The community has only gotten a taste of Kingdom Hearts 4, but they are already hunkering down for the wait to learn more. Sora's next adventure is set to take place in Quadratum, a new reality that runs parallel to the Kingdom Hearts players knew. Resembling modern Tokyo, this mysterious place serves as a sort of afterlife for certain Kingdom Hearts characters. With the forces of darkness beginning to invade, it seems like Sora's duties as a Keyblade wielder will continue, even as his friends search for a way to bring him home.
The trailer included a brief preview of Kingdom Hearts 4 gameplay, which looks like a refined version of Kingdom Hearts 3’s. Some statements have been made on what players are seeing in the new HUD, including the mysterious Build command that occupies the bottom slot in Sora’s command menu. It also appears that the airstep from KH3 has been replaced with a grappling hook Formchange. Most conspicuous of all, however, is the quick time event that appeared while Sora blocked a punch from a giant Heartless. This has been confirmed to be a mechanic Kingdom Hearts fans have seen before, and its return seems based on feedback from KH3.
Kingdom Hearts 2's Reaction Commands Explained
Many Kingdom Hearts titles have had some elements of extra interactivity during their combat. Kingdom Hearts started things with chances for players to extend some of their special attacks with more inputs, like Sonic Blade and Ars Arcanum. This style of special attack can be found all throughout the Kingdom Hearts franchise, with later games including another variant where the player needs to time their inputs to match rings closing in on a circle. This style of special command is what's seen in Kingdom Hearts 4’s reveal trailer, but director Tetsuya Nomura's statements have suggested that it may have originated from a Reaction Command.
Reaction Commands were a mechanic introduced in Kingdom Hearts 2 that served as a mixture of quick time events, context-sensitive abilities, attack extensions, and minigames. They worked as a catch-all input tied to the Triangle button for anything that fell outside normal combat.
Roxas’ prologue section demonstrates them quite well, as Roxas can use Reversals anytime he is near a Dusk, but must also use timed Reaction Commands to avoid heavy damage in Twilight Thorn's mid-fight cutscenes. Many enemies had different Reaction Commands tied to certain attacks or states they could enter, and learning to anticipate and provoke these commands added another degree of complexity and variety to Kingdom Hearts 2’s combat.
Kingdom Hearts 3's Take on Reaction Commands Proved Controversial
Even after Reaction Commands were formally retired post-Kingdom Hearts 2 Final Mix, the concept of additional commands appearing on top of or above the player’s command menu remained. Kingdom Hearts 0.2 and Kingdom Hearts 3 brought Reaction Commands back in a way, transforming them into Situation Commands.
While a few were context-sensitive like Kingdom Hearts 2’s Reaction Commands, most required players to fight enemies until three arrows above the command menu appeared. After a little more fighting, depending on what actions the player took and what they have equipped, one or more Situation Commands will appear for a limited time. These included Formchanges, Grand Magic, team attacks, finishing moves, and Attractions. Attractions are uniquely gained from attacking enemies with green circles on them instead of the typical gauge.
This sounds like a combination of Reaction Commands, Drive forms, and Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep’s command menu, but the implementation is where Situation Commands fall apart. The element of randomness involved in which Situation Commands appear can make them somewhat frustrating. Without equipping certain abilities, team attacks are particularly sparse, seemingly less often than their Limit counterparts in Kingdom Hearts 2.
Preparing the Situation Command gauge is also time-consuming and repetitive, with players eventually feeling like it's a waste of time when they want to initiate a Formchange. Finally, there are only six Attractions, and it quickly becomes tiresome to use them. All of these factors came together to make fans wish that Kingdom Hearts 2 Reaction Commands could make a comeback.
How Kingdom Hearts 4 is Bringing Back Reaction Commands
Square Enix took note of the demand for Reaction Commands after Kingdom Hearts 3 launched, and is supposedly bringing them back for Kingdom Hearts 4. At the moment, it isn't clear how Reaction Commands will be implemented, though sharing a name with the Kingdom Hearts 2 counterpart indicates some similarities.
The sequence shown in the reveal trailer may have been demoing an early version of a Reaction Command for that Heartless type. It seems like if the Heartless throws a punch while Sora is in front of its face, Sora can initiate a quick time event to block and counter it. The preceding sequence with Sora sliding through a falling building may lead to a guaranteed activation of this command.
Speculation aside, it's good for Square Enix to have implemented fan feedback so quickly, and this feature could have major benefits for Kingdom Hearts 4. Enemies and bosses will have slightly deeper and more personalized layers to their encounters. These elements won't appear in every fight, but will make the ones they show up for more memorable.
Battles can have more varied and dynamic sequences, like the multi-part boss fight against Armored Xemnas and his dragon ship at the end of Kingdom Hearts 2, with Reaction Commands facilitating new mechanics. If implemented properly, the concerns with randomness and repetition that plagued Kingdom Hearts 3 should be avoided. Reaction Commands are an exciting addition to Kingdom Hearts 4, and they will hopefully add spectacle and substance to the final game.
Kingdom Hearts 4 is in development.