Summary
In a recent interview with Young Jump magazine, Tetsuya Nomura revealed thatKingdom Hearts 4 will act as a story resetfor the series. My initial reaction to this was fear - Kingdom Hearts has an extensive plot, and, as it stands right now, that plot has plenty of unanswered questions. Will all of these loose threads be left hanging, in favour of making the next game more palatable to newcomers?
The 2022 reveal trailer forKingdom Hearts 4shows Strelitzia, a character from the mobile game Kingdom Hearts Union X, in Quadratum with Sora, so it’s obviously not going to be a completely new story. There’s also Donald, Goofy, and Riku actively looking for Sora since he disappeared at the end of the Kingdom Hearts 3 ReMind DLC. But the new aesthetic, font, and gameplay mechanics all point to some sort of new beginning.
For these existing plotlines to continue despite a ‘reset’, the avenue that makes the most sense is for Sora to lose his memories, so he can relearn the context of the previous games along with the player when the fourth main entry comes around.
Sora is no stranger to losing his memories.He spent all of Chain of Memories forgetting Riku and Kairi, and then had his memory of being in Castle Oblivion wiped after that. It’s possible that something similar could be at play in Kingdom Hearts 4, especially with Quadratum being a strange ‘fake reality’ and Castle Oblivion being a similar liminal space.
On top of that, Kingdom Hearts 3 and its DLC also allude to Sora already having lost some memories. This boy sure does love a spot of amnesia.
Sora May Have Already Forgotten Riku’s Sacrifice
During the Keyblade Graveyard segment of Kingdom Hearts 3, Riku sacrifices himself by shielding Sora from the Demon Tide when everyone else has already been taken by the darkness. The moment is given a lot of focus; after the chaos and Sora’s desperate scream, everything quietens down.
Riku clenches his fist, tells Sora he believes in him (if you go by the original Japanese line), and takes a deep breath before raising his Keyblade against the Demon Tide and standing firm as the darkness swallows him too.
But a few things following this scene are odd, implying that Sora may have forgotten it happened entirely.
Sora Has No Reaction To Seeing Riku Again
After Sora finds Kairi’s heart and they both return to the Keyblade Graveyard, he has no reaction to seeing Riku after what has just happened, when he’s normally pretty open about how he’s feeling,especially about Riku.
Their reunion in KH2 is extremely heartfelt, and when Riku returns after saving Sora’s heart in Dream Drop Distance, Sora doesn’t hide his excitement at seeing him again. This makes it all the more odd that Sora doesn’t acknowledge what’s happened - surely he’s grateful that Riku is even still alive?
Sora also tells Riku earlier in KH3, “Be safe. No reckless stunts.” Using yourself as a human shield is pretty much the definition of a reckless stunt… So why wouldn’t Sora acknowledge this if he remembers what happened?
ReMind Cuts Out The Sacrifice Entirely
KH3’s ReMind DLC sees Sora head back to the Keyblade Graveyard to recover Kairi’s heart, with the cutscene from the main game of everyone being taken by the Demon Tide being shown again. However, rather than showing Riku’s sacrifice, it instead lingers on a black screen for a few moments.
It could have simply been cut for time, but why show the rest of the cutscene up until this exact moment? Why have the black screen linger for just a moment too long for it to be a regular transition, if not to imply that this is a blank spot in Sora’s memory?
When Sora regains consciousness on his Station of Awakening, his eyes are glazed over, as if he was zoned out. As we’re seeing all of this from Sora’s perspective, it’s possible the sacrifice is cut because Sora simply doesn’t remember it ever taking place.
Sora Misremembers How Many Hearts He Saved
When in The Final World in ReMind, Sora tells Chirithy he’s confident about saving Kairi’s heart: “Hey, I’ve already saved six hearts. What’s one more?”
But… he savedsevenhearts. After saving Riku’s heart, Sora travels to six worlds and saves a heart in each one.
Aqua, Ventus, Axel, King Mickey, Donald, Goofy… Are you forgetting someone, Sora?
It is a common joke that Sora can’t count, but it’s not played for laughs here. Donald and Goofy aren’t there to point out that Sora miscounted, so why bother setting up the joke with no punchline?
But How Would Sora Have Forgotten?
Sora could have easily forgotten about Riku sacrificing himself because his subconscious blocked it out: it was a traumatising event, so his subconscious just decided to wipe it away entirely.…
But there’s a more convincing explanation for this. After Sora rescues Axel’s heart in San Fransokyo, Young Xehanort appears and warns Sora that he’s misused the Power of Waking. It’s for traversing hearts to reach worlds; not traversing worlds to reach hearts. The latter of which is what Sora has been doing to rescue his friends already.
Young Xehanort then tells Sora that he’s “already paid the price.” Bearing in mind that this conversation happens well before Sora fully saves Kairi, it suggests that he’s already lostsomethingprior to his disappearance.
Sora Still Hasn’t Thanked Namine
As well as the possibility of Sora already having lost an important memory, a significant plot thread regarding Namine remains open.
Back in Chain of Memories, Sora made a promise to thank Namine for what she did for him - risking her life for him and returning his true memories, even if she might have preferred Sora to keep the altered ones.
Sora makes it clear in KH3 that he’s not fulfilled that ‘thank you’ yet. While he thanked her in the datascape, he wants to thank her properly in the real world. He even accidentally thanks her again while talking to her and makes it doubly clear that’s not therealthank you.
Thanks Namine. Oops! That’s not the official thank you.
Namine’s whole deal is being able to alter Sora’s memories, so it seems particularly fitting that her storyline with Sora has been left open, despite KH3 being an easy place for this to have been resolved. Namine may yet have a part to play in piecing Sora’s memories together once more, as she may be the only one who can relink the chains of his memories.
The seeds of Sora having forgotten at leastsomethingimportant have already been sown, and ‘Thank Namine’ has purposefully been left open, so it wouldn’t be too surprising if Sora lost even more of his memory upon entering Quadratum.
Sora having to recover his previous memories would allow him to have some seriously overdue self-reflection too - I’m not convinced he’s worked on his “alone, I’m worthless” mindset in the slightest - and it would work perfectly in conjunction with making sure newcomers aren’t completely lost jumping into KH4.
