It might have taken me three months to finish this 10 hour game, but I'm glad I did. I bought Undertale shortly after launch when I heard all the positive reception, but took some large breaks in the middle because it wasn't really catching me. Knowing it was likely to be spoiled in Giant Bomb's GOTY discussion podcasts filled me with determination to finally finish this game.
I completed the neutral ending two days ago, watched the genocide ending on youtube (you caught me, Flowey) and completed the pacifist one today. After finishing the neutral ending, I was a little disappointed. Ending the game with a bossfight whose nature and motivations I didn't fully understand, and a phonecall from Sans explaining how everything was still okayish was underwhelming to me. I had enjoyed the world, the characters, the gags and the music (the music!) up to that point, but the end having so little payoff (to me) soured me a little on the whole experience. I understood why people loved Undertale, but not why they did so intensely.
Now, after having seen the genocide and pacifist endings, I get that too. Fortunately, I had spared everyone in my initial run (because I didn't want to kill cute monsters, but also because figuring out how to spare each monster was more fun and interesting than attacking them), so I could immediately enter the pacifist route. Boy did I get the payoff I was looking for! I Seeing all these friends (who were much dearer to me after watching a genocide run) band together in support, experiencing the reveals about how the world is how it is, and fighting one of the hypest boss battles since Asura's Wrath, all of this made me appreciate the game so much more. That one hour of play made the whole of Undertale for me.
I think I would have enjoyed the game more if the story beats that intrigued me were more present throughout the game, rather than tucked away in two optional endings. I would have liked to see things like the history of characters like Flowey, Asriel, Chara, Sans, the nature of concepts like souls, determination, SAVEs, and foreshadowing of the bleak sides of the world to appear earlier. There is something to be said for considering the neutral and pacifist endings as one complete ending, but seeing the credits roll after killing Flowey and turning off the game for two days really killed the momentum for me. You could also argue that the game doesn't need to show it's dark side and is better off commiting to it's whimsy instead.
Despite that small complaint, I'm glad to have experienced this game, and thankful to those that pushed me to play it. It's one of the most memorable games is recent memory.
Lastly, I have one question: does the game itself ever refer to the first human as Chara, and if so, where? If not, how do we know his default name is Chara?
