With Kingdom Hearts III scheduled to launch this year, Disney and Square Enix treated fans at D23 Japan with plenty of big reveals, including a trailer revealing the Monsters Inc. world. In addition to this, Square Enix also teased a major change for Sora and the gang’s main means of transportation in traveling from one world to another.
Gummi Ship segments in Kingdom Hearts III is now less linear compared to past entries due to the inclusion of an open-world style exploration phase, Square Enix revealed as per IGN Japan. With this approach, players can now freely explore the surrounding areas using their Gummi Ship within a 360-degree space. Additionally, Kingdom Hearts III offers more customizability for Gummi Ships.
Combat sections for Gummi Ships will also return, and it touts significantly more enemies than before. Persona Central’s Mystic also reports described Gummi Ship combat to be similar to Star Wars.
Gameplay for Gummi Ships in the Kingdom Hearts series has significantly changed in each main entry. Gummi Ship combat in the first Kingdom Hearts was akin to StarFox, complete with an aerial combat style. Meanwhile, the second main entry was treated more like an on-rails mini-game, with players having to engage in Gummi Ship battles once whenever traveling to a new world.
Kingdom Hearts III is scheduled to launch sometime in 2018 for PS4 and Xbox One.