Noelle’s Actions In Deltarune Explained
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- Опубликовано: 2 июл 2024
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Dess concept sprite by u/FOBFan1998 - ▶ / my_headcanon_of_desss_...
Deltarune Chapter 2 is a delight in every way, but it deeply troubled me that there was a separate darker route involving easily my favorite character in that chapter. In this episode of Psych of Play, we’ll take a deep dive into the psyche of Noelle Holiday, analyze her behaviors, why she is the way she is, why her character works, and how you the player affect her growth.
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Surfshark! (0:00)
"You want to play a little game?" (1:19)
Feeling Learned Helplessness (2:48)
Meet Noelle (3:41)
SPOILERS BEGIN and my thoughts on Deltarune (4:53)
Noelle is Passive (5:33)
Analyzing the Normal Route (7:43)
Noelle is courageous (11:07)
Why it truly is Learned Helplessness (12:15)
Analyzing The Snowgrave Route (16:01)
Two Routes, One Outcome? (19:05)
The Hospital , The Hero, and The Villain (20:04)
ņ̴͘ô̵̧̮͖ê̵̫̤l̵͙̬̊ḷ̸̓e̴͎̯̔ ̴̟̭̫̅̈̀i̴͓̊̾s̴͉̪̆̓ ̶̹͒s̶̖͈͒͂t̵̻͎̒̏͌r̷͍̀͌ö̷̫͛̅n̴͕̝̅g̴͕̥͐͊̚ (22:03)
▶Games Shown
Deltarune Chapter 2 (2021) - Toby Fox
Hollow Knight (2017) - Team Cherry
OMORI (2020) - OMOCAT, LLC
Doki Doki Literature Club! (2017) - Team Salvato
Metroid Dread (2021) - Mercury Steam
Detroit Become Human (2018) - David Cage
Persona 5: Royal (2019) - Atlus, P Studio
NieR:Automata (2017) - PlatinumGames
OMORI (2020) - OMOCAT, LLC
▶Clips/Movies/Anime/TV Shown
Kaguya Sama Love is War
50/50
Tom and Jerry (as usual)
Bakemonagatari
Your Name
Other clips and considerations:
• Snowgrave Psych
▶Music Sources:
Bomberman 64 OST - Stage Select
Castlevania 64 OST - Annex - Silent Madness
1080° Snowboarding - Lost
Dj CUTMAN - Before the Story (Chill Hop Remix) - • Before the Story (Chil...
Dj CUTMAN - Legend (Trip Hop Mix) - • Legend (Trip Hop Mix) ...
Deltarune OST - Lost Girl (Noelle's Theme)
𝕜𝕣𝕪𝕥𝕞 - chime - / chime
Deltarune OST - Faint Glow
Deltarune OST - Girl Next Door
Deltarune OST - Digital Roots
Deltarune OST - The Dark Truth
Cadred - non-locality - • non-locality - generic...
REPULSIVE - Wings - • Video
𝐭𝐫𝐱𝐱𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐝 - Ivory (ft. Jhove) - / ivory-ft-jhove
Lena Raine - Lost Girl Piano Arrangement (unofficial) - • Deltarune Chapter 2 - ...
REPULSIVE - Aftersome - • Video
Deltarune OST - Flashback (GENOCIDE)
Vetrom - Faint Courage (Game Over) - Remix Cover - • Faint Courage (Game Ov...
▶Research Articles Cited
(1)Learned helplessness
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...
(2)Learned Helplessness Among Families and Surrogate Decision-Makers of Patients Admitted to Medical, Surgical, and Trauma ICUs
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...
(3)Learned helplessness and generalization
web.stanford.edu/~ngoodman/pa...
Born to Choose: The Origins and Value of the Need for Control
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...
The neural basis of rationalization: cognitive dissonance reduction during decision-making
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...
Why Losing Control Can Make You Happier
greatergood.berkeley.edu/arti...
Understanding Psychological Reactance
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...
Deltarune endings statement
www.twitlonger.com/show/n_1sq...
Do 'Rage Blackouts' Actually Exist?
www.vice.com/en/article/a3jdx...
#PsychofPlay #Deltarune #Chapter2 #Snowgrave 
Игры
Berdley: _straight up dies_
Daryl: "maybe he'll just walk it off"
My thinking is Berdly will die on the normal route at some point anyway. It would fit into the idea of choices not mattering and would allow later chapters to continue to be similar regardless of route taken.
And definitely not because I'd like to see him dying in some hilarious fail of an attempt at gamer move version of a hero's sacrifice.
@@PlebNC yeah i always figured it was either that or berdly moves away from hometown or something like that (so the end result is that he isn't in the story even if he's not dead)
@@PlebNC God, that would be such a shitty cop-out, especially considering how much more complex this game is with its choices and their impact on the characters. I'm convinced that the whole "single ending" idea is not nearly as clear cut as its made out to be.
@@martyr_lightsilver1833 Well it seems like it's going to be about the futility of choices in games. You can still make choices but no matter what the destination is the same. A dissatisfactory ending may even be intentional as Toby has commented that he designed all of Undertale's endings to be bittersweet. Neutral routes leads to the Underground remaining trapped. Genocide route causes the player to cause the end of the world and Pacifist lets you save everyone except Asriel, who arguably needed saving the most and is doomed to remain a sadistic flower.
The original idea for Deltarune was thought before Undertale so perhaps that bittersweet thinking may be part of Deltarune too.
Obviously this is largely speculative but if Undertale showed one thing it was that the ending can be bittersweet but still satisfying and impactful.
*Badly
I'm betting Noelle's mother has a toned-down personality of Queen.
Noelle's speech at the end seems like something that's been building up for more than a single day.
I agree with this tremendously. Though Queen obviously cares more than her mother does, as in chapter 1 it is shown that Noelle’s mother hates being “bothered” by Noelle, even if she just wants to get inside her own house. Noelle’s anger is more directed at her mother than Queen, because she just needs to get it out to someone (As she can’t actually vent to anyone, because to them Noelle’s mother is either their mayor, or their wife.). Of course she’s angry at Queen as well, which is completely justified. But her anger is out of character for her. If it was anyone but someone who resembles her mother, she would’ve been more firm, but kinder.
When you talk to him, Noelle's Father outright mentions that her mother is quite controlling, and that he's usually there to balance it out, though obviously not anymore.
@@humangarbage3019 It was never implied that her mom hates being bothered, and Noelle only said that she "doesn't like it". Noelle's mom cares about her in an actually suffocating way due to Dess dying. A parent not wanting to be bothered while they are working is a normal thing. Plus, Noelle said that in chapter 1, so we have no reason to believe that she was being honest. It is most likely that she simply would rather avoid home and stay at cattis house because of her mom's controlling.
@@vanoven9205 Rudy never actually said anything bad about Noelle's mom, but it is still a good point. The only reason Carol (that is what I am calling her mom) is controlling is because, just like queen, she wants her to stay safe, and she believes that controlling her life is the only way, especially after Dess died and Rudy became sick.
Carol is a good name. I like Carol.
something that i find equally disturbing about the Snow grave route, is that shopkeepers in undertale and deltarune are usually safe from the player, we can’t fight them, we can’t engage in battle. (there’s actually a running theory that sans picks up all those joke jobs as a method of defense, because you can’t be trusted yet)
so for Noelle to be able to harm a shopkeeper?that’s creepy.
She ain't human, so apparently she can fight even outside the fighting interface
@@Dorumin It's probably more than that. In video games, we can only do so much in "typical RPGs"(talk to shopkeeps, fight monsters, etc.). We, the player, are telling a party member who we don't have control over like Kris(RPG protagonist) to do something outside of the game logic because they have the ability to do so. We are bound by RPG rules, so we can't make our controlled character(Kris) do what's outside what a game "could" do, but we can make someone else do it.
To be fair: Pink Addison is the first and only shopkeeper that wasn't behind a counter that stuck around to be interacted with in a murder route. We still haven't killed anyone under those parameters yet. I think if Nicecream guy in Undertale hadn't fled we would've been able to make nearly the same thing happen.
the shopkeeper was in the overworld, not in the shop screen
@@aneitalt I fucking love this comment
“Why does she come across as a well-meaning yet controlling mother- oh my God.” The suddenness of a realisation makes me laugh
Queen’s actions hits the head on the nail for portraying Mayor Holiday. How convenient!
A second mother, two mothers
M O T H E R 2
@@Mosylla Sans is ness confirmed
I literally read this at the same time he said it
Universal Mother Theory in the corner
It’s funny how angry I sometimes feel when a psychology puzzle like the one at the start of the episode “gets” me. What a weird source of frustration, “Ah! Turns out I’m a person, fuck!”
"Aha! Clearly, these anagrams are impossible and the twist will be 'I made these up lol'! I'm so clever!"
"Actually the trick was that the third one is possible, you just fell into my trap lol"
"oH COME ON-"
"Ah, shucks! I'm one of them!"
Ain’t no way I read this, kept on watching the video AND STILL FELL FOR HIS TRAP
I was already given up at the end of the first part. Coming into the third part, I said 'screw it, I have nothing to lose'.
My guess was 'transmute' and I was left with a spare 'n'.
Welp, seems like I'm also bad at these things.
this exact feeling lol
During Berdly's backstory, the word that broke Noelle was 'December'
she just couldn't get the word out of her mouth... for one reason or another...
December is the name of the 12th month in Dutch
oh crap.
@@xlrevanlx6023 in English too LOL.
@@xlrevanlx6023 and English
Another interesting detail is that in the spelling bee with Berdly, he won because Noelle couldn't bring herself to spell 'December'
@vibe central Actually it proves that it was recent, and that she hadn't gotten over it because of that.
Holy mother of god, it’s true
@@sayyidassons9332 well sunny from omori couldn’t get over his sister’s death for 4 years, it doesn’t need to be recent
@@MasterIsabelle Sunny never had anyone to talk to it about who could understand how they he felt. Noelle has her dad (for now), Kris, and her mom if necessary.
@@sayyidassons9332 They seem a lot younger in those silhouettes. I think they meant during the main story its been a while
The thing about "I am not responsible." A TON of the fandom does that, too. They blame Kris and Chara for Snowgrave and Genocide, even though we are the ones who press fight, who press Iceshock, who press proceed. Kris, Frisk, Noelle, and Chara were all just dragged along for the ride.
i think toby fox noticed the general reception of the fandom blaming chara for the genocide route cuz he made it pretty obvious it's not kris who wants to do snowgrave. it's implied kris is very uncomfortable with the events of snowgrave. near the end of the route, susie and ralsei point out how they look hurt. noelle mentions a couple of times how the voice commanding her doesn't sound like kris's, and during the spamton neo fight, it explicitly states "you whispered noelle's name" not kris. deltarune plays with the idea of how the player and kris are separate characters that happen to share a body in some capacity quite a lot, and snowgrave makes it really obvious.
plus, based on what we know about kris as their own individual, they wouldn't willingly manipulate a childhood friend into committing mass murder. like they're a little shit (affectionately) who likes to prank their friends and be creepy for fun. there's also a couple of scenes where kris acts without the player's influence to protect their friends, like during king's fight at the end of chapter 1. they're a total dork, and portraying them as someone who wants to harm others and has malicious intent is ignoring what we know about them. i totally agree that snowgrave isn't kris's fault, the player is the one who is making them manipulate noelle and the game even has evidence to back it up. it all makes me very interested to see where toby fox is taking this dynamic.
The thing is in that in any other game, saying the protagonist is the villain makes sense. You ARE the protagonist. In Undertale and Deltarune, YOU are very much NOT the protagonist. YOU are responsible, and that's why I fucking love these games.
@@mlabs6005 that part about the voice that's "unlike Kris's" after doing snowgrave is something I've been thinking about lately, because that's the only time anyone makes any comments about Kris's voice being different as far as I know. That's really weird to me, because if their voice being different was the result of the player controlling their actions, wouldn't it sound different _all_ the time, instead of just during or after the Snowgrave route?
Question, I’m just getting back into undertale/delta rune. Why do you press iceshock instead of fighting? What does fighting do? I’m just kinda confused
@@judahsagawa5749 depleting an enemy's health normally causes them to run away so you can't kill them, while doing the same with iceshock freezes them
"I swear to god if it corrects it to Badly one more time..."
"Badly comes in, you fight him..."
I love this already
"After she casts snowgrave on Badly in the weird route..." fhdjfghfhsdjhdshadfls
@@lazice I mean, yeah... she did cast it badly, that's the whole problem
please grammar
"After using Snowgrave on Badly..."
Another case of Learned Helplessness lol
"It keeps autocorrecting to Badly, guess I'm stuck calling him Badly now"
Something worth mentioning is that Queen says "her strange and sad searches, who will answer them?" refering to Noelle.
Queen's knowledge on lightners comes from their internet searches. She might have noticed Noelle's power, but all those sad and desperate searches (likely relating to her missing sister) might have caused Queen to feel sorry for her.
After all, Queen's goal is to make lightners happy, and from her perspective, Noelle is the one who needs help the most.
this may refer to the drawer in noelle's room saing "searches here can't be put into objects"
@@yumyellow9620 As well as the calender with "December Holiday" as its search.
Ohh I like that. That’s got a hell lot of pain potential
@@yumyellow9620 a stranger view of that line is that Noelle due to her stress in her life and her learned helplessness might’ve turned to some “adult content” on the internet to cope and the reason why Noelle’s searches can’t be summoned is because Queen put a +18 lock on them because everyone in the party is under 18.
@@jeremyrossi2716 O god she watched gore?
Ngl i like that type of Stuff but God
I'm honestly surprised that everyone agrees that the Snowgrave route is more creepy and messed up than Undertale's genocide route. And there's obviously a reason for that.
In Undertale, YOU are doing the killing. You are just simply going back and forth looking for monsters to kill. The blame is clearly all on you.
In Deltarune, you are bypassing the restriction of being unable to make a choice by manipulating the weak mind of a sweet, naive and innocent girl to get her hands bloody for you.
You force her to go on a "date" with you(Ferris wheel and the freeze ring). You assert your dominance by threatening her(proceeding through the lighting barrier). And you turn her into a mindless slave that will only obey or be punished (the thorn ring).
It's honestly surprising how Noelle didn't snap at the hospital and didn't go insane or anything.
How do we know you're not crazy?
😂
How much creepier these routes are compared to each other depends on the person and why they're going down that path. That's just my take on things.
doesn't she say to herself keep it together tho?
Noelle is strong in a lot of ways, and that's her being strong to be able to not snap during all of that
This really makes me understand why not saying "proceed" a single time will lock you out of the snowgrave route.
Caring about Noelle even once makes all the difference.
As an additional thought, there's no hint of Dess in the graveyard. If they were confirmed dead, they'd likely have a headstone. As we don't see one, it seems FAR more likely that they're missing, not dead. Or at least not confirmed dead. Kris has PTSD about that door to the South of town, and we know they used to hang out with Dess, Asriel, and Noelle when they were all younger. I'm forcing connections at this point, but what if Dess is trapped down there? Noelle did say the trash mound door was nostalgic. What's the only thing in the overworld that looks anything like that?
Though that does beg the question of why Noelle doesn't seem as traumatized by that memory as Kris does. Maybe they're separate memories? Maybe the group used to hang around that door all the time and that's what Noelle finds nostalgic? Maybe Noelle wasn't there when Kris experienced what he did. And maybe we'll meet Dess in a future chapter, though I doubt they'll be quite so happy to see Us. Lots to think about in this chapter.
Noelle may not remember that event because she's prone to lose her memory in times of stress/trauma. It's dissociation.
Personally I wonder if Noelle just wasn't around when something Happened to Dess, like maybe Kris and Dess (and potentially Asriel?) were doing whatever around that bunker one night and maybe Kris tried pulling some kind of prank (as they've been known to do) that went horribly wrong. I mean, Noelle totally could've also been there, and the reason why she couldn't remember is a coping mechanism or someone (I suppose Asriel in this case) kept her from fully seeing what happened. Idk, one thing that I'm more concrete about is that Dess isn't dead, something definitely happened to her, but she isn't dead.
didn't noelle search for december holiday?
All good points. Noelle might have just blocked that memory out. Maybe she has some level of plausible deniability like with Berdley. I do think her searching for December Holiday on the internet points to her thinking Dess is alive and well somewhere, at the very least. Maybe Asriel's searching for her and just told everyone he was going to college? I'm stretching a little at this point, but speculation is a lot of fun.
Also the Calendar in Noelle's room for some reason stops on the 25th like that date is very important to her
Oh my god, that's the angle, isn't it? That's where the game is going with the whole "your choices don't matter" theme. The *character's* choices don't matter because the player is in control. Is that where the story's gonna go from here? Great video btw, learned a lot.
Oh yeah! I love games where the only winning move is not to play! :D
YEAH! LET'S DO SOME EVIL STUFF! I want a rematch with the Skeleton!
It could also be the opposite, as a key thing is that despite the players choices you always reach the same ending and the characters will always reach the same growth
That's interesting to think about since the whole customization thing ended with our creation being tossed away and our soul stuffed into Kris, who already exists. If my experiences with fan grievances with games in general tell me anything, people normally get really angry even when finding out early their choices don't matter. And then when one finds something, anything to have power depending on how they feel about the consequences, they could go fo it. What if the Soul is a player experiencing things similar to learned helplessness trying to feel important in a world they're intruding in, just because "I'm the player, so I have value."
Perhaps that is the angle of the game, that the player’s presence is not needed and puppeteering everyone does make you look like a villain. Maybe deleting the game and not playing could allow the characters find their own happy ending. However... That is an ending very few people will be happy with.
19:47 Berdly's a true gamer. He'll just respawn, no doubt.
BERDLY is the true main character of deltarune. BERDLY is who it's all about! He's simply BETTER. I bet he had a totem of undying. Can't wait for when he comes back in chapter 3! BERDLY!
Badly*
His bed was destroyed, we can’t find him
@@SoYeahIDidWhat We gotta search spawn. Who knows where he wandered off to.
@@soldierstride554 Maybe he disconnected, let’s just wait it out
"You want to play a little game?"
Me, washing dishes in the other room: oh
This one is definitely in the comment hall of fame now 😂
Noelle standing up for susie in the end of the queen fight is so funny. ralsei and Kris, her CHILDHOOD friend, were also in risk but she only called out queen out for hurting susie lmao. Girl was down BAD.
When Noelle drinks Susie Tea: "Do they sell this in *gallons?"* She thirsty, *VERY* thirsty
LMAO I love this comment
@@Rudxain 😳😳😳
She isn’t down bad, shes down astronomically
I just discovered that you can spell the word risk with Kris' letters
This confirms it for me that what Toby means with "we'll only have one ending" as in, our character only has 1 ending, their actions will lead THEM to a single ending, but that's not the same as saying the characters around them will have the same fate. The way we interact with the world around will affect their endings, if everyone hates or loves us by the end of this journey that won't change our ending, just the way we're perceived by everyone else.
Also that tiny detail at the end, when the enemies might be refering to Noelle instead of Queen at the begining of the game gave me chills. It's all brilliant, Toby Fox threw us in to this hell of a story and locked the door behind us. I can't wait where it all goes.
The way I think dark worlds work is that the world shapes itself around the ones who first enter it, it's why kris trying to kill enemies won't work here (or in chapter 1) they all just run away even after we deplet their HP, noelle however, being the one the world shaped itself around, she's able to "kill" the enemies or at least not leting them run away and successfully get that sweet EXP from them, getting stronger each time. If that's the case the weird routes from next chapters might have to do with us manipulating whoever the dark world is shaped around and have them comiting all the killing.
Another little detail I thought was awesome was when Noelle equips the thornsring for the berdly fight, her HP always goes down to 55, not more not less, 55 in roman numbers translates to "LV"..... so yeah.... that's scary.
Amazing video. Loved every minute of it.
I'm not really sold on the idea of the player manipulating other characters like we did with Noelle in the future since I think she's a special case.
Starting with snowgrave, I believe the reason the alternate route was even possible at all was because of Noelle's unique susceptibility to our influence. Noelle's inability to refuse others was brought up quite a bit for a reason in ch 2. In the normal route she starts off with negative "boldness" stats until she finally gets up the courage to stand up for herself, while in Snowgrave, we take advantage of her more concerning traits and basically make her into our servant who would kill for us with a whisper of her name. Compare this to someone like Susie who has high "Guts" and is shown to outright disregard the player on multiple occasions. Ex: Learning S-Action on her own, ignoring every dialogue option during the ferris wheel scene, running off with Ralsei without letting Kris choose, attacking enemies without command in ch 1, etc.
Another thing that stood out is how Noelle's attachment to things that frighten or can harm her is brought up on multiple occasions in chapter 2 as well. She mentions how frightening things such as getting lost, scary movies, and even Susie make her feel safe. She lags behind during the firework projectiles because she was frightened and fascinated by them (like Rudy said in ch1, she freezes like a "deer in headlights" completely captivated in the fear). In snowgrave, she's creeped out by Spamton's shop, but also mentions how it's nostalgic. She's terrified of the queen, but states before the first Berdly fight that "she couldn't help it" when commanded to be her peon. Let's also not forget how the prospect of Susie getting physical with her (shoving her against a locker/pushing her down and laughing) excites Noelle in ways that resemble a kink. There's other moments too, but I think I've made my point.
The snowgrave route abuses Noelle's "traits" and fully takes advantage of them. The player immediately uses controlling language, saying things like "Noelle will ride with me", "proceed", "get it", etc. As we continue to command Noelle to freeze enemies, she grows stronger and bolder as the route progresses. Her intrusive thoughts begin influencing her actions like when she almost stepped off the switch to electrocute Kris. At first she copes by "blacking out", subconsciously shielding herself from the guilt. After a while however, Noelle rationalizes her actions by saying it's fine as long as she "gets stronger" and follows commands even though she's clearly scared of "Kris" which, as stated before, only increases her attachment to the player. Another thing to note is how Noelle's obedience skyrockets after the thorn ring that actively drains her health from pain is equipped on her. We're really just taking advantage of Noelle's most volatile qualities and making her into our pet. It's so messed up.
After a while, Noelle begins to freeze puzzles without even being commanded and happily asks to hunt more enemies. She doesn't even suspect anything is wrong until Berdly points it out and snaps her out of her trance (if you check Noelle's stats prior, it will actually say that she's entranced). Despite how terrified Noelle is of Kris by the end of the snowgrave route, the player's actions have clearly influenced her (as seen in Noelle's talk with her dad) and the player has her wrapped around their finger which is why all it took was a simple whisper of Noelle's name to one-shot Spamton at the end of Snowgrave.
One more important thing to add is how often Noelle focuses exclusively on Susie in chapter 2 even when the others are around, but in the snowgrave route, Noelle never mentions her once. Even in the hospital, Noelle was only supposed to mention that Susie was in the room with her dad when we walk in, but in Snowgrave, she's initially only focused on Kris and asks what they're doing there. We've completely taken over any thoughts Noelle had about Susie at that point by completely dominating all of her attachment "quirks". The *abusive relationship* undertones aren't lost on Spamton either as he remarks on how we're "using" Noelle and calls her Kris' "Hochi Mama"/"side chick" after we bought rings for her from him and the Addison.
As for what's next for Noelle, The Queen *did* say that she needs to "close her eyes and sleep away into a darker, darker, dream" after stating that she "awakened too much". There's definitely something going on with Noelle. From studying the occult with Catti to having knowledge of fatal spells and carrying one hell of a dark side, I'm expecting some interesting character development in future chapters. And hey, knowing how much Toby likes his character puns, I wouldn't be surprised if she went full Yan-Deer-E at some point.
@@NRobbi42 That makes sense, but then couldn't we manipulate other characters using different strategies? We could control Noelle by taking advantage of her gullibleness and attraction to scary things, i'm pretty sure we could do the same to other characters but by taking advantage of different traits and weaknessess
@@crimson19 I dunno, Toriel and Undyne seem pretty strong-willed. Noelle's malleability and intoxication with getting stronger really sets her apart I think.
@@NRobbi42 the thing about Toriel that you gotta keep in mind is that they are Kris’ mother. Toriel shows a strong will but it could still be manipulated, maybe rather than directly commanding Toriel like you can with Noelle you put yourself in danger and force her into a situation in which she feels like she must take drastic measures to protect you. Especially for Kris, she displays a good amount of worry, talking with coworkers about them, giving them those red horns so they felt less out of place, and shying away from any direct conversations about conflict with Asgore. She treats them somewhat delicately for a teenager so I don’t think it’s safe to rule her out just yet. Toriel me reaction will obviously be much different but the player would be doing the same thing they can do to Noelle.
Edit: they also make Kris, a full teenager, to ride in her car a couple streets down from the school. And it’s assumed that she typically drives them home as well because she offers to pick them up if you call in chapter 2 and the main reason they’ve been staying out is because they are with a friend which is surprising to her.
Oh my gosh I can't believe your here
Not to mention, it's odd that, while Noelle blacks out while she commits her more heinous actions, our screen goes black as well.
Why is that? We see the world from a third person point of view, encompassed around Kris's character, presumably from the soul inside them. Why should our pov be affected by Noelle's state of mind?
It's because that's when we, the player, the soul, are closest to her. Noelle doesn't just black out because she's forcing herself to commit these actions, and can't handle seeing them. After all, during Snowgrave she stays conscious, even if she's trying to not witness Berdly's fate, and our screen stays bright, we can see the whole thing. No, she blacks out because Kris's soul, us, literally reaches out to her and gives her the final push.
How do I know this? Well, besides the pov thing, there's a lot of hints. Noelle refers the voice commanding her to "proceed" as unlike Kris's, and at the end of Snowgrave Spamton NEO's fight, the dialogue specifically says "YOU whispered Noelle's name" (which is emphasized by saying Kris calls out to their friends right before). These show that we are directly speaking to Noelle, and in those moments where she blacks out, we bypass Kris entirely. We [use] her.
I know this is a 2 month old comment but I would also like to add that there's a scene after the hospital where noelle starts monologuing about things and at some point you can choose a response and she says that she's surprised kris is there except....kris isn't.
@@anim242 Kris is there though? They are actively in the scene the screen's still black though.
Not to mention in Snowgrave, it says "YOU got the freezring."
Adding onto this, if Kris's HP gets below 0 during the Berdly fight in Snowgrave, Berdly will ask Noelle why doesn't she escape now that Kris is unconcious and Noelle will respond with "I can still hear their voice" as if somehow, we're still talking to her.
Your reflex on the screen...
(idk, saw someone commenting about this)
Something to mention about Rudy, the game seems to be hinting at his stable condition being an act. He might actually be on big trouble but doesnt want Noelle to know.
Wait, how?
@@SentientIrisu When noelle leaves the room, rudy starts coughing and tells kris that they "used up all their energy just now and won't be much fun to talk to".
It's also worth pointing out, there's a collection of stories on the undertale website centering around a christmas party (which was originally part of a alarm clock app that toby ultimately canceled). In these short stories you learn that...
...Rudy dies in the world of Undertale.
@@nezrafallon4086 Oh. Lovely.
After rewatching Berdly's discussion of the spelling bee, I think he's learned helplessness, too. He needs to look in control, which is why he takes every opportunity to brag, but shuts down if he ever has to solve a real challenge. He never even tries on the puzzles he insists he completes.
I think that just makes him a person trying to keep up a lie
I think he suffers more of extremely low self esteem I can bring a lot of exemples of that but one that stuck with me the most is that the reason he thought Noelle had a crush on him is that he couldn’t possibly imagine someone would help him in anything (probably because he doesn’t think he deserves it) the guy hates himself so much that he can’t even understand the concept of someone just being friends with him.
I think the Reason he Insists he Finished the Puzzles is because he see's Susie and maybe even Kris as "Stupid" so having them complete a puzzle he had Trouble with (Like the Square) makes him feel Inferior, so he tries to keep up his look of being Smarter than Kris and Susie by saying he did the Puzzle. It would be a blow to his Self Esteem after winning the Spelling Bee and Keeping his Grades up. He's considered Smart and has to keep that up, like a King protecting his Throne, cause if not then someone will overtake him and he will no longer be special/Smart.
Berdly has played his facade for so long, part of it has become his true self. At least in Chapter 2, he can start to separate and end his facade once and for all.
So the two friends mirror each other but cope in different ways. Noelle shies away from even the slightest conflict, while Berdly doubles down on trying to make it *appear* as if he has everything under control.
BRUH Man, the starting game was so targeted at me, because I remember being so bad at these where you have to move letters into a word, so when this came up I felt hopeless in every single one. The percentage was also such a mean addition.
*grins villainously*
@@DarylTalksGames Using what you are learning to evil
I had almost exactly the opposite response, but same outcome. I consider myself to be quite smart, so when the first question was supposed to have 97% accuracy, I had to solve it. Cognitive dissonance and whatever. So I went back, paused, and spent a full minute or more trying to solve it, then realized something: it’s impossible. Any word common enough to have 97% of people solve it would be something I’d have tried. So before even moving on to question 2, I had guess that this entire quiz would be impossible, and didn’t even try, since there was simply no solution. I basically chose to make myself helpless by deciding that the puzzles must be impossible, based only off the first.
@@DarylTalksGames you forgot how if you take one of Noelle’s items during snowgrave, such as her watch, when you leave the hospital room, she nearly figures out it wasn’t a dream, and that she killed berdly
Have fun being traumatized :D watch from 42:17 to the end
14:26 Fun Fact: "December" is the same word that Noelle couldn't spell in the spelling competition against Berdly (as seen on Berdly's flashback at least). December been Dess's full name actually makes a lot of sense knowing that
I mean. Hearing your missing/assumed dead sister's name out of nowhere in a spelling competition would make you freeze too, would it not?
OH GOD I PROMISE THAT PUN WAS AN ACCIDENT
With the whole “Why does Queen specifically call Noelle strong?” Part I think it’s hinting at something more…more sinister.
I think in one of the future chapters Noelle will do something. Something that shows how capable she really is. No matter what route you chose, Noelle will probably shatter at some point and lose control of herself showing her strength. Her raw power.
It might have something to do with her sister, Dess or her mom or dad or even the gang (Kris and Susie specifically) but idk, why would Toby add that beginning like “she’s going to-“ and such? Maybe it was a foreshadowing the Snowgrave route or…maybe something else in the future? WHO KNOWS-
And if you think about it... the don't forget lyrics could be really foreboding.
....There's a light inside your soul
That's still shining in the *cold*....
Maybe, at some point, that might actually be it
@Iluhvahtar What if "Don't Forget" is Dess singing to Noelle?
"I'm with you in the dark" makes sense if the theories about Dess being trapped in the dark world are true.
@@NRobbi42 could be. Even both. It'd be nice if the song actually fits in with the story
@Iluhvahtar I'd be surprised if it didn't given the lyrics.
@@NRobbi42It could mean the dark world, or that even in death, Dess' spirit remains with Noelle to guide her.
As for the possibility that Noelle snaps later, if the general endings HAVE to be the same despite your actions, then accounting for Noelle maybe breaking mentally in the future...
It could be because of you starting her off in the Snowgrave route, or if you chose the peaceful route, it could be because her dad dies and that shatters everything she learned and all the growing she's done. It'll be a cold slap from reality that her choices don't matter. She can become more confident all she wants, she can be assertive if she pleases...
*She still can't escape destiny.*
Queen's first line is "Hell Of A Study Session".
She's talking about Noelle's rampage.
HOW DID I NOT NOTICE THIS UNTIL NOW?
huh?
Wait really?
I thought it was queen destroying the vicinity with her control wires and her attempts to capture Noelle and berdly
i think she knows they were supposed to study but ended up here so
@@bbew2914 and maybe she knows bc, as the video says, Queen is supposed to be a manifestation of Noelle’s mother, to who Noelle could have told the idea to bring her friends to the library after school to study
it's so funny that sometimes he calls berdly "badly" after he talks about the autocorrect changing his name all the time
Pretty sure thats a joke.
Badly comes in
LOL
@@mimszanadunstedt441 probably
Man, the part about her learned helplessness coming partially from her dad's condition struck a chord for me. For the past 3 years my dad has been struggling with stage 4 cancer. Luckily we have amazing health insurance. But that learned helplessness, never being able to really "help" my dad in any way that matters, I relate so much to Noelle. And honestly having this detail in the game means a lot to me. It's not often discussed in media and especially not games. So it really means a lot to see someone like Noelle who's beloved father is suffering, become stronger
In that last sentence, you chose your words very poorly. *snowgrave intensifies*
So you’re father is still alive right?
@@MasterIsabelle yes he is
@@cometcraters good
I feel for you and Noelle too, my Dad died 3 years ago tho
After Snowgrave, when we visit Noelle's dad at the hospital, she notices Kris first. She sees Susie only after she speaks.
That fact alone just shows how much Kris has impacted her, she's scared of them.
Well, more like us.
In the normal route she notices Susie first (from what I remember), so her first seeing Kris after genocide is all the more disturbing.
Goddammit I can't wait for the next chapters, and what Toby is preparing for the future "Genocide" routes.
i think it's interesting that then first waking up she notices Susie but then at the hospital Susie is all invisible to her. she clearly loves Susie still but you just don't do that to someone you love so much, in all other scenes it's Kris who's the invisible one, i have a hypophysis (and still developing theory) that Noelle might be catching the feelings for Kris (and might had had something fore him in the past (but nothing as strong as her current feelings for Susie)) (my most damning evidence is that then Kris "buys" her the ring she blushes and it's specificly that it's Kris buying her a ring and not the thought of Susie doing it for her that makes her blush)
@@theprinceofawesomeness tbf the ring scene is intended to be seen as romantic..along with him wanting to ride the faris wheel with her..but not in a good way. A really uncomfortable controlling way. She blushes because she's a bit of a shy gal, having someone hit on her so obviously and being pushy about it would make her a bit red ofc. I don't think she actually likes him..blushing doesn't mean you like someone..but she's sorta being pressured into a relationship with him, the snowgrave route is a toxic relationship through and through. She loves Susie, but just cannot say no to Kris..that's why she notices him first, because she's already been pressured to be with him in a way, she cannot say no to it
@@theprinceofawesomenessi dont think so. their relationship in snowgrave is nothing short of abusive. which is not to say kris themselves is abusive, they very clearly do _not_ like what is being done. but regardless, every interaction they have, that we _make_ them have feels very gross and controlling.
noelle is very obviously not about it, given at one point, with the buttons you have to stand on to turn off the lazer, she thinks about stepping off and letting kris get killed. you can even see her sprite move in place for a moment. and like op said, shes afraid of them. so much so she instantly notices their presence. she doesnt blush or go along with it because she likes them, she does it because shes deep in denial about her friend mistreating her and cant say no to them. which is a real bad sign given she notes kris is specifically one of the few people she can say no to in the normal route.
Also one thing to note is Noelle's relationship with Kris. Part of the time, Kris does scary things to somewhat torment Noelle's fears and yet Kris is the one that Noelle trusts/can talk to/can hang out with the most. (At least what we've seen in this chapter))
Also, another thing, at least that I thought about/noticed, Berdley really was kind to Noelle all that time, considering his backstory of how Noelle helped Berdley study and become (What everyone saw and thought of Berdley as) the smartest kid in school. When she failed or clumsily attempted to gain her confidence, Berdley saw the weakness and timidity she had and would take over, even if it wasn't really needed (Like in Chapter 1 where he thinks having Kris in their group will make them both fail or get in the way of their success. Or at the beginning of Chapter 2 in the classroom or when he thinks Kris is manipulating Noelle in the pacifist or Snowgrave route). Berdley really wasn't a bad guy at all, just a misguided nerd bird overprotecting Noelle. Kind of like Noelle's mother and Queen....
Wow, these chapters really do revolve around a certain character.
Chapter 1 was Susie, and Chapter 2 was Noelle.
Wonder if Chapter 3 will either be Toriel, Undyne, or both.
It also seems like the "genocide route" for each of these chapters is the fastest and "cheapest" way for forced character growth. Instead of allowing the person to grow, we're FORCING them to do bad things.
In Chapter 1, that didn't really matter because Susie somewhat had a love for violence and Ralsei doesn't seem to really be a "real" character, probably something that'll get explained in the future.
Edit: *HOLY CRAP THE MAYOR IS NOELLE'S MOM?!? THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING*
I mean, yeah she is. It was implied since chapter 1 if one searched for details in Hometown.
I really like this thought that each chapter is gonna involve a character in Kris's life finding growth to overcome whatever issue it is they struggle with. It's really got me thinking now and I got a little theory on the full game running through my mind now lol.
If we have 7 chapters, and the first two focused on Susie and then Noelle, Kris's bully turned close friend and their childhood friend, we have 5 characters left for the chapters to focus on. Since Torielle was right there when Kris made the fountain, safe to assume that she will be the focus of Chapter 3. Undyne will probably be involved since she was supposed to be on the way to the house, and Kris left the door open for her to come in most likely, but idk if she's that close to Kris for her to get a full character growth.
So 4 left. I would think the two people who have the biggest affect on Kris that are left would be Asgore, their father, and Alphys, their teacher who they see every day. Alphys seems to be very similar to how she was in Undertale, so probably similar confidence issues she will need to overcome. Like in Undertale where she had big shoes to fill as the new Royal Scientist, she now has to fill in as a Teacher after Gerson passed away and is struggling there as well. While Asgore needs to find a way to move on from the many things that went wrong in his life, his divorce and whatever event had him removed from the Police Force, able to forgive himself and find a new way to be there for his family, and to really let Toriel go so that they can be on better terms, mending the rift that's in the family and hopefully helping the poor dude back on his feet at his clearly struggling flower shop lol.
That leaves two. I think one is for sure going to be Asriel when he comes home. Whether or not his section will lead to a real connection to Ralsei or not, we will see I suppose. If all the Dark World characters are reflecting something a Lightner sees or feels like this video suggests, then the theory that Ralsei is Kris's personification of their brother is even more likely. Both chapters do fit this so far. Queen reflecting how Noelle sees her mother as stated in the video, and I think for Susie, Lancer is who Susie portrayed, being the friend she secretly has always wanted. Hell even King might be her reflection as well, since a common theory is that she has a bad home life, so how King treated Lancer could be a reflection of that in Susies eyes.
Then I think the last chapter is going to be focused on Kris themselves. Maybe them breaking free of us? Maybe our "creation" at the beginning comes back or something? Maybe we control all the other characters so far to fight/help Kris overcome what they are going through after we lose control of them?
Man I got so many thoughts on this now and I can't wait to see the rest of the game lol
@@Gameorama91 i'd like to add some speculation on that.
Asgore was most likely replaced as the Police chief... because of Dess's disappearance. Something like that Toriel would've never forgiven Asgore as well, even if his best friend Rudy would understand the pain he was going through not being able to find Dess who of course must've been pretty much like another child to the closely tied big family of neighbours/friends, Dreemurrs and Holidays. So i suspect that one chapter will definitely happen in the Hospital, when Asgore is gonna gift Rudy more of his flowers.
And more on the Topic of Dess... i suspect that December Holiday is the entire reason we have this story at all. It's all about saving Dess from the Dark World she might've fall into during one of the forest/graveyard trips they had with Noelle and Dreemurr bros. And it was most likely that god damn locked bunker. So, the final chapter, i can guess, will be about Kris rising while saving Dess, which Kris might've started on their own in the first place, opening Dark Fountains to get to her.
A couple of (more) things bug me about the weird route. Proceeding in that route has a down note played, aborting it causes an upbeat to play. In both routes, she gains control through different means. In the weird route, are we pushing her to gain control like her mother: through harm? To abort the Snowgrave route, you teach her only how to gain control, but aborting it teaches her the why.
Let's look at the abort methods:
1. Failing to eliminate all her enemies (not freezing every encounter).
2. Deciding not to get the Freeze Ring ("We're fine" option).
3. Deciding to solve the second mouse puzzle (instead of proceeding through it, instead of apologizing to go through it).
4. Telling Berdly why you're manipulating her (choosing to say "I'm protecting her from you!").
Why do these all abort the route?
These are likely methods her mother employs: if you're an enemy, you're removed. If you get in the way of me becoming stronger, you're removed. If you're inconvenienced, you just take the shortest route. Don't think about other ways of doing things, just power through. Don't think about why you're doing things, just power through.
Equally weird is how kris effectively is a non participant in each.
While I agree that the player is the bad guy in the SnowGrave route, I feel like that’s not so much the case in the normal route. The parallels between Kris and Spamton NEO show this: when Spamton’s strings are cut, he collapses, inert, and the screen goes black. Also, every time Kris removes their soul in chapter 2, they move around like their body is collapsing and always willingly puts the soul back in even when they logically could just leave it behind forever. I think that for one reason or another, Kris’s situation is especially fucked up in that Kris needs to give up some control to us in order to continue being alive. And I think that this because Kris lost their original soul exploring the bunker south of town. Possibly with Asriel, December, and Noelle, since Noelle mentions the four of them exploring in the forest behind the Graveyard. And if that’s true, I think this might be the same incident where whatever happened to December played out.
The player doesn’t know what Kris wants, but they can’t just completely hand over control to Kris without putting them at risk of dying. The player has a chance to figure out what Kris wants through context clues and NPC dialogue, but they don’t necessarily have to respect that. In essence, the player is in the position to try and make Kris’s fucked up situation as bearable as possible… or take full advantage of Kris’s vulnerable state for their own ends.
Without a player, there would be no game.
@@thegrayowl1557 what if kris has a battle with the heart(soul)(player) 👀 i dont know if kris can survive without a soul though maybe they can get back their original soul if thats even a thing
@@lancelikessause It'd be very interesting to see what the mechanics for that kind of battle would be
Regarding Kris and they player, I had the same theory. On top of that I thought of the one with the door just before seeing this comment. Glad I ain’t the only one.
Thinking about it now, if we just came into the picture when we first go into the dark world and get introduced to the town in chapter 1, and if the incident happened when kris and noelle were little...
Who was in control of Kris for the years that followed after? Why did we so happen to awaken that same day when the dark world opened? Who was the person drawing the strings before we entered the story?
I'm actually surprised that more people aren't talking about darkner parallels, like everyone jokes about Ralsei being similar to Asriel (even as far as the name) but now queen seems to be paralleling Noelle's mom. I feel like this is going to be important for the rest of the game
I wonder what the king has to do with Susie.
Well from what we know about noelles mom. She doesn't care nearly as much about noelle that queen does
@@SentientIrisuThe most obvious one is the "Quiet people PISS ME OFF." line, but they're both portrayed as ruthless bullies that have made an attempt at Kris's life. Unlike Queen paralleling Noelle's mother, I feel King parallels Susie herself.
Yeah, each dark world feels like it's made specifically for a certain lightner, and the rulers especially reflect that.
@@friskycalibri2293 to be honest, considering we see Susie eating literally chalk, how it's also implied Susie doesn't have the best home life, and how Chapter 1 is also largely about Lancer standing up to his dad, wouldn't be surprised if Spade King and Lancer weren't alao paralleling her family life
Something that I think adds to Noelle’s learned helplessness is that it’s fairly strongly implied that she doesn’t have a good relationship with her mother
In the first chapter she’s forgotten her house keys and is too afraid of her mother’s reaction to being bothered at work to call her so she ends up standing around till her friend finished work so she can stay there, every time she mentions that it’s just her and her mother at home she hesitates and is distinctly uncomfortable about it and last but certainly not least the main antagonist of chapter 2 is an overbearing maternal figure who focuses entirely on Noelle but who accepts her decision when she does finally speak up
Between a missing sister, a strained relationship with her mother and her father in the hospital it’s no surprise that she acts the way she does
It's also Interesting that Noelle's Power is Ice. And She"Gets Stronger"
By essentially "Being Cold" To others which gives her control but leaves her afraid. Whereas in the other route her Locus Of Control is squarely with her, No Other Unecessary influences.
*love, too, is an acronym.
*it stands for "Level of Violence".
*a way of measuring someone's capacity to hurt.
*the more you kill, the easier it becomes to distance yourself.
*the more you distance yourself, the less you'll hurt.
*the more easily you can bring yourself to hurt others.
There's this sad comic I saw once where this cute little kid doesn't quite understand how search engines work and always types in "thank you" after their cute little queries, but the search engine actually does have a soul and notices this habit with confusion but also a vague sense of gratitude, and then one day it notices the kid searching for things that imply that they or a close family member is fatally ill, and it decides that, instead of just giving the results straight, it attempts to comfort the child? ... it was something like that. I got the impression that that's pretty much what Queen is, based on Noel's personalized room and some things she said.
That said, I don't know if that's airtight or anything, but I liked the concept. Though the Persona angle would be very interesting as well!
Also the psychology stuff. The stuff that the video is about. That, too, is pretty great!
oh nah you might be onto something, queen if i remember right has a line of dialogue something along the lines of 'Poor Noelle's Sad And Strange Searches... Who Will Answer Them?' in her first boss fight, she probably realises noelle is a bit disturbed just from her internet history
in fact that was a profound moment to me, when you examine Noelle’s internet inquiries and the prompt says something like “it’s hard to materialise those”. people with depression may understand how hard it is to put into words all the sadness and despair that we may feel, to explain how we feel - and it is actually partly because of this learned helplessness. you may feel like there’s no point to try to explain what you feel because no one will be able to help you and it’s no point to try to figure out yourself. i imagine Noelle typing into search “i don’t know what to do” or “i feel miserable”. i did that when my depression was at peak. and i found nothing
if you ever find this comic again I'd love to see it, it looks really great
Yeah I want to see it too
you just reminded me of the calender in her room, everyday is christmas, but its based on her search results, like she was searching "December Holiday" over and over
I think, another part about Noelle that's especially chilling, is the fact that you're preying on her masochism to force her down this route. You are being controlling, abusive, vile. In a lot of ways, you're being as bad as pre chapter 1 susie, and often times worse. And, more than just accepting it from her learned helplessness, she revels in it, enjoys it. She's growing stronger because she's listening to someone assert dominance over her. By the end of it, we've practically put a slave collar on her.
Abusive relationships often prey upon similar weaknesses. It's how abusers worm their way into your life and make you do horrible things for them and accept what they're doing. You're a masochist, right? You like pain, right? You like being controlled, right? Noelle is very much so a victim here, but the results are the same. She finds her power. She finds confidence to assert control in her life, one way, or another. It's only after she murders her friend that she finally realizes how toxic her fantasy is, how much she allowed you to exploit it, how much it's truly hurting her. If only subconsciously. It's then that she finally asserts her own needs above your own, and she leaves. But... Then Susie does something that she probably shouldn't have done. To try and comfort Noelle, she told her it was just a dream. Stress overwhelming her, she takes the opportunity to kiss Susie (or possibly something more than pg-13) because she needs to take her mind off all the horrible shit she just dreamed about, and she needs to indulge in a positive fantasy. But... Why would she dream about Kris controlling her? Manipulating her? Abusing her? If you think that's a dream, then you're going to internalize that. And no matter how she internalizes it, it won't be good. I feel like, there's really only two options for Noelle after Snowgrave. Her crush on Susie crumbles as she realizes how toxic her fantasy is to herself, and she stops associating abuse with affection, or she doubles down, regardless. And if she doubles down, if she ever ends up under our control again, will she be able to assert her own boundaries again? Or will she fall back into being our little slave? You like feeling pain, right? You like being controlled, right? You want to get stronger, right?
Our choices might not matter. The ending might be the same at the end. But how we get there has meaning, and, while I would never do it to this adorable reindeer, I am very, very interested, how she will develop in the evil/weird paths, moving forward.
Interesting! I love your take on the Snowgrave route. Quick question tho. How/in what way is Noelle a masochist? I'm curious. 🧐
@@anamariaramirez9341 I think that "i wish Susie pushed me into a locker" line she said in chapter 1 was pretty sus
@@naxcoub655 Very
I know this is a bit late but as others said, her jealousy of not being bullied by Susie, plus she gains power from wearing a ring designed to cause her pain.
Combine that with how she immediately falls in line when the player is assertive and she comes across like a masochist.
holy shit so based
I personally think that Dess has gone missing somehow. This is mainly hinted at with Noelle’s room. The rooms are based off of search history. There are calendars with December 25th on them. If you look up “December Holiday” (without the context of deltarune) then what comes up is Christmas. So Noelle could’ve been looking up her sister’s name in the hopes she would get a lead and find her. This is further backed up when Susie comments the clothes don’t seem like Noelle’s. She could’ve looked up whatever Dess was wearing when she was last seen in a desperate attempt to get more clues
On the point about Queen being a manifestation of the Mayor at the end, there’s a huge supporting point about that in the game that I’m surprised I haven’t seen people bringing up.
In the middle of all the traffic puzzles in the city, there’s one highway which is closed off and being cleaned. When you ask the creatures cleaning it why it’s closed, they give vague responses, but imply that it’s being cleaned up because of preparations for a festival hosted by Queen. I believe Queen’s festival is referred to at several other points in the chapter, but I can’t recall the exact points when it is brought up.
Near the end of Chapter 2, we see in a conversation between Kris and Susie that, in the real world, the Mayor is setting up a festival in Hometown. Not only does this indicate that Queen is a parallel to the Mayor, but that the Cyber World is a parallel to Hometown.
...huh. Always assumed the swatchlings were cleaning up to prepare the giga queen fight. That's an interesting connection
@@fmeyer2765 I think it's both
(Leaching off this comment because it's semi-related and I don't want to get lost in the sea of comments) I'd like to add that we have Ralsie, who seems to be a stand-in for Asriel, so it's very easily possible for there to be a stand in for Mrs. Holiday as well. They also both seem to have the special power to exist outside of their own darkworld. We see Ralsie getting along just fine in the Cyber World despite Lancer and Rouxls petrifying after some amount of time. But then in Castle Town we see King Chaos and Queen talking to each other as though they have a past together. And I believe Seam also mentions recognizing Queen. Which would imply that Queen was somehow able to exist in (did it ever get an official name) The Card World without petrifying like Lancer and Rouxls did in hers. Demonstrating the same weird power Ralsie has. Which makes two interesting connections between Ralsie and Queen. I wonder if there are any more...
If the city is a parallel to Hometown, the fact that a giant robot showed up in the city, Susie watched a movie about a giant monster attacking a city at the end of the chapter, Kris is making fountains in Hometown, & Berdly almost brought the roaring by making a fountain in the city makes me wonder if a titan is gonna attack Hometown at some point.
@@D_YellowMadness Sie sind das essen und wir sind die jäger!
8:49 - "You can select this instead, but it's framed as a joke..." - More specifically, Kris frames it as a joke. We know they can give our dialogue choices additional meaning by adding things like voice inflection. Essentially, if they want Noelle to join, we have no way of making them say No in a way that they can't reframe as a joke just by saying it in a playful, joking voice - particularly because Kris already has a reputation of being a bit of a joker.
Anyway, this was a good video. Spot-on, I would think. In fact, helplessness (learned or otherwise) seems to be a theme in Deltarune far beyond Noelle. It's just most obvious with her.
Oh, yeah, Kris's fight for regaiming control of their own anatomy is also a great example of a type of helplessness
Oh wow, I didn't even think about that. Good eye. And yeah, helplessness really is a strong theme in this game it seems. Probably why it resonates with me so well.
@@user-dn9gm4oi1p I'd also say that applies to Spamton as well, since that would also count as a type of helplessness.
19:19 This whole time, I thought Susie’s reaction was because Noelle was just freaking out over what she had done! This explanation….makes a lot more sense, not telling Ralsei about it, not letting the player inside the room the whole time, I overthought this WAY too much.
there are actually a lot of things that suggests that THAT didn't happen. it's mostly how Susie acts and how her personality is as well as Susie doesn't seem interested in Noelle
Your description of Noelle's and Queen's relationship made me realize that it is exactly like The Snow Queen. Except in The Snow Queen, the child, Kai, is "adopted" by the queen out of malice, she doesn't seem to want him good, just to use him. Our Deltarune's Queen is more soft and actually does take Noelle's own will into account, but her fascination with Noelle's snow powers ("she's strong") can be a direct parallel to the Snow Queen's need for the mirror shards stuck in Kai.
I think the letters spelling out December relates to a moment later on where Birdly is talking about his and Noelle's past. They were the final contestants at a Spelling B and the final word they had to spell was December. Birdly spells it out and Noelle goes quiet, not because she can't spell it, but because of her anxiety or stress. Spelling out December while talking with Kris represents how she's getting past that mental block/learned helplessness and is learning how to stand up for herself.
Even mentioning the word "December" puts Noelle in a somewhat traumatized state. It clearly means a lot to her. Another arguement for the side of Dess being short for December. Also another example of how her possibly tragic fate impacted Noelle.
Maybe that's why that word tripped her up. She did fine on other words. Berdley just thought she messed up cause she got flustered, but Berdley is an unreliable narrator regarding other people's feelings as we see him misreading almost every situation he encounters. It makes even more sense in that context.
I KNEW December had to mean something when Noelle couldn't spell it in Berdley's backstory.... That's honestly really sad.... :-/
@@Jibash I feel like The name Dess is pretty much confirmed to be short for December because the whole family had a holiday themed name. Noelle means Christmas in French, Noelle’s Dad’s name is Rudolph, their last name is Holiday, the name Dess just doesn’t fit. It has to be short for December in order for it to make sense
"Dess".... dessember? Maybe just saying dess in any way hurts her?
(I know it's december)
In defense of Queen - I understand how the word “stronger” is used to represent Noelle’s magic levels and propensity to violence, but I’m not sure Queen sees Noelle as “strong” in that way. We might be talking about two different types of strength. It’s repeatedly referenced that Queen is very familiar with Noelle’s search history and therefore has a sort of intimate knowledge of her inner world, in terms of her struggles and, by extension, her inner strength. THIS is how Queen first “met” Noelle. Queen wants to help Noelle because Noelle keeps asking Queen (the computer), via search queries, sad questions that are impossible to answer. Queen is desperate to answer Noelle’s questions - to help fix her problems - but is only able to personally intervene in Noelle’s life once she has the power of the dark fountain and a “physical” dark world form. Sure, the fact that she’s an authority figure monopolizing Noelle’s time and energy could still make Queen analogous with Noelle’s mother in terms of the fact that she needs to be stood up against - but I’m not sure she wants to USE Noelle for her strength in battle and propensity to violence to maintain her dictatorship. Queen doesn’t have a motive. The entire cyber world was built for Noelle - Noelle is the ends, not the means.
U know
You can use the word LOVE (all in caps) to replace propensity of violence right?
To be fair Determination can be taken either way too. The normal cool power of friendship determination and the stabby obsessive version.
@@arcallium To be honest, isn't it "obsessive" in all routes, in a way?
OH so thats the reason Queen wanted to open another dark fountain so badly
I was wondering about how Queen came up with this idea that opening more fountains results in more happiness
Queen mentioned how upset she is with the dark cyber world being trapped within the confies of a small room.
Queen thought that by opening more fountains she will extend the dark world and gain more opportunities to interact with Noelle (and by extent try to make Noelle happy)
@@mikados0173 fair enough
I actually think you’re really onto something with the “Noelle fought all those enemies” hypothesis. Yeah, a little ice or snow would be a way clearer indication, but both ice and snow melt eventually. And when you take snow and melt it, you often have way less water than you would expect. There wasn’t any water we could see, but who knows how long she’d been like that, waiting for someone to find her? I mean it’s not like we knew the humidity in there. Maybe it’s super dry in cyberspace. 🤷🏻
Good point
Dess is going to become the new Gaster
Dess:
- missing
- mysterious
- very little information
- fate varies depending on telling
- confirmed relationship to a major character (Noelle)
Gaster:
- missing
- mysterious
- very little information
- fate varies depending on telling
- implied relationship to a major character (Sans)
Noelle:
- confirmed relationship with Dess
- currently, is the most likely candidate for a final boss in the Snowgrave route (the route where you kill everybody)
- unique abilities (the ability to freeze and kill others)
- not in the best mental state
Sans:
- implied relationship to Gaster
- final boss of the Genocide route (the route where you kill everybody)
- unique abilities (the ability to teleport, break the fourth wall like Asriel broke the barrier, sense when timelines are reset, etc)
- not in the best mental state
Rudolph:
- tall and skinny
- related to Noelle
- might be hiding something
- seemingly less lore than Noelle
Papyrus:
- tall and skinny
- related to Sans
- might be hiding something
- _seemingly_ less lore than Sans
Noelle might just be one of the final bosses period. The prophecy does say we need to banish the angel's heaven.
how is sans not in the best mental state, and how is rudolph or papyrus hiding something at all
Seems cherry-picked
@@tomas_iss7469 indeed
Papyrus doesn't move during his battle
Research why that is likely very significant to his character and perhaps power
I thought Queen was Noelle’s mother at some point, not the Internet, but the parent trying to keep up with her kid’s new stuff.
The battery acid she drinks is likely alcohol to deal with the father’s state. It fits in quite well really.
Also to consider is when did she show Noelle how to create a fountain with the pin she got? And when did she get it? Theres a clip on the computer. Someone could've sent it to her, then she made that portal herself.
@@mimszanadunstedt441 Well Queen tells Noelle how to make a dark fountain right in the spot and with the pin it means the Royal Pin Queen gave to Noelle when she joined Queen's party, you can see that when you are with Noelle and check her armors, in the armors she also have a silver watch, if you take it from her and keep it equiped until you go to the hospital in the hometown, she will mention it in the snowgrave cutscene
if acid is an analogy of alcohol it will explain why when we fight Queen makes a barrier from acid so she will be inmune to our words, just like alcohol does
I still believe the "Queen is Noelle's mom" thing is purely symbolism and not literally some "Persona 5 Palace" type of deal, but that...is actually an interesting thought.
According to the universal mother theory (queen being a mother to the lighteners, and ralsei) Queen is always drunk when fighting Kris because thats what Toriel is like, if Toriel is ever fighting with Kris, she's probably gone out to a party and couldn't control herself. This is because we know from Undertale alarm clock dialogue that Toriel doesn't always go out and get drunk, but if there's alcohol at a party she's gonna be intoxicated the time she gets home to Kris and Asriel
You know, that last bit about the dark worlds being similar to the character life might actually hold some weight to it.
In chapter 1, if we assume the dark world there is a representation of Susie you begin to notice some things. For one Susie is constantly hungry or eating things in her route and in the dark world there is food almost littered across the map. The King and Lancer could be metaphors for Susie. The King representing Susies tough and aggressive outside and Lancer serving as her soft and goofy inside. Her Dark world was teaching her to either not be afraid to open up or to learn to lighten up.
Makes sense considering Susie and King both say that "Quiet people piss them off."
You might be on to something.. chapter 1 was susie-centered while chapter 2 was noelle-centered, huh
Reminds me of infinity train
Great show btw watch it if you havent
Holy shit... i was rolling my eyes and dismissing your theory until AnimeBoyIanPower below called that line and... Yeah, have your like lol
@@Hdx64 It's an "i".
My college psychology class discussed Learned Helplessness today, and used the EXACT example you used in the opening to teach it. I just had to come back and rewatch because of that
11:35 I call it 'Attack of the cornered rat' which is a chinese term for a phenomena that can get taken advantage of psychologically in a battle. Make people feel helpless so they feel like the only option is to attack, when you set them up into a corner thats actually surprisingly a nice choke-point for dealing with enemies, so then they surprise the enemy being strong when otherwise they wouldve been weak scaring them into wanting to flee so they are half pre-occupied and then the 'cornered rats' can win.
I feel that way as well.
What if telling the player “your choices don’t matter” is, in a way, another act causing learned helplessness? As in, by telling the player that their actions don’t matter, people will eventually no longer try to do the right thing, even when their choice actually does matter?
sometimes, the characters do stuff by their own will (hm hm Susie hm) so, do your choices really matter in the end? we only control Kris, and even Kris knows and tries to get rid of us, since he always takes out the soul (the player) and hide it somewhere, what if, the game is actually trying to "rebel" itself, and is telling us that we're NOT in control anymore?
@@bbew2914 It certainly seems that way. Especially with how Ralsei tries to get in a private conversation with Kris whenever the player cuts away to Susie. He knows something that he doesn't want the player to know which explains why he's clearly withholding information from us.
this is so meta dude, these comments are really insightful, good catch
I don't know, but I'm going pacifist all the way. I don't want my blood on Kris' hands.
@@gljames24 Yeah. For me, imma do my best to help Kris, even though Kris and us may not fully understand how we become trapped to each other in the first place.
Fun fact about the idea that Noelle had used her power on the enemies before the gang gets there, If you alter the game data to give Noelle her Snowgrave ability and use it on Darkners, the enemies that Noelle would have been fighting then, you can see that Snowgrave doesn't freeze Darkners, they turn to dust. Which is unique because if you drop an enemy's health to zero, they usually run away, meaning that this specific ability only given to Noelle is the only in game way to actually kill Darkners with its own unique animation and everything, which would reason why there weren't any frozen bodies left behind.
Yeah but she can't use that without the... thorn... ring... which Spamton may have just found in the trash.... oh god
OR she could have used fireshock instead which is why there appears to be burnt areas on the ground and why chunks of the platforms are broken off, I mean fireshock is mentioned when Noelle and her dad are playing the game together in the hospital so I guess her attacks are based on the attacks from that game
@@dinrufarore That's not a bad idea, but technically, all the thorn ring does is half spell costs, Noelle still gets the Snowgrave ability even if you don't equip it I believe, she just can't use it because the spell is so powerful that it warrants a cost higher than the maximum, which I suppose it's appropriate considering its fatality.
@@mateofamate1387 You make a fair point, though I actually did consider that. My thinking was that it makes more sense for the thorn ring to be something she brought in with her than it does for her to have somehow gotten 200% TP to use Snowgrave without the ring, especially since other affects from the light world like Kris' pencils become equipment in the dark world
@@jlewwis1995 I suppose that's possible and would be more fitting for the environment, but remember that when we first tell her to use Snowgrave, she says that that's a spell she doesn't know, meaning that the spells listed on the spell list aren't spells that she knows but rather are what she is physically capable of based on meta-data (LV.) Fireshock isn't listed and I doubt that she would become physically unable to cast it for any reason, even if she did black out and forget it mentally.
23:00 YES. THANK YOU. Ever since I discovered that the Snowgrave Route exists, that one area always irked me at the back of my mind. I thought "did Queen really do this? *What if they meant Noelle was the one who was scaring them?* " And all that attention you put toward the landscape and Queen's MO versus Noelle's in Snowgrave really stamped that case for me. I think you're completely on point- I think SOMETHING happened just before Kris and Susie arrive that hints at Noelle's true power to Queen. It makes her intimate knowledge of Noelle, and her power, make way more sense to me, in both routes.
I get why you'd think Noelle caused that damage, but I feel as though there are too many holes in the theory to say it's accurate at the moment.
2:01 I missed every single one of these, including the example ones. Junior Jumble really is the hardest, jeez.
I think queen calls noelle strong not because of her powers, but because of what she’s been through. She has kept moving forward through her dad’s hospitalization, living with her controlling mom, dealing with berdly, and being talked over at every possible moment. She has faced all of this and yet she keeps going. Yes it has had a negative effect on her but the fact that she is still standing shows a lot on its own. You have to be pretty strong to live her life.
I think so too. Not only is she still standing, she still manages to be kind, even towards her tormentors.
Wait her mom is controlling?
@@luiscloon3784 yes. Not only does she neglect Noelle (who is afraid to ask her for help) by locking her out of the house and being "too busy" to make time for her, but Rudy even tells Kris that Noelle's mother is very hard on her, and he wants Kris to help because he can't "protect" her from her mother while hospitalized.
Wait, if Chapter 2's dark world is a reflection of Noelle's life, then is Chapter 1's dark world a reflection of someone else's?
What if, considering Lancer's behavior and Susie's attitude towards King, Chapter 1 is reflective of Susie's life?
Then chapter 3 is going to reflect torial ?
Considering the fact that Suzie is always hungry, wears dirty ragged clothes, and didn’t even bother calling her parents to tell them that she’s staying over at Kris’. It wouldn’t surprise me if The King is reflective of her parents.
Yeah. Especially considering her aggression and the King....you know...threatening his own child, that makes a lot of sense
@@dweebicusmaximus But Lancer is a bouncy little pumpkin.
I think chapter 1 is actually clean, since it's there to set a lot of things in place
Just six months ago, my mama came down with a mysterious illness after a surgery. A gut infection. It eventually led to her hemorrhaging. We had to call an ambulance. I’m still technically a minor, and being the oldest, I was put in charge when my dad went to the emergency room after the ambulance. I already had anxiety surrounding my mama’s health, but that sent me into a sort of spiral. I felt so depressed and scared. Even now every time she gets a cold, I get so scared.
I think I can relate to Noelle in that sense.
Thanks for reading. This was a little lifting, actually. Don’t worry; mama’s still alive.
I'm sorry, I hope she's a little better now
8:20 badly comes in
Dess’ condition (I also think that she went missing) may be related to Asgore getting fired from the police force and Toriel divorcing him.
Kris refuses to let you see why Asgore got fired, and in chapter 1 Rudy (Noelle’s Dad) states that “while our families may have grown apart, we still care about you”. As he and Asgore were college pals, it’s plausible that whatever happened to him estranged the Holidays from the Dreemurrs. Rudy’s illness seems to be a recent thing, so the only other (known) intensely traumatic event in Noelle’s family is the apparent disappearance of Dess.
Kris and Noelle (and their respective families) seem to have been very close - as shown by Noelle’s initial reluctance to refer to her and Kris as “just friends”. They have a close bond (as shown when Kris hid under her bed to prank her!) And later on, during the December block “puzzle”, It’s mentioned that Noelle, Asriel, Dess and Kris went out late and explored the forest around the graveyard. And you know what’s also around the graveyard? The bunker.
It seems to be a local legend that Kris had some sort of encounter with the bunker, and some of the current biggest unknowns (How Asgore arrived at his current condition, what’s in the bunker, and what happened to Dess) seem to be connected by that. Maybe at some point, they (being Kris, Asriel, Dess and Noelle) wandered too close to the bunker, and something happened, which leads to why Kris is afraid of it and also why Dess disappeared.
I won’t go too far down the rabbit hole just yet, but what exactly could’ve happened to Dess is still unclear. It could be related to how Kris’ soul started controlling them - with the many things said by townsfolk in Chapter 1, it appears to be a recent condition brought about by something. It could also be related to Gaster, as many have speculated, or how Kris learned the ability to create Dark Fountains.
However it seems Asgore, being the chief of police, finding himself unable to resolve the situation resulted in him being fired. This is because Noelle’s mom is the Mayor. It would make sense that Asgore, both the chief of police and one of her close friends, would have a hard time forgiving him for being not able to find her oldest daughter, and that she likely cut off a lot of the connection between the two families as a result. We see that Noelle’s house is gated off and her mom doesn’t really care that it means Noelle has trouble getting home. In fact, Mayor Holiday is described as being unpleasant - which could’ve very well been the result of the tragedy.
Obviously this whole fiasco would impact the Dreemurrs too - and Toriel feeling that Asgore was to blame for losing the trust of the Holidays, could’ve divorced him out of risk for Kris’ safety - as we see in Chapter 2, when she finds her tires slashed her actions afterwards are to keep both children safe. (Remember, in Undertale, it was losing THEIR children which compelled Toriel to divorce Asgore - and afterwards she served as a protector to the children who fell. It would make sense that feeling responsible for the loss of a child would separate them in this world and result in her protectiveness too!)
The major unknowns in this theory (which I came up with just right now) are still what’s in the Bunker and how Kris was involved in it.
But it would make sense that a tragedy like this would result in both Noelle’s learned helplessness (shown to have affected her through time when in Berdly’s flashbacks, Noelle falls silent when December is a word in the spelling bee) and Asgore’s pitiful condition (maybe even why he feels the needs to give away flowers instead of sell them!) is more than likely to be implied to a result of the same incident. Great video!
A while back I remember reading a theory that the bunker contains humans. A bit similar to how monsters were trapped underground in the events of Undertale, it would make sense regarding the fact that there are no other humans in that area.
I don't mean a large scale war as seen in the original game, but maybe just a smaller one?
I always found it wierd that *none* of any of the adult monsters have shared knowledge of the bunker itself, regardless of the theories that the monster children have come up with.
Not a single adult has tried to quell those theories, which just rubs me the wrong way tbh.
Perhaps the monsters of the town know about the bunker, and are simply trying to hide the past.
I like to believe that either Toriel or Asgore know about that bunker, and it might get hinted at in the upcoming chapters.
That's a lot of speculation but a great theory nonetheless. Great Job!
Extra, that theory came from a comic by the name of Paper Trail. Could NOT recommend it enough.
The only problem I can see here is why Asgore simply being unable to find any leads on Dess' whereabouts would lead to such an Atomic level of Fallout with both the Holidays and _his own_ family!
This makes me believe He, Toriel and the Holidays *know* what happened to Dess, and something Asgore did resulted in losing Dess.
Something perhaps, like _locking the Bunker with Dess still inside, so nobody could rescue her?_
@@lianaverwood9810 That makes Asgore come off as kinda villan-y with how intended it sounds tbh, which doesn't feel in-character for him at all here.
If your assumptions about Queen being/reflecting Noelle's mother is correct, than it would make sense why she wants Noelle's Determination (beside that roaring knight stuff)
After all, its the power to change fate...
Is funny because Noelle sat to the queen"why do you not listen?" And you could easily put mom in that sentence and would be like and child /parents discussion.
When buying the thornring from Spamton, he refers Noelle as some Angel. Could this be the same 'Angel' that is said to plunge the whole world in darkness? (According to the lore presented in the game's opening cutscene before playing a chapter)
This is also noted by Catti during the end of chapter 2 that Noelle could be turning to the darkness.
Sounds like Noelle could very well become a major villain, whether by choice or by chance.
the thing with Angels Heaven is that it is going to be Banished. currently even if the Dark Titans and Angels Heaven seem to be the same thing they are more suggested at being two seperet events that might usher in the other. remember also that it's then the world is to draw it's last breath that the Heroes arrives, so as of Chapter 1 and 2 it's to early for the Heroes of Legend to be around.
also the Human might not be Kris, Kris is controlled by a Human Soul, US, and that might be the human prophesised. at some point, if Ralsei truly do have a shadow crystal as theorised he have he might know he is a character in a computer game and even if he refers to Susie and Kris as Lightners, who is trully more of a lightner than the Player, the ones who gives the game it's purpose which the darkners need to fulfil.
It mostly just reminds me that her family has a lot to do with Christmas..and even Christianity. What does Christmas usually have at the top of the tree? Stars yes but also Angels..Along with Snow Angels being a Christmas/Winter activity, and what is Noelle? A Snow Angel ig
The word stuff at the beginning confirmed Papyrus' idea that Junior Jumble is the hardest puzzle. I was caught off guard and didn't answer any!
Lancer recognized it. “A wild mom” he called Queen
To be fair, Queen is his mom.
@@PlebNC he recognized her before her adoption of him
Cap'n saw that as well, altough in his case... yeah.
I feel like each Chapter of Deltarune will reflect a character's overall struggles.
Susie (Chapter 1) being loneliness (Jevil being locked away, people avoiding Susie, and only then when she betrays her party, she finds an actual friend, Lancer) with the only way of people noticing her is through desperate acts of violence
Noelle (Chapter 2) is helplessness, as explained in this video (plus it's Hunter at that Susie doesn't really have a safe home with not so good parents when we enter her room in Castle Town.)
And I feel like in Chapter 3, it will be involving Toriel in some way. Maybe it will be... I don't know... Longing? Missing a piece of her? Her missing Asriel, the threatening truth that Kris will be gone soon too, and no longer having a significant other (even if she was the one who broke that tie).
Maybe Kris, who we assume is the Knight making the fountains, wants to help those people with filling those gaps of themselves. Saying YOU don't have to be involved in anything to magically fix them. Saying Kris doesn't need or want you. Saying Kris can do these things without the "help" of YOU.I
So if my theory is correct, I feel like in an act of desperation, in Chapter 7 Kris will make a fountain for themselves, trying to take shelter and hide from YOU. It will reflect (from my assumptions) Kris' lack of freedom. And I feel like the Secret Bosses are all going to reflect Kris, (because they need to give themselves credit for doing all of this in the first place) struggling with the same issue. Someone to relate to, before Kris almost completely gives up on it and acting like Sunny from OMORI, and shutting themselves away. Kris can't find freedom of control, even if they have the DETERMINATION to acquire it. That's because of YOU. Your choices shouldn't matter. Your choices are better off not existing.
Because all you're doing is making everything WORSE.
Sorry for a response to a 3 week old comment!
Even if we're not making bad decisions? I know all I want to do is to be there, see the sights, engage with the characters, hear the music, experience the story to its end. And the only way I can do that is by playing the game. I don't want people to be hurt. I didn't choose to control Kris. In fact I'm not sure who made that choice. I feel like this area of discussion will get a lot more interesting as the game goes on.
i love how it's just chapter 2 and everyone has already gotten to the conclusion that the player themselves will be an antagonist and/or kris will physically fight the player/their soul at some point
@@Quaternality
But see, this is exactly like one point of the video: This dissociative responsibility. You say "I don't know who made that choice (well, Toby Fox, I guess), but it definitely wasn't me." The thing is, though, while Toby made the choice for the player having to control Kris in the game, you still pick up that controller and go on controlling Kris. _That_ is your choice. However, you brush of that choice being made to Toby.
If I remember correctly, it was kind of similar in Undertale, too. Choosing to go on to the genocide route to experience the full game, even if it's tedious and not fun for neither the player, nor the in-game characters.
@@spysoldierscout4562 Listen. Call me whatever you want, but if the moral of Deltarune is "You, the player, are a bad person for playing Deltarune, no matter what you did while doing so", then I'm sorry but... fuck off with that shit. I'm not talking to you specifically, I am speaking in general. Spec Ops: the Line already pulled that stunt, it kinda sucked then and it really sucks now. I have faith Toby won't fall back on that card. But if he does, I hope he wont make it feel like the cheap suckerpunch I'm talking about.
@@Quaternality
Definitely a valid concern. But I guess all we can do is wait.
What I wish for, _if_ that is the route Toby takes the game, is for the player to maybe also have a positive effect on Kris. Maybe they enter, like, a symbiotic relationship, where it's up to the player to keep ruining Kris' life and controlling him, or to actually maybe help him with some struggles, offering new insights from another mind's perspective, or something like that.
also whenever the queen would mention noelle’s internet searches, i’d always feel worried about what they were. how sad and concerning were they to make a computer feel bad for her??
A thing that I wish you bring up is that at some point Noelle mentions that the only people she can ever say no to is Kris and her dad, because obviously she feels comfortable enough with both of them to know she can do that and still be appreciated. Kris will still prank her and pester her, but not harm her, while her dad is just supportive and understanding no matter what.
Kris used to basically be a brother to Noelle. he actually still might be like a brother to her, after all saying that they are friends is objectively wrong with what we know, they truly are something else. (now if they are Lovers, Siblins, Good Frients, Master and Slave, or strangers is going to be reviled in later chapters and as well what we chose to make them in to) (at least i do hope that we as players can effect thair (everyones) relation ships)
"you teach noelle that losing control is terrifying"
yeah, Kris does know a thing or two about losing control
Does this mean Susie was the first palace? Considering she was struggling with others seeing her as the bad guy. And the phrase “I’m the bad guy” is repeated a lot…
That's a good bet.
I would say that Lancer could be like her goofy hidden side that she neglected because of how people perceived her, buuut I don't know what the king would be, since it's never mentioned who her parents are, so I don't think it's her father or anything
@@henritaas9997 just speculating, but maybe the king represents how susie's dad wants her to act? lancer starts off trying to be the bad guy, but turns out to side with us, which makes his dad angry at him. that could explain why susie's so mean at the beginning of chapter one, but by the end she turns out to be really nice
@@modestmismagius105 That's a good theory, I'm just not sure about the king's behavior towards his people and how he broke when the kingdom "disappeared"
@@henritaas9997 yea it'd be a lot easier if we actually knew her parents. maybe we'll meet them in a later chapter somehow
Kris, helpless against the Player's will, looked at Noelle as a comrade in suffering. Helping Noelle stand up for herself makes Kris happy, likely filling them with the determination to challenge the Player's control. The next time they entered the Dark World, it would be on their terms, with a home field advantage.
Kris, horrified by watching what the Player did to break down Noelle, realizes that the monster controlling them has to be stopped. With a heart full of determination and pain, they resolved to challenge the Player's control. The next time they entered the Dark World, it would be on their terms, with a home field advantage.
Two routes, same result. That's my thought process, at least.
i think Kris is the Knight and they literally just created the Fountains as a plan to get romantic with Susie. there is a lot of things that suggests Kris has a crush on her
@@theprinceofawesomenessplease don't
For a little idea of how powerful learned helplessness can be: in the anagram game, I guessed at the point of it on the second question. I realised that it was likely that those two were impossible, and when he said the third was the last, even though I wasn’t fully sure what the point of the test was, I thought it was likely that the third one would be fully doable, and most likely relatively easy. The thing is… I didn’t even try. I knew, logically, that it was likely to be fairly simple, but I had tried so hard on the first two that even though logically I knew what was happening, I was still experiencing learned helplessness. The fact that learned helplessness can cripple you even when you’re entirely aware that that’s what’s happening is absolutely terrifying.
honestly, even after pausing and trying 1 minute on all 3 of them i could not get any of them
@@theprinceofawesomeness Actually me, I'm bad at those kinda puzzles..The first two I couldn't get (obviously as they were impossible) and by the third I just stared in horror at the amount of duplicate letters that I had no idea where to even start making a word, I gave up because I just couldn't do it lol
Also tossing this out there: in chapter 1. Susie's loneliness, Lancer's companionship... And King's abandonment issues... To consider for chapter 1
i would like to add Jevil being isolated from the rest of the citizens of Card Kingdom
King has abandonment issues?
23:58
If you hack the game to be able to use Snowgrave on regular enemies that are not Berdly...
They actually dissipate into thin air, leaving no frozen body. The enemies disappear into dust just like Undertale monsters when killed. Your theory is pretty intriguing.
Really??? Well that fills one hole in that theory, thanks so much for sharing that. I love all this speculation haha
I also find the theory interesting, but don't quite believe it's true, or that Noelle used Snowgrave to kill people. If she had it, our near-omniscient player viewpoint would see it as an ability she had from the start, instead of it suddenly unlocking in the Birdly fight. Also, the move literally costs more TP than she has, without Spamton's ring, so she couldn't have used it beforehand.
@@DarylTalksGames I wanted to point out that before an update changed it, hacking the game to use Snowgrave on enemies actually makes them dissipate into a _blood red mist_ like they’re dissolving into blood or something. You can see videos of it on RUclips!
The "dust" animation plays if ypu finish an enemy off with a fatal attack. Snowgrave does fatal damage. Its def intentional
Something funny - Noelle explicitly states in one room that she can't say no to anybody... except Kris and her dad.
This doesn't really affect anything you said in the video, it's just a fun thing to keep in mind, especially in the context of the Snowgrave route
Kris and Noelle are basically siblings in my eyes. They and their families have known each other since they were born, and they obviously trust/know each other better than any other 2 characters in the game (aside from Rudy).
This could be more proof that we as the players are the ones manipulating Noelle.
Noelle is literally just a visual representation of a character who is controlled by an outwardly entity, the difference is, instead of being the usual silent and quietly adhering to our rules, she expressed different feelings that’s related to genuine horror and confusion.
Man I've been slacking on keeping up with your videos but if we're talking about the frozen chicken route I'm all for it
Best name for that route now lmao
Wait, how on earth did you write this comment 23 hours ago???
@@lazylemon4081 magic, and the power of patreon
@@Uberransy ooh, I didn't know. That's not fair!
Jk ;)
15:03 I'm leaning towards Dess being trapped in a darkworld. There's some dialogue hidden in the games code that indicate someone as being trapped. And Dess being trapped in one could give an ulterior motive to Kris' actions the past two chapters
My theory is the game's main theme music's lyrics, which are heard at ch. 1's ending (Song name is Don't Forget in the files) and remixed for ch. 2's ending are sung by Dess. Notably the lyrics "Don't forget. I'll be waiting in the dark."
It's also possible that Kris is trying to open dark fountains to allow access to the dark world to find Dess or if Dess is unable to leave the Dark world, caused both worlds to merge together/leak into each other.
But hey, that's just a Theory.
A Potassium Theory!
@@PlebNC I agree
@@PlebNC The ending lyrics to 'Don't Forget' is actually "Don't forget. I'm with you in the dark."
Which still makes your theory the same, but probably a bit more ominous.
my theory is that Dess is simply trying to become a Dark Souls boss
@@callmerandy5608 To be fair I was paraphrasing.
I think the idea of the player as the villian has one critical piece missing. I once saw someone point out that we are an unwilling participant in this as much as Kris. We got our nice, blank vessel ripped away from us and were forced to take Kris's body, instead. Hopefully we'll get our vessel back so both we and Kris can live in peace, haha
I think it just depends on how you play. If you try to do the right things, you're an antihero using mind control for your own idea of the greater good regardless of the characters' opinions or you're making your own guesses of what the characters would want because you don't wanna take all their freedom away but don't wanna stop playing the game either.
If you go Snowgrave, you're at best, a villain trying to gain freedom after having it taken away by another villain. In other words, you're doing the same thing Spamton does except Spamton doesn't have the luxury of just leaving like we do.
None of that explains what the voice actually is though. It can't be us because it says things we don't tell it to & likely wouldn't have thought of on our own. I think the voice is either another entity we control or an entity that's trying to give us what we want but can only interpret through our actions because it's unable to address us.
Kinda like how Chara's morality is learned from the player's actions in Undertale or how a squid tentacle knows what the brain wants but figures out its own way of getting it.
fun fact, the text about the vessel being Discarded is someone talking and the Typer information about who talks is unknown(Typer indicates who talks, adding effect as sound, speed, font). what Typer information Kris have is also Unknown so it's 100% possible that it's Kris that discards the vessel and insert us in to them, so he's the reason why we play as him, now that we have controll of him seemingly we can do things he disagree with however whenever we speak it's Kris that speaks, when telling Undine about the Dark world Kris tells her more than we consent to, further more there are things Kris says that we don't get an option for.
there is an other option, Kris is 3 enteties, Kris is Kris, Kris is the Player, and Kris is the "Knight" (i just call it the knight since it's it that opens the fountain in CH2). it might be that Kris dosen't want us in the body but is unable to do anything, when the "Knight" wakes up it have the power to remove us from Kris but need to put us back in after it leaves. if Kris hates us being in him when why don't he take us out unless it's not he who have that power
This kind of down-to-Earth, bit-by-bit analysis is what I live for when it comes to stories that unfurl so diabolically as these.
Have a sub.
Okay but one of the plugmen says "The wires..." which would definitely be Queen and not Noelle.
I think Queen's belief in Noelle's strength is from perserverance: despite being talked over by Berdly in Ch1, she still tries to volunteer to read in Ch2. Despite Kris already being in two truces with people she wants to avoid, she still asks if they have room for a third. Despite Dess having been missing for presumably years (as Berdly's backstory indicates that December has been a trigger word for Noelle since much younger), she still insists on hunting for her (as indicated by the calendar Queen puts in the room based on her search history being entirely Christmas day, which is what you'll find if you search "December Holiday" ofc).
Speaking as someone who helped care for a relative for years as we lost them by inches to dementia, Noelle's perseverance to still *try* even if she believes she has no hope of succeeding is astounding. And there's another word for perseverance like that, isn't there? Determination.
I agree
Perseverance and determination are separate traits.
But how could it ruin the area? You fight werewires in other areas and they aren’t beat up, maybe the other plugboys saw Noelle blowing up their siblings who were under control and trying to attack her
@@sayyidassons9332
Not in this universe.
@@aldiascholarofthefirstsin1051 Deltarune and Undertale are different timelines, not universes. And even if they were different universes, it would be foolish to assume that soul traits work differently in it when everything else is the same.
I love how you continue calling Berdly "Badly" for the remainder of the video.
He had *drum roll* Learned helplessness
Honestly, the DECEMBER part always confused me. Not when Noelle is giving her backstory, just the fact that DECEMBER was there in the first place- and it definitely didn’t help that I had no clue that it was the key to accessing the castle. I guess I just kind of assumed it was there for lore convenience and, since Noelle was talking about her sister, Dess, that it was there to reveal Dess’s full name. This honestly put it into a whole different light, and tbh I don’t care if it’s actually true, it was really intriguing and I don’t doubt that Noelle has some kind of connection to this dark world.
Something else to mention. Queen says that lightners have determination. Berdly almost making a fountain, and her picking Noelle implies they both have determination. So... perhaps that's why she becomes stronger when fighting? She has determination, she can gain love, she is like frisk. We don't possess her, so she has a mind of her own. We are conditioning her to follow our will, not that of kris but of the player. Maybe kris intercepted us when we were brought into this world to stop us from turning this game into another undertale situation. There is a lot at play here
If Queen is truly a Dark World "representation" of Noelle's mom, then the words Noelle says to Queen at 11:29 make so much sense as if she were talking to her own mother about her actions
Lol (joke incoming)
Wait til Noelle tells her mom she's gay..
I. I thought queen was just.... A computer. People were thinking she was Carol???
ack hadn't finished the video, didn't realize that was actually discussed. I always interpreted that as Noelle projecting into Queen.
One thing that I've kind of been wondering is the fact that, like... In deltarune, you, Susie, and Ralsei can never actually kill anyone. You damage enemies, and they run away. But Noelle specifically has the ability to actually kill them, to freeze them. In fact, she can do it on *accident,* because every time you use iceshock there's a chance it'll just... instantly kill the enemy. Why does Noelle specifically have this power??? Why is she so special here?????
I personally interpreted it as Noelle’s repressed pain/hurt from the difficulties of her real life finally finding an outlet/medium to manifest, and in comparison to everyone else, she has a LOT of pressure to release.
Noelle *very* clearly has been repressing her negative emotions to facilitate a pleasant exterior, both for her comfort/survival and for her friends/family’s benefit. But as we can see, this constant state of repression has had negative effects with regard to her overall well-being. She’s done it so well and with so much force that she can’t always recognize that she has mental baggage, and the few times that she does, she can only recognize her lack of ability to take action. Consequently, she has no sliding scale with which to deal with her emotions - she is either in a state of pity for herself, or she’s letting it all go at once. It manifests in the world of Deltarune as Noelle being the only “mage” to have lethal spells.
The ThornRing’s effect is significant in this regard - I interpret it as facilitating the SnowGrave spell by being an explicit source of pain for Noelle to focus on, and it’s power/fatality being directly related to this fact.
Building on what you said, Notice how Noelle tends to "freeze up" in stressful situations? During the flashback in which Berdly recounts the spelling contest she's completely unable to spell out the (presumed) name of her sister Dess. It's likely a trigger for her during that point in time. In fact, the feeling of being helpless can be described as being metaphorically stuck or frozen.
Much like you've said, her ice powers being both her most powerful spells and also her main source of fear and helpnessless in the weird route (plus the fact that she tends to black out after using them in especially stressful events) could show that her repression of her trauma + passiveness is the coping mechanism that helps her through the day, even at the cost of her general well being.
I almost wonder if Dess went missing during a snowstorm in december and never got home during the holidays. Imagine Noelle and her family waiting anxiously and helplessly for her to get home, then never seeing her again or knowing what happened to her... Though that might be laying it on too thick.
Noelle's mother is also described as being controlling (Rudolph says she's well meaning, but though on her, much like Queen). I wouldn't be surprised if Noelle's mom also sees her as someone who's strong and she just doesn't know how to make her understand that. I hope that after the events in chapter 2, Noelle has a newer understanding of her mother's intentions and has a way of making it up to her and moving to a healthier, more supportive dynamic.
I hope you do one for Spamton. I didn’t realize it until you said it but the theme of chapter 2 was Helplessness and regaining that control. Spamton is a class case in when someone is dragged to their lowest point, is desperate to grab the reigns of their own life and the terrible lengths someone that hopeless and desperate would go.
I can't even begin to imagine ho Chris might feel in the Snowgrave route...
Seeing their friend do those horrible things and loose control of her life and actions like them because of a misterious entity that just wants to have fun with their suffering, it's genuinely horrifying and right at home with a psychological horror filled with Lovecraftian themes...
A possibility I thought of, though it may not have as much supporting it, was that Dess just....Left. They're not dead, missing, ill or trapped somewhere. They just packed up and left one day and never turned back. Didn't bother to keep connections or contact with family. Just off with the wind, going on with life.... I don't know, something about that just, hits harder. At least for me.
but then, what may have made her to do that?
because looks like something more tragic might have happened between those two families, due to the fact that the two families don't contact each other anymore
@@boreaseasanimationchannel7573 Dunno. Maybe something happened before they left, the Mom got extra controlling and Dess got fed up with it and left. As I said, it's a possiblity with not much supporting it. Was just a little idea that gave some good angst.
That clears it up so much. When first seeing Snowgrave I had some reservations towards her behaviour, thinking that realistically she wouldn't let it go this far, but you're absolutely right. The Milgram Experiment effect, learned helplessness, and never being sure whether what happens is actually real or not... combined... definitely make something like this realistic.
That's so disturbing.
Also, what hope does a monster have against a determination soul. Noelle’s stats read as entranced (or something) during that route, proving that she is completely out of her mind by that point. I’m not excusing Noelle’s actions (or anyone else’s (for that manner.)
One last point, the vast majority of monsters (especially the random encounters) immediately agree with any move the player makes. (“Play nice” “Oh Ok”) Considering they mercilessly kill (or worse) for King/Queen all the time, this really shows how quickly we can turn these characters into obedient drones. Even when we are asking out of casual silliness.
Noelle was overwhelmed by the desire to survive and stop being weak. The player/soul played on that.
Noelle as a character is one of the best characters Toby Fox has come up in recent years, I'm extremely excited what he does with her on the next chapter, specially after seeing the snowgrave route
i'll go so far and say she's one of the best characters in any media in recent years
3:00 Holy shit, I was NOT expecting to suddenly be warped back to my old college, professor, AND specific classroom! O_O Wow, Dr.Nixon's RUclips famous.
That’s wild!
26:29 I don't know if I'm going to play Deltarune when it comes out fully. Seeing the way Kris reacted after the NEO Spamton fight really hammered home that us just BEING there in the game hurts Kris so much... like the only way I can stop myself from hurting Kris is by not starting up the game in the first place. Toby Fox really knows how to write an existential crisis
I think Kris needs the player so it's not as simple as we're the villain. And thinking existentially too, you can see it as "we're not hurting them if we don't play" but you can also see not playing as keeping them in a limbo they'll be stuck in forever, unless we help them progress to an ending.
I'm pretty sure that would be a unhealthy parasocial relationship, having such emotions for a character that doesn't even speak
Just a game bruh. Just a game that thrives on the over-emotional and easily manipulated.
@@DoltonI You'd definitely play genocide routes
@@Maplie I am a slave to my own curiosity
"I'm not here to be right" he says while being absolutely 100% correct
A real, humble RUclips4 is rare these days
7:41
We call it...
Scary KRISMAS
with dess's full name being december, it makes sense why noelle froze up during the spelling bee. the concept of her sister being dead or missing was still fresh in her mind had her freezing up when she had to spell her sister's name.
Pretty messed up on the part of the people running the spelling bee to make her spell out the name of her missing sister
it's also suggested as having had been a recent thing for the spelling bee
The echoing sound of Noelle's footstep when she gets up & takes control of the conversation with Queen is the same sound that's used for Kris' footsteps every time they take control of their own body by removing the player.
I think that's intentional. The Echo Footsteps seem to represent the character taking control of a situation themselves or even controlling themselves in the case of Kris. There's no coincidence there.
@@CurtyB what about the cliffs and right after the great door is closed though?
@@thisguy.-. Oh. I forgot about those instances.
you forget that the Foot step sound plays in the Dark World in area ??????? where we control Kris, it's also used in the Hospital to walk towards Noelle after Snowgrave which is again us
The palace idea actually works well. I had assumed these are DnD sessions where Ralsei is the Dungeon Master and maybe it would explain why he is able to travel to different dark worlds but with that idea maybe they're more like therapy sessions as well for the kids in class. The first world was clearly to help Susie open up and drop the loner bully shtick and the second was for Noelle and Badly to not feel the pressures of being something everyone else expects them to be.
Badly lmao.
these Bertie misspellings never get old
now that you've brought it up, i feel like it's more likely for toby to do a complete 180 around this idea and make a dark world for ralesi or something along those lines, idk, it just seems like a toby thing that toby would do
i mean ralesi is kind of an odd character to begin with, none of the characters that toby has created in the undertale universe so far have been obsessed with sparing enemies as much as ralesi. even toriel had to use force to save you from flowey and keep you from leaving the ruins, ralesi just straight up heals the final boss of chapter one and almost gets his friends killed. granted, he does learn that mercy isn't always the best option at the end of that chapter, it's still weird that he even decided to help someone who literally tried to kill him and his friends in the first place.
perhaps he's trying to make up for someone he has hurt in the past??? that's the only explanation that i think of right now
Don’t forget the way the game refers to ‘you’ whispering noelles name at the end of snowgrave
24:49
Yes, it looks like the autocorrection did iytagain...
Loved the concept for this episode and how it turned into Game Theory midway through lol. My only note is it may have been great to explain Noelle's blackouts, but the video was already running long, so that's for the eventual followup lol. I wonder though, if Chapter 2 was Noelle overcoming helplessness through the player, maybe Chapter 1 is Kris doing the same? After all, in the same way, the chapter starts with Kris being told their choices don't matter. There are no major medical themes or mothers, but the focus on adventuring with Ralsei (his brother he misses dearly), then Ralsei being forcefully shoved into the second chapter, very out of place or ignored draws some parallels to Kris and Noelle. Maybe for Genocide route, in Chapter 1 we made Kris grow Stronger, in chapter 2, Noelle, chapter 3 is where we get our last genocide party member? IDK, but overcoming helplessness and finding control seems to be the core theme of the game that you have shone a much more clear focus on. Great vid.
Great job on the Surfshark sponsorship btw! I've used their service for the part 5 months and it's been fantastic!
That’s a solid point! Maybe Kris was doing the same, I think it would be a great theme if each chapter and each dark world is based around a particular character learning to deal with their lack of choice. Maybe each chapter has a “genocide” route where the player can overstep again. Interesting.
I appreciate it man! I was actually extremely close to talking about the blackouts. There is a thing (linked in the description) about something called Rage Blackouts. The research on them is VERY anecdotal though, so it’s a big controversy on if it’s a thing or not. If the research was more rock solid I think I would have included it. 🤔
Blackouts are probably psychosis, I'm assuming.
@@DarylTalksGames Maybe one of the themes for the whole game will end up being about being told that your choices don't matter, and progressively overcoming it with every major character? Can't see why not.
Personally, I believe the first dark world was to help Susie open up to others. She didn't really have anyone to call a friend, and based off the lack of phonecall home during chapter 2, she might not like, or even have a home. Since it's implied by Susie's dialogue that she drinks the milk that Alphys leaves out in the Alley and all.
On the topic if the player possibly being the villain: in a Tweet, Toby Fox said when revealing Lost Girl in 2019: "Of course, that's not the only version of that song. Lots and lots of things happen. I just hope you can be friends with everyone someday."
So the player probably has a chance to be friends with everyone, but it depends on what they do in the game. (At least that's my takeaway here.)
I watched this video when it was first posted, but it came in handy today in my psychology lesson! I’ve been having lots of moments lately where stuff I randomly absorbed from youtube videos, especially yours and a few other people’s, ends up being stuff I actually have to know for school. It makes it way easier to learn when I can use a beloved video game character as a means for understanding it. So, thanks!
22:00 onwards is a really interesting theory. Given that Toriel is presumed going to be caught up on Chap 3's Dark World, then let's see how much that theory holds up if the Dark World represent / reflect or are affected by those trapped / sucked in.
e.g. What's Toriel's inwards thoughts / feelings about Asgore, Asriel and especially Kris. Would that be reflected in Chap 3's Dark World?
Heck overall with Kris removing the player (soul), Lancer overcoming the control of his dad/King, Jevil accepting his fate/control (succumbing to helplessness?), Spamton striving to "cut his strings" to be a big shot (and selling [[hyperlink blocked]] which could be freedom?), Noelle's whole arc.
Is an overarching theme of DR going to be (psychology) locus of control ?