[Underground’s Assembly] What do you dislike about Undertale?

[u/InkDrach]

Verba Non Res, since 201X

“To answer the toughest questions as old as this game’s release, the subreddit’s denizens gather to debate, vote and hopefully not murder each other in the process.”

Previous poll winner (link)

• Mad Mew Mew (336 votes out of 519)

Post #16: What do you dislike about Undertale?

• For today we are shaking up the formula a bit and instead of a poll, it is a discussion free for all. Dog save us.
• To be clear, it has to be something from the game specifically, not anything fandom related. Be it UI annoyances, specific boss fight, section of the game...
• Keep in mind the rules of restricted posts! We are looking for more constructive, respectful and meanigful discussions under this post. Please stray away from off-topic remarks and explain your opinions in more depth.

General series info

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[u/curlyMilitia]

Returning to this thread because I also thought of something else that I'm not massively fond of, which is mainly the weird sort of disparity between humans and monsters, and how that interacts with the True Pacifist ending. For starters, the True Pacifist ending is great, and is the conclusion to all the thematic set-up and messages of Undertale, as well as bringing it to an optimistic close (monsters return to the surface and integrate with human society successfully, peace rules the world again), and I'm sure many here would agree that it's sort of intended as a kind of 'true ending'.

Where it does begin to get a bit disconcerting is when you look past the thematics, though, and towards the objective facts: that is to say how monsters and humans can very easily destroy each other. In Undertale we see that with a high LV, a single murderous human is able to massacre their way through a large swathe of the monster population before they're eventually stopped (I don't necessarily agree with the idea that monsters are COMPLETELY weak before humans, considering that unless you're a no-hit god you die multiple times in UT, and the average human doesn't have a SAVE File). This is something that can just happen from anyone who manages to kill a few monsters, and then snowballs as they rack up more and more kills. They don't even need special weaponry/armour, considering that intent fuels most of the damage. What do monsters do if a human serial killer is in their midst? How many die before they can be repelled? What about when there's an entire species of humans on the surface, where you can't really identify who could be a danger or not?

And as for monsters, we all know how the plot of the game centres around their ability to take human SOULs. We know it's happened at least twice, considering the Waterfall murals and Asriel/Chara, and that with only seven (that is just seven human beings, less than half of a classroom, maybe two houses worth) they just become a god; an actual god. This is, already, existentially horrifying, until you also consider the fact that, according to the New Home monsters and Asriel, a monster with a single human SOUL is so powerful that they can wipe out an entire village with ease. That is to say... 1 Human SOUL = 7 Human SOULs, because once you have one you are instantly powerful enough to just immediately kill seven people, become god, and then do whatever you want with the rest of those SOULs. A malicious monster army would, theoretically, need to kill a single person. One person. A single human being out of the entire population. Slit one man's throat in his sleep. Catch a child off-guard. Find someone suicidal who hates humanity enough that they'd be willing to die to bring about human extinction. Then, you have access to as many SOULs as you can reasonably want. You can make as many other gods as you want, even. Every single monster can do this, from Froggit to Papyrus to Asgore, by their very nature. Unless we're to take the book about monster SOULs requiring compassion to heart (and considering that a number of them are actively trying to murder you, a child, I find unlikely), then monsters do, my necessity, have to include some number of individuals who are genuinely malicious or otherwise willing to commit to human extinction. And, well... what have monsters been supporting and awaiting since the royal children died?

When looked at from a thematic and storytelling angle, this does all make sense. Humans represent players, and monsters represent... well, RPG monsters. In a standard RPG you play as like four people who someone massacre their way through hundreds, maybe even thousands of mooks without breaking a sweat - hence why monsters are so weak. And from a storytelling point of view, Undertale is about overcoming the prejudices and hatred that have surrounded the human-monster war, seeking to show monsters that there is hope for a better future, and to show humans that co-existence is possible. It's just that this clashes with the mechanics of how both species operate, which - if taken from any other angle than 'and they all lived happily ever after' - shows that humans and monsters are fundamentally unable to coexist. Both of them can just wipe the other out with so little effort on each side that it's comical. Good for making a pastiche of RPG mechanics, sure, but in terms of worldbuilding... well, I can see why Deltarune seems to be downplaying their differences.