The Princess of Stress

This character's biggest issue is that she's boring. Her struggle, being a ghost settling into a body and finding peace with it, is the exact same as two other characters who are actually important to the game. Arguably four other characters if you include Frisk and Kris with Mettaton and Mad Dummy, and I'd argue three of them struggle to be characters in their own right. I don't think Mew Mew being in the original would've helped this issue. I agree her theme is also fine, but forgettable since "Spider Dance", "Dummy!", and "Ghost Fight" are all based on the same track. All I remember Mew Mew for was her boss fight that was quite fun, and I was the 13-year-old this was targetted towards. Even her dialogue progression from "I can't wait to get a new perfect body!" to "Actually, I like this body." in that fight is nearly exactly the same as Dummy's.

What is it with the ghosts in this game and the only plot they can think of with them is that they want a body, but have an identity crisis about it? Unless your name is Mettaton?

I may have never seen a magical girl anime, but I have seen the trope of "cute thing is actually evil" so many times. Mew Mew's shtick, like all of these other characters, quickly grows old as it's the same thing every time. She looks cute and nice, but she actually has a mean evil side! It's boring.

Her design can't save her either. It looks like if you took 100 anime girls, threw them in a blender, and Mew Mew was the result. What does her design tell us about her other than she's girly and she's a cat?

I also noticed that for some reason, not only are her talking sprites so much more detailed than every other character, but she's animated. The only other character like this is Flowery who . . . do I have to say anything? He has a full animated intro.

I agree with the idea that Mew Mew is just Toby Fox's response to Hatsune Miku. I don't know how much more obvious you have to be then getting the voice, and it feels like an artifical way to get people to like Mew Mew by essentially having a different, popular character endorse her (common problem I am getting to).

The difference is that Miku has such an iconic design that you could recongize her from anywhere even if you no nothing about Vocaloid. She was in the FIFA for stars sake. She's like Pikachu. There is a quote from one of my favorite YouTubers, Davis Morgan, in his Sonic.EXE Round 2 video that is exactly how I feel about the matter. The original was about Sonic in the context of the creepypasta:

"-because if that's the case, then I have to believe that the guy who created the original Hatsune Miku character design probably like sold his soul to the devil to do that. And that's honestly kind of believable because Miku is a character design that is so good that it's lasted through like, two decades of terrible music and Miku is still a relevant character in pop culture."

Again, I have never watched a magical girl anime, and that shows the difference between a good parody and a bad parody. A good parody should be able to stand on its own with the source material enhancing the joke. If I need to know the context in order to understand what its trying to say, it'a a bad parody.

So between a boring story, an overused gimmick, and an unmemorable design, it is no wonder she is so unpopular and while I have a theory as to why she's pushed so much in these games, I don't understand why it keeps having as her reception is poor and these games seem to be written by how much the fans like/dislike an element.

Not exactly related to the ask, but while I was looking up images to compare Mew Mew's design, I found a Reddit thread about the matter that included this exchange I wanted to share with the class.

There's something pathetic about the way Mew Mew and Flowery are bait characters. You did something wrong if you have me defending Tenna. At least he has a personality and character motives to his actions.

We're supposed to like Mew Mew because the other characters tell us how cool she is without us actually seeing her do anything signficant. Boss fights aren't enough. I mean, just look at Jevil and how quickly he was forgotten about once he never appeared in the story in the story again and secret boss fights became the norm. Spamton, the Knight, Tenna, the characters with story relevance, were the ones who blew up in popularity. Or even the fan characters from Undertale, So Sorry and Glyde, are barely acknowledged or known about by the general fandom. It took me years to learn Glyde existed.

It's fine with Alphys is obsessing over Mew Mew because she's shown to be a weeb and in the context of the scene, she's secretly talking about her own insecurities and wishes in the form of explaining what the show is about (even if she does make the show sound boring if all that happens is that Mew Mew has cat ears and her friends accept her for it). But having her be the focus of the Nintendo Switch trailer and being the only flower we can save while she gets a special dating simulator boss fight? That feels like this issue.

If Toby Fox wants to launch a spin-off based on Mew Mew, which is my suspicion as to why she keeps showing up, and I would not be surprised if the next anniversary event reveals a Cutie Mew Mew Magic anime or manga, gimmicky secret boss fights and every other character telling us how to feel is not the way to do it. Mew Mew needs a whole section or actual plot relevance to make her interesting.

Oh I'm sure you want to.

As for the song and Japanese theming itself . . . it was a choice that was made for this game. I feel wrong talking about a culture is potrayed that I am not apart of, so instead, I'll bring up a different point.

I just watched a video on My Little Pony's worldbuilding, one of the many types of videos I like as background noise, and one point that the creator of the video keeps bringing up is how the show seperates itself from other fantasy worlds by introducting elements not seen in previous generations, unique arcitecture with carefully chosen color palletes, and holidays and customs that only work in the context of what the rest of the world set up.

However, in later seasons of the show, these special holidays and worldbuilding rules are ignored for simplier stories to write. Why have the unique holiday where the people gather as a community to end winter when you can copy and paste Christmas with a different name? It takes away from a lot of the small-town charm and coziness those first few seasons have and give the show a while not bad, very different energy.

I feel like this same problem is in Deltarune. Doesn't it take away from the magic from the world a bit if there's suddenly a real world country? And that a festival exclusive to this world is suddenly based around a real world version? Deltarune's worldbuilding is already lacking, I'm still annoyed about there being no explaination as to why Kris is the only human, but do we have to muddle it even more?

Cutie Mew Mew's lyrics . . . I'm not sure how much I can comment on given I don't know the parody and if this is how real magical girl intros sound. Without any context, I think the lyrics are a little vague and don't give us a very good picture of who Mew Mew is or what she can do, and the attempt to make her feel quirky and awkward ("While forgetting my lunch" and "I don't know the lyrics") feel forced. However, the line "nya nya girl with the mya mya brigade" does not sit right with me, and I don't know what "If I kiss in heaven it's fine, cutie revolution" means. I think what it's going for is that between this and the "If I burn in hell it's fine, pretty revolution" one, it's supposed to be her two alternate selves trying to take over the song. But you already know how I feel about it.

From my research because I was curious, "mya" is a digraph, which is means it has two letters that are used for one sound (think "bread" and how the "ad" is used together). In this case, it seems to be pronounced "me-a." It is usually used in the word "myaku" and is a diagraph used in very specific circumstances. It's used to decribe blood vessels, someone's pulse, mountain ranges, and hope. It doesn't look like "mya" is ever used on its own, like how it's used in the song. I guess "mya mya brigade" means "She's a meow meow girl with a hopeful brigade?"

So . . . I can not with confidence say that this line is gramatically incorrect, and I sincerely apologize if I got something wrong, but with "I don't know the lyrics" and how Deltarune uses Japan and the language in other cases, there is a non-zero chance that this line was only included so "nya" rhymes with "mya".

I think I was half asleep and thinking to myself, "Hey . . . maybe I'd like "It's TV Time!" more if there were lyrics?" and I looked up a lyrical version of the song.

I still don't like it. No matter how many times I listen to that song, I can never remember what the melody sounds like. I do not understand why that song is the one with the most views on Toby Fox's channel. I will stand my ground on it sounding like a mediocre Mario Kart track.

However, after this, it autoplayed to this cover of Cutie Mew Mew Magic and it actually woke me up. I'm even listening to it as I write and edit this essay.

Chai changes the line of "I don't know the lyrics" to "I fur-got what to say". It seems like a small change, but I think this a huge improvement. I know from my two years of Spanish classes, puns and idioms are rather difficult to translate across languages, but even "I forgot what to say" would've made the joke come off as "Mew Mew is dork" versus "Languages, am I right?"

Chai's version comes off a lot more like a proper intro by talking about the things that Mew Mew does specifically and in my opinion, does a much better job of making her come off as a clumsy, morally questionable, but good-hearted hero. I would actually be interested in watching more of this version of Mew Mew, plus her voice is just perfect for the character and I adore the way she sings "she's got audacity and grace". This cover is worth a listen.

There's something deeply ironic about Mew Mew as well in how she compares to Kris. Once again, we have a character going through an arc for our protagonist, and it's a character from another game instead of our protagoinst. But it also confuses one of the few consistent concepts throughout Deltarune, that being that Kris being possessed is a negative. In Mew Mew's fight, the combination of the original body and the ghost is a positive.

Like all these other "parallels" to Kris, it doesn't work because Kris is silent and has barely done anything with the soul other than resist a handful of choices and pull their soul out for what, two scenes? One scene barely counts because it was a cheap cliffhanger too.

Kris doesn't even have a reaction to being kissed by a stranger, in a scene where we're just listening to her talk without an active choice for the soul to make.

I've thought about this for a while and Asgore's problem is that we don't have the same "bonding" scene we have with every other character. Living in Toriel's home, dating Papyrus, cooking with Undyne, Alphys's date, Mettatton's minigames, and going to Grillby's with Sans allows us to have one-on-one time with these characters. Asgore doesn't get this. Yes, he speaks in battle, but so does every other character. Everything we know about him is from comments made by the other characters, which does paint an interesting image between Toriel's hate and insistance he's evil vs. everyone else calling him a fluffy huggable guy.

At the end of the game, we talk to Sans, meet Asgore, immeditately fight him in a intermediate level battle, and then he's pushed aside to be barely acknowledged in all three main endings. This is a choice that has always confused me. Why is Flowey/Asriel the final boss twice and Asgore not once? In the Asriel fight in Pacifist, I don't know anyone who wanted to save Asgore first because we barely know him.

I'm sorry, but Omega Flowey is such a stupid boss, I thought that even when I was most into Undertale. If the neutral ending was supposed to be the "typical RPG ending", wouldn't having the typical RPG boss work better than whatever Flowey is supposed to be? It could be used as both a boss fight and a character devlopment moment, because we can see from Omega Flowey that a gamestyle shake up isn't impossible.

For the entirity of the True Pacifist ending, Asgore is practically a pre-cursor to his apperance in Deltarune, and Deltarune's cast as a whole. He is one simple joke for the rest of the game: "I am pathetic and miss my wifey that hates me." Even his character model is being pushed off screen like it wants as little attention on him as possible.

This is more of an overall game problem vs Asgore alone, but I almost wonder if the choice to make all of the fallen humans die to Asgore instead of die in the area we find their possessions was to shift blame away from the other characters in fear of the audience not liking them. We see this in Deltarune with that awful TV in how we're supposed to ignore the horrible things he did because he's goofy and silly and one of Fox's favorites, and even in Ralsei never getting consequences for hiding information and motives from the rest of the Fun Gang becauase he's a marketable plushie that sells incredibly well. Or how we're supposed to ignore Susie being a bully and instead focus on how weird and awesome she is.

Having all the humans reach Asgore but leave their possessions behind doesn't make a lot of sense when these same objects are shown to be important to them. And we're not supposed to think of the implcations of two monsters selling off dead kids' possessions as souveiners while giggling about it. It would be an interesting conversation on morality, but just like Frisk getting out of any moral discussion by blaming the player for any negative choice while getting the credit for all positive choices, the monsters get out of their excitement of killing this human child because all the fault goes to Asgore. Ironically, making him a scapegoat.

Asgore in Undertale has the issue feeling like all set up and no pay off due to not having a bonding scene and the game being more focused at poking fun at him than exploring him.

I know bringing in the fandom isn't fair, but I think it's interesting how most Asgore fans I've seen don't actually seem to like Asgore or want to explore his characters (not saying you're not a fan, this is just a transition to bring in another note), but they're only doing it because they feel good about liking an "underrated" character instead of Sans, who they attack if they see fans of him. The Undertale fandom overcorrecting every single main character because they're so ashamed of the pre-2020 fandom, while also not fixing any of the actual issues or inverting them into the opposite extreme, is something I could write a whole other post about because I find it fascinating. I'd argue the fandom grew more toxic overtime because of how strict the rules for potraying characters and the game became, and these shifts started happening after Deltarune Chapter 2's release. Yet for some reason, UTDR fans are never called out for their toxicity, obnoxious behavior (namely how they need to make every single post a Undertale/Deltarune reference, including real world serious topics), inability to handle any criticism, and strange, borderline religious worship of Toby Fox unlike other fandoms with the same issues. My guess as to why this is because everyone outside the fandom knows Undertale as "was worse but grew better over time", while also not being able to explain why the fandom was bad in the first place other than "it was cringe".

Undertale section over. Deltaruined time.

Firstly, I'm surprised Asgore was important (or "important") to any chapter because I was fully convinced he would stay to that "I miss my wife that doesn't love me" joke that was his entire personality for four chapters. I didn't think we were supposed see him as anything more than pathetic given all he seems to is be depressed and stalk Toriel, though he does genuinely love Kris.

I actually thought the same thing about his armor! Flowery is obsessed with Asgore and keeping him happy, so it would make sense if he put a spell on him to keep him close. Except . . . no. Asgore just attacks his kid and their friend, then acts mysterious, for no reason. It sours the ending greatly, along with the tiny handful of moments of Asgore caring about his children earlier. I can't predict how Kris and Asriel are going to be handled in the future. My best guess is that Asriel is going to make a joke related to Flowey and Asgore and Susie are going to look around awkwardly because oops, they know someone like that! Then they move on and the joke is that Asgore is pathetic while Asriel is looking around awkwardly.

The interesting thing about the flowers is that in chapter 2, Asgore talking to his flowers is played off as a joke about how desperate he is. Now we're supposed to take this seriously and feel sad when the 7 human souls- I mean seven humanoid flowers turn back into flowers.

I'm willing to accept the interpretation that this was the intention, that's its a moment we're supposed to look back at fondly after all the context. But I've been decieved and lied to by this game so many times that everything feels like it needs to be taken with a grain of salt.

I can't believe there was a second "Mike reveal", which I think is what I'm going to keep calling these moments if they persist in later chapters. We have chapter 4 with this long, drawn out monologue of Asgore talking to himself (also for no reason) about this terrible event.

It meant nothing. A year of questioning and theorizing and it once again, meant nothing because Asgore can't read the texts he has been so cryptic about.

Once again, I feel like I say this every time I talk about UTDR, but the game is trying to have its cake and eat it too. It wants us to look at Asgore as a bumbling sitcom husband who can't take no for an answer, and a deeply traumatized and complex man who loves his kids despite barely paying interest in them at the same time.

Flowery and Asgore's dynamic is so strange, and another of the many victims of poorly done shipping throughout this chapter. I don't think there's a single ship in this game I like. Flowery is meant to show what Asgore wants, a relationship where he's loved, but Flowery is too unlikable and as you said, a happy magical world full of flowers and Asgore violating his metaphorical restraining order are not comparable when Asgore chose to go with Flowery, when Toriel is trying not to be around Asgore, who can't seem to get the hint.

Deltarune made me realize that one of Undertale's greatest strengths is that it's a short game. Nothing overstays its welcome or has time to grow flanderized or stale. It also doesn't take 1 year or more for each part to release. Sometimes I think I would've liked a lot of the characters if they only had 20 minutes to shine instead of 3 hours. Vice versa, characters like Papyrus would be a lot less charming if his phone quips and quotes were constant and not once in a while.

Both games take place over about the same amount of time, a week to even about 4 days in Undertale's case, but Deltarune feels more rushed and more dragged out at the same time because of how the chapters are split and paced. The same amount of action that takes place over 4 days in Undertale is only 12 hours in Deltarune. It feels like the game has little time to breathe.

I am so worried for how Asriel is going to be potrayed once he appears. Given all this game is interested in doing is subverting expectations and destroying all the Undertale legacy characters, for some reason, I can see Asriel having the same personality as Zephyr Breeze because it's unexpected and a subversion from both the cute and tragic characters of his Undertale iterations.

All of this apparently goes out the window in Deltarune because outside chapter 1, the idea of our Fun Gang collecting these sentient Darkners to add to what is their display cabinet is never to be questioned.

Card Kingdom, Cyber World, TV World, and Flower Kingdom are vastly different areas with different people and cultures, yet there's no concern brought up for destroying their worlds and livelihood because as we're told several times, the Darkners have existed before Kris and Susie came into the world. I'm iffy on the whole concept of "recruitment" and some characters being turned into weapons or items in your inventory too because doesn't that also go against the idea of taking autonomy away from people for our amusement that has been drilled into our head time and time again? I could even ignore it wasn't so obvious that it's to get them out of the story too because as the rules of Deltarune go, as soon as your use in the story is done, you get turned into a single overused gag.

You know what Castle Town actually reminds me of? The Omega Timeline in the world of the Undertale Multiverse. The difference is that Core Frisk founded the Omega Timeline with a selfless motivation of saving people from their dead, abandoned AUs and timelines.

Castle Town could be read as this same brand of good . . . if it wasn't the our heroes themselves causing these worlds to be destroyed.

What is it with these games and having the player be treated as evil for the same actions the characters in the game are praised for?

About the Knight, I don't think introducing them through a boss battle was the best way to go. I appreciate that they're finally shown, even if we still know next to nothing about our main antagonist, but it kills so much of the tension built up throughout the story seeing that we are very successful in fending them off. So we're powerful enough to take down this evil monster that has been seen as impossible to defeat throughout this story . . . but not strong enough to come up with another solution to the fountains and let the Darkeners live in peace? Maybe Ralsei knows one but won't reveal it until the middle of chapter 7 for no reason.

I miss King. He was the only boss who didn't have the same personality as every other boss, that being: "The embodiment of Tumblr humor that is also really sad and lonely and we should ignore all of the attempts to murder you and your loved ones because . . . they just need a friend! And sexy fanart!" He suffered from the Toby Fox issue of only being able to write one kind of antagonist, and King is flat as a result, but he could've been an interesting foil throughout the game.

Imagine if King hadn't been turned into a dumbed down hamster. What if in each chapter, you could go in and talk to King in his cage. He tells you that he can hear the new residents from outside his window and some even will talk to him directly. He can hear how they're trying to be happy that the heroes of the prophecy saved them, but they miss home and they're confused about what's going on. The heroes are no longer interested in them other than as trophies once their chapter is over after all. King goes on about how this is what he expected because of Lightners believing themselves to be morally good just by existing, then makes an unintential jab at Kris like "How would you feel if someone was puppeting your life?"

You're/Kris is left to think about that, how hypocritical you're being by controlling the lives of others to use as your entertainment while feeling bad for doing the same thing to Kris. A choice comes up of whether or not you want to recruit more Darkners to Castle Town. Something changes with the ending where the fountain is sealed up differently/not sealed at all. Susie and Ralsei are confused and angry at you, but you get a scene of the Darkners living peacefully. It's a tradeoff.

King can still be a abusive monarch, but morally gray. If Deltarune wants to be subversive so badly, I think tackling the idea of protagonists not being synonymous with "morally pure" and how these urban fantasy settings often have the main characters (usually reckless teens who want to be "the chosen one") treat the people in the fantasy world as fictional tropes to center around their own story is a more interesting route compared to of "Frisk Undertale with 12 more steps". It would also help with the lack of a central theme issue by focusing more on the idea of control and empathy.

Also, I hope you don't mind the mention, I love your spin on this concept and want to share it, @justa-side-blog.

I've had the suspicion since chapters 3-4 that Toby Fox really wanted Susie to be the main character of Deltarune. She is the one solving the plot. She is the one going through all the character devlopment and having her past explored past other characters' monologues. She is the one who manages to hold back the Roaring Knight from taking Toriel until Undyne arrives while Kris does nothing despite her being their mother. The Fun Gang dynamic is unbalanced with Kris doing the bare minimum and Ralsei's purpose being to do something cutesy or give cryptic lore to drive the plot forward. And I suppose it's a theory, but given Susie and Kris are written to as interchangable, I feel like that was on purpose so Fox could write Kris less and Susie more. Again, Kris is a glorified camera.

I have to bring in my mandatory Gravity Falls comparision because I thought of another one. Take Dipper and Pacifica. Dipper is from a middle-class family and grew up as regular kid pre-Gravity Falls. While his parents are divorcing, his grunkle and sister love him. Pacifica is from a rich family with parents that don't care about her to the point of training her like a dog to stay obedient.

Now imagine instead of their personalities clashing before finding common ground, these two characters with wildly different pasts and experiences being written with Dipper's nerdy adventerous personality. That's my problem with Susie vs Kris post chapter 1. I don't like the trend with indie media treating character introductions like a suggestion, showing the audience one thing and getting confused and angry when they expect them to act that way and not like a completely different character.

All of this being said, that author bias is why I find her writing in chapter 5 both confusing and not surprising at all.

We needed to see the Japan-themed festival, so Susie of course needed to be the one to get us there. However, it is very out of character for her not to want to engage with the fantasy home instead of reality and tell Kris that it isn't time for adventures, just for the sake of Suselle ship moments that are written with artifical sweetner. I also don't know what it is with this Deltarune and wanting to waste the player's time on minigames and non-plot related events because chapter 3 does the same thing. I saw someone say Deltarune is written as a serialized show while Fox and the fandom treat it like an episodic slice of life and I think that's perfect.

If the topic of shipping and shipbait didn't exhaust me, I would make a post about it. I do stand by my theory that chapter 5's endless shipbait supposed to feel like a dating sim and stir up the fandom due to the rest of the anime/Japan theming. I am the person that compares everything to terrible YA novels after all.

Also, not the most relevant thing to anyone but me because I like talking about merch, but why is she the only Lightner to break Fox's "no Lightners get solo merch" rule?

$36 for a non-limited edition graphic tee is also quite high, I'm sorry.

I am so tired of the meta jokes and this game's constant need to be smug and subversive. I don't understand what they're trying to achieve or who finds it funny. Meta jokes in general are tricky to get right because there's always the risk of them being cheap. It's the comedy genre's version of a jumpscare. It technically gets the job done, but there's little substance to it. But Deltarune's jokes aren't just cheap and lazy, they show how little this game cares.

I hate the Mike reveal in chapter 3 with a passion and how it treats the player as stupid for caring about the game and story they wrote. The joke in Chapter 5 about the players needing to take a shower for finding a secret? Really? I never found the "take a shower/put on some deodorant" jokes funny to begin with because of how often people used them in place of arguments and just to be rude.

I don't know, it's not quite lack of passion like a game like Hello Neighbor, but Deltarune feels like it knows it doesn't need to try. I saw a great post recently about how unlike other indie games that need to prove themselves or bring something new to the table, Deltarune could skip this step since it carried over the audience from Undertale. It doesn't matter if the story makes no sense or is never resolved. It doesn't matter if it makes the same jokes over and over and over again. It doesn't matter if the game is more focused on being unpredictable and smug with the most nonsensical examples of "maintaining the creator's vision" I've ever seen (the lack of game translations and the "no lightners get merch" rules) instead of telling a story. Keep throwing sexy men for fanart and pieces of lore for YouTube theorists and people will eat it up no matter what.

It has been a question on my mind for a while as to why Kris is the only human, and we haven't had a HINT of an answer 5 chapters and 25-30 hours of gameplay later. Then these flowers are the first humans with zero explaination as to why they look like that. We've barely had an answer for anything, so I'm disappointed but not surprised.

I realized a lot of my problems regarding how the narrative is told could be fixed by Kris being able to talk. A silent protagonist worked fine in Undertale, even though it ends up confusing itself if you think too hard about the endings, since that is a plot-driven game with a simple structure. Enter an area, fight creatures, meet a main monster, fight the monster, be friends, move on. You could argue that game does have the Toby Fox writing quirk of half the main characters (specifically Undyne) being dumbed down into jokes once their role in the story is complete, but it's for such a short period of time, about 3-5 hours, that it's not a severe problem.

This doesn't work with Kris or Deltarune's longer and more convuluted story. Kris is supposed to be their own person with the tragedy being they're being possessed against their will. However, this falls flat most of the time because we almost never get Kris's perspectives and their moments of autonomy are so boring. In fact, why can Kris rip out their soul seemingly whenever and theoretically end the events of the game whenever they want? Why don't they say anything to Susie and Ralsei about this, even in notes? It takes so much tension out because it's another case of Deltarune's long list of "Reasons Why This Game would be 1 Hour Long if Everyone would Stop Vagueposting". I have no idea what this game wants anymore.

Chapter 5 has near the exact same problem I had with chapter 3 in which the game is so uninterested in doing anything but guilt-tripping with Kris, all of their traumas and issues need to be given to other characters to solve while we never get how they feel outside optional dialogue and implications. Chapter 3 is about divorce and do we get anything from Kris, the child of divorced parents? Or even Lancer? Another child of divorced parents that seemed to be important before he and his dad were turned into unfunny jokes? Barely and no respectively. Instead, it's all about the sexy Dreemurr family's TV and how their TV is so very sad about not being watched anymore and we all need to be sad for him as he takes up precious play time and tries to kill our heroes. Kris who?

Chapter 5 is about Asgore and Kris's relationship to him. Or wait, I'm sorry, this can't be about the main character. It's about a mother-befriending bouquet of flowers who may or may not be at least fantasizing about having sex with their dad. Is there any other way to interpret this scene?

Flowery is the one having an arc about his obsession and feelings for Asgore after Asgore feels abandoned by his family. Kris has no reaction to any of this. No commentary to give. I like this scene here where Kris is stepping back before Asgore can attack, but that's it.

The one argument I've seen for this is that Tenna/Flowery and Kris are foils, metaphors and all. Don't get me wrong, I adore narrative foils when they are done correctly. But this doesn't work because Kris has no reactions! They're supposed to have some secret master plan, but we have no clue as to what it could even be about. I genuinely can't think of another piece of media where someone else is having the character development for another character while they're in the back seat of their own story.

Poor Kris, this is now twice they're watching strangers flirt with their divorced parents right in front of them and the game does not acknowledge it.

Once again, you can't do both, Toby Fox! You can't have a character that we're supposed to feel bad for taking over the life of and then write them as an personality-less self insert! You can't have your game's story be so cryptic and full of red herrings we're supposed to pay attention to, then get angry at the player for being interested in it! Do you see why I call this game mean-spirited? Nothing is allowed to be genuine unless you're a secret boss!

WHERE IS JEVIL?

Another aspect that bothers me is that this game, five chapters in, still has no central theme. The fact it's a chapter game is not an excuse. Undertale? Your actions have consequences. Poppy Playtime and FNAF? Loss of innocence. Bendy and the Ink Machine? How corporations corrupt creativity. My Friendly Neighborhood? Desensitization to tragic events due to the news. Not sure if that game is considered underrated, but please check it out because it's so good. I have mascot horror on the mind again because I'm beginning to write one.

Deltarune? . . . friendship? Maybe?

This game tries to be so much at once that it ends up being nothing at all. I've gone through multiple ideas as to what the main theme could be and none were quite right as they only apply to 2-3 characters or were too broad. I started to believe that the game could be about escapism. It's set up like that. Games, the Internet, TV, all places people go to escape problems in their life which does line up with our burdened main characters. Kris's possession, while a stretch, could be a metaphor for feeling like you have no control over your life as you're reaching adulthood and have expectations placed upon you. Except nope! That actually makes sense and not follow the Dana Terrace school of writing! Now the adults can interact very easily with the Dark World and it's apparently a real place and a real threat, or as threatening as a game that tells you nothing about its story or plot can be. I'm so lost on how time works as well because in chapter 1, no time passes while Kris and Susie were in the Dark World. In chapter 5, it's synced to real time when only five days have passed.

With no central theme for the characters and plot to devlop, everything they do feels pointless. Things are just happening.

This is Big Mouth writing. That show also can't decide whether the metaphor monsters are in the kids' heads or actually exist and everyone can see them if it means they can make a joke out of it.

I don't accept the argument "Chapter 5 was the last chill chapter before the apocalypse happens!" to explain this chapter's lack of events. I don't know how and why Gravity Falls always comes back to these, I have a partially written Helluva Boss essay sitting in my drafts that also compares the character in question to Gravity Falls (it makes sense in context, trust me), but it's just a really good show to use as a comparison.

The most widely hated episode in that fandom is Season 2 Episode 16's "Roadside Attraction". The episode itself is fine, definetely in the lower end of that show's episodes but not bad. The issue is where it was placed. The episode right before this was "The Last Mabelcorn" and the episode after is "Dipper and Mabel vs. The Future" and the Weirdmageddon triology. The tension and anticipation were at their highest and the characters suddenly drop their war preperations in favor of a sudden roadtrip, ignoring everything about Bill and the danger they're in. If this episode was placed in season one or the beginning of season two, I doubt anyone would have complained. Chapter 5 is Deltarune's "Roadside Attraction". The events should've been placed between chapters 1-3, not when they spent chapters 2-4 building up this world-ending event and they suddenly drop it in favor of a Japanese festival and an anime pretty boy that uses the term "m'lady" with full sincerity.

I can't exactly put my finger on what it is, but there's something about how Deltarune writes all of its characters that makes me fail to attach to any of them. There's something shallow about them all, maybe it's a mix of the above. There is no character in this game I can confidently say I like. And I'm the type of person who can look past poor writing if the characters or even a character is engaging enough to keep my attention. I'm not even touching the ship bait because I am too tired, but I strongly dislike it too and it doesn't help with the "weeb obsession" this game has by essentially giving Kris a harem.

The Weird Route is so strange. It's the route we're not supposed to do, the equivalnt to the genocide route, yet it is the signficantly more interesting game. The characters are more in-character, there is plot actually happening, yet players are discouraged from playing it.

Imagine if the Pacifist Route in Undertale punished you for playing over and over by telling you how horrible you are for taking over Frisk and making them help people, while also never letting Frisk have the option to make choices themselves. You as the player are mocked for thinking you can spare monsters while they're trying to attack you, while also being treated as stupid for not clicking the spare button. There is no Papyrus dating scene, no cooking with Undyne, no True Lab, no Alphyne date, no Asriel battle, basically just a glorified neutral run. Also no boss fights and instead they're all replaced with those 30 second Mario Party minigames. Meanwhile, the genocide route contains all of the events I just mentioned and the gameplay is far more engaging, but you're told you're also evil for playing this route.

Finally, the Undertale references and how Deltarune takes that game down along with it. The souls are painfully obviously the six human souls, except it makes no sense in the context of Deltarune because unless there's something Asgore is not sharing (which is honestly very likely for how this game is written), he did not murder six children. I do not understand why Toby Fox hates him so much. However, that is the most excusable and fine of the references. Then there's Sans, oh goodness gracious . . . they were already pushing it with him in Toriel in the last two chapters, but having him be an actual AU hopper that originates from Deltarune is a terrible idea. And this is coming from the person whose entire thing is Undertale AUs! I adore these skeletons from other universes! The problem is that it makes Sans's interactions with Papyrus, Toriel, and Frisk feel so much more shallow because they're just copies of who he knows. And it's not written cleverly like several of his AUs, like my beloved Error.

When I saw Mad Mew Mew was the hidden boss, I was confused to say the least. I was thinking a while back that it might be nice to have a female secret boss or main boss, hopefully with a different personality than Queen's, so I guess I ended up what I wanted, but I shoud've asked for the character to be original to Deltarune too. I suppose it makes sense with the anime/Japan theming, and you could argue, but . . . is that really a good thing? On the positive side, her dynamic with Orange is cute. "Pink" might be my favorite song in the whole track and I hope Man on the Internet makes a lyrical version of it. Honestly, Mad Mew Mew's boss fight is catchy too. A relief compared to Flower- HATSUNE MIKU AND A DATING SIMULATOR?

It's like . . . it's like this game was personalized to piss me off in paticular.

I do think it is really funny how much Toby Fox keeps pushing Mad Mew Mew in these games and trailers (see the Undertale Nintendo Switch trailer) and while I'd argue she's on a similar level of bait to Tenna, especially in this chapter, nobody in Undertale, Deltarune, or Undertale AU fandoms cares about her. It makes me think of this:

Wait, more of a Deltarune fandom thing, but I am also so sick of the "DELTARUNE TOMMOROW!" memes on every corner of the Internet every time something slightly of note comes out of that game. They're not that funny and I don't understand why they think it is. It's worse with that "Driving in my car, right after a beer" meme because people were putting that under actual car crash tragedies because they couldn't make something about their stupid quirky game for 2 minutes.

Okay . . . I think I calmed down. Goodness, this game exhausts me. This rant is over 2000 words long.

I take that back, while I was watching videos to fact check things, this popped up in my reccomendations. I'm done.

Also YOU, Mr. "Pomni and Ragatha with Giant Breasts in my Thumbnails".