(Note: this review contains minor spoilers of general elements of the game. It also mentions topics essential to the game’s plot that may be triggering for some. I note these topics to inform readers what the game entails.)
Toby Fox’s instant indie classic Undertale is one of the seminal games of my childhood. Its virtuosic soundtrack, incisive metanarrative, and beautiful thematic message—embracing pacifism and a universal capacity for redemption—lingered with me far longer than its brief runtime. Growing up on Nintendo games, I welcomed its similar storytelling language and tropes and loved how it subverted them at every turn. I learned all about the mysteries lurking in its depths, from a lost scientist to phantasms appearing only in certain playthroughs, and though I could not bring myself to try the villainous route of the game, I watched rapt as friends and online strangers tackled the game’s most difficult bosses, reserved for the worst of routes. My core friend group shared an adoration for it, and as I wrote my first long-form narratives as a teen, the game’s concepts formed a bedrock for my forays into storytelling.
When the demo for a sequel of sorts—a “parallel story,” officially—surfaced in 2018, I read about the concept, watched the ominous conclusion, and decided to pass on it. Undertale’s minimalist world, its focused story, was and is one of its strengths. In my eyes, Fox needn’t meddle with his masterpiece. Perhaps I understood already that his approach to storytelling didn’t require complete closure—as he would later say during a charity event, he cares about what his audiences imagine with his worlds, too. Besides, the friends with whom I’d shared Undertale were no longer part of my life. So, the game remained a treasured memory, and for the most part, I ignored its successor, almost forgetting about it.
In 2026, I decided I might as well try Deltarune. I had gotten a recommendation for it from a friend who loves Undertale even more than I do, whose referrals have been great. I also had seen encouraging footage of newer parts of the game, which despite my not knowing any of the characters, I found moving. With a lot of spare time on my hands, I decided picking up the successor to a childhood favorite was a worthy investment, and around my birthday—ten years after I got Undertale as a present from a friend, in fact—I bought Deltarune, with a bit of trepidation. I could not expect it would actually live up to the original masterpiece, after all.
And then Deltarune exceeded Undertale.
Toby Fox’s Deltarune is The Empire Strikes Back to Undertale’s A New Hope. Everything, from the characterizations to the gameplay to the narrative to the world itself, is more complex and nuanced, and the themes this time around are more mature, with full faith in the audience to meet them. The metanarrative and moral elements that make Undertale revolutionary have evolved in new, exciting, and—if you so dare to inquire—horrifying ways. As idiosyncratic as Undertale is, Deltarune is even more so, and while that certainly drives people away from the game, as Fox himself has acknowledged his work is for a particular audience, if Deltarune works for you, it is singular and breathtaking. It is an artist at peak confidence sharing a magnum opus that is so specific in its ruminations that it feels like a conversation, yet so masterfully conceived that I sincerely think it deserves its place in art history books. As some of Deltarune’s characters stretch toward the infinite, here, Fox and his collaborators have made an experience that should remain forever.
Deltarune is a turn-based role-playing game, and as one would expect of the genre, it has a rich narrative for the characters to traverse. As in Undertale, players can defeat enemies either with fighting or, on most occasions, “acting” with words or peaceful minigames, which can build toward more positive story outcomes. The player’s turns are spent managing who in the party is doing what—fighting, acting, using an item, or defending to build up energy. When enemies attack the player, a “bullet hell” section begins, in which the player, represented by a red soul, must dodge oncoming attacks of all sorts, from thrown knifes to drops of acid to, occasionally, ducks. If the player can slide closely by an oncoming bullet, they’ll gain extra energy to power their acts or attacks. Battles are balances of strategy in planning your turns and finesse with dodging oncoming assaults and daring to weave as close to enemy projectiles as possible. While I am not the most frequent or experienced gamer, I found the challenge level healthy for almost the entire game, with the most difficult battles left as optional. And as I took on those battles, too, I can say the challenge is excellent, leaving light at the end of every tunnel and a massive sense of accomplishment for those determined enough to keep on battling.
The heart of Deltarune, though, is its story, presented with vintage, pixilated graphics. On the surface, it seems like the plot of a somewhat derivative 80s adventure movie. In a sleepy suburb populated by anthropomorphic creatures of various sorts—lizards, cats, and a family of Christmas-themed reindeers like “Rudy,” “Noelle,” and “Carol”—strange Dark Fountains spewing shadows have appeared, in hidden locations that most of the town does not notice. These fountains turn innocuous places, such as a games closet, a computer library, or a local church, into wondrous “Dark Worlds,” where normally inanimate objects take on personalities and once-tiny environments swallow the horizon in labyrinthine forests of carpet, shimmering computerized skyscrapers, or endless temple hallways. The only person who can dispel the darkness is the playable teenager Kris, the sole human in town, who ventures into these worlds with the equine school bully Susie. Joining them on their quest is the prince of the dark, an enigmatic, hooded figure named Ralsei—named suspiciously like Kris’ collegiate elder brother, Asriel. As the trio journeys through these worlds, they encounter the hilarious, oddball denizens of the dark and learn that if they cannot contain the Dark Fountains, then shadow will consume all reality, destroying the Dark Worlds and the normal, everyday town. It would seem the sort of apocalyptic scheme that everyone should oppose, except a mysterious Knight is hard at work making Fountains, bringing the world close to calamity.
Oh, right: Kris, whom the player controls, is in on the Knight’s plan. And you are puppeteering them without their say in the matter, meaning that you and they are at war for the body with which you play the game.
Nothing in the world of Deltarune is as it seems, and players who click with this imaginative universe are in for an unforgettable thrill ride. Every character is wonderfully conceived, from the comedic relief that keep on surprising to the deep, multilayered, and struggling trio at the story’s heart. The game also has a majority-queer cast, with every main playable character holding a queer identity of some sort (even if that might not seem the case at first), and yet Fox writes his characters with great psychological insight beyond any single identity label. The suburb itself is neither homophobic nor insistent on a gender binary, so the queer cast members here exist in a world where neither their own nor their partners’ gender defines them; they shine as complete persons with real problems. And the struggles Fox explores are serious: PTSD, self-harm, suicidal ideation, and in some cases, gender dysphoria. These are real demons that many teenagers grapple with, even if adults pretend otherwise.
The game is full of secrets and alternate paths, always rewarding the player with deeper insights into its cast and probing the same questions of morality that Undertale so famously handles. Just like his prior work, Fox lets his mysteries fester, and the longer the game goes on, the more unnerving oddities surface, such as townspeople that seem to have a different script than everyone else, perhaps tying back to a long-lingering question buried in Undertale. One of the highlights of the game is an 8-bit miniature world within one of the Dark Worlds, with two levels required for the main adventure. But if you maximize your achievements in the Dark World, you can uncover a different side to the 8-bit game, turning it into a gnawing, uncomfortable journey reminiscent of “haunted game” stories passed around by children. This minigame, in turn, reveals an alternate route in another Dark World, and allows the player to proceed to a normal boss fight in a different way, opening the greatest challenge of the game so far. And just as Undertale housed a villainous route, Deltarune presents the player with the potential to see a different ending to the game through certain “evil” decisions you can make, though the exact pathway deliberately requires work to discern. I personally could not stomach Undertale’s evil path and am far more averse to this “Weird Route” of Deltarune, which turns the game into true horror as Fox tackles a psychologically abusive relationship* and unveils his most compelling character yet, precisely drawn and powerfully tragic. To play the Weird Route is truly not for the faint of heart, though fortunately, the community around the game has produced excellent playthroughs of it.
The entirety of Deltarune’s soundtrack is composed by Fox himself, along with a small collection of collaborators who assist certain tracks. The vast collection of music here is even better than Undertale’s score—and Undertale is considered to have one of the best soundtracks in video game history. (Even Pope Francis has heard Undertale.) From the sweeping overworld themes in every Dark World to the solemnities of “12am,” “Dreamwatchers,” and “Dark Place,” Fox strikes every emotional chord. And he reserves his best for boss fights, from quirky, infectious collaborations (“Attack of the Killer Queen” with Celeste and Minecraft composer Lena Raine and Marcy Nabors, “Cutie Mew Mew Magic” with Camellia and, somehow, Hatsune Miku) to foreboding adrenaline pumpers (“Big Shot,” “Black Knife”). Of all the songs so far, those latter tracks “Big Shot” and “Black Knife” are my two favorites, with “Big Shot” featuring a fantastic breakdown of vocal samples and “Black Knife” bursting out of the gate with the ferocity of a bull. But if you are looking to augment your playlists, also see “I guess I’m in love” from the most recent soundtrack collection, the most beautiful song in the game so far, scoring an all-time romantic confession scene with spacious pads and gentle keys sprinkling on top of a gorgeous guitar line. And if you can pick up on the many leitmotifs Fox weaves throughout his work, then you’ll know exactly whose guitar line this is, as is the case for songs across the soundtrack that cleverly bind themselves to characters and moments through their motifs.
Not every aspect of Deltarune is perfect, nor does every decision resonate with me. Deltarune is split into chapters, with one Dark World environment in each, and in all but one of these chapters, there is a minor, regional antagonist in addition to the Knight, who looms over the narrative. All these antagonists are partially comedic, yet I did not find most of them funny, and especially disliked the most recent one, who parodies tropes of genres I do not personally know, leaving me unable to connect to Fox’s jokes. My favorite chapters are 2, 3, and 4, with the first chapter being a bit too spare and reminiscent of Undertale for me to love it, and the fifth and most recent chapter serving as my least favorite, at least outside of the Weird Route, where it is, funnily enough, my favorite work of writing in either of Fox’s games. This recent chapter spends too much time with its side characters, many of whom I find less compelling than the other chapters’ crews, and is a tonal reversal of the fourth chapter, which had a moody atmosphere I adored. Still, depending on what aspects of Fox’s work resonate the most with any given player, I can see someone who loves the game find the fifth chapter excellent and revel in its characters.
I absolutely love Deltarune. While it is so idiosyncratic in its composition that I cannot recommend it to everyone, if this sort of game seems to resonate with you, I would highly advise you to try it. For me, its world of imagination brings me back to my own childhood, to the stories I would dream up on the playground with my friends, to our own Dark Worlds that we would make of a swing set or a climbing fort or a field of trees at the back of the playground, where few other kids were. But the game offers more than nostalgia: it is also a wonderfully crafted examination of the human psyche and (as Deltarune fans have elucidated) how stories reveal and change us. I call the game a conversation with Fox because he has revealed himself so completely here, not because anything is explicit autobiographical (although I sense parts of it are), but because his insights, interests, tastes, challenges, and massive compassion for others are all visible and palpable. As someone who creates characters and writes stories, when I see how unabashedly Fox has left his handprints on this work and feel how much pain is present within the stories of these characters, I am reminded that all artists, including myself, do the same, pouring ourselves into our works hoping to help someone else through a struggle—and also help ourselves. There are many, many other takeaways a person could draw from Deltarune, a host of important topics one could follow through this piece and uplift. The density of Deltarune, the breadth of its imagination, the range of its questions, the earnestness that defines it—what more could one ask for from a piece of art?
Go play Deltarune.
*For anyone sensitive to this topic, note that as of Chapter 5 of Deltarune, this relationship only comes to be in versions of the Weird Route.