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Translation: The text and implementation are done, working on fixing some last issues. Testing: Still ongoing. One tester said "players will find it very inconvenient that you cannot save or load in the Light World"... I was initially resistant, but I decided to add Save Points there in Chapter 4.

It could be like when we skip to the Dark World by going to bed in chapter 1 and 2. We would "save" in the Light World, but getting to the save point would be like a skip from our last save in Castle Town

i feel like an easy way to do this without sacrificing the light world's role is having it be via kris's bed, like how skipping to the dark world is. like having it just say "would you like to rest for a bit?" or something which then lets you save, rather than a regular save point like in the DW

hi toby, you probably won't see this but I also think it would be a cool addition if you could access the settings in the light world so you can stuff like auto run on/off.

Ch4 PC Testing / Translation: Winding down. No longer looking for new issues, only fixing and checking remaining ones. Console Testing: Starts tomorrow. The goal is to test Chapter 1,2,3,4 on all platforms (PC,Mac,Switch,PS4,PS5)

Hi, Toby! Sooo I know everyone is freaking out about this post, and tbh I'm not far behind, but I gotta know... What exactly do you do while the playtesting is going on? As a gamedev myself, it's sees like it would be quite boring. Anyways, thanks for any consideration you might give this. :)

PlayStation makes it a requirement to have trophies (achievements), so those will be one of the things that have to be tested. I don't think they're going to like testing the trophies though

I cannot wait for this release because every day I have to feign interest in my son dissecting every post you make about the release date. I love him, I love that he still wants to talk to me about his interests, but I’ve reached the smile and nod stage. This mom is begging you to release it soon.

Hey toby good to hear that things are going well at a steady pace and if you run into future problems with making the game don't worry about getting it done quickly, i mean we waited this long chapter 3 & 4 we can wait a little longer so keep up the good work & i hope you have a good day.

What if Switch 2 has an achievement system called "milestones." It could say "milestone reached." And there could be a 1-up sound, Zelda dungeon jingle, squid noises, and more whenever reach a milestone.

as a person using a computer that got messed up after shipping it multiple times and now sometimes crashes randomly with zero warning, more save points are very much appreciated <3

ok some people have replied with theories so heres mine 1- theres an excuse to go back to the closet dark world/fall asleep so you can do a quick save (probably not happening) 2- "hidden" automatic save points that the game doesnt tell you or acknowledge exist but also idfk how this will work so

I feel like I'll take it upon myself to challenge myself to not use the light world savepoints since you were pretty reluctant to add them. I don't even imagine you'll add that many of them... right?

ok a few things abt this post 1. why is it an image? u couldve just typed this out 2. why does ur device think that all those words are misspelled, theyre not 😭 3. this is a cool thought. something like this happened in paper trail

awful of you to fold on this but also understandable though I feel like whoever is commited enough to have waited for the chapter so long can also deal with this

"awful of you to fold" that's what testing is *for*, too. a lot of things you are adamant on will have unintended effects on how folk play your game, and you have to strike a balance between alleviating them and your original idea so it goes! there's no shame or weight in it

if you mean "will chapters 1 and 2 still be free," the ch 1 & 2 demo is generally separate from the full version on every marketplace i assume that will stay the same after the ch 3 & 4 release, but the full version is still an undetermined price (confirmed to be paid though)

I can imagine the save point already: "A light shines from a pocket of dark. You ponder the lore significance, but are overwhelmed by a feeling of convenience. The power of lore inaccurate convenience shines within you"

I'm not sure how you could handle this, maybe something like, "If you need to SAVE for whatever reason, the door to Castle Town is always open." Unless you're locked into a specific section in the Light World for a significant period of time, in which case... I don't know. Your solution will work.

I think this is fair. Although I don't know how Chapter 4 situation would have been regarding not having those save points, I personally would have not minded having less save points, since that's your vision to the game, Mr Fox. Do what you feel comfortable with in creating this fun world.

I appreciate you admitting to you being reluctant to add light world save points in order to not create contradictions in the worldbuilding. Hopefully the fact that you _made_ a post about this is enough for most people to treat their existence as nothing more than convenience

He won't. You can already save in the light world in one place via debug mode: Kris' room (in fact, that's how complete chapter saves are labeled). And the menu one to one with undertale's. I doubt Toby would let us savescum just like that, it's very out of his style.

knowing what we know so far and seeing the existing trend, it makes sense that you would be resistant on that point, but it definitely makes sense to have it and if there's gonna be an emphasis on light world stuff this time then yeah that'd definitely be nice to have lol

Way more interesting than the implications of narrative balance is that you decided to say this out loud. Not sure if you're being devious or just want to be more transparent but not sure what else to talk about, lmao Looking forward to it either way. Good job on getting through it!

You could make it an option to "warp" between the place you are and the Dark World save point and back, while implying it's just Kris running to the closet. If the problem is because of the school being closed, you could just have the character in charge of closing the door forget about it.

Light World sequences did feel like they were meant to be prologues and epilogues to each chapter, but there's still, like, an hour's worth of checking on NPCs in those epilogues, so yeah, it's probably good to have a save point somewhere. maybe at that room with the sealed door and no music?

I first noticed that in the First Chapter after beating the boss and returning the Light World, I was looking around for a save star in case I wanted to explore the town for later, but ended up exploring the entire town anyways as a result and decided to head back home afterwards.

此帖中文翻译: 翻译上:文本和实现已完成,致力于解决一些最后的问题 测试上:测试仍在进行。一位测试员说:“玩家会发现您无法在光明世界中保存或加载非常不便”……我开始时修复过,但我决定在第4章中添加存档点

I think that's probably a smart idea. A fun way to do it is probably in a similar way to Omori where it's just a generic item rather than a special object Also does this mean Chapter 4 is a Light World chapter? Very confusing messages

As long as you're adding Light World save points in Chapter 4, consider adding one at the end of Chapter 1. If you read all the dialogue, there's about an hour and a half of gameplay with no saves between the start of the King fight and end of Chapter.

Im assuming the lightworld is still gonna be all dialogue? Cuz if so that makes sense. If not thats kinda dissapointing, i like the idea of resource managing over long gaps between save points in dungeons.

I think events you started are going to take Place. Like Mettaton Hangout It could be something with Susie and Noelle. It could be with onion san It could be with Papyrus It could be with Undyne and alphys There are a lot of events that could take Place in ch4 LW that maybe take a lot of time

it could just be spending a lot of time there. having to backtrack all the way to the school to save is already kinda annoying if you want to take a break during the light world segment of ch2.

I highly doubt it would be non canon. Since the story includes you, the player, and the game's reception in the real world, it is more likely that checkpoints appearing due to feedback is canon. Like how that one twitter comment supposedly seadled berdley's fate........

Just finished Replaying chapter 1 and 2 and literally said to myself "oh damn why did it take me this long to notice there's no checkpoints in the light world" so it will be interesting to see how having none in the next chapters will work out!

coming from the future it does feel a little dissatisfying (especially during moments you can just zip over to dark world), but ultimately I appreciated that they were there I'd probly feel different if I had the game on switch instead of steam, since I could just use sleep mode when I need breaks

I can't wait for people trying to fit light world save points into the lore man. The curse of using game mechanics as plot points is that you can never use them in ways not seen as plot-relevant anymore

One way to go about it was to have a drcorational object that hauses something that looks like a Undertale save be the save or generally to implement an enviormental checkpoint but then you might run into issues of players not knowing they Are there to Save the game

This approach would be fundamentally flawed imo, I assume your intent is to make it seem more discrete, the issue here is that saving and loading is diegetic, and this method would clash with that. It would just cause confusion about what is/isn’t diegetic I feel

I feel like it depends I'm assuming there's some sort of long Lightworld quest where you can't access a darkworld, I think it would be annoying to be unable to save if that's the case

Player convenience should always come before narrative sense. Real life matters happen. Don't forget books let you use a bookmark and videos let you pause. I'm all for using game mechanics to communicate stories, but there's some things one just shouldn't mess with too much.

...yeah, I can get behind that, the town exploration at the end of Chapter 1 already felt limiting in that regard since people either have to have the time in their day to be able to explore everything or just skip it altogether. Game mechanics being attention-needy as always.

If there's a lore reason for not having a Save Point in the Light World then can't the player just go to the Closet Dark World to save...? ... Can't they...? ... Toby... Why is the Closet Dark World inaccessible in Chapter 4...!?

I mean to be fair just because they're save points doesn't mean they have to be "save points"... They could be integrated into the world somewhat like the notebooks in silent hill

People are assuming this means more Light World focus, but even the previous chapters had more than enough content in the "post-story" Light World bits to justify save points. If anything I think the fact that there was hesitation means there's probably not THAT much more Light World stuff.

But, I would like to bring your attention the post does not say "save points in the light world" it says, "save points in chapter 4 light world" Despite 3 and 4 coming out in the same update, only 4 gets them, and 1 and 2 remain saveless - there seems to be a reason for player to need the save in 4

Why were you hesitant to add save points to the LW? What does their existence mean for the metanarrative? It’s so weird that you were hesitant to add them in the first place. If saving and loading exists in the LW canonically why were you hesitant to add save points? This is confusing man.

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I enjoy your work and look forward to future releases. Do your thing, don't worry about rushing, I will be waiting for whatever you have, you do you team toby.

As in, bugtesting because the game is technically feature complete and now ironing out all the unwanted weirdness to make sure the weirdness is playable as intended, so its just a couple months away?!?!?!

no matter how much they cost or when they release i will be playing the new chapters of deltarune IMMEDIATELY and ceaselessly until i have achieved every thing i can and im not kidding at all

The fact that I'm gonna be able to play this game THIS year is insane to me. All these years of waiting is gonna feel so surreal when I finally boot it up on stream lol

I wonder if Toby will be involved again with the music of the next Pokemon game (this time Legends), because that would mean we are gonna be eating insanely good with music from both pokemon AND deltarune the same year 👀

We've been waiting for 7 years already. Toby, if my memory serves me right, you said that Deltarun might come out in 7 years, but only chapters 3 and 4 have come out :)

The bee is trying so hard to push the button, but it is so small, and the button is so big. Please be understanding, the bee is doing its best.