Man, this whole thing is like... the author had a genuinely interesting idea for a mindfucky horror story about two princesses and the horrible consequences that spiralled out from a child's error and their father's well-meaning mistake, but instead of diverting time and attention from his primary project or shelving it for later, he just... smooshed the story into the one he was already writing.
Like, this evil princess character has not remotely earned the amount of time and energy being spent on unpacking her crimes and motivations. The only character we halfway care about in this situation is the party member elf, but she's not even the central character of this arc - her evil little sister has way more agency and personality than she does.
She can't even take an active role in solving the problem, because bland ninja boy is obligated to play that part, even though he has literally no reason to be here and no interest in this conflict. Party member elf is relegated to meekly reacting to things, even she should be the reason any of this matters to us.
Even if party member elf did play a bigger role in this little sideshow, she's been here for all of five minutes. We haven't even had a chance to endear her to the audience yet, or properly set up her personal conflict, but here we are, solving it.
Really, the pieces are all here to tell at least one interesting story, but as it is, it's just a tedious distraction.
Like, this evil princess character has not remotely earned the amount of time and energy being spent on unpacking her crimes and motivations. The only character we halfway care about in this situation is the party member elf, but she's not even the central character of this arc - her evil little sister has way more agency and personality than she does.
She can't even take an active role in solving the problem, because bland ninja boy is obligated to play that part, even though he has literally no reason to be here and no interest in this conflict. Party member elf is relegated to meekly reacting to things, even she should be the reason any of this matters to us.
Even if party member elf did play a bigger role in this little sideshow, she's been here for all of five minutes. We haven't even had a chance to endear her to the audience yet, or properly set up her personal conflict, but here we are, solving it.
Really, the pieces are all here to tell at least one interesting story, but as it is, it's just a tedious distraction.