Kingdom Hearts IV is still in development
The official X (formerly Twitter) account for Square Enix’s Kingdom Hearts Missing-Link smartphone game announced on Wednesday that the game’s development has been canceled. The game’s development team explains that they worked hard on developing and adjusting the game, but determined that it would be difficult to offer players a service that would be satisfactory for a long period of time. The team apologizes to everyone who were looking forward to the game’s launch. The development team also assures that the Kingdom Hearts IV game is still in development.
© Square Enix
The Missing-Link staff had announced on November 19 that the game’s 2024 release window was delayed indefinitely. The game hosted a closed beta test for iOS devices from November to December in 2023.
As Square Enix noted in Wednesday’s announcement, it is also currently developing the Kingdom Hearts IV game. It most recently launched the Kingdom Hearts HD 1.5 + 2.5 Remix, Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue, and Kingdom Hearts III + Re Mind games for Nintendo Switch via cloud in February 2023. Square Enix then released the same games on PC via Steam in June 2024.
Square Enix’s Kingdom Hearts Union χ [Cross] and Kingdom Hearts Dark Road smartphone games were both originally supposed to end service in May 2021, but Kingdom Hearts Union χ [Cross] released its final story in June 2021 instead and both games switched to offline mode in the same month. Both games are available in one app. Square Enix had planned to release a new story update for the offline version of Kingdom Hearts Dark Road in 2022, but has delayed the update due a “major scenario addition.”
Square Enix released the Kingdom Hearts III game in January 2019 in Japan and the West for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. The game had shipped more than 5 million copies worldwide, including digital sales, as of February 2019, and is the fastest-selling title in the history of the franchise. The “Re Mind” DLC launched in January 2020.
Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory, the first rhythm action game in the franchise, launched for the Switch, PS4, and Xbox One in the West and in Japan in November 2020, and was previously the only title in the series available for the Switch.
The franchise also includes manga and light novel adaptations of the games, which Yen Press releases in English.
Sources: Kingdom Hearts Missing-Link game’s X/Twitter account, Oricon
