problem_redditor
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User ID: 1083
Playing Deltarune at the moment (so far I've completed chapter 4, haven't gotten to playing 5 yet). I really wasn't going to play it; I'm time-poor and don't usually have the energy or motivation for skill-dexterity games like this one, but every friend of mine in existence wanted to see me play it and so here I am.
This game is much, much better and more enjoyable than Undertale, I have to say. Undertale was absolutely chock-full of these utterly frustrating JRPG pop-up battles where you could be subjected to an impromptu fight against an enemy at any moment, meaning you had no ability to plan any of your fights and made the simple act of walking around something you barely wanted to do lest you get ambushed by some disproportionately difficult enemy without enough health items. In contrast Deltarune foreshadows its fights adequately since its enemies can actually be seen wandering around in the overworld; they're visible from a mile away and this means encounters can either be avoided or planned for in advance, and it makes the act of walking around a lot less tense since the game won't just foist unwelcome encounters on you.
The battle system itself is a lot more refined here as well. It still sticks to the same core gameplay routine of RPG turn-based battles mixed with bullet hell components, except this time you have three characters to do battle with now instead of just one, which allows for a far greater degree of strategy and coordination in fights and really makes combat much more entertaining than in Undertale. For somebody like me who may as well be handicapped when it comes to reaction time, I find myself compensating on the strategy side very often, doling out health items and coordinating group attacks at opportune times, and this made it easier to get through fights then it otherwise would be if it were a pure bullet hell game. The increased strategy component in Deltarune means that there's a lot of flexibility in how you approach fights.
Difficulty is an aspect of game design that I've seen endless debate about and there's no easy way to "solve" difficulty in games in a way that makes every single player happy with the level of challenge offered, but at least in my subjective opinion it's well-calibrated for the most part, though chapter 4 has a hard spike in difficulty that coincides with a sudden increase in the intensity and ominousness of the narrative. I think it generally works, though I was banging my head against the wall in frustration for a while at the final boss of chapter 4 (which is very difficult) but the boss of the chapter is something that has been foreshadowed for a good portion of the game and is tremendously built up to, so the difficulty doesn't feel unearned. It really feels like an accomplishment to beat it, and almost comes off like something you really should not have been able to do.
There's also a lot more playing with format here than there was in Undertale. Deltarune really experiments with some fights, with battle mechanics calling back to many other games, and sometimes this works and sometimes it doesn't. As an example of where this really works, there is a bossfight in Chapter 2 which involves you fighting a shounen mecha version of a character with Punch-Out! gameplay, and it's legitimately a great moment. Chapter 3 has a bossfight involving a mechanic where you play minigames for points, which culminates in a Special Attack towards the end where they get thrown at you in rapid-fire succession WarioWare-style. Much of the time these gambits pay off really well, and helps innovate on the general gameplay loop such that it always feels fresh.
It's sometimes the case however that these diversions into alternative gameplay can feel underdeveloped, and also some of these gambles work less well than others. For instance Chapter 4 features a miniboss named Jackenstein whose attacks involves you collecting points in a Pac-Man-esque setting peppered full of bullets that deal damage, and the attack doesn't end until you collect a key located on the far side of the battle box and make an exit; frankly it's quite a frustrating boss to play through. The base battle system in Deltarune feels quick and keeps you on your toes, this boss on the other hand forces you to go slowly because there is no timer, no predetermined end for an attack and every time you bump into a bullet you lose a shit-ton of health, so you're incentivised to slowly wait for the correct openings where the bullets part in order to progress without losing health. When you die on this boss, you have to go through the entire laborious process all over again. I found myself getting impatient with this, just a insanely bad concept for a boss battle in my opinion. In general though, the gameplay is an all-around improvement on Undertale, and it's very fun to play.
It also looks much better than Undertale. Though I have to say the chapter-based release schedule of Deltarune does mean there's this persistent inconsistency in the production value between chapters, which makes the game feel far more uneven than it would be had it released in one go. There's a clear upward trend in polish as the game goes on, with Chapter 1 having by far the jankiest presentation, least expressiveness in the character animations and most rudimentary environments, which then steadily improves from then on. You can also clearly see ideas, character illustrations and concepts in the earlier chapters that disappeared or were replaced later on, which again adds to the feeling of a lack of cohesion. It's unavoidable with this kind of release really, but can feel jarring at points. Still, looks great and the soundtrack is a certified hood classic.
Plot- and atmosphere-wise it's noticeable just how much more ominous Deltarune is compared to its predecessor. This time the game is centred around a prophecy that looms large over the whole narrative, which slowly begins to come true as you play. There's a lot of quirky funny stuff that's typical of this type of fiction (which is often laid on too thick) but as Chapter 4 develops you begin to learn that the prophecy includes far more than you initially believed, predicts far more than you initially believed, and the chapter hints at an infohazard of the highest order at the very core of the prophecy - one that concerns the main characters - but is evidently so horrifying that everybody who knows about it denies it, refuses to talk about it, and attempts to cover it up as if it doesn't exist. There's a strong theme of fatalism and lack of agency at the core of this game that is almost antithetical to what Undertale offered up, which is that Your Choices Matter; in this game that concept appears to be thrown into question pretty heavily. The heavy-handed, almost child-like moralising that Undertale deployed in its attempts to subversively critique the gameplay loop of RPGs is noticeably absent here. At the halfway point of the game, it really is trying its hardest to foster a sense of impending calamity on the horizon, and at the final part of Chapter 4 you meet a colossus of a being that has no consciousness, can't be reasoned with, and in spite of the fact that it's an infant still in the process of hatching, it is a fight your characters barely scrape through even with help.
Overall I really like it. I think in spite of the association Toby Fox's games have with insufferable they/thems who really just like anything that looks and feels like "happy Tumblr neurodivergent shipping time" and fill the internet with unhinged gay and trans fanfictions of their favourite characters (which his games certainly cater to a lot) and Cawthon-esque lore fanatics who spend half their life poring over the smallest details and secrets in a game only to make a 30 hour video about it that ends up being completely wrong (which his games also certainly cater to a lot) there is a genuine attempt here to make a good, well balanced game that's compelling.
problem_redditor
21d ago
I have noticed a lot of creative pursuits are like this; getting anywhere is far more about fostering mundane, day-to-day discipline than it is about feverish bouts of lightbulb-brained inspiration like the stereotype would suggest. The people I know who do this wait far too long to know what they want to make, and in the end barely make anything. Far more important is to get into a routine of just working on something everyday, honing your skill as you go on, and even if 95% of it is shit that 5% of good, worthwhile material will accumulate overtime.
Perhaps the sentence is confusing (I wrote my comment hastily while at work). What I mean is that the official narrative is currently trying to play both sides; on the one hand, we are supposed to believe that regime change was never the goal, on the other, we are supposed to believe that regime change has already been achieved actually and that it was a huge success. The impressive degree of hedging from the current administration is rather amusing.
“It’s not happening and if it is it’s good” is a tactic wokists tend to use a lot when people start Noticing their preferred policies being shoehorned into every institution and is the same kind of goalpost-shifting that's occurring here. Frankly Hlynka keeps being vindicated more and more everyday.
So what's your point? Warmed-over pacifism does not actually stress me. I still believe that Iran acquiring nukes would be evil, and it's good for America to stop this.
The point is that the costs of such military engagements (lost human lives, further destabilisation of the region) are immense and as such war should be a last resort, employed only once all diplomacy has failed and when there is strong proof of a present threat. These conditions have not been met in the case of the Iran war, where diplomacy was still a possible course of action and there is no evidence they were producing warheads. I do not believe that this war was started for prudent reasons at all; the US and Israel really just appear to have attacked because they thought Iran was showing signs of weakness and they saw it as a great opportunity.
I have never argued that regime change is necessary and neither has Trump. I think it causes great confusion for war critics when they imagine that the Iranian regime surviving is proof that Iran is winning.
I am not arguing that regime change was the goal, I’m arguing that even if you don't intend to do so you can still badly destabilise and destroy the region. Regarding the goals of the war, I think the instigators of the war had many different objectives; Netanyahu in particular certainly wanted regime change. Trump was very wishy-washy on this, but many of his statements suggest regime change was at least one goal among others.
"Finally, to the great proud people of Iran, I say tonight that the hour of your freedom is at hand. Stay sheltered. Don't leave your home. It's very dangerous outside. Bombs will be dropping everywhere. When we are finished, take over your government. It will be yours to take. This will be probably your only chance for generations. For many years, you have asked for America's help. But you never got it. No president was willing to do what I am willing to do tonight." Unlike how you’ve portrayed it, Trump did not say it was “not essential” and alongside the tweet that Dase posted where he outright proclaims that there will be nothing but Unconditional Surrender, it sure sounds like regime change was on the agenda.
The official narrative surrounding regime change is really quite funny, to be honest. The administration's later statements are this contradictory mix of “Regime change was never our goal, but also if it was we achieved it”, somewhat akin to “It’s not happening and if it is it’s good”. Trump wants to back out at this point, and in spite of the fact that he advocated the idea of regime change early on he has now reneged on the idea just in case he needs to cut his losses and save face, since that goal is a lot more definite and less open-ended than “depleting missile stocks” and “harming Iranian military-industrial complex” - which frankly is not that meaningful of a war goal in itself; in any war you’re virtually always guaranteed to deplete your enemy’s war resources to some degree.
Ultimately the most relevant metric when assessing victory is the cost-benefit of the engagement; does the loss of your interceptors and other war resources (which limits your ability to project power elsewhere) outweigh the benefit of hampering the combat-readiness of the Iranian regime, and is it still worth it once you factor in the economic shocks and regional instability the whole affair caused? That kind of sober analysis is what strategic victory is about, it’s not some chimp-brained goal solely oriented around fucking your enemies up.
See, there we are. This isn’t an impassionate debate about whether America is winning the war or not, it’s just a debate about good and evil.
No shit lol, I thought that was clear the second I said your moral system was disturbing. There is no way to discuss morality without having some of your own moral priors to begin with. And I never criticised you simply for making proclamations on good and evil, my criticism is that you believe all action taken against The Evil is automatically justified, regardless of the collateral damage it may cause. Just because you don’t like something and believe it is evil doesn’t mean it automatically becomes moral or high-minded for you to utilise any violence you want to achieve your aims.
It sounds like your assessment of the war is just believing pro-IRGC sources and disbelieving pro-America sources.
US intelligence is now a pro-IRGC source, got it.
Besides, you’ve been the one trumpeting American victory uncritically, you are a self-admitted American Exceptionalist who solely believes “pro-America sources” and ignores “pro-IRGC sources” whereas I have been relatively cautious in my assessments, so for you to accuse me of that is projection to the highest degree. Your confidence that Iranian capabilities have been completely decimated should not be anywhere near as high as it is.
I consider this pretty decent progress towards accepting my views.
And there you go again proclaiming victory based on nothing but your own jingoistic fanfictions. Six ships going through the strait, with massive supply chain disruptions still ongoing, is not something to be gleeful about.
EDIT: wording
This was in response to an argument that America isn't part of Western Civilization.
This was in response to a claim of moral relativism that criticized American attempts to be moral in war as a pretention.
I am aware what these quotes were in response to. However, it's hard to ignore the original answer you gave, that both commenters were in turn responding to:
"Western Civilization is better than the Third World and America is better than Iran. Even for all our flaws America at her best is and can be a force for good. Putting America and Iran on the same moral plane is actually a form of weakness because -- well, if it's all the same anyways who cares if Iran conquers? Who cares if barbarism or civilization prevails? It's all predicated on violence anyways right? Well no, I assert that the ends towards which I apply violence are actually more moral than theirs. I do prefer my civilization to theirs. I'm not a neutral third-party observer, I'm not a nihilist. My values are better than theirs and it's justified for me to use violence to defend what's mine."
I don't think I'm misrepresenting you at all.
My argument is that this is not a mere pretention, America has a righteous claim to morality over Iran, it's actually ridiculous to put America and a terrorist Islamic regime on the same moral plane.
Yes, exactly the argument I was criticising. America is good, Iran is evil, the violence America inflicts on Iran is justified and the violence Iran inflicts on America is unjustified. Nevermind that both these states include many people who have pretty much nothing to do with the regime in question, and the regime falling apart often means power vacuums, significant instability in the region, massive civil war and other super moral outcomes. It's like collateral doesn't exist to you: the Iranian regime is Evil and therefore Evil must be destroyed. Nevermind that the Iranian regime might be the best of the options currently available to the Iranians, nevermind that American-style Democracy, Whiskey and Sexy is probably not feasible in much of the Middle East as it stands.
You are raining hellfire down on a people, causing instability and destruction in a region which isn't even in your immediate geopolitical sphere that frankly you shouldn't even be involved in, and claiming it is perfectly moral, that as the "good guys" you are entitled to use violence against your enemies. There isn't even a figleaf of pretence that you're "bringing stability to the region" (it may well destabilise it further and is already doing so); you're basking and preening and cheering on the destruction of a country.
I make no apologies for actually believing in good and evil and using my sense of them to advance my arguments. I think anyone not doing this, out of a misguided sense of sophistication, is kidding themselves.
No, I'm not a moral relativist; I do believe in good and evil. I wouldn't be able to believe that this war and its supporters are evil otherwise.
No my argument has been and remains that America won the war already in every meaningful sense. We destroyed Iran's military-industrial complex, we destroyed their nuclear program, we alienated them from their neighbors and potential allies, we won.
And the fact that this is your goal says everything anyone needs to know about your "theory" of military victory. Not only that, I think you're underestimating costs for the US and just how much Iran is holding on, and your argument ignores significant uncertainties around much of the data. That being said your interceptors have been burned through hugely whereas Iranian missile stockpiles as of May were estimated to be approximately still 70% of their prewar total, and they have regained access to 90% of their underground missile storage and launch facilities. Granted it is possible these are conservative overestimates, but I would not be so quick to declare Iran dead in the water yet; the idea that Iran is obviously out of options and hanging on by a thread is wishful thinking and they may well have a good amount of freedom of action left if they want to keep causing pain.
Now it's clear that a lot of traffic can still transit the strait, because the American military is that much more powerful than the Iranian military, and I'm starting to hear that maybe the Americans started winning recently, who can really say?
X to doubt. The strait is currently incredibly operationally disrupted and the idea that it's "clear" that "a lot" of traffic is transiting is capeshit Amerikaposting of the highest order. Only six ships went through the strait on Sunday, and I don't know about you but that doesn't sound anywhere close to a lot to me. There are multiple estimates of this, and all show significantly and catastrophically reduced shipping through the strait; as long as that is the case the supply shocks will continue. I frankly do not know where you are getting your information diet from, but you're very clearly ignoring any data that contradicts your extremely jingoistic cries of victory.
America is justified to fight Iran and America is winning against Iran.
I'm sure the more you say this, the more true it will become.
I just don't take it seriously when someone does, er, literally exactly what you're accusing Shakes of doing - shameless, jingoistic boosterism that doesn't even try to make a serious analysis of their situation.
In that case, kindly point to a comment that Dase has made regarding his China-boosterism that doesn't include any "serious analysis of their situation", and is situated in the context of a thread where he hasn't made any serious analysis. That would help prove your charge against him. I follow the guy, and while he can be needlessly inflammatory I have to say his comments are routinely more well-informed than the America First crowd here. And on Xitter there are a good number of tweets where he criticises China (I think he has requested that his account not be shared here though), so I don't think your model of him as a jingoistic unconditional booster is accurate.
This is far more true of Shakes regarding America, who talks about the war in cartoon-villain ways like "Now I advance the argument that Bestern Civilization is better than the Third world, and better than Iran, so I support our moral claims against theirs etc. etc. etc. etc." and "It's good to destroy evil and it's evil to destroy good" which just translates to an unconditional support of America against its enemies regardless of what they do and how many second- or third-order effects it may have. In spite of how inflammatory Dase can be I don't think he has said anything to the effect of "China blowing up its evil, disgusting enemies is Good Actually and I support it unconditionally". It is low-quality tribalism par excellence, it is disturbing, and it is the farthest thing from "self-aware and humble" I can think of.
Also where did you get the idea that Dase was living in China? Since many of your comments appear to imply he currently does, I'd like to see where that was indicated. I am genuinely curious FWIW.
It sounds like you're trying to manifest a conclusion via sheer memery, rather than making any effort to understand - particularly when even the most jingoistic Americans (Shakes) are making meaningful admissions.
Okay, what "meaningful admissions" is Shakes making? He's doing exactly what you're accusing the "America lost" crowd of doing - claiming "America won" when what he actually means is "America caused damage to Iran without achieving many of their larger strategic goals in the timeframe they expected, has likely burned through a significant portion of their interceptors, and is now trying to find a way out of a costly war it can't back out from without losing face and ceding ground it's not willing to cede". The idea that this constitutes "winning" is quite ridiculous; they might win yet (and they may not), but Shakes keeps proclaiming victory every time there is any shadow of an agreement and when these agreements fall apart he predicts victory any time soon. It's tiresome and it's like gleefully proclaiming that Libya was a victory in any meaningful sense because the US fucked them up so bad. It is not a reasonable metric through which to measure foreign policy, and if wanton destruction is the sole endgoal of all your engagements you should expect pushback from those who don't revel in turning countries into Somalia.
There's a reason I assume he's trying to ingratiate himself with his new overlords. Legit sounds like a classier translation of racist xanxia slop.
Given the kind of patriotic preening Shakes routinely engages in, his unconditional and triumphant support for yet another war of aggression in the Middle East, his constant tendency to claim US victory under virtually any circumstances including the now-defunct MoU (his theory of victory seems to reduce to "We fucked them up! We fucked them up so bad"), and considering the brainrotted knee-jerk condemnation of everything China that you and many other posters routinely engage in, I'm most certainly not convinced that Dase is anywhere near as shameless as half of the posters here.
It's almost as if US hawks have no barometer for how insane they look to the rest of the world, and consider any China-bullishness as "ingratiation" because nobody could possibly ever like that country for any reason at all.
There are currently extant Chinese salvationist religions, they're not extinct and are quite alive and well. Falun Gong is a prominent example of a currently-extant salvationist religion, and it's only one among a crop that emerged throughout the Sinosphere in the 20th century; Weixinism, Tiandiism, Shanrendao and so on. There's also those which trace their roots all the way back to the Ming and Qing dynasties, such as the Luoist religious sects, Jiugongdao, the Eight Trigram teachings and Sanyi teachings. They tend to be syncretic and have some focus on personal and social redemption. It's difficult to really "give thoughts" on these religions given the broad nature of the category, the term encapsulates quite literally hundreds of different unaffiliated religious strands.
In general Chinese religions are very heterogenous, non-exclusivist and difficult to pin down, and once you look beyond the oversimplified Buddhism-Confucianism-Taoism trifecta there are a million unique local sects with different sets of beliefs, gods and practices which aren't really amenable to broad analysis (the level of heterogeneity is to such a degree that there are literally extant practicing Manichaeans in the hills of Fujian). Throughout ancient and modern Chinese history alike the state tended to police these societies due to the risk of a Taiping situation if left unchecked, but the creation of local religious movements still goes on nevertheless.
To be quite honest this is maximally uncharitable salacious conjecture about the motives of a dead man who can't defend himself. I was never some great fan of Anthony Bourdain, but to trash his suicide as a "narcissistic act" done out of spite in a thread where he is already being dogpiled is impressively distasteful.
Sweet matcha drinks heavily mixed in with milk/coconut milk can be pretty good in my opinion, since the grassy taste is softened out significantly by the other components. But matcha proper, drunk the Authentic Japanese™ way, certainly tastes like liquid grass and is absolutely revolting. I like my tea steeped in the Chinese manner.
In any case I think the better green East Asian flavour is pandan. It's like Southeast Asian vanilla, but with a fresher, nuttier flavour.
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