Dark Holy Elf: First off, let me say I'm among the first ones to say "screw out of game info." If it was that important, put it in the damn game, even obscurely. So yeah, I'm part of the eye-rolling crew when Niu mentions out-of-game stuff or CK rambles about Chrono Cross or Xenogears invoking Perfect Works or whatever, lala don't care. *However*, this is one of the times I'm willing to believe that there's enough already in the games to nudge me toward what Matsuno was thinking. TO still gets a demerit for not explaining what it is the conspirators seek to accomplish (that isn't the kind of plot point you want the player to puzzle out), but it's not made-up-out-of-whole-cloth level. (Also, it's definitely, definitely not to revive Dorgaula. That's more an incidental side effect, though since it's the one Our Heroes confront, I can totally see assuming it was the original plan.)
Fenrir already made the point, but in general, I'll take a plot with 90% politics and 10% SURPRIZE DEMONZ over a plot with 50% politics and 50% demons. Maybe the demons are done better in the second game, but I'd still rather have the more politics, even if it comes at the expense of the demons making sense.
It wasn't "Dorguala's sword," it was the stupid FAQ-bait item in the original Ogre Battle that apparently unlocked both the best & worst endings, and also unlocked gates to various secret levels to recruit the Dragoons or something. Stuff I didn't do in Ogre Battle, but I'm familiar with it, and I do think it's kind of cool that having established a super-sword, they remembered that it existed and made it a national treasure of Xenobia, which makes sense. (Although on that note, not a huge deal, but the plot never does explain why Lans H. thinks that the Isles are a good place to look for the sword. By all rights it should be in the high security wing of the Lodis equivalent of the Pentagon. I mean, Lans H. is right of course, and if the mission was to unseal the Hell Gate it also makes perfect sense why Lodis would risk sending Lans T. out with it, but even something vague like "spies saw Lans T. with a weird sword" would have been nice.) Going back to the point, it's a bit obscure, but it is established that opening seals is exactly the kind of thing... Brynhildir was it? Does, albeit in "pls play our whole series for best effect" form.
Fenrir already commented on setting up the internal Dark Knight politics fairly well. I still have no idea WTF Andorras was up to, betraying the Dark Knights out of spite for his homeland or something, but then intentionally letting Lans T. & Balexphon go as well? Wut? But more generally, I really liked how TO threw the normal expectations of the endgame back in your face. That's cool. I don't want everything to be too predictable; keep me on my guard some, even if that means denying some obvious confrontations. It sends a message: this world is bigger than your story. You might not even finish your story and get assassinated and killed. So yeah, no final showdown between the two Lanselots (which seemed obvious), no showdown between Hobyrim & Balexphon, they get away, suck it. It's different. Different is good sometimes.
