Ethics, Consequence, and Player Agency: An Undertale Retrospective

Whilst indulging in the artful escapism of gaming, it’s easy to feel disconnected from morality and the consequences of our actions. We as players are shielded from ethical dilemmas, as, in the context of a digital world, it’s the characters we operate that are making decisions, not us. After all, once we step away and close the game, the game world ceases to exist, and thus every benevolent or harmful act we commit fails to leave a long-standing impact. This is why we replay digital works repeatedly – we can always reset them to their default state, facilitating the exploration of all possibilities outcomes and endings. Subverting this trend of inconsequential moral flexibility is at the core of Toby Fox’s Undertale, a game which not only remembers your past actions but rewards and punishes you for them, constituting a unique genre-defining role-playing game (RPG) that challenges the very notion of interactive storytelling.

The agency players are provided with is unrivalled – something Undertale uses to completely shift its story, tone, and difficulty adjusting to your decisions

Initial assessments of Undertale, including that of The Boar’s Alexander Brock in 2016 https://theboar.org/2016/02/67303/, praised the game’s bullet hell-esque combat system, witty humor, and for breaking the “kill everything in sight” mentality of video games. Whilst these are valid appraisals, the upsides of Undertale were – and still are – often met with scepticism as to the game’s value compared to other juggernauts of the medium’s history. These reviews fail, however, in considering the multifaceted complexity of the moral paradigms Undertale presents, and how, as an entertainment medium, it transcends the boundaries of what a video game can achieve. To describe Undertale as merely “breaking the ‘kill everything in sight’ mentality” doesn’t do justice to its true impact.

Undertale offers fewer binary encounters than typical narrative-based RPGs. It has become renowned for enabling the player to be completely pacifist and offering a path of utmost morality and decency. The agency players are provided with is unrivalled – something Undertale uses to completely shift its story, tone, and difficulty adjusting to your decisions. The story begins with a human falling into ‘the Underground’: a world of monsters sealed off by humanity following a brief but brutal war. These monsters need to kill you, as the power of your soul will enable their freedom, and thus most characters you meet initially want to incite your untimely death.

It is therefore ethically justifiable to defend yourself, and yet Undertale establishes very early on that this is by no means required. The question is: will you pursue compassion? And if so, to what extent? Does every foe deserve your mercy, even those who have been nothing but immoral themselves?

Let’s say, you open the game for the first time and, intrigued by the unique mercy mechanic, attempt to be as pacifist as possible, sparing every enemy. Yet, as initial roadblocks amount on your journey, you fail to see any other option, and thus out of inexperience, frustration, or a combination of both, you end up slaying one particularly nasty or obstructive foe. In regret, you reload your save file and change your actions, saving the life of the creature. All’s well that ends well, right? Not in Undertale. Undertale remembers. Flowey, the most cunning and hyperaware monster in the Underground, will chastise you for your actions, declaring: “I know what you did. You murdered [them]. And then you went back, because you regretted it.”

Within Undertale, meta-awareness is a core element of the story. Saving, for example, is a power you possess, but that doesn’t mean you aren’t answerable for the repercussions you avoid by using it. Operating within such narrative frameworks – where everything you do canonically happens – means the ethical paradigms the game presents are inescapable, no matter how you respond. Your response happens, no matter what it is you do, and the characters (including by extension, yourself) within the universe will have to endure the consequences of your actions, no matter how you try to undo or fix them.

Undertale provides players with a unique experience, one littered with deep moral questions, fascinating story-telling, a feverishly fun combat system

Suppose you complete your adventure without hurting anyone, whilst simultaneously building friendships with the game’s various charming (and not-so-charming) characters, you can successfully free the monsters from the Underground. Whilst one of the most heartwarming and joyous conclusions to any game – it comes at a cost. After the credits roll, and you get to enjoy watching all your newfound friends living it large above ground. Then you’re met with Flowey. He begs and pleads with you not to reset your save file and leave the monsters in their hard-earned happiness. Will you sacrifice everything you and your friends achieved for replayability? And now that you know the path to fulfilling everyone’s hopes and dreams, will you follow the same path – or break from it just to see what might happen?

Undertale is your game. You have dominion over its world, able to reset your save file and act however you desire. After fulfilling the role of the ‘good guy’, some players choose a much darker path. Committing genocide in Undertale is a completely valid undertaking – but the game ensures you feel the weight of your actions. To achieve the no-mercy route, you must actively seek out and destroy every enemy, grinding through a slog of violence, turning a relatively peaceful world into a dark, nightmarish hellscape. Along the way, you are faced with Undertale’s most challenging fights, including the infamously gruelling encounter with Sans the skeleton. During the fight, Sans explains how he understands he cannot kill you – as your power over the world allows you to continually come back and try again. Yet, he heroically continues to put up a fight, recognizing that if you can’t beat him, you may well give up on the game altogether out of frustration, saving the world. For many, Sans is an insurmountable obstacle. His eerie warning “you’re gonna have a bad time”, which occurs much earlier in the genocide route, prophetically unfolds in a brutal punishment for your sins.

Providing players with canonical dominion over the world of Undertale facilitates the player to be directly rewarded or punished for their actions. No other game provides such consequence for your actions, cementing Undertale as one of, if not the, greatest game of all time. Undertale provides players with a unique experience, one littered with deep moral questions, fascinating storytelling, a feverishly fun combat system, and above all – impact, not only on the player but on the world you experience. If you haven’t played it, or haven’t in a while, it is more than worth falling into the Underground to feel the joy of benevolence or deep founded regret as your sins crawl up your back.