Aqua doesn't have to be norted / fallen to darkness to present a challenge. Getting into the realm of darkness won't be easy, finding her won't be easy, surviving there won't be easy, getting out won't be easy and it will be hard for her to hear what has become of her friends and the world and there was even a whole game about her hardships and people still think "it shouldn't be so easy to get her", like what? Personally, I think it's much more fulfilling to choose a few of the hurting squad and give them a chance to get back at Xehanort for all the things he has done to them in one way or the other and fight for what they lost or what they want to regain. Having Sora / Riku / Kairi / Mickey go against everyone else because every important character might've suddenly got norted and saving them by beating them all up even though it should be up to the hurting squad to reclaim their place doesn't sound very thrilling to me.
Yes, all of this. Characters like Aqua and Xion and Ven have way more potential for growth and a meaningful contribution to the story as protagonists with agency, free will and the drive to right the wrongs in their arcs than as just more villain fodder for Sora or whoever to purify and turn back to the light at the last minute. Which is exactly what we know is going to happen, so there's no dramatic intrigue to it. All it really represents is a way for Nomura to sideline these characters for large portions of the game and neglect his due diligence to develop their arcs in a big way for the final game in this saga, which diminishes the value of KH3 as an installment. Did you really like fighting as Aqua and form a strong connection to her character over the course of BBS and 0.2? Welllll too bad, you'll see fleeting glimpses of her for 90% of KH3 and then she'll be a good guy again for five minutes and all the bad things she did under the influence of darkness will be instantly forgotten and forgiven. Her being a Darkness is a narrative gimmick, nothing more-- I don't expect to be permanently changed or affected as a character, so I have no reason to feel invested in her fall to darkness.
People complain that it would have been too predictable and "easy" for Riku and Mickey to simply bring Aqua back from the RoD (despite all the factors you brought up) but for whatever reason Nomura using the same exact tactic over and over and recreating the exact same existential stakes for everyone in this game is challenging and fresh? It was one thing when it was Isa and Terra who actually have something to
gain as characters from their battle with the darkness and Xehanort's influence; indeed, they have arcs steeped in that primary conflict which need to be brought to closure in a satisfying manner. But Darkness loses a lot of its symbolic potential when its hosts seem to be just a random grab bag of anybody for whatever reasons. Why not just throw in Ansem the Wise, or hell, make Goofy a Darkness? That would be soooo unpredictable y'all.
EDIT: If Aquanort is a thing, I don't believe it was planned because 0.2 ended on a generally positive note and the whole game was about Aqua facing her darkness and while admitting doubt and chasing illusions, ultimately regaining hope and deciding what's worth fighting for. She has survived there un-darknessed and un-norted for twelve years, so making her into a Nort just one year before she is going to be saved and even giving her a companion to talk to (even if not the best one) would feel kinda unnatural to me. So, currently it still feels like a shock value thing to me and I'm not really pleased with that.
Yeah, it's pretty convenient that she *finally* lost the light as she was on the brink of potentially getting out of the RoD (I actually think she ought to have escaped much earlier with AtW, but that's another conversation). If Nomura wanted to make this convincing? He would have chosen a different course in 0.2, actively depicted Aqua losing her light bit by bit and ended it with her succumbing. That would have been a valid cliffhanger which would possibly help place her arc in KH3 into perspective. Instead it's this wishy washy noncommittal symbolism that gets him into trouble, because he can't in one breath invoke the "light in the darkness" mantra that underscores the entire series and then out of the other side of his mouth try to convince us that was all just talk this whole time.
The prospect of the BBS and Days characters finally joining the fray on the right side, meaning on Sora's, has been certainly teased and used as a possible hook for the audience ever since Blank Points in BBS back in 2010 so people expecting somewhat of a follow up on this is very understandable, as is the notion of not wanting this happening only with a few cameo appearances in the final battle.
Exactly: this is pretty much the entire justification for KH3's existence vis-a-vis every other title we were expected to play and every character we were expected to become familiar with and attached to over the course of the saga. Again, it would be one thing if these characters were somehow going to get powerful, emotionally strong storylines out of this, but that's not what's happening. More than likely, Xion and Aqua and whoever else will be reduced to having about the same impact on the plot as Luxord or Larxene, and possibly even less than characters like Vanitas, Xemnas and Ansem SoD-- because unlike with those characters, Nomura has to play keep-away with the Darknesses he doesn't want Sora and co. to meet too early for the ~dramatic~ impact. It also diminishes the story's capacity to bring characters like Terra and Isa into focus and give them especially powerful redemptive arcs, which is what they deserve: instead they'll just be two more bad guys in need of rescuing, assuming Terra is even a Darkness at this point.
would you rather everyone getting saved so easily that makes Sora going on this adventure pointless
or
everyone Sora has to save he has to fight be unfulfilling because why not try to make the Seekers a threat?
That's simply a false dichotomy. The Seekers and the darkness are not the only threats or obstacles KH can pursue in order to complicate the narrative. Just bringing Xion back in any way, shape or form should be a massive and perhaps even perilous undertaking given the extent to which she is tangled up in other peoples' memories: remember when CoM spent an entire game barely even mentioning the word "darkness" (Reverse/Rebirth notwithstanding) and instead created compelling drama using the emotions and memories of our main protagonists against them? Because it doesn't look like Nomura does.
But Aqua falling to darkness? Succumbing to everything she was holding back in 0.2? It makes sense for Aqua to have fallen eventually. This is the dark realm. THE Dark Realm. Every light eventually get snuffed out, Aqua is not a special case no matter how much we love her. She admitted she had cracks in her heart and the darkness found a way in and repeatedly tried to die at least 3 times now
Not going to rehash this whole argument, just going to say it's not that there isn't an in-world logic to her falling, but its justification is weak and I don't believe the returns we will get on it are going to deliver for her as a character. Obviously within the RoD it's possible for someone to fall prey to darkness, but Nomura could have used 0.2 to advance that narrative instead of playing it in exactly the opposite direction and once a character's resolve has been given the kind of grounding Aqua's was given in 0.2 (i.e. literally the embodiment of the series' core philosophy; yes, I get that she was sad and depressed in portions but playing that up selectively in order to justify a plot twist is just as bad as ignoring it altogether) it's pretty cheap and underhanded to dismantle that set-up in as shrugging a manner as Nomura looks to be doing it. What is the message we're supposed to take away from this? "Actually, there's not always a light in the darkness, it just kind of depends on how Nomura is feeling about the plot that day lol."
Saying “everyone is norted†is an exaggeration. Only Terra, Aqua, and most likely Xion. Who’s to say those 3 won’t get a chance to get back at Xehanort?
Ven will be effectively Norted if Vanitas gains access to his body. Also can't rule out Roxas as a Darkness yet. The point is that you can only pull the same stunt so many times before it becomes routine. We jumped that shark during E3.
Just because they’re norted now it doesn’t seal their fate the whole game. They could be turned back around/before the climax or after the X-blades forging.
Which means all that valuable time they could have been developed during the rest of the game, y'know, had interactions and formed or reestablished relationships with the rest of the main cast, has been lost. That's the damage. We all know they're going to get rescued, but if there's nothing to get excited for after that, what's the point? So they can cameo as assist characters during the last big fight? Even that's speculative at this point, and not the extent of what I want to see out of main characters like Aqua and Xion.
Aquanort not being a thing would be Shock value. Having people think Aqua was norted in a trailer than being all “Psych†in game would have been done just to get people’s attention and also a massive troll move.
It wouldn't be "shock value," it would be a normal red herring. KH trailers are generally full of them. I don't like them either, but I'd rather see Aqua get the development she deserves than see the final game maintain fealty to bad plot elements introduced in marketing material.
