Silverblade, the weird thing is a normal map doesn't look like a greyscale version, even a colour version of the color map, so this is why I find it weird that Vue creates a bump out of a normal map. This said, it just creates a bump out of it, and it doesn't look too good in close-ups, just as a regular bump map.
Offrench: CrazyBump can also create 16bit displacement maps out of a diffuse map, did you try it in Vue? Your 3rd example is very convincing.