Undertale review - Writing this really fills me with determination
So recently I finally got around to playing Undertale… And boy! What a gem of a game that is!
Undertale is a top-down RPG inspired by several older titles such as Mario & Luigi, Shin Meani Tensei and various Bullet Hell shooters. It was created almost solely by Toby Fox over a course of almost three years. He is most known for being a music composer, and a good one at that as you can hear in Undertale. He launched a successful Kickstarter campaign for Undertale in 2013 His goal with Undertale was to develop a rpg that was different from more traditional ones, which I think he pulled off brilliantly!
Undertale’s backstory is, to put it simply, that in the old days both humans and monsters were living together on the surface. Something happened that caused monsters to be trapped in the “underground” and sealed off by a barrier. You as the main character, also known as “The Human”, fell down a hole and landed down in the underground. Like so the game begins and you meet the first character of the game, Toriel.
You know how in many modern games during the tutorial there is a lot of “handholding”? Toriel is a parody of such tutorials, which is translated so well in the gameplay and dialog. Meeting her and playing through the opening really puts a smile on your face, and in such a small amount of time actually makes you care about the character!
What follows afterwards is just as brilliant! The new characters that you meet are filled with personality, and are all so likable! Never before have I played through a video game or watched a movie or tv-series where I like all of the characters. But in Undertale the writing for every character is so good that it makes you emotionally attached to them! Even their names often reflect their personality, such as Toriel being similar to tutorial, and of course you got “Sans”... I will leave it up to you to guess what kind of personality he has. Their personality are also amplified by their own little music tune that plays when you meet them and when you are talking to them.
I guess that brings me to the music, And what a musical masterpiece it is! I am even listening to the soundtrack while writing this review. I am tempted to say that the music is the strongest part of the game, but the problem is that every other aspect also is so strong and are therefore unable to decide. As I said, the music brings even more personality to the characters and it really sets the mood during the whole game. Additionally the songs are simple enough that they are memorable, resulting in you remembering where in the game you heard it, what happened and feel all the emotions that you felt while playing the game. Many of the songs are also simply beautiful, and if not beautiful you can be sure that they are either funny or calming or energizing or or… yeah… my point is that you are always feeling something! Several of the songs genuinely bring tears to my eyes!
Undertale’s art style is quite minimalistic, but are at the same time beautiful. With such an simple art style every character’s move becomes much more apparent and you far more notice the details of the world and “monsters”.
Because of the fantastic cast of characters, the art style and the brilliant music it is easy to just lose yourself in the game, and this is only amplified by the world around you. The world feels so alive and is full of characters to meet, secrets to find and lore to discover. You can talk to people once and then then go back later to find that they have different things to say, which is also affected by how you play the game. Oh, and of course the music also greatly fits the different areas that you wander through.
You probably understand by now that there are multiple ways to play the game, considering that the dialog gets affected by your actions. But not only the dialog gets affected, the entire world and characters around you changes based on what you are doing! That is such a good feature in a video game, to feel that you are actually doing something, not just being lead through a predetermined path without choices or anything. This brings a lot of replay value to the game. After I finished my first playthrough I just had to play through it again, and again! In total I have played Undertale for almost twenty hours, and if you compare that to several AAA titles they don’t even come close to that!
Of course I wouldn’t have bothered playing for that long if the gameplay wasn’t good. During the game you have to get through multiple fights, which are all enjoyable, and funny, and sad and fantastic! Again emphasized by the music. It’s easy to get into because of simple controls, but it has much depth too, which makes for a challenging and addictive gameplay! At first glance the battle mechanics looks similar to that of Final Fantasy, Pokèmon and various other rpg’s, but you quickly realise that this is just the top “layer” so to speak. There is an impressive amount of depth to the combat with multiple ways to end a fight. And while in Pokèmon where you after selecting a attack you just watch an animation, in Undertale you have to respond to your enemies attack, all done in a bullet hell kind of fashion.
comes Undertale! A game that brought me tears and joy, anger and despair, hope and tears of joy. It’s a brilliantly crafted game by the man Toby Fox that brings a fantastic character lineup that you quickly form a bond with, a simple yet beautiful art style that makes details so much more apparent, a musical masterpiece that sets the tone for every character and every part of the Underground, a world with lots of things to discover including a rich story, and last but by no means least… Emotions! (And determination)
10/10 - Simply a masterpiece
On a side note I recommend checking out Undertale’s website, it’s really clever!
Stay Frisk everyone, and I’ll see you next time.
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