Spoilers for the story and my confusion of the endings.

[Resist]

I feel like the story takes a nose dive ever since Gustav's death. It all feels so rushed after. Verso's introduction, Alicia's plot twist, who the painters are and the entire entity of the world being a canvas of their making. It's like the ACT 1 and 2 were carefully made for years and after that it was "OH S*** WE GOT TO HURRY TO MEET DEADLINES".

The ending of the story makes no sense to me. Unless I'm missing context, due to the rushed nature of ACT3 and the introduction of the painters, I feel the stakes are all artificial and senseless. Alicia could enter and exit the canvas at any point, that was established by Verso in their final confrontation and her respond was "Papa will erase it", which he literally gave up on when you defeat him a few scenes prior. So Alicia's ending, where she basically kills herself to live in the canvas is pointless.
Same with Verso's. There is no reason for Verso to erase the canvas. It is implied the boy who is painting at the end is the real Verso's soul and he is keeping the world together, which is fine if the message is "let Verso rest in piece", but again the stakes are artificial. Every painter that was in the canvas (Alicia for 16 years, her mother and father for 67) can recreate the world if they wished to on another canvas. Alicia literally recreated the dead with old chroma. So there is no downside.

I think the game story was extremely rushed past ACT 2, there wasn't enough time to establish the canvas worlds and build the stakes. It is implied that painters pay a price for creating these worlds, but we never see it. In Verso's ending everyone is physically fine in the end. No signs of corruption, no nothing so the "No win scenario" just feels forced. I can easily see Alicia and her parents go together in a canvas and recreate the world and that should be the happy ending.

[archonsod]

Originally posted by Resist:

Alicia could enter and exit the canvas at any point, that was established by Verso in their final confrontation and her respond was "Papa will erase it", which he literally gave up on when you defeat him a few scenes prior. So Alicia's ending, where she basically kills herself to live in the canvas is pointless.

In much the same way Juliet killing herself after finding Romeo dead is pointless. Grief makes people do odd things. In Alicia's case she'd rather die in the canvas with her recreation of Verso than face the fact that he's gone. You can either kick her out and force her to deal with her grief, or let her wallow in it until she dies.

Same with Verso's. There is no reason for Verso to erase the canvas.

How much of Verso is actually Verso? How would you feel if you were trapped in a computer game and knew you could never leave and experience the real world because you were dead?

Alicia literally recreated the dead with old chroma. So there is no downside.

Well, apart from the fact what you have is basically a simulation rather than the real deal. It's one of the themes the game is pushing towards, is it better to face a painful truth or live a happy illusion?