Why does UNDERTALE Break the 4th Wall?

hi folks I'm Josh and I've got to admit that even though I really enjoyed undertale I didn't think I can ever play it again undertale takes so much care creating your connections with the characters and planted an idea in my head does their happy ending and their world exists inside a save file it did this by breaking the fourth wall so I've brought along my friend snowman from snowman gaming to help me explain but first this video contains spoilers for undertale so putting a watch later list if you haven't played it and then come back hey guys it's snowman and i'm excited to talk about how undertale breaks the fourth wall to tug on our heartstrings but quickly for those that haven't heard of it before the fourth wall originally comes from the theater and it's the idea that a stage is made up of the three physical walls at the back and the sides plus a fourth imaginary wall between the actors and the audience when an actor talks or interacts with the audience that is when the fourth wall is broken it's tough to decide exactly where the fourth wall goes with games because the audience is always interacting with at least some part of it seeing as this is kind of essential for games when and where it breaks the fourth wall is kind of debatable the most famous examples include the Psycho Mantis fight from Metal Gear Solid it makes you switch the port your controller is plugged into so that the Psycho Mantis can't read your inputs you seem to like a legend himself don't you on another occasion it doesn't even tell you the radio frequency to contact one of the characters you had to check the back of the CD box this blew my mind when I first played it but it's really only a small part of a game that doesn't use the technique to great effect elsewhere most games have some kind of tutorial and an NPC saying press X to do the thing what is an X button how would I know is kind of Almond but I think undertale does it better when a Frogger is sad because people skip through his dialogue by pressing X which may be cute but it's only the tip of this heart-wrenching iceberg from the first moment sans cracks a pun he also cracks the fourth wall undertale also constructs part of its story around the save system unlike other games where it's a simple function outside of the game world in undertale your determination gives you the ability to save and change history when flowey absorbs the other human souls the game takes away your power to save and control the outcome you see this control is normally just for the player but once flowey has it the game takes things a step further and actually shuts down if you die this was really impactful partly because I never expected it but also because it made me feel completely powerless you'd be forgiven for thinking it was the end of the game you have no power but at this point it's only your real determination to find a happy ending that could make it happen undertale forces you to think about the value of the characters and your relationships with them because unlike most games you didn't get what you want the powerlessness feels much more real than say taking away your abilities and other RPGs because it was an assault on me the player so I didn't start the game up again just to complete it I did it to get the best ending I could so the characters I liked could be happy undertale has a great sense of humor and more than a few secrets that wouldn't be as cool without shattering the fourth wall over-the-top reactions to puns a battle system that pokes fun at itself and other RPGs you'd normally expect a games battle system to work the same throughout a game but with things such as shifting boundaries for the bullet health sections undertale leaves so much room for the unexpected as an enemy builds up to their ultimate attack it should do damage within the confines of that system but a doc eating it instead comes completely from left field or to the right if you could be technical about it a really cool secret that ties into the system is how you can get a key to sans room by manipulating time when you're in the hall where sans judges you which I loved by the way when he explains what love and exp actually stand for it not only makes me feel like a monster but also subverts my expectations of a normal RPG anyway during a pacifist run save and then go talk to a normal once the conversation is over close down your game it's ok sans is kind of magical too he can tell that you've heard him say this only he'll give you a secret password to prove that you're a time traveler close down the game without saving again and when you talk to him the third time you won't have to listen to his judgement you'll just give him the password sans needs more convincing than that so he'll give you another password to take back to the future after all this time travel he finally believes you and gives you the key to his room I won't spoil it for you but the truth is very surprising undertale' also does something that I've never seen another game do there's a subtly hinted at secret character that the story implies was researching the save system and got stuck outside of the game it invites players to unravel this by delving into its files to find more clues does this count as reverse fourth-wall breaking if the game did all this without breaking the fourth wall it would probably come off a bit preachy but instead it reinforces its themes of empathy by connecting with you instead of your avatar earthbound is such a strong influence on the game and it does the same thing to great effect during the final boss fight by calling directly to you to help out your characters undertale goes beyond that to make you think about your actions in the world and ask questions about why you're acting that way it even accuses you and anyone watching during the evil route through the game does that count as double fourth wall breaking flowy asks you if all the pain you're causing is really worth it just to satisfy your curiosity on top of all of this the final reason why I don't want to play undertale ever again is because there's only one save slot in the end if you start a new game your friendships you worked so hard for or raised do you really want to take that from them thank you for watching if you've enjoyed then subscribe and if you want to head over to snowman gaming he does the good game design series of videos where he talks about all sorts of principles of game design and I was featured in one the other week about spelunky which is a very cool game so tell him I sent you if you subscribe and if you want to support our work then we both have patreon pages waking it rewards for supporting us and then continually helping us to produce things like this that hopefully you enjoy so until next time moustache be sure to follow us both on Twitter and you can also support our work on patreon if you would like thanks again and we'll see you guys next time I was jealous of Josh's mustache though I decided to grow my own real quick what do you think

Channel: JoshFTL

Views: 33,769

Keywords: undertale, undertale gameplay, metal gear solid, mother, mother 3, earthbound, 4th wall, breaking the 4th wall, 4th wall break, undertale 4th wall, undertale true pacifist, undertale genocide, undertale review, good game design, undertale game design, undertale gaster, undertale w d gaster, undertale secrets, undertale sans, undertale papyrus, undertale time travel, undertale flowey, undertale ending, undertale end, undertale morality, chara, frisk, dreemur, undertale morals

Id: EPdIAQLujYU

Length: 7min 22sec (442 seconds)

Published: Mon Mar 28 2016

Reddit Comments

[u/[deleted]]

That's all good and dandy, I like how Undertale affects people like this and all......

But then I moved my files.

No Resetting here. People seem to forget this quite a bit. You can still play without taking away anyones happiness.

[u/Rogue_Zealot]

This is really well done and hits all the right points.