Undertale

Undertale is a role-playing game developed and published by Toby Fox on September 15, 2015. It has only been released on Microsoft Windows. The main story of the game is that you are a young child who has fallen into the 'Underground', a hidden world underground inhabited by monsters, with some being friendly and some being horrible. The good thing about the game is its humour, soundtrack and its battle system. Unlike other role-playing games, the player has the choice to either fight or spare enemy monsters. The game has a lot of unique characters, and several different endings, depending on if the player fights or spares enemies.

G​ameplay
The gameplay is similar to a normal RPG. You travel through a 2D world called the 'Underground', a place where the monsters of the world live after being banished from the surface by humans. The player can travel to lots of different areas, like the snowy forest of Snowdin, and the lava labyrinths of Hotland. Like a normal RPG, you can buy and sell items from shops to heal you during battle, boost your attack or defense, give you stats etc. The player also has a cell phone, in which they can phone and talk to specific characters anywhere during their adventure.

The main difference to normal RPGs is the combat. You are in a white box playing as your SOUL, taking the form of a red heart. You are able to move your soul around in the box in order to dodge incoming attacks from enemies. You have the options to fight, act, use items or mercy. On several boss battles, your heart can change colour and get a new effect to it. When you fight an enemy, you must time your strikes right to deal the most amount of damage.

P​lot
True P​acifist Route:

You play as a young gender-neutral child named Frisk, who has fallen through Mount Ebott into the Underground. He is met by a devious sentient flower named Flowey, who introduces the player to the combat system, but immediately tries to kill him afterwards. However, a motherly monster named Toriel stops Flowey from killing the player, and takes him through the Ruins and helps him solve several puzzles blocking the way. She takes the player to her home, where she treats Frisk as her child, until Frisk demands to leave the Ruins. Toriel attempts to stop him, and even tries to fight the player, but gives up when she sees Frisk's determination to leave the Ruins. Toriel lets the player leave, but tells them to never come back. The player exits the Ruins into the snowy forest of Snowdin.

In Snowdin, the player encounters several monsters, including Sans, a humourous, mysterious and lazy skeleton, and Papyrus, Sans' flamboyaunt, incompetent skeleton brother, who is determined to capture Frisk so he can become a member of the Royal Guard, as the monsters will be able to destroy the barrier trapping them underground by collecting seven human souls, in which they already have six, however he and Sans end up befriending the protagonist, and Papyrus can even have a date with Frisk. After exploring Snowdin, Papyrus tells Frisk to go to King Asgore's castle, as the barrier to the surface is there.

Frisk travels through the caverns of Waterfall, while he is being hunted by the dangerous and deadly Undyne, the head of the Royal Guard, who is determined to kill Frisk. But, after fighting Undyne, they discover that Undyne is a fish-like monster rebel who befriends him, proclaiming that Frisk is too powerful for her. She lets him continue into the scorching labyrinth of Hotland.

In Hotland, the player enters a laboratory where they meet Dr. Alphys, the nervous and anxious Royal Scientist, and Mettaton, Alphys' robotic creation made to be a comedic TV star, and also a human-killing monster. Alphys helps the player travel through Hotland, and encounters several dangerous events with Mettaton, including a cooking show, a news show and a play. The player also encounters Muffet, a girl spider monster. After all the encounters, the player reaches the Core, a mechanical area which powers the entire Underground.

In the Core, the player has a final battle with Mettaton, who transforms into his second form, Mettaton EX. After stopping Mettaton, the player travels up through the elevators of the Core and finally reaches Asgore's castle. The player travels through the castle and the 'New Home'. The player eventually encounters Asgore, who fights the player to get the last human soul they need to cross the barrier. However, Flowey appears and murders Asgore, and uses the power of the human souls to transform into a photoshop monster. Frisk keeps sparing Photoshop Flowey, who eventually leaves because Frisk keeps sparing him even through he has done lots wrong. The player then gets a call from Sans in a dark future, and explains that everyone is sad over Asgore's death, but they say the queen (Toriel) has returned to the Underground.

Afterwards, the player returns and helps the characters they have met, including going on a date with Alphys and boosting Alphys' and Undyne's love for each other. The player also explores the secret and abandoned areas of Alphys' labs, and find out that either Alphys or W. D. Gaster (the previous Royal Scientist) wrote messages informing the player that they were trying to extract 'determination' from things and put them in monsters, hoping for them to be able to cross the barrier. However, the monster's bodies couldn't handle the determination, and ended up melting and becoming horifying creatures. The player eventually reaches Asgore's castle again, and finds Flowey there again, plotting to destroy the barrier using the human souls and Frisk. However, Frisk's friends appear (Sans, Papyrus, Undyne, Alphys, Toriel and Asgore) and try to stop him. Flowey then uses their souls to transform back into his original form, Asriel, the son of Asgore and Toriel, whose soul was put into a flower. Asriel then becomes a villainous monster and tries to destroy Frisk. However Frisk rescues his friends and manages to stop the demon Asriel from destroying the world. Asriel returns to his normal state and apologizes to Frisk for the trouble he has caused, stating that he will eventually transform back into an emotionless flower. Asriel then uses the souls to destroy the barrier. All the monsters are able to go to the surface, and Frisk and his monster friends are standing on a cliff overlooking the sunset, and decide that they will love it there. Toriel stays with Frisk while everyone else leaves to do their own thing, and Frisk can even go and live with Toriel. The game ends with epilogue credits, showing that Toriel became a teacher, Papyrus got a cool car and Mettaton got the audience he deserved.

G​enocide Route:

The game starts with Frisk entering the Ruins and meeting Flowey. The same things happen from the normal route until the player fights Toriel. If the player wants to stay on the Genocide Route, they must simply fight Toriel. One hit will be enough to kill her. Frisk then leaves the Ruins and enters Snowdin, defeating all the monsters he can find. He meets Sans and Papyrus, however they don't seem to like him, especially when Frisk simply walks through all of Papyrus' puzzles. Frisk then eventually fights Papyrus, who thinks Frisk wants to hug him, but one hit will kill Papyrus. Before Papyrus dies, he still believes that the player can be a better person. Frisk then enters Waterfall.

In Waterfall, Frisk kills every monster in sight, and eventually meets up with the Monster Kid, a radical cute monster, who Frisk tries to kill. However, Undyne appears and blocks the fatal hit, making the Monster Kid flee and turning Undyne into Undyne the Undying. This battle is hard, but eventually Frisk will defeat Undyne. Frisk then happily continues into Hotland.

In Hotland, Frisk finds out that Alphys has evacuated all the monsters to safety as they are scared of the player. Frisk finds Mettaton, who keeps running away because Frisk will be able to kill him easily. Frisk continues along past the already completed puzzles while killing everything in sight. Frisk finds Muffet in a spider web hall, but instantly kills her, too. Eventually, Mettaton decides to fight the player in the Core, turning himself into Mettaton NEO to stop the player, however Frisk kills him in a single hit. Frisk makes his way to Asgore's castle.

Making his way through the castle, Flowey appears and explains the story of him being Asriel and turning into Flowey as he died on a bed of golden flowers, and his soul was put into one. Flowey says that he became emotionless, and couldn't feel anything, no happiness, no joy, no fear, nothing. Flowey then says that he decided to start killing monsters as he felt nothing towards them. Flowey then says that he hopes Chara (who is starting to possess and overturn Frisk) will not kill him too, before running away. In the final corridor, Sans appears and asks the player if even the worst person can change, before asking if the player wants to 'have a bad time'. The player uncontrollably steps forward and Sans fights him, giving him a flurry of devastating attacks, while explaining to the player that he knows about the player's SAVE and RESET ability, and even says that he gave up trying to go to the surface, as the player will eventually just reset the timeline, putting them all back into the Underground.

After a hard battle, the player eventually defeats Sans in one hit (he couldn't do it before because Sans kept dodging his attacks), who starts bleeding ketchup, and walks away as he is going to Grillby's, before asking the dead Papyrus if he wants anything, too, before he dies off-screen. Frisk continues off to meet Asgore, and instantly fights him. Before Frisk (now fully overcome by Chara) has a chance to attack, Flowey appears and violently kills Asgore himself, telling the player that he is helpful and pleads for Chara not to kill him. However, Chara brutally kills Flowey in a number of uncontrolled hits. In the epilogue, Chara appears in front of player and thanks them for bringing them back from the dead because of their power and hatred. Chara asks the player if they want to erase the world to start a new one. If the player chooses ERASE, Chara says that the player is a good partner. If the player presses DO NOT, Chara will ask why, before jumpscaring the player and crashing the game either way. If the player keeps the game on for 10 minutes, Chara will ask the player why they want to go back to the world that they destroyed, and gives the player the option to go back in exchange for their soul. If the player agrees, the game will come back, however the True Pacifist Route's ending will be permanently affected, but if the player disagrees, Chara jumpscares and crashes the game again, making the player wait another 10 minutes for Chara to offer the same deal.

Backstory:

Long ago, two races ruled across Earth; humans and monsters. Suddenly, a war broke out between the two races. The humans were victorious and sealed the monsters underground with a powerful spell, trapping the monsters in the Underground.

Shortly after, a child named Chara falls into the Underground from Mount Ebott because they hated humanity. Chara is taken in and adopted by the Dreemurr family, consisting of Asgore, Toriel and Asriel. Asriel and Chara become best friends, however they accidentally make Asgore sick by putting buttercup flowers into his butterscotch pie instead of butterscotch. Chara also purposely ends up getting sick off them, and ends up dying. Chara's soul is absorbed into Asriel, and Asriel takes Chara's body back to their village on the surface, using Chara to cross the barrier. However, the people at the village think Asriel killed Chara, and Asriel is attacked by the humans. Asriel makes it back to his home, however dies from his injuries shortly after on a bed of golden flowers, turning him into Flowey. Asgore then blames humans for killing their son and decides to kill seven humans that come down so they can break the barrier. Toriel doesn't like the idea, and ends up leaving the castle and Asgore and goes to live in the Ruins.