Fucking Play Undertale God Dammit

NOTE: if you want to pick up this game, I highly recommend staying the hell away from spoiler pits like Tumblr, twitter, any message boards, etc, involving this game. It strongly revolves around several surprises in the game itself and it ruins some of the experience if those surprises are gone. If you wanna pick up the game, or need a guide, I'll provide both of those at the very bottom.

So, because I'm mostly caught up on RPs, and because I need to experience other people experiencing this game for what it is, I'm writing this. As of right now, several people on this forum have played this game, and two of us, to my knowledge, have actually beaten it. Those of us that have beaten it are myself and Admin, and Gregar is attempting to play through it on his own time. Consider, however, that I know quite a few more people that have played it, and no matter what they've reacted in some way at least positively to it. Burner's enjoyed the demo and he plans on buying the full game and playing the way he wants, and Admin and I have played the same route and thoroughly enjoyed it. Following this will be a breakdown and honest TL;DR recommendation and why I love this game so much.

To start off, we have music. The game is made and composed by the rather illustrious Toby Fox, and you've probably heard a couple of his tracks before. I'll list some at the end of this section, but his biggest pedigrees in here are the Halloween Hack of Earthbound, notable for being a genuinely spooky hack and, furthermore, Toby DECOMPILED PORKY GETS SERIOUS IN-ENGINE AND REMIXED IT INTO HIS SIGNATURE TRACK. This track, which any of you who read Homstuck might recognize, is called Megalovania. It also features in Undertale but I won't say where. Suffice it to say, if you're listening to it in game, you've probably earned it. The music also plays a large role in the game, as several characters' themes are repeated throughout in several ways that enhance the experience. The main theme, "Undertale", is a prominent example, and many others are reflected in differing tunes. For instance, the first ghostly enemy you encounter has a reprise of his theme later in a different fight, and is remixed thoroughly for a later boss. The sound design for the UI, BGM, and overall SFX is reminiscent of Earthbound with touches of Custom Robo peppered in (with the "voices" of the characters). It's overall really solid.
Here's some spoiler-free tracks for you all to enjoy. 
Intro theme (Once Upon A Time): http://www.nospoiler.com/y/s7RRgF5Ve_E
Options menu Fall version (Uwa!! So Temperate!): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jKyfROvK91s
Shop Theme: http://www.nospoiler.com/y/jKyfROvK91s
Undertale Main Theme: http://www.nospoiler.com/y/jKyfROvK91s
PS: Undertale almost always makes me cry when I hear it.

Story: This... is rather hard to talk around when most of this is trying to steer you away from spoilers, but I believe if I talk about certain subjects in an oblique manner, things will be not apparent until you reach them yourself. The story itself is rather similar to that of Cave Story in its own way, where you find yourself underneath somewhere and your overall objective is to find your way out of this place. How you accomplish this will more and more drastically change the final outcome of the story, and comparing two different paths will create a very distinct and marked change in some characters. Additionally, how the characters are written gives a lot of life to the story and some of the story mechanically revolves around fucking with your perceptions of gameplay itself. While I entreat you on your first playthrough to let things happen naturally, I would highly recommend experimenting in a second or third playthrough. There's plenty of secrets to be found in this game, and nearly all of them relate directly to the characters and the setting itself. The results of any of several different endings are entirely decided by you, the player. I won't go into any detail about those, save that they all evoke very strong feelings even now.

Gameplay: This is going to be much shorter as some of it was covered in the story section, but overall the gameplay consists partly of an adventure game and also partly as a typical turn based JRPG with SMT elements. You can Fight, Act, Item, or Mercy. Mercy functions as a type of encounter-ender, where you can either Spare monsters under certain conditions, or flee from battle. However, most monsters can't be Spared unless you Act a certain way.

Graphics: There's not much to say here, save that it's stylized in an Earthbound way in the overworld and in combat you're treated to rather impressive black and white detailed versions of an enemy's overworld sprite. 

The Honest Recommendation: If you're looking for a game that can be totally completed in under 24 hours (and this includes 3 seperate runs for each ending group), has charming appeal in art, music, and characterization, has interesting combat and other gameplay mechanics, or something to subvert your expecations... or even just a good RPG, play this game. The game will throw some gameplay curveballs at you now and then, so expect those. This is not a good idea to play if you absolutely cannot handle bullet hells, you are looking for more "traditional" and "modern" RPG mechanics, or if older graphics do not appeal to you.

Finally, why I wrote this, why I care so much that others play, why I need someone more to share this with: something happened in this game to me. There were three things that deeply affected me, and every time I was overcome with some kind of emotion. This game also consistently made me cry, and I'm not the type of person to easily do so with media. It's something that I love that I played first hand, because experiencing it as an LP or second hand does NOT do this game justice. Please, please play this game. If you want to but for some reason can't afford it, that's fine. I will save up for Christmas and buy everyone I can this game and it's OST. Promise you I won't miss the money and I'd be more than happy to help.

Links to the game and the most spoiler free guide this game can offer:
http://undertale.com/
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=526991894

It's like a sign...I was just about to redeem some gift-cards and buy this game when I saw this. Heh, life...

Haar, I don't know you very well, since we don't really talk that much (we should really fix that man XD) but honestly, you're not gonna be disappointed. There's a playstyle suited to you one way or another here, and I think you'd rather like it. It's a good game, man. Get it.

Oh, I've seen a bit of it courtesy of a friend of mine (The DUMMY tires of your aimless shenanigans.) so I have an idea...a very general idea. It's also this type of thing that tells me "You have a copy of Earthbound, you should play that."

If it's as short as I've heard (which it likely is, considering I play most RPGs rather fast), then there shouldn't be a problem getting around to it this weekend.

...y'know, we really kinda should fix that, given how little is actually required of me in life...it's not like I don't have time.

To give you an idea, I did one ending in about 9 hours, and then did another in another five hours. Altogether, I died a few times and had some other setbacks, and generally took my time and skipped no text, wandered around a lot, etc. I then did two speedruns of the first ending I got and beat those in about 5 hours each, and this latest run I did ended at about 6 hours. It's a short game overall, even if you take your time.

I played it pretty recently, too. Shit's amazing.

Got to it yesterday, like I thought. Ended up with one of the neutral endings. Probably one of the most depressing endings to anything ever. For an idea, I was LV 10. Definitely one of the better games I've played lately. Had some good music, no characters I really disliked (outside of maybe Onionsan), and a tone that felt pretty realistic in terms of seriousness vs humor.

And of course, the villain has one of the best final lines I've ever heard.

ZM!!! HOW. DARE. YOU. FORGET. ME. AS. ONE. WHO. HAS. PLAYED. THIS. GAME. HOW. DARE. YOU.

Haar I implore you to get the "nicer" ending if you can. It's a bit hard but it's worth it for the secret scene. And yeah, that final boss? Threw me for the biggest fucking loop ever. But it's not the biggest loop you'll be thrown for if you decide to get the nicer ending.

I have to say though, LV 10? Damn man. I won't say it aloud here, but... dang.

And Mala I forgot and I'm sorry pls forguv.

I've beaten one ending, working on another rn

And that was me only killing what I felt was a threat. Namely those cleaner guys and like, two or three bosses. And the mold dudes. But stuff like that. I can only imagine running from a lot of enemies in the second half of the game on a less...EXP-y run.

I promise it's possible to spare every single enemy in this game from start to finish because I've done that. Even the two secret enemies. And I can also guarantee you that it's great and absolutely worth it. You just gotta git gud. And additionally, I think some enemies have scaling damage. But yeah, get ahold of me when you two beat it on the nice run.

Oh, I'm sure it is. It's just the way I played the game. I was originally going to just spare most stuff, but then I found that the cleaning guys are really annoying to spare, so I started killing them too. I think I only killed two or three bosses the whole game. But some enemies just annoyed me/freaked me out, so I started killing them. And then I was LV 10.

On a related note, my lock-screen wallpaper on my cell phone is now Temmie.

My Skype screenpic is Temmie's designer's own piece of art starring herself and two Tems. But yeah. I... >__> I found something else that needs attention, and whoops, sorry, but here it is.

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/indivisible-rpg-from-the-creators-of-skullgirls#/

Long story short: the people who made Skullgirls, who took huge losses just to make a game, are trying to make another game, which is ethnic-rich and looks amazing. The prototype is free for everyone and gives a good rough idea of the game. If it doesn't get funded, these people are going to disband, and there will be NOTHING. I don't care if you guys don't even donate, just fucking share this around, please.

Honestly, I usually avoid looking closely at this topic, because no amount of information about Undertale will convince me to play it faster - I KNOW it's amazing, but I've got other things to do lately and a baffling lack of energy at night - but duly noted. I'll spread the word whenever possible, at least.