A friend of mine from Japan working for MediaWorks Inc. that creates the Japanese Magazine “Dengeki PlayStation” recently interviewed Yoko Shimomura for an article for the June edition. I’ll post that at the time, but she also gave him a short sample of the theme she has planned for the new member of the Organization in Kingdom Hearts: 358/2 Days!

So he emailed me the new track, temporarily entitled “The XIVth Member”, which is just over a minute long and sounds absolutely fantastic! Feel free to download it yourselves from either FileFactory or MegaUpload below:

Enjoy!

Update: The song you were actually downloading is the second section of the song “April Fool no Uta” - Hope you enjoyed it and didn’t mind the April Fool! I don’t know anyone that works for MediaWorks Inc. and I have no idea what will be in the June edition of Dengeki Playstation, but I wouldn’t be surprised if something about Kingdom Hearts will be in it. I got the music from this YouTube video:

Square-Enix have been updating their site for the Tokyo Game Show 2007, and the Official Site about the event has been updated too:

The Square-Enix site has wallpapers (although none related to Kingdom Hearts) to download and use too if you wish - Just go to the far left or right, and then up or down respectively. It’s a very interactive site with many extra features.

Kingdom Hearts doesn’t feature in the games line-up (as many people have mentioned in the comments), but that is due to the fact that the new project hasn’t been officially “announced” yet. The new video should be shown in the Closed Mega Theatre at some point over the weekend. There won’t be playable demos.

For more information, please look at the Tokyo Game Show 2007 News Post.

In other news, Yoko Shimomura has updated her blog to say that 4 Kingdom Hearts pieces will be performed at “Press Start 2007 - Symphony of Games”. The concert is being performed on the 17th and 22nd of September. (If you’re in Japan, I’d recommend going to the 17th September concert before going to the Tokyo Game Show.) One of these 4 pieces is said to be a new piece that hasn’t been heard before! The 4 pieces will form the finale of the concert. (Fans of the Black Mages will be pleased to know that they will be performing at the first of the two concerts.)

Also, apologies for the massive delay in news - For those who don’t already know, the Official Square-Enix Shop is now open:

It’s been awhile since any news has been posted, so I thought I should post this. GermanSeabass has recently done his second fantastic medley of Kingdom Hearts music improvised on piano. It also includes an interpretation of “Fate of the Unknown” using the arrangement on this site:

Still no real news about the upcoming “New Project” for now, so I decided to upload some more remixes that I’ve received, most of them absolutely brilliant! You can download them from FileFactory or MegaUpload from the new “More KH Remixes” page.

Also, for those of you still waiting for the English versions of the Atlantica songs, I should be able to get them up sometime over the coming week.

Other than confirming again that the next game will NOT be called “Kingdom Hearts III”, it has now been confirmed in Dengeki PS Magazine that:

Unfortunately, this may mean very little news for a couple of months, but we’ll still keep you up-to-date on anything new!

• TheWertle is still working on translating the Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix+ Ultimania book. We’ll hopefully be getting more scans of it as well. If you want to buy it yourself, you can get it at Play-Asia, but bear in mind that it’s 511 pages almost all in Japanese.
• We are also still getting translations on Kingdom Hearts: Another Report. The Proto Type Report should be the next to be translated.
• More Kingdom Hearts Novels are going on sale soon, apparently possibly with a little bit of information that we haven’t found out yet, but this is unconfirmed.
• After the great feedback on the “Fate of the Unknown” Piano Sheet Music, I’m working on the requests of other arrangements for that piece, as well as creating piano versions of other music from the Kingdom Hearts series by Yoko Shimomura. The Kingdom Hearts OST Complete is still available.
• The Square-Enix USA Online Merchandise Store should be opening soon, so if you’re a big fan, sign up to find out when the store opens.
• The Kingdom Hearts Complete Visual Art Book will be on sale in July if you wish to pre-order it now.
• If there are any unanswered questions about this site or about the Kingdom Hearts series that I might know, please ask in the Frequently Asked Questions section and read the Summary of Kingdom Hearts Interviews.

Hi everyone. Thought you might be interested in seeing some pics from the Eminence concert in Sydney, Australia. It was a wonderful night and a great experience (being my first gaming concert). The piece from Kingdom Hearts, “Fantasia alla Marcia” was the final piece in the program and well worth the wait. Even better was the encore, which was recognised by the whole audience as soon as the orchestra had struck the first few notes, “One Winged Angel”.

We were lucky enough to get to meet the seven special guests of honour following the concert and get some autographs. I got a chance to meet Yoko Shimomura, composer of the Kingdom Hearts music and, even though she only speaks Japanese, she understood enough English for me to tell her I love Kingdom Hearts and ask her about if there will be a Kingdom Hearts 3. She replied “Maybe. There is very good chance.” Then I asked if she would be doing the music and she answered “I hope to be”.

I just want to say if Riku hadn’t told me about the concert, I’d never have known about it or had such a great night. Thanks Riku.

Enjoy the pics.

Aerith

(Click any image to enlarge it)

(Riku: We also have a video of the Eminence Symphony Orchestra rehearsing for this 2007 concert. Enjoy it!)

Everything in this News Post has been moved to this page:

Everything in this News Post has now been moved to these pages:

With it now being past midnight in Japan, today is technically the big day! Some people have been lucky enough to have had their game arrive already though, and one of the KH-Vids staff has already got some Re: Chain of Memories Footage, all translated!

We have Kingdom Hearts Complete Official Soundtrack images. The first three are images from Play-Asia of the box set, the next two are 4 of the 9 CDs and the second is a photo of some of the artwork included. Click any images to enlarge them:

And we also have some Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix+ images taken by someone lucky enough to have the game now: