Ever since Sora from the Kingdom Hearts series was revealed as the final DLC fighter for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, fans have been making references to the theme song "Simple and Clean". It's performed by Utada Hikaru has been heard across multiple Kingdom Hearts games over the years.
Unfortunately, it didn't make the cut in Smash Bros. Ultimate - but Alexander Trevino and the team over at Zelda Universe have found a way to pay tribute to it with their ongoing project that is now finally complete.
Apart from Piranha Plant, none of the DLC characters actually get custom dialogue when activating Palutena's Guidance on Palutena's Temple level in Smash Ultimate, so that's the aim here - to swap out the generic conversation with custom dialogue for each DLC fighter.
As much we would like to have seen this Kingdom Hearts track (also known as Hikari) in the game, it seems this unofficial one is as good as it's going to get. About the only other alternative was Sora's reveal, as highlighted by Kotaku:
"In Sora’s reveal clip for Smash Bros. Ultimate, an orchestral rendition of Hikaru Utada’s “Simple and Clean” played in the background."
Although we won't get to hear this song in Smash, there are still nine other new tracks to enjoy if you've picked up the second Fighters Pass or Sora as a standalone purchase.
After downloading Challenger Pack 11, players will also receive nine music tracks from the KINGDOM HEARTS series. An additional music track, Dearly Beloved -Swing Version, will be added to this game for those who have played KINGDOM HEARTS Melody of Memory.
The Kingdom Hearts series is also coming to the Nintendo Switch as a cloud version, so newcomers and returning fans will be able to hear the famous track once again in the near future.
What do you think of the above fan-made effort? Leave a comment down below.
[source youtu.be, via twitter.com]
Comments 19
Okay that's pretty cool. Well done.
That song is the most early 2000s thing ever and I love it for that.
Not exactly fond of the music we got. The boring ass KH1 fighting music and the clearly inferior version of Scherzo di Notte. Nothing from after KH1 which means no Sanctuary or any of the Organisation themes. Would have killed for The Other Promise.
It was actually Zelda Universe... I know the difference from using Zelda Dungeon's walkthroughs as a kid, (thanks Mases and Caleb), plus listening to Zelda Universe's fantastic dubs of Zelda game!
@nessisonett
Not to mention The 13th Struggle, Rowdy Rumble, Tension Rising, Deep Drive, A Fight to the Death, Dark Dive, Wave of Darkness, Edge of Existence, and Yozora!
A real shame the licensing issues didn't allow this song to be part of Sora's music selection. With the absence of Donald, King Mickey and Goofy (not even as spirits), this DLC simply feels incomplete.
Dman that nostalgia watching that opening again
That opening immediately takes me back to my 10 year old self booting KH1 up on Christmas morning 2002, shaking with excitement when the CG cutscene started!
Such a shame Simple & Clean didn't make it into Smash. As someone who works with music rights in TV shows now, I dread to think how much the license fee was for it for it to have not made the cut!
My favorite was the DLC guidance with Sephiroth and Pyra/Mythra. Hilarious
But this was pretty good. Nostalgia trip while watching the whole thing.
@rushiosan It's fitting really when u think about it, When you play smash tournaments half off the games content is removed/banned and in Sora's case more than half of his games was not used.
And as long as Live and Learn is in smash Sonic will always have the best song in the game.
Fun to see fans do little things like this. Still really wish the orchestrated version was in the game though. It’s one of my fav video game music pieces ever.
@nessisonett They should have at least pulled a few tracks from KH2, since I believe that was one of Yoko Shimomura's best soundtracks. I personally would have liked to see Sinister Sundown, Tension Rising and 13th Struggle.
the included KH music was pretty disappointing. The only low point of the DLC
I didn't play that much of every Kingdom Hearts game to get into its music but I find Nintendo maybe a bit lazy not to include new official Palutena's Guidance to all the DLC fighters. I know the Snake codecs only works with the Brawl roster in Ultimate but would of been nice to have updated ones to all the newcomers in SSB4 and Ultimate as well. If Nintendo ever release a definitive version of this game I hope they add more of those to it.
As for Hikari Simple and Clean the singing version, remember that the song originally had nothing to do with Kingdom Hearts and is not own by Square Enix, Disney, or even Utada Hikaru herself so getting the song's rights for Smash Bros. Ultimate is literally impossible. This fan made tribute is a nice throwback though.
The song was great, and the follow-up Guidance was even better: think of Viridi's Piranha Plant rant and extend it to Kingdom Hearts lore. It's glorious. Zelda Universe's efforts pretty much show why we need Guidance for DLC fighters too.
Hikari is one of my favorite Utada songs, and it was neat to hear afterward she made an English version of it (Simple and Clean) for the Kingdom Hearts game. True star power there, for the Japanese market at least!
I haven't played any KH games and I'm not particularly interested in Sora for Smash, but the absence of that great song really is such a shame. Couldn't they work out an instrumental cover of it?? Sheesh.
Makes me respect Super Robot Taisen games with all that licensed music that much more.
I don’t play Smash but I’ve watched the Sora trailer over and over because it is glorious. That music brought me right back, for better or worse, and will result in a KH binge in the near future.
oh that was dope
This made my day so much
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