The Illusion of Choice: ‘Deltarune’ and the Separation of Player and Character
It is recommended that you play through the Deltarune demo before reading. Spoiler warning!
The first chapter of Deltarune is themed around a lack of player choice. It opens with a character creation screen, immediately followed by the game throwing out your creation and forcing you to play as a character named Kris. At multiple points early on, a prompt comes up asking for a choice, which is then immediately disregarded. As Susie, another character in the game, puts it: “In case you haven’t figured it out by now… Your choices don’t matter.”
Deltarune likes to play around with the expectations set by its predecessor, Undertale. Undertale revolves around player choice and the ability to either kill or spare any enemy in the game. Deltarune appears to do this at first, but upon successfully defeating an enemy, they instead run away and you get zero exp. Thus the result is the same regardless – your choices don’t matter.
The ending of chapter one set up a big cliffhanger in which Kris rips out their soul, throwing it in a cage and taking out a knife. The soul – represented by a heart – can still be controlled. Through this it is shown that the soul represents you, the player. When Kris takes out their soul, they are removing player control. This led a lot of speculation as to where the story would go to next – after all, Undertale had a genocide playthrough with a knife as the most iconic weapon. As a lack of choice is the central theme, would the player be forced to go through with a genocide mindset?
It’s All An Act
Chapter two opens with a subversion of expectations – Kris’ motherly figure Toriel finds the knife in a pie tin, implying that they merely used the knife to eat some pie. The game goes back to normal from that point, following a new antagonist, Queen, through a new area of the dark world. Interestingly, more choices start to open up throughout the chapter. They are relatively minor and almost always lead to the same outcome, but it is nice to have the option to, say, pick up a banana.
A significant note is mentioned almost right away – the recruit system. By sparing enough of each enemy type, that enemy will be added to the central hub area, slowly growing it into a bustling city. On the other hand, attacking enemies will slowly increase your power, like any other RPG. This is an important implementation of player agency, allowing you to have some control over the characters’ lives, something that will come to fruition down the line.
The chapter ends with a similar cliffhanger, though much more sinister. Toward the end, it is revealed that there is a ‘knight’ character that thrust a knife into the ground to create part of the dark world, referred to in-game as a ‘fountain.’ In the ending sequence, Kris once again rips the soul out of their body, taking the opportunity to sneak out the window to do something – likely slash the tires of Toriel’s car, as she calls the police later during this segment to report that.
It all ends with Kris taking out their soul again, taking the opportunity to create another fountain. In this re-subversion, it is implied that Kris did do something else the previous night beyond stealing some pie. Of course, this is just speculation, and we might see another subversion when the third chapter eventually arrives. Nevertheless, these major story beats are ones that you have no control over, moving the story along regardless of player intervention. Thus, the developer’s stance that Deltarune will have one ending might actually be true, just not in the way it was believed to be. The characters take the story into their own hands, keeping it on track.
No Strings On Me
An interesting character regarding this theme of choice is Spamton. When you first meet Spamton, he is down on his luck in an alleyway, thrown away in favor of more modern options. He dreams of one day making it big, becoming a “big shot.” Spamton realizes that Kris is from the light world and thus has a “heart-shaped object” – a soul. However, Spamton notices that Kris’ soul is different from what he’s seen before. Kris, or rather their soul, might know how to achieve freedom, and thus Spamton tries to make a deal. This involves going out of your way to retrieve a disk from an underground facility and upload Spamton into it. As side objectives such as this are very rare in Deltarune, being given the choice to do something optional is exciting.
Considering the implications of what a soul and ‘freedom’ are, it appears that player-made choices are what freedom entails. Otherwise, Spamton has to follow the code of the game. Being a “big shot” can therefore be interpreted as being free. For him, freedom means breaking free of the game and being able to make his own choices, which comes to fruition when he gets uploaded into the NEO body — something players might recognize from Undertale and in Deltarune is said to be the result of a dream. Unfortunately for Spamton, the NEO body is physically held up like a marionette by wires, making him a literal puppet. Spamton realizes that the only way to get freedom is from Kris and the player, and goes berserk.
A fight ensues between the party and Spamton. Through the pacifist approach, Spamton is slowly defeated by cutting the wires holding him up. At the battle’s climax, Spamton realizes what is going on and incorrectly believes that being free of the strings will grant him freedom, and cuts the final wire himself. However, Spamton is not free, and instead instantly collapses. The party does reconnect him, but Spamton is stuck where he is. He couldn’t be more than a simple puppet. He also remarks that the party is strong, and that perhaps they can cut their own strings, offering himself as an item.
As Spamton is an optional boss alongside Jevil from the first chapter, there is a running theme of going on optional quests to earn freedom. Most choices don’t matter, but given that going on a side quest is a choice in itself, there is a heavy emphasis that said choice will have some kind of future impact. The implication of the party cutting their own strings seems to be that you might be cut out of control, which would certainly be an interesting twist on the game characters experiencing freedom.
Proceed
Early on in chapter two, we are introduced to Noelle, a sweet girl who is captured by the antagonist of the area. It is shown that she has trouble standing up for herself and will do whatever she is told if commanded to, but tends to side with her friends if push comes to shove. We know from the previous chapter that Kris is aware of the soul inside of them telling them what to do, and we also know that other characters within Deltarune will usually act according to their own wishes regardless of what you want. However, Noelle provides an interesting opportunity for you to have some actual control within the world.
Because Noelle is friends with Kris, she will stand up for them and think they are in the right, no matter what they say or do. She might mention some hesitations, but in the end she does what she is told. This is what lets you break free from the main narrative and change the story.
Noelle’s speciality is ice magic, allowing her to freeze opponents in battle. Thus, they can’t actually run away, letting her get actual kills and get stronger. At one point during Deltarune, Kris and Noelle are left alone without the other party members. It is at this point that you can direct Noelle to go on a killing spree, slowly getting more powerful. You can direct her to solve puzzles by freezing them and even kill a salesman to get a free ring. This is mostly done through the command word, “Proceed.” A single word command is especially powerful to someone who otherwise would be too timid to act.
Everything starts to blur together for Noelle. Any horrible acts she commits she can’t actually remember doing, but she constantly reminds herself that it is all in the name of “getting stronger.” That is all that matters. Noelle does think about killing Kris at one point, thinking to herself that she could have easily done so by getting off a switch. Kris then responds to this, despite it being an internal dialogue. That wasn’t actually Kris responding, that was you.
This genocidal arc culminates in a showdown with one of her school friends, Berdly. Kris is acting differently from usual, having been controlled by the player, yet Noelle continues to act on their behalf. She is told to proceed, and the battle begins. Berdly does his best to fight back, but Noelle is commanded to use a spell she had never heard of before, ‘snowgrave’, which creates a vicious snowstorm that freezes Berdly in a block of ice, killing him outright. Noelle, having no idea what she’s done and feeling sick afterwards, decides to leave.
Chilling Repercussions
Berdly would normally have a redemption arc and a significant impact on the story progression of the back half of the chapter. Because of his absence, the whole sequence got turned on its head, with the final dungeon being seemingly taken over by Spamton and the final fights against Queen nonexistent. Because of your intervention, Spamton has gained access to the NEO body, taking over duties as the final boss.
Weirdly, Spamton is no longer concerned about freedom. With genocide on the table, he is suddenly more concerned about survival, as sealing the fountain will cause him and his newly acquired mansion to vanish. Even with Kris fighting with every fiber of its being, Spamton proves too tough to defeat alone. They call out to their friends, but they’re not available. Only one option is left: Noelle. A sudden chill comes over Spamton, and he is slain instantly.
Waking up in the light world, Berdly is still dead, yet everyone seems to simply think that he is asleep. Noelle believes the events of the dark world to be just a dream, but an event in the hospital shows that she is still traumatized by what happened. Even more twisted is that she recalled Kris’ commands as having a more terrifying voice. That is the voice of you, who told her what to do. You have been taking advantage of this innocent girl to do your evil bidding.
Regardless of what happened in the dark world, the main overarching story stays on track, with Kris wrestling control away from you to create the fountain. Intermediate pieces may be jumbled due to your actions, however. At least in Undertale’s genocide route, you could say that the player character, Chara, was the force behind all of the evil acts. In Deltarune, there is no plausible deniability. This is all on you.
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