A Breakdown Of The Latest Kingdom Hearts IV Trailer

I know I’m late but I still don’t believe it. Getting a Kingdom Hearts IV update was not on my 2026 bingo card. Why is it in a Nintendo Direct and not this past PlayStation’s State of Play is still weirdly confusing, but I guess it’s to promote it coming to Nintendo Switch 2. The last time we got news about Kingdom Hearts IV was the trailer that was released 4 years ago. Given the series track record in providing updates, all of us KH fans were not expecting to hear any news about this game for at least another 3 more years.

The End of Kingdom 3 and The Lost Masters Arc

Before we unpack the trailer for KH IV, I want to recap what happened at the end of Kingdom Hearts III and insert some lore from . It is common knowledge that the lore of Kingdom Hearts is a…unholy mess. There is so much lore spread across original titles, remixes, backcovers, manga books, and mobile games that is now unplayable or cancelled (RIP Missing Link). As a writer, I love Kingdom Hearts because of how insanely convoluted the story is and the many recons that make everything unnecessary confusing. Everyone speaks in riddles that hint at a deep, overarching story that barely holds water. In every Kingdom Hearts game, there are like 100 questions that are brought up, and only like 2 get answered before another sequel throws another 100 at us.

After defeating Xehanort at the end of KH III, Sora leaves to find Kairi, who was sacrificed by Xehanort to summon Kingdom Hearts. Sora intends to use the power of waking to find her, but Mickey warns him that chasing after hearts will have dire consequences. But, Sora being Sora, has his heart set on rescuing Kairi. Through the power of waking, Sora successfully rescued Kairi and brought her back to The Realm of Light. Unfortunately, Mickey’s warning comes to fruition as Sora dies and ends up in a strange world called Quadratum, which is basically Kingdom Hearts’ version of the afterlife.

In the KH III Epilogue, four of the six Foretellers appear in the Keyblade Graveyard, all seemingly from another point in time (I forgot there is time travel in this game…). They meet with Xigbar, who is revealed to be a fifth Foreteller by the name of Luxu. Ok, so context time. Back in 2015, Square Enix released a mobile Kingdom Hearts game called Kingdom Hearts Unchained (later rebranded as Union χ (Union Cross) after the Keyblade War). Very, very, long story short, there mysterious man called The Master of Masters who was the first Keyblade Wielder. He possessed the power to see into the future, in which he saw the Keyblade War, the world falling into darkness, and himself disappearing. The Master wrote his predictions in a tome called the Book of Prophecies and entrusted copies of it to five of his six apprentices named The Foretellers: Ira, Aced, Invi, Ava, and Gula. Along with the book, The Master gave them a secret role to play to prepare for the incoming future, as well as the warning of a traitor amongst them. As for his sixth apprentice, Luxu, he was not given a copy of the book. Instead, he was entrusted to protect a Black Box and observe future events using The Master’s Keyblade that contained his all-seeing eye.

After The Master disappeared, the Foretellers became paranoid at the idea of a traitor and competed with each other to collect Lux (light) to empower their respective Unions. As the Master predicted, the Keyblade War broke out due to the conflict, and the world fell into darkness. However, thanks to The Dandelions established by Ava, light returned to the world once again, and a new order was established. Unfortunately, Union χ was discontinued in 2021 and was eventually removed from all app stores in August 2024. There was also Kingdom Hearts Dark Road, which was a story that touched on a young Xehanort’s past and his descent into darkness. It is asinine that Square Enix completely made these games unavailable to play because both have TONS, and I mean TONS, of important lore and characters that relate to the overarching story as a whole.

Thankfully, a little place called YouTube exists! If you want to see the entire game, a wonderful Youtuber named Everglow has full videos of both games with explanations between cutscenes!

Unpacking The New KH IV Trailer

With all of that established, let’s finally jump into the trailer! It opens up to a person dressed in an Organization coat describing Quadratum. Could this person be the Master of Masters, who perhaps was transported to this world after disappearing? Unlike Realm of Light, Darkness, and In-Between, Quadratum is a world of “fiction” that is neither light nor darkness. They note that their presence brought darkness to Quadratum, which manifested into physical forms. We see a few seconds later the OG boss Darkside appearing above the city, and Sora rushing in with Kingdom Key in hand to stop it.

In the new Nintendo Direct trailer, it opens up to a person dressed in an Organization coat describing Quadratum in which it does not contain any manifestations of light or darkness. Could this person be The Master of Masters who perhaps was transported to this world after disappearing? Or are they another member They note that their prescence brought darkness to Quadratum which manifested into physical forms. We see a few seconds later the OG KH 1 boss Darkside appearing above the city and Sora rushing in Kingdom Key in hand to stop it.

Strelitiza appears once again in this trailer as she did in the first one. Strelitiza was a character from Unchained and was Marluxia’s younger sister. She, along with her brother, was chosen to be the New Foretellers after the Keyblade War and was given copies of The Book of Prophecies by Ava. Unfortunately, Strelitza was never given a chance to fulfill her role as she was murdered by Ventus, who was possessed by Darkness (See what I mean by important lore?). Ventus stole her copy of the Book and took her place with no memory of what he had done. It appears Strelitza was transported to Quadratum after her death and is now helping Sora understand this new world. When KH IV finally releases 7 or 13 years from now, we may finally get to see her play a pivotal role in the story.

In the next shot, we get flashes to another figure in a black coat as well as three new characters, including the appearance of a completed Luxord. Regarding the character in the mask and spiky black hair, a lot of people think this is Noctis Lucis Caelum from Final Fantasy XV. He is actually a character named Vali from Kingdom Hearts Dark Road who was part of Xehanort’s Upper Classmen and was murdered. If a certain multi-billion dollar game company had not deleted a really important game, people would have known that… As for the sketchy guy in the purple coat, he seems to an original character for KH IV or the remnants of Nomura’s vision for Final Fantasy Versus XIII, which eventually became Final Fantasy XV. Oh yeah, I forgot about that part…

In the Toy Story World in KH III, there is a trailer for a fictional video game called Verem Rex. Although its name is not real, the characters that appear in the game were actually real, as they were a part of Nomura’s vision for the original FF Versus XIII. Yozora was actually the prototype design for Noctis, and Quadratum was supposed to be the setting for the game. However, Nomura was removed from the project because he was juggling between the development of Kingdom Hearts III and Versus XIII, which left the latter in development limbo. Square Enix decided to rebrand the game as Final Fantasy XV and established Hajime Tabata as its new director so Nomura could continue. So basically, Kingdom Hearts IV is going to be the afterlife for all of Nomura’s dead games. Talk about staying on theme.

In the next shot, we see Donald and Goofy being surrounded by blue flames, which hints at the notion of Hades from Hercules possibly helping them reach Quadratum to find Sora. At the end of Melody of Memory, Kairi and Riku were able to reach The Final World through The Fairy Godmother from Cinderella to find the portal to Quadratum. So, it’s possible Hades from Hercules may know a way there as well, which makes sense given he is the god of the afterlife. It’s actually great to see the Disney characters given some involvement in KH’s story outside their canon stories for once.

Young Xehanort then appears in the next shot, holding an umbrella over a seemingly surprised and distraught Sora. Before he disappeared in KH III, Xehanort warned Sora that his time in their world was coming to an end. Could this version of Xehanort have originated from Quadratum before he appeared in Dream Drop Distance, or is this Realm of Light Xehanort who traveled here with Eraqus after dying?

In the final part of the trailer, we get a preview of the some of the gameplay and how much has been improved since the first trailer. It appears it is running on the same mechanics as KH III with some minor adjustments with Sora is hitting his inner Vanitas surfing on Keyblades. Although it’s brief but the enemy desgins for the Heartless look really cool especially the ones with the glowing arm shield things. See at how insanely detailed Darkside’s arm looks. It looks like there are billions of Heartless hiding inside of it.

Conclusion

With only two trailers released, there is some growing excitement over what could possibly happen in this new installment of Kingdom Hearts. Although probably nothing will still not make sense, there is a lot to wonder about how The Foretellers, The Master of Masters, and the other character will fit into the story.

What are your thoughts about the Kingdom Hearts IV trailer? Are you excited for the new game or are you completely done with game and its confusing lore?

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