SuperBiasedMan

Undertale - No need to kill things, even if they try kill you

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So, as promised, I gave the Undertale demo another go, when in a slightly better mental state for it. This time, I actually made it to the end of the demo, and the conclusion

where you essentially passive-resistance out Toriel into giving in

is much superior to the rest of the game (although I did like the

Spider Bake Sale

too), and if there's more like that in the full game I'd be interested. I still find the humour really detracts from the experience more than it aids it - I've just never really gotten on much with "Homestuck-style" humour, so this is just a personal taste thing - so that (and the general JRPG "random encounters getting in the way of stuff" mechanic) is the main thing putting me off from buying the full game at the moment.

Still, I can definitely see why some people have this as their game of the year now. :)

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Though your theory is entirely wrong. The two fan trolls are optional boss fights. Toby Fox intentionally sequestered them from having any impact on the story. I think it's just that Asriel as a character was made to fill a plot need, and that need involves having him take two extremes of a situation in a way that really doesn't mesh so it never rings true for him to be a real character. I would've preferred if Flowey was just Flowey and he was resolved as a character somehow. I think Fox wanted to press the idea that there's good in anyone and value in extending empathy to them, but I think that would've been better done by having Flowey able to change without making it that Asriel was hidden in him.

 

Whoops! I take that back, then. But yeah, I agree that Flowey is himself a strong enough villain that Asriel's appearance seemed unnecessary.

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Wait, wait, I thought Asriel WAS Flowey?

 

Sorry, he is! By his 'appearance' in the story, I meant the revelation that he was Flowey all along. Need to choose better words!

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Wait, wait, I thought Asriel WAS Flowey?

Yes, though in a sense Flowey is a perverted sense of Asriel? Asriel died because he was 100% pacifist and refused to fight back against humans that attacked him. Flowey is the opposite, which I think is supposed to slightly make Flowey his own entity with a part of Asriel's soul inside? Again, this is the part I wasn't so big on. Undyne was probably my fave.

 

 

So, as promised, I gave the Undertale demo another go, when in a slightly better mental state for it. This time, I actually made it to the end of the demo, and the conclusion

where you essentially passive-resistance out Toriel into giving in

is much superior to the rest of the game

 

That absolutely is the core of what I care about in this game. I think even with some of the spoilered reservations we're having about the ending, it does a great job of this theme through the game.

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The demo is pretty accurate. It's (as far as I remember) exactly just the first level of the game. There's more actual interacting with others and story, and the fights get more interesting. But if you found it hard it will only get worse (depending on how you play),  unfortunately you may want to skip it.

 

As a more general point. it's interesting that a lot of people praise the humour. I definitely found it funny but that's one of the least important aspects of the game. I found the humour better for just the game's general charm and endearing me to the characters.

In my experience that general charm and making me care about the characters was what made the game feel so special for me. In that sense I feel that the humor was critical to my enjoyment of the game. Also the anticipation of what was coming up next kept me going in addition to the overarching story.

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I really love this game. I was wondering, are there any articles about Toby's use of music? I feel like his use of repeating motifs and melodies in different places and instrumentation really elevates a lot of the moments and makes the soundtrack really stick in your mind afterwards. For a non-spoilery example, I ran across this quirky track that overlays a specific version of the dog track with the regular battle theme and was pleasantly surprised to find that they use the same motif/melody. I'm guessing there's a lot of that style of music writing in the Homestuck stuff he did, where some interactive updates go from an exploratory section to a battle or mini-game and he uses the same melody in both, but in a longer form work it really brings moments together.

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I don't know but I would love it because he has a good mix of chiptune-y and 'real' music. If you listen to the boss tracks in particular you can hear how it begins with simple chiptunes and layers in the more real sounding instruments for depth to the track. It's just one small thing I've noticed so I'm sure there's tons to talk about for anyone who knows about music.

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Just completed this game, with the true ending. 

 

And man oh man, I don't really know where to start. 

 

Well first of all I agree with a lot of what you're saying about the ending.

 

Specifically Asriel. The build up with the VHS tapes in the True Lab, and Toriel and Asgore's backstory made the reveal work well. But his motivation didn't really make much sense to me. Why would the child of probably the two kindest and sweetest people in the kingdom turn into such a relentless monster? That he was attacked by humans is just too simplistic, especially considering how nuanced the rest of the characters are written.

If you wanna get meta about it, which is appropriate for this game, you could interpret it as him having already completed a pacifist run and is now doing a Genocide playthrough. But that's not really overtly stated anywhere so I'm hesitant to make that conclusion.

 

But mechanically I had no issues with the final boss(es). Asgore's fight was entirely appropriate because you are in a situation that can't be solved with peace. Heck, he even breaks your Mercy button making it utterly clear that it's not an option. After exhausting the Act commands and noticing he doesn't react to you missing your attacks like Toriel did it became quite clear to me that attacking was the only option.

 

By the way, can we talk about how utterly brilliant and subversive this game's use of interface is? I think that is one of the most impressive parts about it. I was amazed at the ways it managed to come up with new ways to surprise me with breaking conventions, and then it went a step further and started breaking its own conventions, and then it would go even further again and break the new rules it had placed in their stead. The fight with Papyrus is the earliest example of where it gets really creative with how it bends the rules and interface in really unexpected ways. I took my hands off the keyboard to exclaim "wow" out loud after he had used his Super Regular Attack. And the game just keeps going further with it from that point.

It really is a deconstruction of how we interact with video games.

 

Easily my GOTY, maybe only contested by Bloodborne. I would like to do a genocide run for the complete experience, but I hesitate to because the ending was so satisfying I don't want to sully those good memories by bathing in the blood of all my friends.

 

There is a youtube series called Tasteful Understated Nerdrage by a MrBTongue who has a lot of intelligent and compelling analysis of games. One of his videos brings up the concept of Gezamtkuntswerk, or in english a "Complete Work of Art", in relation to video games. The central thesis being that harmony between all of a work's elements can elevate a work to something above just the sum of it's parts, regardless of the individual quality of each of them. 

 

 

I think it's fair to say that Undertale is without a doubt a complete work of art.

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I really feel like this game was much worse than the sum of its parts.  For all the individual moments of joy, the overall view I have of the game is surprisingly low.  At the end of the day, I don't think the game has anything to say.  Sure, it's clever and I loved it for that, but I don't imagine I'll be think about this game two or three years from now.  I'm just not sure that being irreverent is enough to make something a great game. 

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I'm intrigued you said it has nothing to say. I think it could have said it better in parts but to me the game is pretty clearly exploring motivations behind violence and ways to circumvent the desire in yourself and others to use violence.

@Gaizo Are you familiar with JRPGs. I wouldn't have considered that necessary, but the conventions of those games have apparently repelled some people.

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@Gaizo Are you familiar with JRPGs. I wouldn't have considered that necessary, but the conventions of those games have apparently repelled some people.

 

Yes, and I also bounced pretty hard off JRPGs for a while (last one I genuinely enjoyed was FF10 (but that was more or less cause of Blitzball)) so that might be a helpful context to make sense out of my view.

 

Hence I really don't want to make any value judgement on a game that feels clearly out of my preference by wide margin.

Edit: heck only reason I'm commenting here is because my social media is just flooded with Undertale stuff recently.  So I guess my short opinion here is more of reaction to that than anything else.

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I'm intrigued you said it has nothing to say. I think it could have said it better in parts but to me the game is pretty clearly exploring motivations behind violence and ways to circumvent the desire in yourself and others to use violence.

 

It does explore those kind of, but what does it say about it?  It's not even clear to me whether the game thinks violence is bad or not.  I certainly don't think any game with a special genocide run can be said to be against cathartic violence.  It treats violence differently in its systems than most (j)RPGs, but just because it is different doesn't mean it had a cohesive purpose.  I honestly think all it's decisions where based on how to make it quirkier.

 

I'd be interested to know what exactly you think it's saying because to me it explores these issues just in an awkward circular way.  By the end of the game, I really didn't feel like it had gone anywhere.

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Have you seen that ending totally? I feel like you might not have.

 

The genocide run ends with you having killed everyone/thing in sight. The demon you named reveals itself to you, then the game hard quits. If you re-open the game, there is nothing but whitenoise because you've literally destroyed all that there is. Even before that, a lot of the game is much more joyless when the puzzles are solved and bosses die instantly. Without NPCs you barely get to have any conversation and enjoy the game's writing. It's supposed to be void of worthwhile interaction.

 

I think it's silly to say that this undermines the idea. Presenting his idea of what happens if you do choose extreme violence supports Toby Fox's exploration of why people act violently and what it means. It lets you try acting violently and tries to respond in turn. This is one of the great strengths in game narrative, they can present you with different views of an idea depending on how you interact with the game.

 

This may be a difference of ideas but I don't think that a creative work needs a message that is trying to teach or say a succinct thing like "Violence is bad because x". To me it's plenty if the game explores the idea of violence/empathy in a way that resonates with me even if there's no key message that it gets to me. I like that it just tries to show different reasons people can be violent and how you can still extend empathy to someone that's acting violently towards you regardless of their reason. Or you can extend violence to them and see the consequences of that. As someone who decided to become vegan on ethical grounds, I can get behind the philosophy of this game.

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It does explore those kind of, but what does it say about it?  It's not even clear to me whether the game thinks violence is bad or not.  I certainly don't think any game with a special genocide run can be said to be against cathartic violence.  It treats violence differently in its systems than most (j)RPGs, but just because it is different doesn't mean it had a cohesive purpose.  I honestly think all it's decisions where based on how to make it quirkier.

 

I'd be interested to know what exactly you think it's saying because to me it explores these issues just in an awkward circular way.  By the end of the game, I really didn't feel like it had gone anywhere.

I feel like it's pretty clearly against violence. Especially with the beginning of the game where Toriel tells you most monsters are friendly and if they are attacking you it's likely out of fear.  Then you get to the end of the game where it explains EXP as "Execution Points" and Level as "Level of Violence," both of which I feel have a pretty negative connotation. I don't think the ability to complete a genocide run counts against the overall message either. Especially considering that if you finish a genocidal run you have to sell your soul to reset the game and any subsequent runs it's implied Frisk is still possessed no matter how you played that run.

Obviously I'm a pretty big fan of the game though, but that's just my take.

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How does a neutral run end? As in, you killed a few bosses but not all. Or you spared all the bosses but killed random mobs.

And I'm surprised you feel the game has no message. Aside from what has been argued above I think it also challenges your ideas of what motivates pacifism.

For example when I started playing the game I

killed Toriel

and I decided to reset the save and start over to avoid that. The game actually recognized that and kept heckling or reminding me of what I had done. A certain character mocked me saying no matter if I reset I've still done the deed.

And that same character raises the question why I'm even doing it. Which made me think. Is it because I'm an altruistic being? Well I already did it once, not to mention all the time in other games. Is it guilt? Because I sure as hell felt bad going through the beginning a second time, especially with the game aknowledging what I'd done. Is it pride? Being able to sit on the moral high horse. Or is it it fear of consequences? Thinking purely in gameplay I was worried that I'd miss something or lock away content if I did the encounter wrong.

So what is it? Are you a liar, a sinner, vain, or a coward? Or are you just inherently a good person?

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Holy crap, he had some good advice on the first question (couldn't watch any more,) or at least not unreasonable advice considering the starting viewpoint.

 

Also, Holy Crap, 700 club is still on? i remember when my mom used to watch that all the time before she started to see through the BS.

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Holy crap, he had some good advice on the first question (couldn't watch any more,) or at least not unreasonable advice considering the starting viewpoint.

 

Also, Holy Crap, 700 club is still on? i remember when my mom used to watch that all the time before she started to see through the BS.

 

Oh man, he starts ranting about the gays and the trans and the constitution and how Muslims love pedophiles on the very next question. 

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I've played this for about an hour. I went in wanting to dislike it (dumb reasons) but it's super charming. I really like it.

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