I even believe that she is the girl mentioned in the game and the third heart inside Sora.
Nah, that was Xion. There was an old heart, Ventus, then Roxas', and another that's been in Sora for around the same time as Roxas'. That's Xion's since she went back to Sora around the time Roxas went back too. Which begs the question... how did the Organization get their hands on Xion's heart? I've seen the wiki's explanation and some other places, but I disagree that Xion's heart only returned when Sora called her out since she was suffering a bit before that and tried to protect Axel.
I do wonder if Strelitzia (if she really is the nameless star) will return to life somehow... It would defeat the purpose of The Final World somewhat if all the named (eventually, for her case) characters we meet their return. I find it hard to imagine for her to not play a significant role going forward, though, so... I guess I should expect it to happen.
I just finished the game, without ever been into KH. I did watch a 3 hour video to give me an idea of what I'm in for, which helped a lot. I think there's few things now I have questions about, but less than I thought there would be.
However, I have a big problem with Kairi. Has she always been this useless? Here I thought the trope has died, but hey, it's 2019 and I'm still seeing this bs being done? It's almost as if they were about to give her some purpose and actual power, just to be kidnapped and killed for the sake of character progression.
Also, are all the KH games this easy? It felt a bit like a faceroll. It got really frustrating at the end with Org XIII - 1min battle, 7min cutscene. I just wanted more of these cutscenes to be in game or some interaction, it just got a bit frustrating. :(
It makes very little sense to me why the game would be so easy, as the main target audience seems to be the hardcore fans of the franchise, so it's not like you're trying to sell it to kids who are into Disney, because let's be real - they'll most likely hate it.
Oh! I was just wondering how newcomers felt about the game since I hadn't seen any yet. I'm glad to hear you enjoyed it and understood it for the most part, it seems? Sadly though, yeah... Kairi. I had such high hopes for the character and was really hoping we'd get to play her and kick Heartless butt with her but Nomura said otherwise. All this buildup since Kingdom Hearts II amounted to mostly nothing in terms of her combat prowess. As much as I love this game, there are quite a bit of disappointing things that happened with the characters with many of them falling short of what I would expect of them. All three Keyblade Masters were defeated fairly throughout the story, for example.
Seriously, it really bugs me that Aqua just took that Firaga at face value like that. She blocks with Barrier, for Pete's sake.
Kingdom Hearts III is the easiest game in the entire series, by far. Which is very disappointing indeed because as you said, fans have been waiting for this conclusion for a very long time now so it would have been great if it was a satisfying challenge as well. I didn't die once (by the time I finished the story, at least) on Proud and I generally suck at Kingdom Hearts combat, so that's saying something.
Larxene was totally happy. Vanitas was never meant to be, he was simply emotions, YX went back to his time. They were not punished.
Larxene was just glad she didn't end up becoming Xehanort's vessel. Vanitas is coalesced darkness from Ven's heart and can't really be redeemed cause there isn't even the tiniest fraction of good in him. Returning to your time or wherever you're from is... just that. That doesn't change anything about a person or make them grow in any way. None of these fall under the definition of redemption.