Deltarune Thread [WARNING: SPOILERS!!!]

[HeroicSpirit]

So, decided to create this thread because I’m pretty sure at least a few people here are into this game and would’ve to talk about it.

Here’s some of my thoughts:

Spoiler: Deltarune 2 Spoilers

Berdley is simultaneously a character I despise and greatly enjoy, because’s he’s an awful nerd bird and very funny.

Noelle sure is a lesbian for Susie! Also, Alphys is just as thirsty for Undyne as she was in Undertale; no surprise there.

I bet Ralsei has something weird going on.

I love the Queen. Definitely much better than Spade King. Love every second she’s on screen. By far the funniest character in Deltarune. Potassium

Spamtom is pretty funny and good, even if I forgot to go back and try to be a [[BIG SHOT]]. Still, it’ll be interesting to see what’ll happen in the future.

Tasque Manager and Swatch are clearly designed for porn, the former being a robot cat girl with a whip and the latter being a buff bird man. Like, already, there’s a lot.

I know this doesn’t bother everyone but I get annoyed when people forget that Kris is canonically nonbinary. Like, they get read as male often because they have shoulder-length hair and wear pants with a shirt, but the design is meant pretty clearly to be gender ambiguous. Also, throughout the game, they/their pronouns are used, in case it wasn’t clear enough, and the character makes a point that they have an identity and history of their own.

Regardless though, you always were a kidder, Kris.

 

[Wint3rRyd3r]

So, decided to create this thread because I’m pretty sure at least a few people here are into this game and would’ve to talk about it.

Here’s some of my thoughts:

Spoiler: Deltarune 2 Spoilers

Berdley is simultaneously a character I despise and greatly enjoy, because’s he’s an awful nerd bird and very funny.

Noelle sure is a lesbian for Susie! Also, Alphys is just as thirsty for Undyne as she was in Undertale; no surprise there.

I bet Ralsei has something weird going on.

I love the Queen. Definitely much better than Spade King. Love every second she’s on screen. By far the funniest character in Deltarune. Potassium

Spamtom is pretty funny and good, even if I forgot to go back and try to be a [[BIG SHOT]]. Still, it’ll be interesting to see what’ll happen in the future.

Tasque Manager and Swatch are clearly designed for porn, the former being a robot cat girl with a whip and the latter being a buff bird man. Like, already, there’s a lot.

I know this doesn’t bother everyone but I get annoyed when people forget that Kris is canonically nonbinary. Like, they get read as male often because they have short hair and wear pants with a shirt, but the design is meant pretty clearly to be gender ambiguous. Also, throughout the game, they/their pronouns are used, in case it wasn’t clear enough.

Regardless though, you always were a kidder, Kris.

Spoiler

I thought Berdly was the worst and I do not miss his arm.

Ralsei knows about the statue thing but was unaffected by it and arrived to the cyber dark world out of no where. He's shady AF and his very existence raises too many damn questions.

Undyne and Alphys suck at their jobs in any world apparently.

I personally thought Noelle is bi and got some ship teasing with Kris but she just prefers Susie for whatever, yet very correct, reasons.

Queen was fun but she never really felt like a villain. Berdly felt more like the actual villain, at least for the first half. Also, is no one gonna address the fact that Lancer called her mom when Spade King being his dad was important?

I did snowgrave route and it was dark. Like, portrayed an abusive relationship but the abuser encourages their victim to violently isolate themselves and embrace their worse traits that the abuser likes. Is it wrong that I enjoyed that route? Toby Fox does evil routes very well and I like being the villain.

And on Kris's nonbinary status, I always assumed they were meant to be projected on and making them nonbinary was the easiest way to do that. Or it's foreshadowing. Also Kris's hair isn't that short. It looks like it goes to their shoulders and is in a messy bob cut style.

No pacifism for me thanks. I choose violence everyday I wake up. And this game is a dating sim, but Susie is the protagonist and we're playing as one of her romance options.

 

[badbreadpuns]

I’m glad ch 2 came out when it did, this month started out shitty for me and it really cheered me up.

What’s your fave new song? I have a couple but I think the battle theme for the first Queen fight is mine.

(Though Spamton has a catchy leitmotif too.)

Berdley is simultaneously a character I despise and greatly enjoy, because’s he’s an awful nerd bird and very funny.

Can’t say I was expecting Berdly to get any character development, but I ended up liking him more than I thought I would. He’s the second funniest character next to Queen.

Noelle sure is a lesbian for Susie! Also, Alphys is just as thirsty for Undyne as she was in Undertale; no surprise there.

Noelle and Susie are so cute, and I’m glad Alphyne is likely going to be canon again!

I know this doesn’t bother everyone but I get annoyed when people forget that Kris is canonically nonbinary. Like, they get read as male often because they have shoulder-length hair and wear pants with a shirt, but the design is meant pretty clearly to be gender ambiguous. Also, throughout the game, they/their pronouns are used, in case it wasn’t clear enough, and the character makes a point that they have an identity and history of their own.

It bothers me too, dw. Though I’m not too surprised considering people did it with Frisk and Chara too. :/

 

[Tide Hunter]

Spoiler: y'know, spoiler

Berdly was pretty annoying, but he's an understandable person, and even without seeing his backstory, the queen summarizes it best: He's not a bad person, just annoying.


Ralsei definitely has something weird going on. I love him, he's a cute fluffy boy, but he knows too much. How does he know all about our combat systems, enough to tutorialize them and write a manual on it? Nobody else seems to follow these combat rules, only the party members do. Also, he seems to be aware of the camera/view. When Susie goes to Noelle's room, on both paths he tells Kris to close their eyes and imagine what they're doing, but on the Snowgrave route, he gets confused when nothing happens, and he mutters about if something's going wrong or if they should wait before doing it before Susie comes back out.


Queen, as far as I can tell, is not actually Lancer's mom. Based on the nicknames they use and how they talk, Queen and King may have previously been in a relationship of some sort, but Lancer calls her something like a "third dad" after King (first dad) and Rouxls Kaard (second dad), so it may just be that she saw Lancer and said "This is mine now."


Interesting little note on the nb protags thing, I've seen screenshots of a Tweet that Toby seemingly made on the 15th of September 2015 (though I can only seem to find screenshots and web archives of it, though that archive is the wayback machine). He says

Some people say "What am I supposed to name the fallen child?"

Your own name.

which seems pretty interesting. Frisk, themselves, is canonically depicted without gender, but also, this implies that players would be encouraged to essentially represent themself in Frisk's role, essentially just projecting themselves onto Frisk. This may have contributed to people not referring to Frisk with they/them, because of the ability to give a name and essentially identify yourself with the protag. And with the real name only being revealed at the very end of the pacifist route and the nature of the name you gave being an evil murder-demon only being revealed at the very end of the geno route, there's not that much time dedicated to really dismissing the idea that the protagonist is not the player, which also assists in the projection. I don't know if it was ever actually intended for players to project themselves onto Frisk, but Frisk is designed as such a perfectly empty, personality-less shell/vessel for a player to latch onto that I absolutely do not blame anyone for doing it to Frisk.

With Kris, though, Kris has a defined character. They often struggle to be free and act as they would were you not controlling them, hell there's a little thing when picking choices where the red heart will often spawn closer to one choice than the others, which is what players speculate is the "real" choice that Kris would pick, and Kris also very clearly does not like Ralsei as much as anyone else likes each other, as the Ralsei Tea only heals Kris for 60 hp rather than 120 and Susie describes Kris as giving no reaction to it. Kris is designed as their own character, who just happens to be nonbinary, and people should respect that, but, well, I would assume this is a situation of "old habits die hard."

 

[Wint3rRyd3r]

Berdly was pretty annoying, but he's an understandable person, and even without seeing his backstory, the queen summarizes it best: He's not a bad person, just annoying.

Reject Berdly. Embrace [Hochi Mama].

Nobody else seems to follow these combat rules, only the party members do.

To be fair to Ralsei, when you first get Noelle and have her ACT in her first battle, Kris and an enemy explain battle mechanics to her. So It's not just a Ralsei thing.

Queen, as far as I can tell, is not actually Lancer's mom. Based on the nicknames they use and how they talk, Queen and King may have previously been in a relationship of some sort, but Lancer calls her something like a "third dad" after King (first dad) and Rouxls Kaard (second dad), so it may just be that she saw Lancer and said "This is mine now."

My thing is that after being captured by her, Lancer says "You got caught by a wild mom" and nobody addresses it. It could just be Lancer being Lancer though.

Spoiler: Got Dayum I love overanalyzing media and have nothing better to do today! In this essay I will

Kris has been bothering me though. There's too many weird things about them that just doesn't make sense. The abandoned classroom dark well was opened prior to the player ever taking control of Kris. We even overwrite their save on a new game, showing that it was just Kris previously. So them opening the wells doesn't make much sense and can't just be a form of rebellion against the player when they did it before we showed up. And their first class description lists them as being a vessel containing a human soul. Not human souls, just a human soul. My theory is that either there's a second stowaway using Kris's body and neither it nor Kris are truly human, or that Kris themselves has reached a breaking point and is trying to make the world more "favorable" for them. But I'm personally leaning towards there being a second stowaway.

No one seems to be aware of the dark world. Not even as some fairytale. Undyne and Susie aren't a good measure for this because it's Undyne and Susie, but book smart Noelle and Berdly clearly never heard of it either. So how would anybody who's never so much as heard of it know what the wells are and how to open one? And the Knight has opened both new wells. They were referenced by King and Queen with Queen even recording it. The only one we know of who could be doing it is Kris. Kris, who we're repeatedly told is the one who can seal the wells. Their dark world appearance even looks like a knight.

The thing is, it doesn't make much sense for Kris to do that. If we take the snowgrave route, then Kris is distraught over what happened. Showing some kind of morality, at least towards their friends. So it doesn't seem in character for Kris to willingly endanger their friends and friendship by opening more wells. Then there's Kris's magic and being a monster thing. Kris, with Catti, studied into the occult and Kris has searched up magic stuff. In addition Kris has seemingly felt like an outsider as a human. They always wondered when their horns would grow in for example. Now's the part where I get extremely speculative so bear with me please. What if Kris's feelings of being an outsider became overwhelming and Kris decided to try and use magic to become a monster. But since humans aren't magically inclined, whatever was used went wrong resulting in the Knight appearing and high jacking Kris's body in place of their soul. They were always viewed as mischievous and doing weird things but seemed to be a normal, albeit trolling, child. We see Kris have a zombie like gait when they remove the player soul. If that became the norm then it's no wonder they grew apart from everyone and was viewed as creepy. If so, then Kris isn't opening the wells, the Knight is using Kris's body. And the Knight may have been puppeting Kris for a long time before making a move for whatever reason. But with our involvement, the Knight can't act without removing us when player control is disabled. If this is the case, then it puts Kris's obvious discomfort and fear of Spamton in a newish light. Kris hasn't had control of their body in a while and has likely been a prisoner in their own body. Even before the player arrived. Spamton is a walking reminder that Kris may never be free again. I wouldn't be shocked if the last chapter throws us into that player made body and has us fight the Knight, either alongside Kris instead or with the Knight using Kris to fight. But hey that's just a theory. A [HYPERLINK BLOCKED].

Also Kris is clearly crushing on Susie like everyone else in the game like Noelle and I'm curious how that'll go since even with Susie seeming to prefer Noelle, she does still get some ship tease with Kris. The obvious answer is a threesome but I bet Toby's a coward and won't give the people what they want.

 

[badbreadpuns]

Spoiler: y'know, spoiler

Interesting little note on the nb protags thing, I've seen screenshots of a Tweet that Toby seemingly made on the 15th of September 2015 (though I can only seem to find screenshots and web archives of it, though that archive is the wayback machine). He says

which seems pretty interesting. Frisk, themselves, is canonically depicted without gender, but also, this implies that players would be encouraged to essentially represent themself in Frisk's role, essentially just projecting themselves onto Frisk. This may have contributed to people not referring to Frisk with they/them, because of the ability to give a name and essentially identify yourself with the protag. And with the real name only being revealed at the very end of the pacifist route and the nature of the name you gave being an evil murder-demon only being revealed at the very end of the geno route, there's not that much time dedicated to really dismissing the idea that the protagonist is not the player, which also assists in the projection. I don't know if it was ever actually intended for players to project themselves onto Frisk, but Frisk is designed as such a perfectly empty, personality-less shell/vessel for a player to latch onto that I absolutely do not blame anyone for doing it to Frisk.

With Kris, though, Kris has a defined character. They often struggle to be free and act as they would were you not controlling them, hell there's a little thing when picking choices where the red heart will often spawn closer to one choice than the others, which is what players speculate is the "real" choice that Kris would pick, and Kris also very clearly does not like Ralsei as much as anyone else likes each other, as the Ralsei Tea only heals Kris for 60 hp rather than 120 and Susie describes Kris as giving no reaction to it. Kris is designed as their own character, who just happens to be nonbinary, and people should respect that, but, well, I would assume this is a situation of "old habits die hard."

Yeah unfortunately Toby deleted a lot of old tweets from his personal Twitter. Including one where someone asked whether Papyrus or Sans is the bigger slut (this is pre Sans’ tumblr sexy man status….), to which Toby replied (might be paraphrasing here) “Papyrus doesn’t know what that is and Sans is too lazy to do anything to anyone.” I don’t have the screenshot on me unfortunately.

Spoiler: Got Dayum I love overanalyzing media and have nothing better to do today! In this essay I will

Kris has been bothering me though. There's too many weird things about them that just doesn't make sense. The abandoned classroom dark well was opened prior to the player ever taking control of Kris. We even overwrite their save on a new game, showing that it was just Kris previously. So them opening the wells doesn't make much sense and can't just be a form of rebellion against the player when they did it before we showed up. And their first class description lists them as being a vessel containing a human soul. Not human souls, just a human soul. My theory is that either there's a second stowaway using Kris's body and neither it nor Kris are truly human, or that Kris themselves has reached a breaking point and is trying to make the world more "favorable" for them. But I'm personally leaning towards there being a second stowaway.

No one seems to be aware of the dark world. Not even as some fairytale. Undyne and Susie aren't a good measure for this because it's Undyne and Susie, but book smart Noelle and Berdly clearly never heard of it either. So how would anybody who's never so much as heard of it know what the wells are and how to open one? And the Knight has opened both new wells. They were referenced by King and Queen with Queen even recording it. The only one we know of who could be doing it is Kris. Kris, who we're repeatedly told is the one who can seal the wells. Their dark world appearance even looks like a knight.

The thing is, it doesn't make much sense for Kris to do that. If we take the snowgrave route, then Kris is distraught over what happened. Showing some kind of morality, at least towards their friends. So it doesn't seem in character for Kris to willingly endanger their friends and friendship by opening more wells. Then there's Kris's magic and being a monster thing. Kris, with Catti, studied into the occult and Kris has searched up magic stuff. In addition Kris has seemingly felt like an outsider as a human. They always wondered when their horns would grow in for example. Now's the part where I get extremely speculative so bear with me please. What if Kris's feelings of being an outsider became overwhelming and Kris decided to try and use magic to become a monster. But since humans aren't magically inclined, whatever was used went wrong resulting in the Knight appearing and high jacking Kris's body in place of their soul. They were always viewed as mischievous and doing weird things but seemed to be a normal, albeit trolling, child. We see Kris have a zombie like gait when they remove the player soul. If that became the norm then it's no wonder they grew apart from everyone and was viewed as creepy. If so, then Kris isn't opening the wells, the Knight is using Kris's body. And the Knight may have been puppeting Kris for a long time before making a move for whatever reason. But with our involvement, the Knight can't act without removing us when player control is disabled. If this is the case, then it puts Kris's obvious discomfort and fear of Spamton in a newish light. Kris hasn't had control of their body in a while and has likely been a prisoner in their own body. Even before the player arrived. Spamton is a walking reminder that Kris may never be free again. I wouldn't be shocked if the last chapter throws us into that player made body and has us fight the Knight, either alongside Kris instead or with the Knight using Kris to fight. But hey that's just a theory. A [HYPERLINK BLOCKED].

Also Kris is clearly crushing on Susie like everyone else in the game like Noelle and I'm curious how that'll go since even with Susie seeming to prefer Noelle, she does still get some ship tease with Kris. The obvious answer is a threesome but I bet Toby's a coward and won't give the people what they want.

a) Love your analysis! The speculation about Deltarune’s plot is one of my favorite parts of the fandom.

b) There were definitely some dating sim vibes with some of the dialogue choices you could pick.

Spoiler: such as

talking to Noelle about the ferris wheel + the guy with the dating shoes, the end of the swan boat ride with Ralsei

I wonder if it will lead anywhere, especially since the main theme of the game is that our choices are meaningless. Either way I want Susie and Noelle to smooch.

 

[Wint3rRyd3r]

The speculation about Deltarune’s plot is one of my favorite parts of the fandom.

At this point and given this is Toby Fox, speculation is all we can do. Lancer could be the true villain for all we know. Kris just raises too many questions and I wouldn't be shocked if chapter 3 has us separated from Kris permanently and we have to find the player made body to save the world since I assume a soul is needed to close the wells and it's ambiguous whether or not Kris even has one. Given that chapters 1 and 2 were free and the next release is going to be 3, 4, and 5 together and paid, the first two chapters may have been a prologue to set up Kris as the villain. They did hold the soul up to the smoke at two's end so who knows what'll happen after entering the dark world.

talking to Noelle about the ferris wheel + the guy with the dating shoes, the end of the swan boat ride with Ralsei

I noticed those too. But those're interesting examples since those potential relationships rely on the player since Kris seems to dislike or distrust Ralsei and seems to views Noelle as just a friend. Susie however gets to actually ride the ferris wheel with Noelle, goes off alone with Ralsei to a fair and learn ultimate healing, and spends the epilogue spending time with Kris and meets their mom and spends the night. Susie clearly doesn't know who's route she wants to be on yet though. Hopefully the player soul will be added to her options. Barney the Dinosaur's grunge daughter hits most of my likes.

 

[Tide Hunter]

and we have to find the player made body to save the world

I doubt that, mostly because of the "Your choices don't matter, you don't get to choose who you are in this world." If Toby actually did do that, there would be a lot of people who end up playing generic preset number 1, the character made up of literally just every single first place option because you're using your third savefile now.

They did hold the soul up to the smoke at two's end so who knows what'll happen after entering the dark world.

As the smoke descended, it looked like the arm curved further towards Kris's chest, though we didn't actually hear anything, so I'm not sure either way.

 

[Wint3rRyd3r]

I doubt that, mostly because of the "Your choices don't matter, you don't get to choose who you are in this world." If Toby actually did do that, there would be a lot of people who end up playing generic preset number 1, the character made up of literally just every single first place option because you're using your third savefile now.

Toby has already contradicted that somewhat though. Ralsei constantly tries to say our choices matter and chapter 2 is affected by whether or not we choose to fight or befriend enemies. Berdly is also affected by this. Then there's the snowgrave route and everything that happens there. And if I'm remembering what I read correctly, someone who looked through the files found that the vessel made at the beginning was still saved in files and that the voice who interrupted is listed as voice 2 in the files and voice 1 was used prior to being told the vessel was being discarded. So maybe Charlie Brown will save the world after all. I'm pretty sure I'm remembering that right. Obviously ingest salt with that file stuff. Though given the release cycle, Toby may only release the next chapters after the heat death of the universe so the world may never know.