Sora has been announced as Super Smash Bros. Ultimate's final fighter, and some Kingdom Hearts fans might have noticed a subtle difference about the stage he is bringing with him.
That's it, folks. It's all over. Masahiro Sakurai has revealed a Smash Bros. fighter to us for the final time, and as many expected, it is Sora from Kingdom Hearts. While expected by some, and a disappointment to a few, Sora in Smash is a big deal. While there are plenty of non-Nintendo characters in Smash already, none are from a game created by Disney.
The arrival of a new fighter also comes with new music and, of course, a new stage. Sora's stage is Hollow Bastion, but like some of Smash Ultimate's other stages, it will eventually transform. After a certain period of time, Hollow Bastion will become Dive To The Heart.
Pretty cool, although Kingdom Hearts aficionados immediately noticed something about Smash Ultimate's take on Dive To The Heart is awry. The stained glass window in the background is supposed to showcase a few iconic characters from Kingdom Hearts. In the games, those characters include Donald and Goofy. In Smash, they have been replaced with a boat and a paopu fruit.
There's no mention of why the pair needed to be replaced, though it seems likely that their presence would have cost Nintendo a lot of money. Moments before Mario frees Sora during the reveal trailer, a Mickey Mouse keychain is shown on screen. It might seem wild, but that alone probably took a lot of back and forth between Nintendo and Disney. Sakurai did openly admit how hard it was to get Sora into Smash and discussed how many years it has taken to make it happen.
No Goofy and Donald in the background of a stage also means there is very little chance of them being added to Smash in the future, perhaps via assist trophies now that Sora is in the game. Plenty of people have already noticed, some of which have been having fun with it. A few players have jokingly pointed out Goofy and Donald were added to Smash a while ago, pointing to Duck Hunt Duo as the evidence.