'Kingdom Hearts 3': Haley Joel Osment Would Love to Play Sora "Forever"

For nearly 20 years, Haley Joel Osment has been lending his voice to Kingdom Hearts' protagonist Sora over the course of three mainline games and numerous few spin-offs. And according to the actor, he isn't interested in stopping anytime soon.

When Osment began his journey as Sora, he was just 12 years old. Now, 18 years later, he's much older, but he's still bringing to life one of the most popular characters in video games.

"It's by far the longest relationship I've had with any character," said Osment while speaking about the role to Heat Vision (via Hollywood Reporter).

According to Osment, it's the series' vast story that partially keeps him coming back to the role. Further, while he's done more than Kingdom Hearts work, it's the the most commonly brought up thing by fans.

"I was doing a Q&A in Philadelphia and almost all the questions were about when the next Kingdom Hearts was coming out — and that was seven years ago," said the actor.

As you may know, to date the series has sold over 20 million copies, and while it's still too early to tell how Kingdom Hearts III has performed commercially, its impressive start in Japan (600,000 units sold in the first week), it's critical praise, and the general hype around the game at launch, suggests it will do just fine. And for Osment, this really isn't a surprise, given the quality of the series.

"You have some of the best creative minds in gameplay and storytelling," said Osment about the franchise's lasting popularity. "The variety of worlds and how complex the gameplay is is how [the developers] have kept up with the international arms race that is video games now."

While Kingdom Hearts is adored by many, it's also criticized by large swaths of gamers and critics for its increasingly convoluted story that has unraveled and taken shape across 10 different titles. But don't feel bad if you can't keep the series' story straight, even Sora sometimes can't.

"I remember when I was doing Kingdom Hearts 2, we had this poster board with arrows and all the plot points to help keep it straight," said Osment.

That said, while things get complicated sometimes, and conflicting schedules between himself and Square Enix in Tokyo can cause issues when scheduling recording sessions, Osment is more than happy to continue to play the role.

"I'd be happy playing this character forever," said Osment.