This goes to say that this is filled with spoilers for the recent Deltarune Chapter 5 release all over!!!
With that said, I’ve spent twelve hours going through the whole game + beating the secret boss. I barely had any expectations going in except for it being Asgore-centric and that it would be set during the festival in Hometown.
I was supposed to live-log my whole experience but immediately forgot lol but I started downloading around 1:30pm and finished playing by 1:30am the following early morning so yes, the longest chapter so far but it was soooooooooo good, dude.
I first noticed the increase in budget when you first step outside the house and woah morning shadows????? The most graphically satisfying chapter so far. Very obvious with the dark world, but even during the overworld festival with the cute ass scenes. Also more varying sprites even for established characters! I appreciate it very much and this probably is the best use for it:
honorable mentions: cute ass angry ralsei sprites that lasted the whole chapter…and the noelle sprites. all of them.
With how long the game is I kinda expected to get bored at some point but I didn’t. Maybe it was the adrenaline induced “DELTARUNE TODAY!!!!” or it was really just so engaging. EVERY AREA WAS DONE IN BOTH THE DEFAULT GAMEPLAY STYLE AND THE NEW PLATFORMER STYLE??? I’ll admit that I suck at platformers (that’s why I haven’t played Celeste yet even though it’s in my Steam library) and fell a bunch to a lot of the platforming sections in the cliffs area but I still thought it was fun to play. Maybe because the music was so good? oh god i’ll get to that later.
All the areas were so distinct and expansive that the dichotomy (i can’t say that word without thinking of dan and phil especially you mr. english major thanks guys) between the garden area and the castle is so shocking from how simple to intricate the designing was. But really, compare one area to another and you’d recognize them immediately.
CHARACTERS!!!! my favorites from the new roster are blue, yellow (guns n roses is a top tier ship name the fandom rlly came thru with that), green (i love them at first sight)... and PINK! RAAAAHHHHHHHHH
i’ve been very adamant that we were very, very close to toby fox working on a vocaloid song but i didn’t expect it to be hatsune mew mew secret boss freedom motif ft. camellia in the anime chapter. On second thought i should’ve seen this coming.
i think i’ve spent an hour on the secret boss? but it’s the most fun secret boss, second to tenna when we add the final bosses…again, maybe a lot in part of the music, but that goes for a lot of the game already.
I already got a sense of the main plot going slowly this chapter since it’s already been alluded to from a newsletter if I remember correctly? So I get why ppl are a bit divisive about the chapter but we’ve also got a bunch of developments like SUSELLE SUSELLE EVERYWHERE!!! I LOVE!!! Ralsei developing his true self of becoming a hater I’m so proud of you sweetie!!! Direct statement of asgore having a connection to the disappearance of dess and a little character growth of his… Potentially one-sided krusie?!?!?!!!! My only gripe is not spending the festival with Berdly TOBY!!!! I mean I get that it progresses the plot but still TOBY!!!
As many people have pointed out, the chapter is a blatant nostalgia trip, not just for asgore and kris but more explicitly for the playerbase as well. We’ve already gathered that Kris has been missing their childhood when their parents weren’t divorced, their brother still being there and the Holidays still intact during Chapter 3, but this chapter has been very blatantly referencing a lot of past dark worlds, and Undertale. It’s first very blatant at the first area, the garden, basically being just the first area of the first chapter but make it sakura pink. Even the area music is just a rendition of Field of Hopes and Dreams (which was a fucking banger, immediately knew it was insaneintherain). YET ANOTHER rendition of rude buster, the flowers being a 1:1 counterpart of undertale’s seven human souls (with the same attacks, weapons and armor from ut as well), asgore acting as the king, the literal existence of FLOWERY and flowey’s motif in flower man. Also pink’s/mew mew’s song being motif-filled, so is the entire soundtrack. This feels like a transitional period for the player most especially, like a farewell to a lot of the highlights from past chapters…but yknow, I could just be hallucinating.
also… After seeing video clips of the lake scene with kris and noelle I could not stomach letting that in my own game because that was horrifying. I’m interpreting it as both a joint (unwanted) successful attempt and a meta “out-of-bounds” thing. Also from a meta psychological horror perspective it’s horrifying in a good way that firmly cements the player as a part of the story, explicitly YOUR fault. And the fact that we have to wait for the last chapter to see the weird route resolution? WTF does side-b mean? Are they gonna be missing for an entire day? Are we even gonna see what happens? What’s the tail of hell? Where’s FRIEND? Gaster?????????? Keeps you on your toes. I love it.
Anyways, such a fun chapter, maybe even the most fun in terms of gameplay. Time to count my DELTARUNE TOMORROW’s again!