I literally hadn't replayed Chapter 1 until like a week ago cause I only caught up on Chapter 2 before the full release, but I actually love a lot about how King and the Card Dark World are presented as part of the game as a whole and less as a standalone introduction to the game as it was in 2018. It's the darkest, simplest, and most generic feeling darkworld of the bunch, only beat out in its feeling of emptiness by the Church Dark World cause like obviously its meant to feel way more cavernous, but its themeing is still way more unique.
But that actually goes well with King being the most basic of all playthings -- a playing card. The Cyber Dark World is meant to be full and bustling, bright and distracting, as the internet is; the TV World is supposed to feel cozy and spectacular as a nostalgic studio working out of your living room should. But the Card Dark World is just very barren in comparison because its dealing with something that has no pizazz and lights to drag you into its imagination, you have to fill in all the blanks about what a card game means besides raw mechanics for yourself. And then as well as laying bare that baseness of card and board games compared to computers and TV, it also works with the fact that this world was very much not built for lightners.
The TV and Cyber World are like theme parks run by managers who need the attention and amusement of its guests to live, whereas the Card World is run by a darkner who literally hates you and is just trying to kill you outright. Its a Dark World made for darkners.
King is actually such a fucking curveball from what it seems comparing him to the other darkner bosses but hes also the first so the vibes are just off in every way. Its funny, if he was AFTER Queen and Tenna I wonder if people would find him more interesting for being the first guy to really fucking hate you. The way that Spamton stands out so much in the Cyber World for being a guy from the shadows trying to hustle you for his own gain rather than constantly appealing to your like most others.
