RPGs usually follow very strict genre rules and don’t offer many surprises in turn-based battles, but tobyfox’s indie 8-bit Undertale isn’t one of those games.
Developing an RPG that gives players the option to win fights against weird monsters without actually killing them, but instead talking to them or dancing, is already quite weird, but if bullet hell shooter mechanics, i.e. evading enemies in mini-games, are thrown in, one should get really confused about what type of game or genre this actually is.
The plot of a human child falling down into an underground system of various foes might not seem like much, but it’s a refreshing take on the typical hero-saves-the-world template, while the option to befriend bosses is pretty awesome. So one could call this game a friendly RPG, one that doesn’t promote violence against foes who just want to live their life underground without being disturbed by the outside world, although they might not be the nicest ones. One can also decide to annihilate them, but this would be missing the point of the whole experience.
If you’re as confused as me and still don’t know which surprises the game has in store for you, then rest assured that this seems to be the intention of the developer, i.e. making the player question his RPG-and-arcade-action trained decisions. The game has been available for some time on Steam, but now it’s DRM-free with a 20% launch discount that will last until March 8, 1:59 PM GMT, hopefully encouraging more people to try out this weird little title.
Buy the game for PC on
GOG
Steam
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