Tesuya Nomura has just announced that the various Kingdom Hearts 3 language dubs will only be in Japanese and English, leaving everyone who doesn’t speak those languages to rely on subtitles for the game if they speak a different language. However, Nomura does have a reason for why those two languages are the only ones.
According to Nomura, the reason that the game will only be in English and Japanese is because of reasons of time and money, two things that often limit what developers can do. Kingdom Hearts 3 has been in development for many years, especially since the last mainline game, Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance, came out back in 2012, six years ago.
The possibility of fans accepting any more delays, especially after we finally got a release date for the game at E3 2018, is impossible, especially when the game has been delayed multiple times since it was first announced.
That, plus the game finally having a release date in January of next year, has given the Kingdom Hearts 3 team a timetable that they have to stick to, and considering the large amount of dialogue in any Kingdom Hearts game, the Kingdom Hearts 3 language dubs in English and Japanese are the only ones they may have time for.
Not to mention, hiring a number of voice actors for each language option and making sure that they’re good is also an expensive process, and a time-consuming one too. Who knows how much longer the game might be delayed if they went beyond simple subtitles to use in the game for other languages.
While the fact that the Kingdom Hearts 3 language dubs won’t be able to get in anything except English and Japanese, the fact that Kingdom Hearts 3 is at last coming out will likely be enough for the many Kingdom Hearts fans around the world. The game releases on January 29 for Xbox One and Playstation 4.
