The third trailer for
Frozen II, was released today and as I said before, it's bound to be one of the returning worlds in the next numbered KH title. On top of that more areas for Sora, Donald and Goofy to be involved in.
Also a week ago the Japanese Poster from Frozen 2 was released last week suggesting it looks to be coming out the same day it releases in the US (November 22) for Japan instead of Spring 2020. Seems to me that Frozen 2 is coming in KHIV sooner than later:
I won't really argue that. Xaldin was used much better in Beast Castle then Marluxia was at Kingdom of Corona. But that's mainly because of how strict the Tangled world was to it's plot. Had they have had more freedom we might have seen Gothel and Marluxia actually teamup, which would have been amazing. I wish the Organization could actually teamup with the Disney villains the same way Sora teams with the heroes. Marluxia/Gothel, Larxene/Hans, Vanitas/Randall, Luxord/Davy Jones! I feel like those could have really spiced up things on the villains side in Disney worlds. I hope we get things like that in KH4.
Tbh, from all the Disney worlds that had the most guidelines and less freedom in
Kingdom Hearts III it's the following in the order:
- Frozen (Obviously, as said in most interviews by Nomura and the development team and MOST KH fans)
- Monster's Inc.
- Tangled
- Toy Story (to some degree, but not quite)
Don't forget while
Frozen may be the Disney world with the most guidelines in KH3, apparently Pixar also did put guidelines to Nomura and his team on the worlds, based on their films that appeared in the game (Toy Story and Monster's Inc.) with the most notable being that they followed an original storyline instead of a retelling of the movie. Personally that's the only change I didn't mind since it did protect the "canon" of each Pixar film and allowed for Sora, Donald, and Goofy to be involved in the character's world and have good interactions with the instead of being a retelling of the movie's plot, cause Pixar is known for their storytelling hence why most of their movies get critical acclaim. From all the Pixar worlds, that Pixar was strict on I'd say the Monster's Inc. world had the "most control" from Pixar when compared to the
Toy Story world imao, given that the prevented us from fighting Randall as a boss, but when compared with CLU (DDD) and Gaston (KHx) I can understand why we didn't lay a keyblade on Randall.
For Tangled, as you said it yourself, their were many restrictions that this world had even they drastically changed a couple of characters from Tangled (Mother Gothel and especially Flynn Rider). Even this video seem to sum up the problems of the Tangled world in their opinion:
Plus I said this before, after Rapunzel and Gothel encountered Marluxia ONCE, none of them ever brought up his name again for the majority of the world and pretend like it was nothing. At least in Olympus, The Caribbean, Toy Box, Monstropolis and San Fransokyo (mainly the latter three worlds) the inhabitants (besides the ones that join Sora's party) acknowledge the Organization XIII member instead of just seeing them and brushing them off like it was nothing.
The Toy Story world as far goes as restrictions/guidelines, I didn't see any that were in the level as Frozen/Tangled and Monster's Inc., but some complaints said that most are disappointed we didn't explore other locations from the film series (e.g. Al's Toy Barn) and the only ones we got are Andy's House and Galaxy Toys.
San Fransokyo (Big Hero 6) was the only new Disney world in KH3 I'd say that Disney didn't put Guidelines and restrictions given that it was set after the events of the movie instead of being a retelling of the original film.
As for Olympus, 100 Acre Wood, and The Caribbean, I don't know if their were ANY restrictions on those worlds given that most of the people who worked on those films weren't involved with the game and they just allowed Nomura and his Team to do what they want given that they appeared in previous KH titles (particularly the first two worlds). So it's going to be interesting what future Disney worlds will have guidelines/restrictions in future games and which ones will have no restrictions and allow Nomura and his team to do whatever they want with the worlds.
Regarding villain teamup with the Disney villains, I'm neutral with this, given that in the first game and in KH3, it seems that the original KH villains just used the Disney villains as "pawns/puppets" for their own use and benefits (e.g. Ansem, Seeker of Darkness and to a degree Xehanort to Maleficent and her council of villains (Jafar, Hades, Oogie, Ursula, Captain Hook) in KH; Marluxia to Mother Gothel; Vanitas to Randall). The closest we got of a villain teamup was Vanitas/Randall, but in the end Randall too was a "pawn" to Vanitas in the same way Marluxia did it to Mother Gothel. But's that's a story for another post in a different thread.