Kingdom Hearts 3 moves to Unreal Engine 4

Square Enix will not use its own Luminous Engine for Kingdom Hearts 3. The developer and publisher prefers Unreal Engine 4, which is developed by Epic Games, for several unknown reasons.

The game is not expected to be delayed by the switch to Unreal Engine 4, developer Tetsuya Nomura has told Famitsu and that has been noted on the NeoGAF forum. Square Enix would currently have some difficulty rendering the images already made, but the development of the RPG would still go according to plan. Epic Games promises to help Square Enix with any problems it encounters. The Luminous Engine still serves as the basis for Final Fantasy XV.

Kingdom Hearts 2 was released in 2005 for the PlayStation 2 and 3. The last game in the series, Kingdom Hearts 3D: Deam Drop Distance, was released in 2012 for the Nintendo 3DS. In 2010, it was already rumored that Kingdom Hearts 3 would be developed. Nomura stated at the time that the game would not be released until after Final Fantasy Versus XIII. Kingdom Hearts 3 is expected in 2015 for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.