PS4

Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue

Role-playing (RPG)Adventure

Time to beat: about 18.2 hours
Plays offline: Yes

Overview

Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue is a compilation of games from the Kingdom Hearts series, developed and published by Square Enix. A successor to the Kingdom Hearts HD 2.5 Remix game compilation, the new title was announced in September 2015 and released in January 2017 on PlayStation 4, on February 18, 2020, on Xbox One, and on March 30, 2021, and June 13, 2024, on Windows via Epic Games Store and Steam respectively. A cloud version of the collection was released for the Nintendo Switch on February 10, 2022. Ports for Nintendo Switch 2, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S were released on October 8, 2026.

Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue includes a high-definition remaster of Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance (2012). This title covers how protagonists Sora and Riku prepared for the return of the antagonist Xehanort. The collection also includes two new pieces of content set in the Kingdom Hearts series. The first, Kingdom Hearts χ Back Cover, is a "cinematic" film based on the game Kingdom Hearts χ. It includes events not shown in that game regarding the earliest parts of the series' story. The other title, Kingdom Hearts 0.2: Birth by Sleep, A Fragmentary Passage, is an original game that takes place after the events of Dream Drop Distance. This title revealed what happened to the protagonist Aqua during her time lost in the Realm of Darkness. To avoid having too much backstory in Kingdom Hearts III, series director Tetsuya Nomura chose to place this story he long desired to tell in this collection. Back Cover and A Fragmentary Passage are the tenth and eleventh installments in the Kingdom Hearts series.

Critics had varied opinions on the value of the game compilation. Most praised the quality of the graphics, utilizing technology then being developed for the upcoming Kingdom Hearts III. Some also praised the role of the collection in filling story gaps in the storyline of the Kingdom Hearts series. Some, however, criticized the release of the compilation as a teaser for Kingdom Hearts III.