My expectations of the game before purchase were completely surpassed after actually going through the game for the first 10 minutes. The font design almost immediately made my eyes go wide. Obviously the art style as a whole is wonderful, but the fonts were something I could not stop thinking about. The idea of highlighting character traits through the use of various fonts was such a light-bulb moment for me because it's often taken for granted, but when done right, was so effective. And it was done with such consistency, thoughtfulness and wit. There is a lot of detail that go beyond a choice of fonts: the ink dripping on the parchment to show strong emotion, the different rate of typos and misspellings depending on the person I am talking to, the sound those fonts are associated with...no decision is random. In one instance Andreas was talking to a character who initially uses the regular font as the other peasant characters - but the moment Andreas realized that he was able to read, the font switched to something more sophisticated. Which was so unexpected and smooth, but at the same time managed to feel so sensible.
(Also, this research is interesting)
The art style carried a lot of weight, but the plot is not coming up short. It shines in subtle ways so that the art feels weightier. Even though it's driven by mostly clicking through conversations, the thing that made it not feel dry or boring was, honestly, just how well paced those conversations were, eventually I started to genuinely feel interested in what the characters had to say/do. (Which is why it still throws me in a rage when I think about Otto's death, at the same time I'm beyond happy that I made the decision to encourage Endris to pursue his love. Most importantly: JUSTICE FOR CASPER 
). Once the game was able to do that, everything else was a bonus.
The context of reformation hangs lightly as a backdrop, and despite the heavier plot line in Act 2, the plot did not turn into a class in history. Again, it was about making me truly care about the villagers as individuals and their personal/their families' turmoil, with or without acknowledgement, or self-awareness, of the bigger historical context they were placed in. (There is something off-putting about characters that are too self-aware - there are none that exist in this game.)
If i have to complain about one thing, I do think act 3 was somewhat disjointed. The change of main character was not an issue - I found it interesting to see a different perspective, ~~even though I do feel Magdalene is not as well written as Andreas ~~ but the change of the pace in story telling was throwing me off. The fast-forward of time, the sudden reappearance of Andreas, and the incomplete-ness of the Roman site, all contributed to the sense of a plot line that was rushing to wrap up. Things that could be hinted had to be now spelled out. It was just a different vibe from the first 2 acts.
(And it's not because Magdalene's sometimes-hilariously-unnecessary-barbed response options lol. Btw, I did not even pick the barbed option for her. Although I kind of appreciate how she's able to snap back if she chooses to.)
An image that I would remember for a long time would be Andrea's mind maze - or rather the whole experience that comes with this maze. With the simple sound effect of footsteps, and the quiet appearance of Sabine and August, this maze punched me on my tear duct twice. It would not have been possible without the other quiet moments that led up to it, with their rich illustrations, and scratching of pen tips on parchment. Sometimes I forget that it was a whodunit and there were still parts of the story that I did not resolve - but I'll leave those mysteries to a second play through.