Hey, one of the writers here. Thanks for taking the time to do a detailed write up. I will generally agree with you that the story could have been tighter in places. About what was happening on screen, it was mentioned when Root and Hugo first show up that he was imagining things/they were roleplaying most of it. I didn't want us to be restricted by the format of the setting and result in a dry script, so it was intentionally written more like a traditional Visual Novel experience with a splash of MMO flavor at times. I understand how it could be confusing. I didn't want to bloat the text with repeated reminders about how none of this was technically real, but it could've been communicated more clearly, or simply implemented better. For a lot of the other stuff, it comes down to taste and personal preference. The darker jokes, anachronisms, tonal shifts, fourth wall breaks, were all intentionally done. Some of the jokes definitely won't land for some people, but that's okay.