This right here is exactly why I was so disappointed by the secret ending of KHIII. The whole movie seemed to have been a "Look how amazing and lifelike these graphics are" when they were pretty par the course for many games. KHI and II's secret endings had amazing graphics as well, but they weren't indicative of the final product we got in the teased game, so the graphics alone are not a selling point at all for me. At the time though, I found the graphics in I and II to be truly mind-blowing because of where technology was at the time, but the main intrigue of those movies for me was the action and the mysteries they were setting up. Just having random text and quotes flood the screen was much more thought-provoking than what we got in KHIII's secret ending in my opinion.
In KHIII's secret ending, there was literally no action, just Sora and Riku waking up in yet another city. Sora and Riku being amazed at their surroundings never made sense to me because they've been in similar settings, Sora being in one from that same game. So, all we got was a secret ending with no intriguing text, no action, yet another figure in a black coat (if I never see these outfits used ever again in a KH game, it will be soon) that most correctly speculated was the MoM, and simply a showcase of graphics that weren't really as impressive as I think SE thought. The other secret endings really pumped me up for what was to come in the series and I couldn't wait for the next game. This one was just "meh, I'll wait and see." Though, to be fair, 10+ games in, I'm not sure if any secret movie could keep my investment up as high as it once was.
Forgive me if I am misunderstanding your comment but it does feel a bit like you are comparing apples to oranges with the secret endings, which is slightly unfair. The original secret endings for KH1 and KH2 (another side another story and the gathering) are VERY different from the final mix version secret endings of 1 and 2 (deep dive and birth by sleep) which were quite expanded and added a LOT more content. KH3's vanilla secret ending is much more in line with the former set rather than the later set. However, KH3's "final mix" secret ending would be imo the entire sequence from Sora waking up in Yozora's final world through the end of his battle with Yozora and the final scenes depending on win or loss. So in that sense KH3's final secret ending is incredible because its technically playable--a first. So if you are going to be comparing things like Deep Dive or Birth By Sleep secret ending to KH3 you should probably be comparing it to the Re:mind version of the secret ending.
Apologies if you were strictly talking about ASAS and Gathering, I wasn't sure.
Now, if we are talking about the vanilla secret endings as a whole, obviously people are entitled to be hyped by different things, but just my opinion on the matter is that the vanilla KH3 ending trailer was just as hype if not more for me personally than, say, the vanilla KH2 one, the Gathering. Maybe this is because I live in Tokyo, but suddenly seeing Sora wake up somewhere and realizing all too suddenly like "wait what the hell thats Shibuya--why is he there? HOW is he there?"
It was a really cool moment for me because I could recognize the landmarks the game was teasing immediately and it opened a HUGE can of questions. It didn't need text posing random gibberish quotes because the images themselves were intriguing enough. "Is it ACTUALLY Shibuya? Is it the WEWY Shibuya? Isn't he supposed to be dead though? Do KH characters go to the real world when they die!? But...Riku was there..."
We were essentially told "hey, Sora and Riku are somehow in the real world now. Maybe. And also the person who was supposed to be a video game character ISN'T just a video game character which means KH might be getting insanely meta"
Not only that but imo it was pretty dang cool seeing the KH characters in my city, and laughing at the little joke about the MoM essentially standing on top of the Square Enix building.
To me it left WAY more unanswered questions that I could actually theorize about, vs something say, The Gathering. In that ending I saw 3 people I didn't know and had no reason to care for standing around and just sort of...picking Keyblades up with ominous quotes from ansem reports flashing at me. It felt like a promotional movie teaser trailer that tells me basically nothing but "hey, I guess we are going to learn about Keyblades and the past of Keyblade wielders or something". Then....that's it really. Not saying it is BAD, but I didn't particularly feel hyped after watching it. I was more confused than anything else. There is also not a lot of "action" in this trailer either, honestly. They just walk forward a bit and pick Keyblades up out of the dirt.
I get hyped when I get actual tangible morsels of concepts I can actually theorize with, and also offers me information about characters that I already have a reason to care about. It's why ASAS was absolutely spectacular. It was very cinematic, but also teased the fates of characters I was already invested in.
I think there was a really nice balance with the KH3 vanilla and with the Re:mind secret endings.
Not that I think you should change your mind, you can feel however you like-- just trying to give some insight into why I liked the KH3 one.
i think they wre really just flexing with how far their technological abilities have come. "Look, we can basically recreate a Pixar movie in the game now"
Well, no. It wasn't about "recreating a Pixar movie" in terms of graphics, it was about capturing the STYLE of the movie. It's why Olympus Coliseum opens with a narrator talking about Hercules and Hades (because that's how the movie Hercules starts). It's why Kingdom of Corona opened with young Rapunzel talking to Mother Gothel about needing to stay in the tower, because that's how the movie started.
They introduced a flashy crazy out of the world high-budget cutscene of stuff that makes no sense only to pull the rug out and be like PSYCHE it was a COMMERCIAL....because that's what Toy Story did in their opening to the movie.
