5/5 ★ – PhatBaby's review of Undertale.

Figured I'd fill the empty seething void that is finishing another set of Deltarune chapters by going back and playing Undertale, especially as a lot of fans are clamboring onto their mighty high horses, sipping their champagne and telling the world it's aged poorly. And honestly, I (respectfully) think those people are insane. I absolutely, down to the deepest reaches of my soul, love this game. If you ask me, it's a masterpiece. And I think it's easy to forget just how wildly inventive and innovational it is in 2025. The reason I glaze Toby Fox so hard is because every fibre of Undertale is so deeply handcrafted, lovingly sculpted and infused with the kind of creative approach to game design that the industry as a whole is lacking. It's a game where no corner has been cut; where reactivity is the core tenant, and the idea of player agency and using it to tell a story is king. And it uses that agency to become an experience that has A LOT to say and always finds the most interesting way possible to say it. One that, in a lot of ways, you could view as this big chaotic explosion of ideas. But it's so unapologetically itself, so deeply trusting in the idea that the player will get it, that it leans into it full hog and becomes something entirely original. It's partly a comedy that never buckles under the idea of its sense of humour being niche or too much. It's partly an affecting, touching drama about connection and friendship. It's also a fucked up, meta commentary on disassociation to violence, that has some of the most chill-inducing scenes in any video game ever. And it's doing all that by tracking what YOU do. By predicting how the player will interact with this world, the decisions they'll make, and the assumptions they'll run with. And he's right everytime! When Sans starts bringing up heinous shit you did in ANOTHER save file that you made for the shits and giggles, you realise Toby has been playing 5D chess this entire time, and he's counteracted things we think we're doing independently to tell a story based entirely on how people play video games. It's what video games as a medium should be producing: the end goal of this art form becoming more than arcade cabinets and glorified toys. It's taking the interactivity of video games and using them to craft a story that reacts to and challenges you by weaponising how you approach what it offers. Trust me, I could say a million more things about why Undertale is so special. I could talk about what a great storyteller Toby is, and how he sets up morbid mysteries that are genuinely compelling and lays breadcrumbs that are rewarding to follow. How every character he makes is unique, charming, and fun, and how great it is to see him cram his personality into every corner (not to mention the black magic he wields that allows him to successfully tone shift between humour, drama and horror, and make all three somehow walk hand-in-hand). I could talk at length about why the battle system is genius, creating this cocktail of a platformer, a puzzle game and a turn-based RPG that shouldn't work but is somehow absolute dynamite. But at the end of the day, it says everything that this game is an all-timer when it's a bunch of PNGs on screen making kooky internet jokes. This shit's just special, man. And it's not because it came out when games weren't like this. It's inspired so much, but nothing that followed the Undertale wave was ever Undertale. Well... except maybe Deltarune... but we'll have that discussion when it's finished and I'm 76 being like "hee hee, I like the little fat snowman guy who calls the bird dude chicken nugget man" as my nurse is wheeling me in to get my seventh colonoscopy that month. Just play it if you haven't. It's cheap and it's one of the best games ever made. Even the Pope had a copy, guys. Come on now. Dead ass, you know he was playing fan-made Sans fights in his free time.