Undertale

Undertale begins with a child falling through a hole on Mount Ebott and landing on a bed of golden flowers, deep in the Underground where monsters have been sealed away for centuries. What follows is a short, strange and very funny RPG that keeps asking one question in every battle: do you have to hurt anyone at all? Every enemy you meet can be killed, and every enemy you meet can also be spared. The game remembers which you chose, and the people you meet later will remember it too.

Battles That Are Half RPG, Half Dodging Game

Fights start like an old turn-based RPG with four buttons: FIGHT, ACT, ITEM and MERCY. Choose FIGHT and a bar slides across the screen; press the button as it crosses the center for maximum damage. Then it is the monster's turn, and instead of a damage number you get a small white box with your soul inside, a red heart you move around while bullets, bones, spears and stranger things fly at you. Getting hit lowers your HP. Learning each monster's pattern is the real challenge, and it is why Undertale feels nothing like a menu game even though it looks like one.

ACT is where the personality lives. You can check a monster's stats, compliment it, joke with it, pet it, flirt, or do something only that monster would care about. Do the right acts and its name turns yellow, which means you can use MERCY to spare it. No experience, no kill, and usually a funny line on the way out.

Places and Characters in the Underground

• The Ruins - your first area, full of simple switch puzzles, where a gentle goat-like monster named Toriel takes you in. Leaving her is the first hard choice in the game.
• Snowdin - a snowy town guarded by two skeleton brothers. Papyrus is loud, sets ridiculous traps and desperately wants to join the Royal Guard. Sans is lazy, tells bad jokes and knows more than he says.
• Waterfall - glowing grass, echo flowers that repeat what people said, and Undyne, the spear-throwing captain of the guard who chases you across bridges.
• Hotland - lava, conveyor belts and the lab of Alphys, a nervous scientist, plus the TV robot Mettaton who turns every encounter into a show.
• New Home - the capital, where King Asgore waits at the end.

Routes and Why They Matter

Players talk about Undertale's endings in terms of routes. A Pacifist run means sparing every monster and making friends along the way; it unlocks the most complete ending and the best character moments. A Neutral run is any mix of sparing and killing, and the ending call you receive changes depending on who you spared. A Genocide run means hunting down every monster in each area until no more encounters appear, and the world reacts in a much darker way, with some of the hardest boss fights in the game. You do not need to plan a route on your first play. Just do what feels right in each fight, and you will understand why people replay it.

The Music

Much of Undertale's reputation comes from its soundtrack. Almost every important character has a theme, and those melodies come back remixed in later fights, so the music tells you who matters before the dialogue does. Boss battles like Papyrus's "Bonetrousle" and Undyne's "Spear of Justice" make the dodging sections feel like a dance.

Controls

• Arrow keys - walk around, move through menus, and move your soul during attacks.
• Z or Enter - confirm, talk, read signs and interact.
• X or Shift - cancel; hold it to walk faster while exploring.
• C or Ctrl - open the menu with your items, stats and phone.

Tips for a First Run

• Save at every glowing star. These save points also restore your HP, and if a boss knocks you out you restart from the most recent one you touched.
• Use Check in ACT on new enemies. The description often hints at what will make them stop fighting.
• Buy healing food in shops before a new area. Cinnamon Bunnies in Snowdin are cheap and fill a lot of HP early on.
• If a boss seems impossible to spare, keep talking and keep surviving. Some fights only end after a number of turns.
• Some attacks change your soul's color. A blue soul is affected by gravity, so you have to jump with the up arrow instead of floating freely.

After the Underground, the fan-made prequel Undertale Yellow follows a different fallen child through the same world, and Deltarune continues the creator's style with a brand-new story and party battles.