The Kingdom Hearts series might be crossing over with Star Wars, at least according to a brief tease during today’s Kingdom Hearts 4 trailer. Earlier this morning, Square Enix made a wide assortment of Kingdom Hearts-related announcements in honor of the franchise’s 20th anniversary, the most noteworthy of which was the reveal of the often speculated Kingdom Hearts 4. Fans had started to wonder if Square Enix would announce another mainline entry in its Final Fantasy/Disney JRPG crossover since such a project was teased in last year’s massive Nvidia GeForce Now data leak, and now it seems that these predictions have been proven true once again.
Today’s Kingdom Hearts 4 trailer was as cryptic as fans could expect from the infamously nebulous franchise, as series protagonist and recent Super Smash Bros. Ultimate guest star Sora awoke in a modern-style city named Quadratum and battled against a massive shadowy creature using magic and parkour-style maneuvers. Meanwhile, his ever-faithful allies Donald Duck and Goofy were shown wondering a dark void in search of someone who can help them on their latest adventure, only to come across a mysterious entity that many fans believe is Hades from Hercules. The Kingdom Hearts 4 trailer was relatively light on Disney references, but one brief tease has fans speculating that a new world could be added from the company’s ever-growing library of intellectual properties.
Not too long after today’s Kingdom Hearts 20th Anniversary stream was released, several fans have started to notice a possible Star Wars-related tease hidden within the Kingdom Hearts IV trailer. One of these fans is Twitter user dallin1016, who pointed out a brief scene in the trailer of a grassy world that strongly resembles Endor from Star Wars Episode VI: Return Of The Jedi. Even more pressing, dallin1016 points out that there is a large, circular metal structure that could be the foot of the Galactic Empire’s hulking AT-ST walkers, which were present during the climax of that film. Dallin1016's Twitter post has since exploded in likes, comments, and retweets as other fans are speculating about the possibility of Kingdom Hearts 4 including Star Wars content.
This would be a massive deal for longtime Kingdom Hearts fans, as while the series has included plenty of Disney-related worlds, characters, and storylines, most of these have remained confined to the company’s mainline animated films and offerings from Pixar - with the closest Kingdom Hearts has gotten to including worlds from other Disney-owned properties being Sora and company visiting Big Hero 6’s San Fransokyo in Kingdom Hearts III. Kingdom Hearts creator Tetsuya Nomura previously discussed the possibility of Kingdom Hearts branching into other Disney franchises in the run-up to Kingdom Hearts III's release in 2019, but he cited licensing issues among various video game publishers as being the main obstacle to their inclusion in a future Kingdom Hearts game.
However, Disney has shown a willingness to branch out the licensing rights to Marvel and Star Wars across many publishers over the past couple of years, so it’s possible that the House of Mouse could allow Square Enix to feature worlds like Endor in a future Kingdom Hearts title. Star Wars in particular would be a good match for Kingdom Hearts due to both franchises’ shared themes of light battling darkness, and the dreaded AT-ST could make for a formidable boss battle should Endor indeed be featured in the recently announced Kingdom Hearts IV.
Source: dallin1016/Twitter