Sooo much jank & unfortunate difficulty spikes, I get the feeling that this wasn't playtested enough during development leaving a lot of areas feeling unpolished. There's bullet sponge enemies that are too fast, completely pitch black areas you need to navigate with your flashlight that's always dead, doors getting stuck... Oh, and don't forget the invisible zombies & teleporting faces that are borderline impossible to defeat without cheesing the game. I knew the original would be a bit rough but this is the re-release so I don't really know what happened there.

It's a shame because the atmosphere, sound and texturing is so great - especially the "drawings scratched into the walls" aesthetic. Still, a very commendable effort considering the dev would have been literally 14 years old for the majority of the development. The games I was making at 14 were not nearly this impressive lmao.

Still have Cry of Fear to play through though, so hopefully that'll combine the atmosphere with some more solid gameplay!

Still a hood classic man god damn. Undertale somehow manages to be masterfully subversive but still completely genuine at the same time. Replaying it I thought that mentioning your save file and previous playthroughs would be cliche and not age super well, but it still manages to pull it off in a way I haven’t really seen anywhere else. Breaking the 4th wall in any other game pretty much amounts to an npc saying “HEHEH WOULDNT IT BE CRAZY IF I WAS A VIDEO GAME CHARACTER RIGHT NOW!!???”, but Undertale manages to hint at it with a good level of subtlety.

The characters can be a bit overbearing at times but behind the cheesy overly friendly dialogue are multifaceted, dark and even mysterious implications. In a way they often come across as more complex than some triple A game characters trying too hard to be “dark” and “edgy.” It isn’t trying too hard to make you feel anything, it’s just a genuinely good-hearted emotional story. Yeah, the graphics do look like shit sometimes but in a way it almost baits you into thinking it’s some boring, budget indie game by someone who doesn’t know what they’re doing, only for it to be the complete opposite. The bullet hell battle system really was a stroke of genius gameplay wise, there’s been a couple of games trying to do a similar thing only with wario ware style minigames but Undertale for me is still the best freedom and control-wise.

I don’t think I need to even mention the music, just listen to it. This shit slaps.

I would say though that I wish there was a little bit more to do in the early game when replaying for a true pacifist run after the neutral run. This is generally seen as the best way to play but there isn’t much different to do when you restart the game, save for a few memorable bits of dialogue.

Many people are finding the “quirky earthbound inspired rpg” to be getting a bit long in the tooth and cliched now. But these copycats are here for a reason, not just because UT got lucky and was a big success but because… it actually is a pretty damn good game.

A nice intro to that era in the 2000s where EA was actually putting out some unique games for whatever reason. I think Faith is a really cool character but unfortunately the story just didn't grip me that much, and the flat and quite uninteresting 2D cutscenes didn't really help. It's a shame because the 3D world you play in is striking but it's not really backed up by any notable worldbuilding or themes.

Mechanically the game is very satisfying, and has the some of the best parkour movement I've seen. One gripe though is that the hitscan enemies are way too dead-on, to the point that it basically decentivises parkour and melee in favour of shooting, which kind of goes against the idea of the game I think. Overall though, good game, would recommend playing even just to chill and enjoy the movement and vibe of the city alone.

Damn all DICE did was make a decent game and EA still banished them to lootbox hell lmao