Review: Deltarune Surpasses Undertale With Chapter 4

The indie game Undertale, created almost entirely by Toby Fox, is so well known there's little need for an introduction. With its reputation for being one of the most influential games of all time, it would seem that nothing could compare, but Deltarune has done just that.

Deltarune is the companion game to Undertale. Rather than be a direct sequel or prequel, it seems to be a "parallel" story with many of the same characters in a different world. This time, the player controls a character named Kris- and the emphasis is that the player controls Kris, but is not Kris themselves.

While playing through chapter 1 of Deltarune, it seemed to be a solid game with a new main trio to get attached to. Susie, the school misfit and bully, falls into the alternate Dark World of the school with Kris, where they meet Ralsei, the eventual third to their party, who somehow knows how the game's controls work. My first impression was that Deltarune would be a good time, as it kept the same delightful tonal balance of whimsical and unnerving like Undertale has, but that it was probably not going to catch up to the highs of completing an Undertale run.

Later chapters proved me absolutely wrong. Snowgrave in particular is intense and breaks all sorts of ways in which typical character-player dynamics usually work, but the standard route of the game and overall impact of Chapter 4 is spectacular.

Spoilers for Chapter 2 and Onwards:

While chapter 2 introduced a secondary, darker route either referred to as the Weird or Snowgrave route, the closest thing Deltarune has to a "genocide" route from Undertale, Chapter 4 took it to another level. The conditions to embark on the Snowgrave route are similar to the prior game's dark route: kill every enemy. Chapter 2's Snowgrave route is the first time that the player's control over Kris can go from a benign outside influence to truly feeling like the player is the real antagonist of the game, as it involves the player forcing Kris not only to kill enemies but to psychologically push and torment their friend, Noelle Holiday, further and further down the violent path.

Chapter 4 is the chilling aftermath.

If a player has a save file with the Snowgrave route and has not overridden the trajectory of the route (by being too nice, generally speaking), there is a scene in chapter 4 where Noelle invites Kris to speak with her.

In both routes, this point in the story is the first time Kris rips the SOUL (the heart cursor the player uses in combat and menus) out of their chest in the middle of a chapter, throwing the player's ability to control them away. While it's been previously shown that they do this at night at the end of other chapters to act without the player's knowledge, Kris is too desperate to not be overheard in both the standard and Snowgrave route in chapter 4 and resorts to hiding us away in the middle of the day.

As the SOUL, the player moves through the vents in both routes, but in Snowgrave, we overhear Noelle speaking to Kris.

Evidently, Kris had left us to try and convince Noelle that the events of Chapter 2 were a dream, that it was just "a stupid prank", and that Berdly, who was injured in Chapter 2 due to our actions, would get better.

However, Noelle reveals that Kris had told her not to speak about this the next time they met, or they'd be "overheard."

Overheard by us, the player.

The scene continues with the player needing to possess Kris again (as this truly is more like possession than anything else) and in dialoguing further with Noelle, who realizes she's no longer talking to the "Kris" she thought she was, we reveal through Kris speaking that we can even read her thoughts, and that the dream wasn't a dream at all.

As far as cosmic horror goes, or a breaking of the forth wall in such an eerie way, the last time I'd felt anything like this was when I hit the ending of Doki Doki Literature Club! for the first time. Deltarune really took what Undertale was building towards with Frisk and Chara and the concept of control and pushed it to a new level, and it's only chapter 4 out of a potential seven chapters.

In addition to the heightened creepiness and progression of the Snowgrave route, Chapter 4 also featured new Dark Worlds (plural!) with the most beautiful environments yet, new characters within those Dark Worlds, and directly addressed the prophecy hanging over the main trio's heads. What seemed to be a heroic destiny is apparently a tragedy— one Ralsei has known all along and is desperate to keep Susie and Kris from finding out about.

Susie does see the ending of the prophecy, much to Ralsei's fear, but we, the audience, still don't know what lies ahead.

In addition to other major events with heavy implications for the story ahead, Susie and Ralsei see the SOUL for themselves.

The SOUL provides light in a fight in the darkness, and is still our way to control Kris in this scene, but in this instance we guide them to safety as we always do during combat, by avoiding projectiles.

There are further instances of emotional blows, signature hilarity, and stunning lore drops which made chapter 4 of Deltarune truly special. The writing is top-notch, as always, and the new soundtracks composed by Toby Fox are as phenomenal as all of the music he's made before with musical callbacks to prior tracks woven in.

While some people are waiting until Deltarune is finished to start playing it, I'm glad to be along for the ride as it comes out and to let every release have some breathing room. Its a story worth the wait and worth savoring.

Chapter 5 is set to come out in 2026!