Okay so I just started playing it, and I beat a Neutral Run and then True Pacifist. Pretty good, True Pacifist was super satisfying and I felt really happy about what I'd done.
So naturally as flowey put it being extremely morbid and just having to "see" what happens, I started up a genocide run and was generally feeling pretty shitty about my actions, while also enjoying the slightly ramped up boss fight of Undine, and how completely different the tone and story was.
That was until Sans.
There is one thing I've never been amazing at in real life, and in video games. Reaction speed tests. I smash the entire sans fight through muscle memory and repetition but I cannot do the parts where he flings me super fast against the wall and then extends bones from it. Everytime he smashes me against the wall and I jump away, he double smashes me on top of the bones that have already been extended and I lose.
You might think this is gonna be me complaining about being shit, nah I'm fine with it. I've only spent an hour on Sans, I was sure I'd get it eventually and I did, after all I just needed enough health after that section to win. What I actually want to talk about is the impact it has on the run and the feeling of the run.
I was feeling genuine remorse for everyone. I felt like a monster killing Toriel, and each kill thereafter was just making me feel worse, even little mini monsters. I felt horrible for striking down Undine and Meta. Killing Papyrus nearly moved my heart that hasn't cried during a videogame to its first tears, and some of the monsters are too scared for me to even have a chance to meet this run. Talking to Flowey in the house, with the knowledge I have from pacifist route, knowing he's Asriel is actually horrible. What happened to him was a tragedy and I was feeling terrible when he seemed to realize he wasn't exempt from my to do list. Then I met Sans and thought wow, now I have to kill my bro OKAY FINE.
Then I spent an hour maybe a little more attempting to kill him.
That time completely washed away any guilt or any emotion I had towards this route and what I'd done and it makes me view it as simply another grind RPG game that I leveled up to fight a last boss who is actually challenging and it was pretty exciting. Despite what Sans said I had a really good time and that's probably a bad thing. I think making Sans so much harder than the rest of the game was a mistake from narrative perspective, because now I literally don't care what I've done, I just HAD to kill Sans. So when I eventually killed him and finished the route I was okay with selling my soul because I didn't care.
inb4 "lel thats the point" Flowey was right all along UNDERTALE PLAYING 5D CHESS AGAIN *tips fedora*. w/e. Even if that is meant to be the point from my viewpoint the route suffers from it, since I'm not a soulless monster in real life and this is a video game so I can't even relate like OMG THEY GOT ME I'M A SOCIOPATH I JUST ENJOY VIOLENCE AND MY EMPATHY TO THESE CHARACTERS WAS A LIE
.
No, it got me because if you make something tedious in a videogame then people want to beat it and feel great when they do, they took me away from the story and the weight of my decisions to put me in a platformer with a spike in difficulty higher than any I'd seen in a game.
I dunno. That one thing pretty much changed it for me, cause I was all aboard the wow the game is right, I'm just doing this for my morbid curiosity, then it was like nope flowey was right what an excuse I told myself it's for fun and that bummed me out. Cause Killing Sans isn't fun, the boss fight was, and it basically destroyed the whole route for me.
Thoughts?
Opinions?
Fanart that's dope?
I still really liked Undertale and it's definitely the best Indie game I've played, dethroning FTL from my list, and if Sans hadn't been so difficult as to prolong the route an extra hour+ It would have been the most emotional experience I've ever had in a videogame.
There were a thousand threads about Undertale when it came out but I hadn't played it till now and I avoided spoilers, so I dunno if this topics been done to death, but was wondering what everyone else thought about this?
So naturally as flowey put it being extremely morbid and just having to "see" what happens, I started up a genocide run and was generally feeling pretty shitty about my actions, while also enjoying the slightly ramped up boss fight of Undine, and how completely different the tone and story was.
That was until Sans.
There is one thing I've never been amazing at in real life, and in video games. Reaction speed tests. I smash the entire sans fight through muscle memory and repetition but I cannot do the parts where he flings me super fast against the wall and then extends bones from it. Everytime he smashes me against the wall and I jump away, he double smashes me on top of the bones that have already been extended and I lose.
You might think this is gonna be me complaining about being shit, nah I'm fine with it. I've only spent an hour on Sans, I was sure I'd get it eventually and I did, after all I just needed enough health after that section to win. What I actually want to talk about is the impact it has on the run and the feeling of the run.
I was feeling genuine remorse for everyone. I felt like a monster killing Toriel, and each kill thereafter was just making me feel worse, even little mini monsters. I felt horrible for striking down Undine and Meta. Killing Papyrus nearly moved my heart that hasn't cried during a videogame to its first tears, and some of the monsters are too scared for me to even have a chance to meet this run. Talking to Flowey in the house, with the knowledge I have from pacifist route, knowing he's Asriel is actually horrible. What happened to him was a tragedy and I was feeling terrible when he seemed to realize he wasn't exempt from my to do list. Then I met Sans and thought wow, now I have to kill my bro OKAY FINE.
Then I spent an hour maybe a little more attempting to kill him.
That time completely washed away any guilt or any emotion I had towards this route and what I'd done and it makes me view it as simply another grind RPG game that I leveled up to fight a last boss who is actually challenging and it was pretty exciting. Despite what Sans said I had a really good time and that's probably a bad thing. I think making Sans so much harder than the rest of the game was a mistake from narrative perspective, because now I literally don't care what I've done, I just HAD to kill Sans. So when I eventually killed him and finished the route I was okay with selling my soul because I didn't care.
inb4 "lel thats the point" Flowey was right all along UNDERTALE PLAYING 5D CHESS AGAIN *tips fedora*. w/e. Even if that is meant to be the point from my viewpoint the route suffers from it, since I'm not a soulless monster in real life and this is a video game so I can't even relate like OMG THEY GOT ME I'M A SOCIOPATH I JUST ENJOY VIOLENCE AND MY EMPATHY TO THESE CHARACTERS WAS A LIE
. No, it got me because if you make something tedious in a videogame then people want to beat it and feel great when they do, they took me away from the story and the weight of my decisions to put me in a platformer with a spike in difficulty higher than any I'd seen in a game.
I dunno. That one thing pretty much changed it for me, cause I was all aboard the wow the game is right, I'm just doing this for my morbid curiosity, then it was like nope flowey was right what an excuse I told myself it's for fun and that bummed me out. Cause Killing Sans isn't fun, the boss fight was, and it basically destroyed the whole route for me.
Thoughts?
Opinions?
Fanart that's dope?
I still really liked Undertale and it's definitely the best Indie game I've played, dethroning FTL from my list, and if Sans hadn't been so difficult as to prolong the route an extra hour+ It would have been the most emotional experience I've ever had in a videogame.
There were a thousand threads about Undertale when it came out but I hadn't played it till now and I avoided spoilers, so I dunno if this topics been done to death, but was wondering what everyone else thought about this?
