I found a good criticism of FGO's Story, specifically Nasu stuff. They say that having a choices based the self-insert protagonist prevents Nasu from doing his strongest suit in writing: Self-Introspective Monologue+Internal Analysis. They say that Nasu's strongest ability has always been this even as back in KnK, and some of Fate's strongest moments are based on this. They say that FGO's Format makes it so that doing this is difficult. Even more than Extra. And I kind of agree. What about you?
I think this criticism misses the point and theme Nasu is trying to make & explore in GO.
Personally I believe that, differently from both sn and Extra, this point isn’t the analysis of the main character and themes closely connected to a person (heroism and identity) but the worth of mankind’s history and experiences, as a collective, and human life in general.
What we produced, what we feel, how we connect with each other and how “we” and our history have inherent value, even in the face of the horrors we inflicted and inflict on each other and even if there’s pain and suffering and even if a life without pain isn’t possible.
Goetia’s question of why Mash and Guda feel the need to fight him when he’s just trying to make a better, happier humanity and Mash’s answer that life has meaning and value even with pain, even with death awaiting us... isn’t a question that could be answered by Shirou or Hakuno and isn’t one that can be posed in a work where the focus is on a single individual.
That’s also why the civilians, the “useless” NPC characters are necessary in this scenario and why Camelot and Babylonia were the point Nasu stopped pulling his punches, bc we players started to see the humanity Chaldea was protecting and it wasn’t a nebulous concept but a child whose mom got murdered, a old blinded lady being kind to strangers, a tired overworked secretary.
In EoR we see a timeline deemed “worthless” and Guda saving it anyway bc humans of this timeline have value too dammit, in Cosmos we’re seeing the terrible choices these abandoned rulers have to make to protect what’s left of their worlds but also the civilians of these worlds and how they live and no one ever -thankfully- tried to rationalize the destruction of these worlds bc the Yaga, the forever children and the dehumanized SIN citizens had value no matter their circumstances and not even the necessity of the -justified- fight to save the panhuman history 7 billions of lives is ever used to erase that value.
Wodime’s apparent plan to bring mankind’s back under the talon of the gods of old is seen as a bad thing while "our world” humans growing past Tiamat’s care, becoming independent and always reaching for more (for the Stars, one day? How very Dante of Nasu) is seen as good, even by Tiamat herself.
The “competition” of the Lostbelts is abhorrent and treated as such by any decent character (look at QSH going “not on my fucking watch” at the Crypters!)
“Pioneer of the Stars” are called the heroes/figures that gave all of mankind means to grow stronger, but there’s also many protectors.
These are all little parts cooperating to drive the point home, I believe, and a focus on the interiority of the protagonist would divert the attention from it.
Nasu isn’t being “prevented” to write self-introspection by GO’s format, he’s interested in telling a different kind of story and themes than usual and thus using a different format.