Kingdom Hearts IV will have different worlds, seemingly confirming it will not be an open-world game

Kingdom Hearts IV, the latest upcoming title of the beloved Disney and Square Enix franchise has officially been announced. Naturally, fans have run rampant on different theories for the upcoming JRPG including whether or not Kingdom Hearts IV will be an open-world game. There are already thoughts that Endor from Star Wars will be a world in Kingdom Hearts IV and while we don’t know for certain it appears that there will be different worlds that Sora will be traveling to that isn’t Quadratum, the Shinjuku inspired metropolis that he appears in during the reveal trailer.

During the 20th anniversary event in which Kingdom Hearts IV was shown for the first time, Kingdom Hearts creator Tetsuya Nomura shared with those in attendance that the development team is working on the worlds for Kingdom Hearts IV right now. This more or less debunks the theories that the next big Kingdom Hearts title would be an open-world game taking place entirely in Quadratum.

Fans of the series speculated as such with the introduction of Verum Rex, a video game that was a part of the Toy Story world in Kingdom Hearts III. It was later learned that Yozora, the main protagonist of Verum Rex is in fact real and Verum Rex takes place in Quadratum. Verum Rex also has a very close resemblance to Final Fantasy Versus XIII, a project that Nomura was working on over a decade ago which eventually evolved into Final Fantasy XV.

Even with Kingdom Hearts IV not being an open-world title that doesn’t mean it is completely out of the question. Both Nomura and series co-director Tai Yasue said that they made Kingdom Hearts IV over Verum Rex, but didn’t shoot down the idea of a game staring Yozora wouldn’t or couldn’t happen.

Now Kingdom Hearts fans can begin waiting to see which worlds based on Disney-owned IP will be making their way to the latest chapter of the franchise.