does anyone know what you actually get for solving the piano puzzle, also i think i saw light-able mushrooms early in the a game with what looked like a door.
Solving the piano puzzle gives you the infinitely replenishing "Dog Residue", which upon use, fills up the empty space in your inventory with more Dog Residue or Dog Salad, a random healing item.
The door is opened by dodging every name in the true credits. Behind it is a developer room where Toby is sleeping. That's all lol
There's probably videos of both out there if you're curious.
does anyone know what you actually get for solving the piano puzzle, also i think i saw light-able mushrooms early in the a game with what looked like a door.
You find an ancient historical artifact... which is promptly stolen by an Annoying Dog leaving you with "Dog Residue." As for the door, that's unlocked by dodging all the names in the credits.
Hopefully some other mainstream sites pick up on it as well, though Undertale seems to be getting a lot of positive word of mouth through other means.
Seeing some people's reactions to the demo in this thread convinced me to buy into the full game, and I ended up playing through it in two sittings. Beyond the clever gameplay permutations, catchy music and snappy writing, Undertale just has a whole lot more all-around heart than anything I can remember playing in a great long time.
I got the true/non-violent ending and I was going to go back to find more secrets and see the other endings but ended up deciding otherwise. At least for now, I'm enamored enough with the game that I don't want to play it again, despite kind of wanting to play it more, and that's pretty amazing.
I got the true ending but..... I'm still trying to decide if I should do the other endings or not. I feel if I love a game this hard I should but..... I just don't know
Hopefully some other mainstream sites pick up on it as well, though Undertale seems to be getting a lot of positive word of mouth through other means.
Seeing some people's reactions to the demo in this thread convinced me to buy into the full game, and I ended up playing through it in two sittings. Beyond the clever gameplay permutations, catchy music and snappy writing, Undertale just has a whole lot more all-around heart than anything I can remember playing in a great long time.
I got the true/non-violent ending and I was going to go back to find more secrets and see the other endings but ended up deciding otherwise. At least for now, I'm enamored enough with the game that I don't want to play it again, despite kind of wanting to play it more, and that's pretty amazing.
What a fantastic experience.
There are some alternate fights that have really great music, but is getting to them worth your conscience?
I looked stuff up on Youtube to satisfy my curiosity.
I can kinda understand the comments about the third quarter of the game being a notch or two below the rest.
I don't think Alphys ever 100% clicked with me (at least not as much as the rest of the cast) and neither Hotland nor the Core really ended up being particularly remarkable in my mind. That being said, I thought Mettaton and everything surrounding him was just so good, he pretty much carried that section of the game. The quiz show, news report, and FF6 opera parody all had me rolling. And then everything following the Core, in pretty much any playthrough, is really really great.
Basically this and I think a lot of it comes down to how people feel about
Alphys's humor
. It is awfully reliant on that character despite the fact that their humor has niche appeal compared to that of the rest of the cast, I'd say.
I can kinda understand the comments about the third quarter of the game being a notch or two below the rest.
I don't think Alphys ever 100% clicked with me (at least not as much as the rest of the cast) and neither Hotland nor the Core really ended up being particularly remarkable in my mind. That being said, I thought Mettaton and everything surrounding him was just so good, he pretty much carried that section of the game. The quiz show, news report, and FF6 opera parody all had me rolling. And then everything following the Core, in pretty much any playthrough, is really really great.
Basically this and I think a lot of it comes down to how people feel about
Alphys's humor
. It is awfully reliant on that character despite the fact that their humor has niche appeal compared to that of the rest of the cast, I'd say.
Same. It never gets bad or boring, but I must admit I felt a bit of a lull in the flow.
Alphys' gags didn't always hit the mark, and made me think "ok" a few times. A lot of her jokes rely on repetition and references to an angsty branch of a neurotic subculture. It's not going to work for everyone.
It also doesn't help that Hotland doesn't feel as lived in. Once you pass the appropriately desolate ruins, the game establishes a world that feels like a home to these monsters. I never really got that sense in Hotland and the Core. I guess it's close enough to the capital for it to make sense, and the place does have enough NPCs. However seeing as the capital was just a wallpaper, you're getting no pay-off for the momentary deprivation of that sense of place. Maybe some more props like the rest of the game had would have gone a long way, or NPC dialogue that wasn't constantly referencing Mettaton. Once you're done with the Core though, the game picks back up.
This is probably the best game I've played all year, which is saying something because there have been a lot of good ones so far.
Heck it's one of the best games I've played in the past several years. I feel similar to when I played Cave Story so many years ago, where I realized I wasn't playing "just another game" and instead was playing something truly memorable.
Is it possible to get the true/pacifist ending on your first run, or do you absolutely have to see the neutral ending first? Possibly equivalently, can you befriend Alphys on the first run, or is there no way to trigger Undyne giving you the letter?
Is it possible to get the true/pacifist ending on your first run, or do you absolutely have to see the neutral ending first? Possibly equivalently, can you befriend Alphys on the first run, or is there no way to trigger Undyne giving you the letter?
I think you have to get the neutral ending first
a passive run first just means you dont have to reset to get the true ending
on an unrelated note, did you save after you talked to sans in the chapel?
It's been four and a half days since I beat Undertale, and I still spend more time thinking about Undertale than I do playing other games. Maybe I can bring myself to play again, but, well, you know.
There's some pretty fun Undertale mashups on Soundcloud, although I guess technically spoiler warning for some of them? https://soundcloud.com/tags/undertale
I'm really excited that Austin played/apparently liked Undertale.I was hoping someone at GB would pick it up. I think all of GBeast would find the game charming, but it's first and foremost definitely an Austin game.
This is probably the best game I've played all year, which is saying something because there have been a lot of good ones so far.
Heck it's one of the best games I've played in the past several years. I feel similar to when I played Cave Story so many years ago, where I realized I wasn't playing "just another game" and instead was playing something truly memorable.
Yeah I definitely agree with this. I've liked quite a few games quite a bit this year (broke 80 hours in witcher 3, rocket league and mgsv.) But after playing Undertale the thought was immediately "okay, I know this is my game of the year, where does this fit in my all-time list?"
Same. It never gets bad or boring, but I must admit I felt a bit of a lull in the flow.
Alphys' gags didn't always hit the mark, and made me think "ok" a few times. A lot of her jokes rely on repetition and references to an angsty branch of a neurotic subculture. It's not going to work for everyone.
It also doesn't help that Hotland doesn't feel as lived in. Once you pass the appropriately desolate ruins, the game establishes a world that feels like a home to these monsters. I never really got that sense in Hotland and the Core. I guess it's close enough to the capital for it to make sense, and the place does have enough NPCs. However seeing as the capital was just a wallpaper, you're getting no pay-off for the momentary deprivation of that sense of place. Maybe some more props like the rest of the game had would have gone a long way, or NPC dialogue that wasn't constantly referencing Mettaton. Once you're done with the Core though, the game picks back up.
Yeah, in comparison to the Snowdin section, everything just feels less neatly laid out. Encounters with Papyrus go on for maybe thirty minutes to an hour, and between them pretty much every room has a puzzle, lots of good dialog, or a clever boss battle with one of the dogs, along with the town itself towards the end of it. Mettaton's section lasts maybe... 2 hours or so? And it's much, much less dense. MTT Hotel is pretty small, there's only 2 or so non-Mettaton boss battles, and many rooms are just hopping puzzles with no dialog other than messages from Alphys (and the Core doesn't even give you cell phone dialog lol). I think that section could've done with a few more unique battles like Muffet, because it was a lot of time focused on pretty much just Mettaton and Alphys. I still think the Muffet and Mettaton fights were all really great and inspired, it's just that the stuff between them kinda went on for a while and were more standard.
But this is all really just stuff I'm noticing in retrospect. The drop was slight enough that I barely felt it while playing the game. I hope I'm not sounding too negative or anything, because "this part isn't quite as genius" is the worst criticism I can muster, lol. It does not affect my opinion that the game is seriously amazing in the least!
edit: what the heck
Muffet
was one of the backer reward characters? Their design and battle are so good and they're integrated into the game so well I had no idea lol
Is it possible to get the true/pacifist ending on your first run, or do you absolutely have to see the neutral ending first? Possibly equivalently, can you befriend Alphys on the first run, or is there no way to trigger Undyne giving you the letter?
Pacifist on the first run, which unlocks True after that. If you spare
Flowey
they will tell you what you need to do and where you need to go after the pacifist end to be on the road to the true end.
...I've since been told that sparing step might not be required, but you get enough information from that step alone. And it fits well into what goes on with the True end, anyway.
FURTHER EDIT that actually spoils a bit of the late game in pacifist:
Something will cause Alphys to lock up the lab, and the lab is inaccessible on any route even if you befriended Undyne and Papyrus prior to that. When you get access to the lab during the sequence of events in True end, check what's in the trash can next to the desk; there's something different there.
That's not even the beginning of what makes that route so.
I saw the differences video on Youtube, but that doesn't even really touch on the most interesting bits. It's an experience calculated to make you feel horrible.
Even
enemies you wouldn't normally randomly encounter start showing up to look for their missing children
i bought toby fox's soundtrack about a year ago or something and totally forgot it was part of a game. i just loved the blipbloops. ended up buying this last night and put just over an hour in it, sans and papyrus are hilarious, looking forward to more!
I don't think so? I don't remember if I talked to the snowman again immediately after getting the piece, but I definitely spoke to him more than once without taking another piece. Plus the snowman begs you to stop and that doesn't seem too in-line with the tone of a normal playthrough lol
That's not even the beginning of what makes that route so.
I saw the differences video on Youtube, but that doesn't even really touch on the most interesting bits. It's an experience calculated to make you feel horrible.
Even
enemies you wouldn't normally randomly encounter start showing up to look for their missing children
You can switch between Genocide and Pacifist behavior within a single run. I don't know if that counts as "normal route" to you, but I'm counting behavior required for a specific ending as being part of that route. There is no way you can run into this enemy as a Pacifist, they don't even show up in True end credits roll.
Genocide times spoiler;
by the time I saw this father figure, they showed up as the very last enemy needed to kill in a Geno run through Snowden. Once you kill him at that point, you're in the too far gone ...but no one came territory with the distorted Flowey theme and all.
There are two things about this game that are really hitting a major sweet spot for me, and I feel this is worthy of a few essays by the time the hype cools a bit.
First, can I just say that it's amazing that this game not only subverts RPG conventions, but actually has the balls to say yes, you are an evil person doing evil things, and you will not go unpunished for that.
I always found it a bit cheesy that Vice City chose to do the Tony Montana tribute fight, but totally free from the consequences of being fictional open world Tony Montana. I understand that part of the old LucasArts philosophy was that people lose enough in real life, and games shouldn't make them feel even more like losers.
But Undertale is so refreshing precisely because it has the balls to beat down you, the player, for slaughtering a misguided population that, sure, has largely supported a (true end spoilers)
poorly thought out plan to kill children, extract their souls to achieve freedom, and forcefully remove their means of coming back to life
. Despite those horrors, they turn out to have (late game spoilers)
genuinely good intentions that were absolutely not deserving of any of that
.
The line between self-defense and just plain wanton carnage is passed early on if you're playing in this specific way. There's no ambiguity about it, the situations you're trapped in require you to be absolutely frigid. The ending is as fitting as it could be.
Second, I love that this game is a six-hour RPG. I'm tired of Atlus RPGs with 100+ hours of gameplay that feel like marathons by the end, and the format's turned me off of the new Persona series quite a bit. Six to eight quality hours for a single play through is absolutely ideal, probably the reason I still like Panzer Dragoon Saga as much as I do today.
I wish more games focused on making the best six hours possible instead of following bad trends from the PlayStation years to chase those high double digits of play time. I'm aware this is already the case with some genres, but RPGs could really stand to do better by this rule. Here's looking at you, Bravely Default.
On the essays thing
my first game ever was pokemon gold
theres a few things reminiscent of that game for me
The ability to call your "mom" & the ice puzzles
idk that special piece of nostalgia just warms my heart
im to tired and sick to write more about that but idk
it just means a lot
But Undertale is so refreshing precisely because it has the balls to beat down you, the player, for slaughtering a misguided population that, sure, has largely supported a (true end spoilers)
poorly thought out plan to kill children, extract their souls to achieve freedom, and forcefully remove their means of coming back to life
Does the game ever explicitly state that the souls had to be childrens' souls? I know that they do all end up being children's souls, but in the True Pacifist route Toriel admonishes Asgore for waiting for children to fall into the underworld instead of using the first soul to break the barrier and take six souls from above the surface. It is in her character to take the route that would save any children from harm.
And I'm at this point right now as well. There's a finality to the ending that is pretty much perfect and makes me not want to touch the game again, but it's so damn good that I'm having a really hard time not immediately diving back in.
But Undertale is so refreshing precisely because it has the balls to beat down you, the player, for slaughtering a misguided population that, sure, has largely supported a (true end spoilers)
poorly thought out plan to kill children, extract their souls to achieve freedom, and forcefully remove their means of coming back to life
. Despite those horrors, they turn out to have (late game spoilers)
genuinely good intentions that were absolutely not deserving of any of that
it seems that Asgore's plan was at least not unprovoked, and I wonder just how much he actually did outside of the lab stuff with Alphys. The first child (the one with your name) is painted in a pretty nihilistic and evil light. The first child is canonically the one "possessing" you when you kill as Frisk. When I read that the first child seems to be the one who instigated Asriel to collect the souls of other humans, it kind of made me wonder if Asgore actually collected any the souls himself. Maybe the ones we saw are ones that Asriel and the first child obtained, as they were trying to shatter the barrier before Asgore took over.
I hope someone does a comprehensive wiki soon, as it's getting messy to keep track of facts, implications, theories and trolling.
it seems that Asgore's plan was at least not unprovoked, and I wonder just how much he actually did outside of the lab stuff with Alphys. The first child (the one with your name) is painted in a pretty nihilistic and evil light. The first child is canonically the one "possessing" you when you kill as Frisk. When I read that the first child seems to be the one who instigated Asriel to collect the souls of other humans, it kind of made me wonder if Asgore actually collected any the souls himself. Maybe the ones we saw are ones that Asriel and the first child obtained, as they were trying to shatter the barrier before Asgore took over.
I hope someone does a comprehensive wiki soon, as it's getting messy to keep track of facts, implications, theories and trolling.
There are two things about this game that are really hitting a major sweet spot for me, and I feel this is worthy of a few essays by the time the hype cools a bit.
First, can I just say that it's amazing that this game not only subverts RPG conventions, but actually has the balls to say yes, you are an evil person doing evil things, and you will not go unpunished for that.
I always found it a bit cheesy that Vice City chose to do the Tony Montana tribute fight, but totally free from the consequences of being fictional open world Tony Montana. I understand that part of the old LucasArts philosophy was that people lose enough in real life, and games shouldn't make them feel even more like losers.
But Undertale is so refreshing precisely because it has the balls to beat down you, the player, for slaughtering a misguided population that, sure, has largely supported a (true end spoilers)
poorly thought out plan to kill children, extract their souls to achieve freedom, and forcefully remove their means of coming back to life
. Despite those horrors, they turn out to have (late game spoilers)
genuinely good intentions that were absolutely not deserving of any of that
.
The line between self-defense and just plain wanton carnage is passed early on if you're playing in this specific way. There's no ambiguity about it, the situations you're trapped in require you to be absolutely frigid. The ending is as fitting as it could be.
Second, I love that this game is a six-hour RPG. I'm tired of Atlus RPGs with 100+ hours of gameplay that feel like marathons by the end, and the format's turned me off of the new Persona series quite a bit. Six to eight quality hours for a single play through is absolutely ideal, probably the reason I still like Panzer Dragoon Saga as much as I do today.
I wish more games focused on making the best six hours possible instead of following bad trends from the PlayStation years to chase those high double digits of play time. I'm aware this is already the case with some genres, but RPGs could really stand to do better by this rule. Here's looking at you, Bravely Default.
I really, really like the length of this game. Partially because it allows me to easily recommend it to other people (as I get older it gets harder to sell my friends on 50+ hour rpgs,) but I think mostly because it allows the entire game to be a curated experience. Every NPC, every randomly encountered opponent, every boss, every room is a uniquely crafted element designed to fit exactly in a singular vision of the world. Not satisfied with a merely 'Excellent' level of coherence, Undertale adds a branching narrative that accounts for multiple variables and methods of play, and creates unique experiences (both emotionally and physically) based off of them. The largest contributor to the game's success in these aspects is that it is the work of a single creator with a single vision, and certainly to some degree the length is limited sheerly by manpower (and the Kickstarter promise to, you know, actually release at some point.)
That said, I don't necessarily think that with an indefinite amount of time and resources a longer game could or should have been made. Is there really any need for more content to tell this story? I'm sure it would have been fine, there's no reason to believe Toby Fox couldn't continue creating enjoyable characters, but how much would it add to the overall experience? Looking back at the entire package, I don't need more content. It was absolutely delicious, and I'm full.
I am of those guys who never buy full price, but i am really tempted. Its cheap so i guess i should not wait for long.. I feel i will get heavily spoilered soon :S
I'm hoping all the 10s will increase exposure. Or at the very least it picks up after a Steam sale. Aside from /v/ and Tumblr not a whole lot of people have checked it out.
One thing I really respect about Undertale re:some of the discussion above is that
it never tries to trick you into playing as a villain. There are plenty of games out there that address the player's tendencies towards violence in games by providing you little instruction or even forcing you into decisions and then chastising you for them later. By comparison, nearly everything in Undertale is in place to encourage you to spare characters and make you feel awful when you don't (entirely by choice). Anyone playing the game for the first time would almost assuredly learn very quickly that if they want to have a good time, they should probably try not to kill monsters. And that's great, the player truly has agency in that regard.
Instead, what it gets you on is curiosity. The game doesn't mislead you towards the genocide path, or even encourage you to check it out after you've cleared another path like it does from neutral to the true ending. It catches people looking for more out of the game, and questioning the "what if"s. Really, Flowey's speech in the castle corridor covers it better than I ever could.
I'm usually not a big fan of the whole
the player is a monster!!!
narrative but this game just handles it with so much intelligence and such finesse.
Hell the game better make year end lists period. It was a more enjoyable experience for me than all the 60 hour open world collectathons I bought this year for sure. Part of me is glad Persona 5 got delayed so I wouldn't have to try to choose between that and Undertale for my GOTY.
Post-credits spoilers ahead. >> I don't think I have the heart
to "true reset" the game especially with Flowey vividly describing what will happen even though you already know what will happen. I...I just can't do a genocide run yo.
I am a mess of emotions right now...
Like seriously... Undertale is one of my top contenders for "Sleeper Hits of 2015"
Reviews trickling in finally, metacritic is super consistent between user and critics atm, which is really cool to see (4 critic reviews, I know).
There's a groundswell of hype for the game in underground channels (/v/ threads are fun), but hopefully the few critics so far will cascade into more reviews and bring it to the greater masses.
also makes Asriel's breakdown in the pacifist run much more poignant
. So many of the songs and leitmotifs in the game reference each other, and it works so damn well.
Though I will say, while I loved the moment where "Undertale" played as it was happening, when I thought about it later I couldn't stop wondering how the hell those monsters got into that house. Jokes aside "Undertale" is probably my favorite song in the game to listen to independent of the game itself.
Just played through the first hour of this tonight (to the first of what I'm guessing is a few towns?) and I'm enjoying the heck out of it. Playing straight-up pacifist so far, since that seems to fit the tone of the monster encounters best. Defense is starting to prove challenging. I had trouble with avoiding the
ax attacks from the Dogi pair - they pretty much fill the entire window
. Do I just need to stock up on healing items and good armor and Git Gud?
also makes Asriel's breakdown in the pacifist run much more poignant
. So many of the songs and leitmotifs in the game reference each other, and it works so damn well.
Though I will say, while I loved the moment where "Undertale" played as it was happening, when I thought about it later I couldn't stop wondering how the hell those monsters got into that house. Jokes aside "Undertale" is probably my favorite song in the game to listen to independent of the game itself.
Well there WAS a note in his house that said something to the effect of "Howdy help yourself to anything in the fridge, if you need me the keys are down either hallways."
Anyhow, I'm gonna go ahead and gush a little bit about the scene with "Undertale" playing. The entire thing is so perfectly set up.
You're more than likely caught off-guard that New Home really IS new "Home." It's a carbon copy of Toriel's home at the beginning, and you probably make the connection that "oh jeez Toriel was the queen". You get confirmation that, yes, the king really is a big fuzzy nice guy. Dude's SANTA for pete's sake. The music builds and builds as you're told about his motivations. And you feel bad, because you're there to smash everyone's hopes and dreams. Then, at the end, the music cuts out, and you're left with nothing but your thoughts, your anticipation, and your DETERMINATION.
Lots of MOTHER/Earthbound feelings with the final boss.You can't beat it directly but must call out for those you have met. And then when it lets you explore the world after the game is over with the same song playing reminds me of
EARTHBOUND SPOILERS:
Guiding Paula back home after the game with "Because I Love You" playing, and tiny little things in the world change.
What an incredible little game. And I got to see my name in the credits, as a kickstarter backer, so that was neat.
Kinda don't want to do a genocide run to kill the warm fuzzies...
Just played through the first hour of this tonight (to the first of what I'm guessing is a few towns?) and I'm enjoying the heck out of it. Playing straight-up pacifist so far, since that seems to fit the tone of the monster encounters best. Defense is starting to prove challenging. I had trouble with avoiding the
ax attacks from the Dogi pair - they pretty much fill the entire window
. Do I just need to stock up on healing items and good armor and Git Gud?
The axe attacks will always try to make the same heart shape with their combined weapons. If you stay low, you should be able to slide under them.
Getting more healing items is key though. I had a lot of instances where attacks just caught me off guard and I didn't know the trick to them until I already lost a decent chunk of health to it. I don't remember if you have any shops or healing spots at your disposal at that moment however.
