from Nintendo’s servers, where they’ll presumably be run by heartier processors than the Switch possesses.
Nintendo has not yet clarified when the cloud games will be available, nor how much they will cost, though if we’re lucky, we’ll get a free trial version like Control got to see how well the games run.
