I think Undertale has gotten a lot of undue hate over the years. Forgive me for sounding like most Obnoxious Person Ever, but it really does remind me of the overall discourse with—please bear with me here—In the Aeroplane Over the Sea, especially recently. It's an album which people go into expected this unbelievable, 11/10 experience with the BEST production and BEST lyricism but in reality it's simply a neat, imperfect album that was just different from what was out at the time, trying something new. Do I LIKE like the album? No. But I can be impressed with it's earnestness and what it's trying to do.

Undertale had the same effect on people: many, many people went in expecting to be blown away but probably got turned off by the Tumblr-era random humor and somewhat tacky characterizations. It's definitely not something that was meant to be presented on a wide scale and I understand why people may not vibe with it. I can agree that a lot of the characters and your relationship with them feels really forced. Undyne is a fantastic character and the hang out section with her is funny and heartfelt. But it really feels like you were rushed into that plot point. It should've taken a LOT more to befriend her. Papyrus, again, love the goober but he really feels like he could've gotten to know you better more beforehand. And I never really felt any real connection to Toriel.

Maybe I feel this way because obviously, something talked and discussed on THIS scale I was bound to have pretty much every detail spoiled before picking it up. But I found what really makes Undertale work are the tiny details that make a pretty small game feel much, much bigger than it actually is. Just so much care was put into the whole package. San's blue stop sign joke got a hearty chuckle. Talking to the first Echo Flower before talking to the Echo Flower Explainer Guy gives you some pretty funny dialogue. Reading about Water Saugages and then interacting with the unidentified plant again will claim "Oh! It's a Water Sausage." Alphy's fake date, unbelievably funny. Asgore's reaction to you walking into the room. The genuinely haunting tapes in the true lab. And I thought I wasn't gonna cry during the pacifist ending! I swear I almost made it through. But it wasn't anything that Asriel said that made me tear up, nor was it any big bombastic moment, nor was it the true lab. It was the hug. The hug itself didn't get me either! It was the subtle arm movement. The simple movement the arm up and down to comfort a scared child. That fucking got me so bad. You don't animate that if you don't care. This is a game made by someone who absolutely cares and believes in what they're saying. I think the small moments get overshadowed by all the big "WTF" moments, which is sad because to me that's what makes UT special.

I would say that Undertale is a simple but heartfelt story with simple but heartfelt character but I'd be completely wrong. What's unique about Undertale and what makes it stick around was that it's probably one of the first games that wasn't overtly comedic like the STanely Parable to be THIS malleable and reactive to decisions. The Natural endings tend to get overlooked a lot and I feel like those are always so fascinating: the little dialogues that change depending on a myriad of different decisions you can make throughout the game. And I think it's unfair to say that Undertale is specifically "murder bad," which, duh! Obviously. But what makes the genocide route so effective is that you have to continually make the constant decision to continue to do what you're doing. You could kill everything you encounter but you'll just get a "bad" neutral ending. But the truly bad ending you are given so, so, so, SO many opportunities to stop but you keep going JUST to see what would happen. And then you get Flowey's monologue which may be one of the coolest bits of metanarrative... ever? It even calls out people who straight up just go online to watch the genocide route as pathetic weirdos... like me. Lol. I didn't feel like going through with it. I have a life. But it genuinely fascinates me that the characters aren't directly looking at the camera to say "hey look! We're a video game!!! LOL isn't this weird!" It's more like the characters are aware that their own reality is being intruded upon by some... force beyond their understanding. The actual mechanics of the game work more as physics or magic than mechanics in the game world and it makes sense. The Genocide route is genuinely so haunting, it reveals so much information about the world that you don't get from the other two endings that honestly should just be left alone because of how hazardous it can be to re-experience and how damning it makes everything.
In conclusion I'm tired of people thinking Sans isn't cool! He is! He may have been circle jerked and glazed to hell and back but that doesn't make it any less cool.

But more importantly, Undertale is a story that really truly only be told through a video games. I respect the hell outta it just for that: it's not a masterpiece obviously, just a small game made by one person that was doing things nobody else was really doing at the time, or doing something in a different way. Whether you're drawn by the passion, heart and pure joy of the main game or the dark mysterious underbelly, there's a lot to appreciate. Deltarune seems to be taking what limitations that Undertale has and compeltey breaking past them so I'm excited to see the "full vision" that will probably be the true 10 once that game is complete. But Undertale will still always be Undertale.


couldnt fit this anywhere but this game also got a lot of undue hate for it's style simply because it kinda got subsumed into a general "style" that it ended up creating which is always a stupid argument. The recent twitter discourse about Portal 2's writing/humor was so fucking stupid. First off it never had "cringe internet humor" outside of maybe Cake is a Lie (which is not even in the second game)), second it came out BEFORE the deluge of internet humor that it (PARTLY) inspired and people who weren't around during it's release just lump in with the rest which again is stupid and dumb and stupid. Happened to undertale too if I catch you saying "quirky pixelated Earthbound inspired RPG about depression" I will shoot you dead on sight I stg