The Kingdom Hearts series is one of the most sprawling stories in gaming history. That’s been true from the beginning, as the developers at Square Enix filled that first game with more content and story than most players could imagine in 2002. Beyond that, there are hundreds of little factoids and tidbits about Kingdom Hearts 1‘s development, giving hardcore fans plenty of reasons to stay in tune with the series. With so much information available, things can easily slip through the cracks, even for dedicated players. Here are a few Kingdom Hearts 1 facts you might not know.
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5) Where It All Started
With properties as massive as Disney and Final Fantasy, you’d think the team-up was created in a lab trying to maximize profits. After all, there weren’t many bigger IPs than those two in the late ’90s and early ’00s, so the duo had to know this partnership would do bookoo numbers. You’d have to imagine the executives spent dozens of hours locked inside a meeting room trying to hash out something that would churn record profits.
I’m sure that eventually happened, but the central idea of Kingdom Hearts was actually created inside an elevator. See, Square Enix and Disney shared an office in Tokyo back in the day. KH producer Shinji Hashimoto found himself spending several minutes riding up the building with Disney execs every day, so he decided to strike up a conversation. That led to the big pitch and the rest is history. Well, sort of. Hashimoto and Tetsuya Nomura had to shut down quite a few instances of Disney proposals to get to the ultimate vision, but it still all started in that elevator.
4) Goofy and Donald Might Be Ghosts
Okay, I am trolling with that headline, but now that you’re here, let’s talk about the Item Shop in the First District of Traverse Town. In that shop, you’ll notice a mechanical scale near the front counter. If you look at it in first-person mode, you’ll note that the scale is zeroed out. However, if you step on it as Sora and switch to first-person mode, you’ll see it go up a few notches, hinting at Sora’s weight.
There are no numbers on the scale, so we can’t know exactly how much Sora weighs. That said, it’s a neat Easter egg for players to uncover. Strangely, if you’re able to have Goofy or Donald stand on the scale, it doesn’t register. Does that mean the Disney heroes are ghosts or somehow weigh less than nothing? Probably not, but it made you read this entry, and you might have learned something new. You’re welcome.
3) Kurt Zisa
There are quite a few superbosses featured in the first Kingdom Hearts game. Ice Titan and Phantom are neat fights, and nobody can forget fighting against Sephiroth. That’s especially true when you realize that the Final Fantasy VII baddie is voiced by NSYNC’s Lance Bass. This factoid isn’t about the fan-favorite singer’s inclusion, though that casting might’ve also gone under the radar. Instead, I’m focused on the fourth secret boss: Kurt Siza.
This guy shows up in Agrabah after completing the first story episode in Hollow Bastion. It might seem like a relatively normal fight against a four-armed snake man, but there’s a hidden bit of trivia about his name. After all, it’s a little weird that this big monster’s name sounds like a guy you’d meet in Medford, New York. If you thought that was your first time fighting him, I have good news. Kurt Zisa is, in fact, the name of a guy who won a “Kingdom Hearts: Name-In-Game” contest held a few months before KH‘s release. And yes, he is from Medford.
2) The Fake Speedrun
Speedrunning is no joke. Anyone who engages in that hobby needs to have incredible patience and game knowledge in addition to their otherworldly gaming skills. Sometimes, developers try speedrunning achievements into their trophy list, and Kingdom Hearts 1 is no different. Obviously, the original version didn’t have trophies, but future remasters included them. One of those trophies is called Speedster, and it requires you to defeat World of Chaos in under 15 hours.
You might assume that you’d need to sprint to the end of the game to accomplish that feat. However, Kingdom Hearts 1 has a weird quirk with how it tracks time. The easiest way to earn this trophy is to play the game for dozens of hours. That’s because the timer resets when you hit 100 hours, so if you complete the game between hours 101 and 115, you’ll earn the trophy. This is a speedrunning challenge literally anyone can complete.
1) Sean Astin’s Hercules
As mentioned above, Kingdom Hearts 1 features a star-studded voice cast packed with Hollywood talent. And I’m not just talking about Lance Bass! Haley Joel Osmond voices Sora. Hayden Panettiere voices Kairi. The list goes on and on. However, Square Enix and Disney wanted to make sure the Disney characters were voiced by their original actors, or that they at least hired sound-alikes for actors who had passed away.
That’s true about the entire cast except Hercules. His original voice actor, Tate Donovan, was still working, but fans noticed Sean Astin took over the role for the first game. What makes this even stranger is that Donovan has come back for all of Hercules’ future appearances in the series. So, why did Astin voice Hercules in KH1? Well, Donovan was reportedly “unavailable.” It’s not clear what he was working on at the time, but his role on The O.C. likely trumped his appearance in Kingdom Hearts 1. Thankfully, Astin’s take was pretty solid, so we didn’t lose too much with Donovan taking time out to play Jimmy Cooper, one of the worst dads in TV history.
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