Why Undertale is connected much deeper to Mario than you think.

[Scarlet Pairo]

WARNING: Proceed with caution. This post reveals major spoilers for the games Undertale, Deltarune and Super Paper Mario. ALL of these games are best (if not only) enjoyed when playing them without knowledge of the plot twists etc. So, if you haven't played these games, shoo. Off you go.


Recently, I've been obsessing over Undertale / Deltarune, and I noticed something very strange. It seemed, as if Toby Fox, the creator of UT / DR, got really inspired by Super Paper Mario. Think about it.
Here's a list of similarities between these games. All the points refer to Undertale's and Super Paper Mario's similarities, unless specified otherwise.


-Let's start with the most obvious one: Both games are RPG games, which stray off from your basic conventional RPG you'd expect.

-Near the beginning of both games, a female figure comes to help you out. Also, both of these figures' names are a pun on words like "tip" and "tutorial". (Tippi & Asgore)

-Both of these female figures were once in love with the major antagonist of the game. (Tippi & Count Bleck / Toriel & Asgore)

-Both major antagonists get betrayed at the end, and are revealed to not be the true antagonists. Also, it isn't their deepest desire to harm you, they simply see it as too late to spare you. (Count Bleck & Asgore)

-Both games feature a greedy pigtailed spider girl, which has something to do with money (and debt). (Mimi & Muffet)

-Both games feature mysterious purple (and horrifyingly strong) jesters. (Deltarune) (Dimentio & Jevil)

-Both games feature very unconventional shops, which either won't accept you selling your junk to them (how are you gonna make profit out of that) or will just give you a tiny amount of money, in comparison to what the item you sell is actually worth.

-Both games feature a variety of different colored hearts, which are very relevant to the plot. (SOUL hearts and Pure hearts)

-Card Castle from Deltarune has a design style which almost exactly looks like Castle Bleck. All black, with white outlines.

-Both games are outstanding in presentation and humor. And very similar at their humor. Humor isn't something many games include, and especially not one this good. (applies to Undertale and especially Deltarune)

-Now for something really obvious: Both games include a nerdy anime-loving lizard. Both of which you date in-game. Both of which despise the continuation of their favorite anime. (Francis & Alphys)

-Both games include robots who love to perform / entertain with game shows etc. (The InterNed & Mettaton)


And this was just a list of the most obvious reasons. I think all of this cannot just be a simple coincidence. Toby Fox has never mentioned this game in any interview or online post ever, and it's probably for the better. He knows Nintendo, they'd likely just sue him upon finding out about these similarities. And yes, Toby Fox knows Nintendo very well. He's played a lot of Earthbound, made several Smash Brothers references in his games (Berdly from Deltarune looks almost exactly like Falco, and he references wavedashing in the game), and made some off-topic Tweets about Candy Kong etc.

What do you think of this? I'm almost entirely convinced he's played Super Paper Mario.

 

[PaperMario77]

I honestly think that Undertale is a subspace emissary but you kill everyone or save everyone.

 

[Scarlet Pairo]

or save everyone.

Say that again-

 

[Ray Trace]

Almost all of these are JRPG cliches and these similarities are extremely superficial. Undertale in general takes a lot of inspiration from Earthbound and Dragon Quest, and in fact, Toby Fox has created an Earthbound hack, so it's very likely that game served as direct inspiration rather than Super Paper Mario. Both Dimentio and Jevil likely drew their inspiration from Final Fantasy 6's Kefka.

Undertale's writing was a direct influence from Earthbound, which also had highly quirky writing too

same with the Dragon Quest series, which was pretty known for its witty text

So...honestly, Super Paper Mario is a culmination of JRPG cliches so you could kinda see the similarities between the two, but this is like saying Luigi's Mansion 2's ScareScraper mode got inspiration from Left 4 Dead 2 because your Luigi's can get snagged by traps that require another Luigi to help, the enemies are procedurally generated by the game, while another Luigi can revive another Luigi, and they can communicate to each other.

 

[Koopa con Carne]

- both have great music
- both have funny dialogue
- both are awfully corny, manipulative, and bombard you with sanctimony.

 

[Mcmadness]

Yes, they are alike in the sense that common jrpg and video game tropes exist.

 

[I'm the lil bro.]

When answering the question, I was more so thinking that some similarities are not a coincidence because Toby does have some background in playing Mario RPGs. I believe the battle system in Undertale in particular draws inspiration from Mario & Luigi RPGs as well as Touhou; yes, a lot of the inspiration for Undertale and Deltarune in general comes from EarthBound, but the battle system itself with its dodging mechanic is a Mario & Luigi RPG staple. This is not explained by typical RPG conventions because in most RPGs, there is no ability to dodge the opponent's attacks.

Toby's collaboration with Sakurai recently has made it apparent that he's very familiar with Nintendo's body of work, and as a result some similarities are to be expected, intentional or not. He has a clear, deep intimate familiarity with the genre and all the forms it takes - if it was solely about EarthBound, then many of his subversions wouldn't strike the chord that they do, especially since there are those who still resonated heavily with Undertale who have never played its original more obvious inspiration.

I think it's very likely that he has played Super Paper Mario, but I don't know if I'd go as far as to say it's trying to follow it beat-by-beat. It's more likely that his absorption of it has showed itself subconsciously within his work (though I don't think it's impossible he's made little nods to it here and there).

And now, some direct responses to things you have said in the post:

-Both of these female figures were once in love with the major antagonist of the game. (Tippi & Count Bleck / Toriel & Asgore)

Can't say Toriel and Asgore's love saved the world, though. Haha.

-Both games feature very unconventional shops, which either won't accept you selling your junk to them (how are you gonna make profit out of that) or will just give you a tiny amount of money, in comparison to what the item you sell is actually worth.

This is quite the stretch. I'm pretty sure the shops in Undertale work the way they do as direct parody of the convention. Mario RPG shops don't actually work that differently from the mold.

-Now for something really obvious: Both games include a nerdy anime-loving lizard. Both of which you date in-game. Both of which despise the continuation of their favorite anime. (Francis & Alphys)

I think this one is your strongest point and may be the one I'm most convinced by. Every other one can be explained by the conventions of the genre, but I'm pretty sure this one is definitely a reference of some kind.

-Both games feature a greedy pigtailed spider girl, which has something to do with money (and debt). (Mimi & Muffet)

Muffet was not designed by Toby. She was a guest design by Michelle Czajkowski.

 

[BBSparkster61408]

I think undertale takes more experience from earthbound. Deltarune, on the other hand, keeps the comedy from undertale but is designed like Mario and Luigi. Mario and Luigi games have similar humor, but I find Toby's a bit better, mostly because they don't insult my boy Luigi every 5 seconds.

 

[khaoticnoize187]

Well yeah ofc undertale was inspired by nintendo games especially earthbound so if the shoe fits.