Each and every conceivable thing about this game screams "surface level" (pun unintended); The need for almost 90% of the game consisting of 1-dimensional characters with cheeky but ultimately useless bland dialogue just for the sake of making it easier for the more predominant/important ones shine more; the cheesy and euphemistic "friendship saves the day" cliche ; the repetitive combat system with the only surprises being the constantly inconsistent change of difficulty within the fights of any route ; how uninspirendly it toys with it's influence to the point where a great deal of it strikes me as largely unauthorial (both visually and mechanically); the shallow/irresponsible interplay with morality which almost seems funny when you consider that the game tries to make it sound like your actions matter even though the game itself is heavily indulged by self-awareness and 4-th wall breaking moments. Toby, you want me to care about this universe or not? The more characters knowing about their surrounding the less reasons I have to give a damn.
And don't even get me started on how poor the execution is sometimes. Genocide is not a thing that should be encouraged or perceived as good, yes, I know, that's understood, however, that does not mean that making the grind of this mode and the general experience painfully monotonous enhaces that point. The way the game tries to teach this is similar to how a christian mom would try to guide her child about choices she considers immoral or bad for the well-being. When the game itself is biased towards what side it thinks it's correct, it doesn't get any point across exactly because it's too desperate on that. You don't sell me this idea by sabotaging my entire path via doctrines, if it's naturally a bad thing then you wouldn't need to get in my way to make it seem like that. If that route had more movement and coherency that wouldn't stop me from knowing what I did was terrible because at the end of the day, I still would be erasing the entire world and I still wouldn't be able to ever have a good ending again. All of that bullshit is unnecessary
Contrived urgency is basically Toby's entire sthick on how he stablishes a lot of the things on this game (if you tell me there's anything more to look at Papyrus' character other than he being a silly sounding skeletor with stereotypical cocky sidekick personality or that Undyne is anything more than a over the top tough tomboy-ish knight, you're realistically projecting. These are not characters, there are running gags and that's all there's to it). You could argue that not every character needs to be complicated and I agree with you on that, Asgore for instance is an example of this, but simple does not mean that they have to be the way they are in every single situation. One of Undertale's key compromises is with development but these characters don't suffer from a major change of conciousness other than Flowey. None of them were evil so the choice of them later on deciding not to kill doesn't count as a development either, they just realized your character had no business to fight them and that's all (btw, it seems bitterly cynical that the game demonizes you for attacking creatures from an outside world as if this wasn't a plausible and compreheemsible reaction out of the fact that, well, every single one in that place wants to murder a kid, just not as cynical as the manipulative guilt trick choice to make them hesitant in fighting you back in more chaotic routes).
Do you think I'm overanalysing it too much? well excuse me but that's pratically what Undertale wants me to do considering how ambitious and pompous the entire premisse is despite at the end of the day still being that kind of thing that's so narrow that it ends up with that silly and nonsensical friendship saves the day thing. And to be fair, the existence of Deltarune as a whole makes everything about this game even worse in my eyes, considering that the 2 released chapters of that game already fix pretty much everything I've listed as an issue here, even on soundtrack. It's not as direct nor as catchy as everything on Undertale, but that's far from being something that makes it inferior. It's a game that has more purpose and dabbles upon more mature kinds of language without sacrificing it's appeal to the audience it's pandering for.
And don't even get me started on how poor the execution is sometimes. Genocide is not a thing that should be encouraged or perceived as good, yes, I know, that's understood, however, that does not mean that making the grind of this mode and the general experience painfully monotonous enhaces that point. The way the game tries to teach this is similar to how a christian mom would try to guide her child about choices she considers immoral or bad for the well-being. When the game itself is biased towards what side it thinks it's correct, it doesn't get any point across exactly because it's too desperate on that. You don't sell me this idea by sabotaging my entire path via doctrines, if it's naturally a bad thing then you wouldn't need to get in my way to make it seem like that. If that route had more movement and coherency that wouldn't stop me from knowing what I did was terrible because at the end of the day, I still would be erasing the entire world and I still wouldn't be able to ever have a good ending again. All of that bullshit is unnecessary
Contrived urgency is basically Toby's entire sthick on how he stablishes a lot of the things on this game (if you tell me there's anything more to look at Papyrus' character other than he being a silly sounding skeletor with stereotypical cocky sidekick personality or that Undyne is anything more than a over the top tough tomboy-ish knight, you're realistically projecting. These are not characters, there are running gags and that's all there's to it). You could argue that not every character needs to be complicated and I agree with you on that, Asgore for instance is an example of this, but simple does not mean that they have to be the way they are in every single situation. One of Undertale's key compromises is with development but these characters don't suffer from a major change of conciousness other than Flowey. None of them were evil so the choice of them later on deciding not to kill doesn't count as a development either, they just realized your character had no business to fight them and that's all (btw, it seems bitterly cynical that the game demonizes you for attacking creatures from an outside world as if this wasn't a plausible and compreheemsible reaction out of the fact that, well, every single one in that place wants to murder a kid, just not as cynical as the manipulative guilt trick choice to make them hesitant in fighting you back in more chaotic routes).
Do you think I'm overanalysing it too much? well excuse me but that's pratically what Undertale wants me to do considering how ambitious and pompous the entire premisse is despite at the end of the day still being that kind of thing that's so narrow that it ends up with that silly and nonsensical friendship saves the day thing. And to be fair, the existence of Deltarune as a whole makes everything about this game even worse in my eyes, considering that the 2 released chapters of that game already fix pretty much everything I've listed as an issue here, even on soundtrack. It's not as direct nor as catchy as everything on Undertale, but that's far from being something that makes it inferior. It's a game that has more purpose and dabbles upon more mature kinds of language without sacrificing it's appeal to the audience it's pandering for.