End of the World and Final World

[kirabook]

Sorry if this has been discussed before. It's been a while since the initial release of KH3 and I did do a surface level search before posting this.

I've been watching some gamers do blind playthroughs of Kingdom Hearts recently. I mean, I always do, it's a favoirte past time, but there's been a wave of newbies lately giving plenty of cool reactions.

For the first time, I realized something that maybe was obvious to everyone else or someone already brought it up but.... The Final World and The End of the World are virtually the same in appearance? (at least, the surface level of End of the World). The End of the World is just more purple/lilac/dark theme while the Final World is blue/light or a starry clear sky. They're both seemingly endless plains of water that mirror reflect the sky above.

https://imgur.com/7sGIsrQ

https://imgur.com/bg9t3Bh

Not only that, in some battles in the End of the World, there's these purple looking crystal structures. They look strikingly similar to the huge crystal structure Sora has to maneuver to gather himself.

https://imgur.com/chlsEU3

https://imgur.com/S59SCuq

This makes me think the Final World and The End of the World is kinda like... the kind of "Kingdom Hearts" you can make? The Kingdom Hearts of worlds (KH1), the Kingdom Hearts of Man (KH2), the "true" Kingdom Hearts which seems to be the one from BbS/KH3 maybe...... or maybe not I dunno.

ANYWAY, maybe "death" works in a similar way. End of the World is where worlds go to die. Final World is here living things go to die.


I wouldn't call this a theory or anything. After all, the connection between the two places is shaky at best and I can't think of a way this would have plot relevance. But, the design call back is interesting. It must be a callback right? Imagine The End of the World in KH3 fidelity. I bet modders could easily do that these days.

 

[KeybladeLordSora]

Don't forget, the area in EotW is called "Final Dimension."

Final World is most definitely a callback in all regards.

Oh, and yeah. When the PC version comes out and modders get to work, I'd love to see EotW in KH3. One of my fantasy mods is an expanded Keyblade Graveyard with pieces both EotW and World that Never Was haphazardly merged into the world. Complete with enemy encounters.

 

[KingdomKurdistan]

Love this.

The Final World in KH3 was Nomura back to the auteurish peak of his powers. By far the most thematically, philosophically, aesthetically, and narratively resonant part of the game.

I hadn't considered the similarities you've shown here, and upon reading the thread title I was getting ready to realise just how jarring the presence of both these seemingly contradictory worlds is. Turns out it's not jarring at all, but remarkably consistent.

Thanks!

 

[AdrianXXII]

Oh this is a nice catch I never even considered putting those dots together. Guess the generally aesthetics of the Final World were already floating around in Nomura's head back then and the world we got in KH3 was an evolution of the idea that he used for the early sections of the End of The World.