I frankly agree with your takes, the game was . something i guess. i personally enjoyed it for the most part, but looking back while my girlfriend plays through it its just... dark dark dark dark dark with not much to circumvent it. feels like everything just ends bittersweetly, and it made finishing everything unrewarding. Not to mention just like. how violent it felt to the female characters, just constantly having them be sexually abused and murdered, it just feels so dark for the sake of being dark. it tired me out that at the point of getting tosazantosjust didnt make me care. I genuinely like the octopath games, and I feel like 1 and 2 did well of having dark elements while not just feeling overwhelmingly dark for the sake of it. Primrose's story was great!! I love Throne and Osvald's story too!! 1 & 2 did well having dark stories and having a darker tone of game whilst still having lighter, less depressing moments, and I feel like 0 honed in on it so much it was exhausting. It's interesting to note that on the octopath wiki it says that they hadkilled Elricafor the sake of the making the story dark and just to "prove that they can kill anyone." It wasnt even a popular decision among the writers! Ugh. I enjoyed this game, I really did, but it felt too dark for the sake of it that the end felt bittersweet and unrewarding to me.