LogFAQs > #962856777

Also: @NBIceman , I don't remember reading your post above. WHOOPS! Definitely missed that since you posted it while I was playing and I had the con the next day. A few replies:
-Artorius creating a calamity that he could then solve to be a hero was what I interpolated as his motive. Now I only believe the hero part. Celica's sacrifice was an accident. That caused a desire to be the hero who "solved daemonblight" - but it could have Melchior's manipulation (despite them knowing each other beforehand?). But he never created a calamity. The Scarlet Night and the cross in the sky that were emblazoned into my head so it was natural to connect those dots. Because of this... Artorius is kind of a meh villain for me too. Velvet admired him and I do agree in a different timeline, she's the henchwoman that Eleanor was. I don't remember her logical deductions since that was a long time ago for me.
-Melchior is indeed the true villain, because it manipulated Artorius and used him as a puppet figurehead, tried to pin the blame on daemons when everything was its doing, probably caused "unfortunate accidents," created a fake Aball to trap Velvet, thought it was the hero despite all this, and, most importantly, murdered thousands of people and took away any reason for anyone else to live. It is a monster. It is not human.
-Which leads me to your point about the Abbey being so irredeemably evil. I agree that defining so clearly who is good and who is evil goes against the previous themes where you questioned whether Velvet was in the right or not. That helped make the narrative compelling, and for the Abbey to turn out to be some of the most vile villains I have ever encountered threw it all out the window. It became clear who the true calamity is, and that's Melchior.
-This world is indeed bleak and depressing compared to other JRPGs I've played. Vesperia is the exact opposite of this in that, aside from Capua Nor, it's... just a bright and airy place where you can do anything. That makes for a boring game. This doesn't.
-Thanks for clearing up the Hexen Isle scene. It was hard to tell that he was actually pulling out all the stops and she was strong enough to resist those artes. I thought that given the thing's track record, you'd think he could have gone "Avada Kedavra!" and boom. That, in retrospect, makes Magilou an even BIGGER badass.
-And yes, Berseria's cast is awesome. There are six equally developed members of it who all interact like they're real.