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How Undertale Makes Reference to 8 Iconic Games

By Andrew on March 16, 2016 in Gaming

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Undertale is certainly a labor of love from Toby Fox. Besides the awesome soundtrack, the game is chock-full of influences and references to many other iconic video games. Some are quite easy to spot, and some require a little digging to uncover. But to help you enjoy and appreciate Undertale‘s experience even more, here’s a breakdown of some of the coolest ones that I’ve discovered.

Warning: massive spoilers below.

Breath of Fire

Aaron, the muscle-bound flex-aholic horse monster, quotes Dir.HR from Breath of Fire II during battle.

BoFII image credit: this tweet by Toby Fox

Chrono Trigger

Undyne’s fight has a similar vibe to the fight with Magus, including save point text about the wind howling (Magus says this as his child self, Janus, when you meet him in Zeal).

The CORE is likely inspired by the Ocean Palace, both visually and how the background music plays uninterrupted through battles.

EarthBound

To anyone who’s played both Undertale and EarthBound, it should be obvious that Toby Fox was heavily influenced by the latter game, even directly stating this in an interview. I’m sure there are many small references that I missed, but here are some of the more easy-to-recognize ones.

When you first meet him in Snowdin, Monster Kid innocently points out that you must also be a kid because you’re wearing a striped shirt. This assumption that anyone wearing a striped shirt is also a child is a clear nod to the heroes of the Mother series. The shirt designs are also quite similar across the games, as seen below.

Continuing the fashion references, there is a small symbol on Papyrus’ shirt that is pretty much identical to the Starman symbol.

Image credit: Reddit user pobels

And here’s a list of some other non-visual cues from EarthBound:

The track that plays, with matching text, after you’ve killed all monsters in an area is called But Nobody Came. This is the same message you see in EarthBound when enemies fail to call for backup.
The River Person will sometimes say: “Tra la la. Remember to take a break every-so-often…”, which is like how Ness’ father will tell you to take a break when you call him.
In both games, you can find a burger in a trash can (and still eat it).
Calling for help during the fight with Omega Flowey is a lot like when Paula uses her Pray ability to reach out for help in the final fight against Gigyas.
Both games have an epilogue where you can walk around previous areas and talk to everyone after you save the world.

Final Fantasy

Mettaton’s grand musical number greatly resembles the famous opera scene from Final Fantasy VI.

When fighting Undyne, she can say a quote that’s nearly word-for-word what Garland says in the first Final Fantasy.

Final Fantasy image credit: Final Fantasy Wiki Italia

The Legend of Zelda

Muffet’s spider croissant is suspiciously similar to the Power Bracelet design.

Image credit: Reddit user show_me_yo_moves

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

There’s a possible influence from Ace Attorney during Papyrus’ “date”. The music has a vibe like the Turnabout Sisters’ Theme, and you can inspect him in a similar method to conducting investigations.

Shin Megami Tensei

One of Undertale‘s key gameplay pillars revolves around befriending monsters instead of just killing them mercilessly. Toby Fox has even said that he was always interested in how the Shin Megami Tensei series lets you talk with monsters to avoid conflict, and thus we have the Pacifist route.

Image credit: Youtuber TheShadowofX

Touhou Project

The bullet hell battle system is definitely inspired by games like the Touhou Project. But besides the gameplay influences, the music is also paid homage to, as heard in the climactic battle against Omega Flowey at the end of the Neutral route.

I’m sure that there are many more references that I’ve missed — Undertale is just a wealth of nods to gaming history, especially JRPGs. So if you’ve got a neat gaming-related reference or Easter egg not mentioned here, let me know in the comments below.

Helpful sources:
The Undertale Wikia
Frisk’s sprites and Ness’ sprites
Possible References and Inspirations in Undertale
Chrono Trigger screenshots from Youtuber StoneMonkWisdom

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Anonymous

kinda suprised touhou wasnt mentioned more with asriel having star and laser based attacks like marisa and his name being an anagram for sariel, the final boss of the first touhou game.

Guest

Anonymous

I believe Toby has mentioned before another big inspiration for the game was Mortis Ghost’s OFF (Papyrus’s character design, the concept of the genocide run, the idea that the character and the player are not entirely the same person, etc…)

Guest

Anonymous

Undertale is for men

Guest

Anonymous

Only for me the piano where you have to play the theme of the game is a Final Fantasy VII reference?

Guest

ourNightlyIdiot

If you’re on a genocide/neutral route (as long as you kill Snowdrake), when you talk to Snowdrake’s father in MTT Resort, he will talk about how he wants to reconnect with his son, and he references Heavy Rain by saying:
Have you seen him?
Have you seen my son?

Mettaton references the hardcover version of the game for the PS4 during the bomb-defusing part on the PS4 version. Instead of the book, it has a hard copy of the Undertale Collector’s Edition for the PS4.

Guest

Anonymous

Undertale also references Kefka’s Vwee hee hee several times in the game and genocide Chara is the closest villian to Kefka I have ever seen.

Guest

Nerd

What about the fact that the 7 human souls are a possible reference to the 7 chaos emeralds from Sonic the Hedgehog?

Guest

ClarksVertiginous

I think I’mscared is a large influence, like how Undertale messes with your perception of what a computer game should act (forced closure of window, gameplay changing when reopening window, etc.) Also, the I’mscared sprite is very similar to Clara’s jumpscare face.

Guest

Anonymous

*Spoilers* *Speculation* *From a TRUE fan”

True Lab is a reference to the old Atari game “Adventure” where you spend time in a castle hunting for colored keys to help get through mazes. It’s been years since I played the game, but the second I started the True Lab part of Undertale, it reminded me the gameplay a lot. Another reason I think it’s a reference is because Toby really likes to use minimalistic art while still creating the feeling of immersion in the player, and this rpg was one of the first games to use bare bones art with the intention of being immersive.

The golden sunflowers are a reference to Mother 3. Lucas’ mother dies in the first arc, and sunflowers were her favorite flowers. Using sunflowers to represent a mother’s love is a recurring theme in the game.

Guest

goharik

from just the beginning, u’ve fall on the golden flowers. it’s fine, but if u keep going to the escape from ruines, fight with Toriel and MERCY her (u need to do it about 20 times in the fight), and after that GO BACK to the beggining, Toriel will stand near those flowers and says “Dont worry about me. Someone need to worry about this flowers”. And this whole thing – reference to the “Final Fantasy: Crisis Core” from PSP)

Author

Andrew

I can certainly see the parallels there, good attention to detail!

Guest

Pedro

On Chrono Trigger references, you forgot the ring of the bells right before you talk with Sans when you are going to face asgore.

Author

Andrew

Hmm I missed that one, good catch though. I’ll have to dig up some videos to check it out.

Guest

dave123

What about kill or be killed Reference from metal gear rising!

Guest

StarDragonJP

You forgot the about the obvious Delta Rune = Triforce connection. Some of the music is made using soundfonts from other games & some of the sound effects are from games as well

Author

Andrew

Oh yes, there are definitely a ton of references that I didn’t cover here. It’s not meant to be a 100% complete compendium but just some of the ones that I noticed and enjoyed (and the music/sound, wow that topic can stand alone as an entire article or two…or three).

But you’re right, the very obvious Delta rune = Zelda series’ royal crest/Triforce should have been added :)

Guest

Anonymous

Hyper Goner is probably a reference Kefka’s Goner. It even comes with a close-up on just the face and a cackle beforehand.

Author

Andrew

I looked around for more info on this and you may be right! The two attacks are pretty similar in some ways. I didn’t research as much into animations and battle moves, but with enough material I’d consider compiling another article about that stuff. Thanks for the heads up!

How Undertale Makes Reference to 8 Iconic Games

Breath of Fire

BoFII image credit: this tweet by Toby Fox

Chrono Trigger