In Deltarune, players step into the shoes of Kris, a teenager residing in a charming town filled with amiable creatures and monsters. Kris is partnered with Susie, a tough and intimidating classmate, for a school project, and together they find themselves in the Dark World—a mystical place residing in the school’s closet. Here, they join forces with the Dark World’s prince, adopt heroic roles, and set out to eliminate the Dark Fountains threatening the world. Their quest also blossoms into a journey of friendship.

The currently available four chapters of Deltarune typically revolve around different sections of the Dark World, each with its own antagonist. This episodic, “monster-of-the-week” storytelling works perfectly for the game’s format. By focusing on distinct adventures set in varied thematic environments, each installment presents a fulfilling narrative, balancing succinct chapter story arcs with overarching plot elements that unfold into significant moments as the game progresses.

Like with Undertale, Deltarune’s battles give you the choice to fight enemies or to “act” to try and “spare” them instead. The game strongly encourages taking the peaceful route by making unique act moves for every single enemy — and they’re often quite silly, like playing a short minigame to try and capture a “maus” (mouse) enemy in a cyber-themed world.

Also like Undertale, when enemies attack in Deltarune, your goal is to try to dodge their projectiles by moving around a tiny heart on the battlefield. Each enemy has different attack patterns that can also be pretty wacky: the “maus” enemy can attack with mice (the animals) or a roving computer mouse pointer, for example.

Those kinds of gags are everywhere in Deltarune, and they made each conversation and battle feel worthwhile over the course of my nearly 15-hour playthrough of the chapters that are out now. There are many characters to talk to and different potential enemies to fight, but seeking out every one is rarely a waste of time because of the volume of puns, jokes, and goofy gimmicks. (For much of chapter 3, you interact with a walking television that is a game show host.)

Fans of Undertale will recognize a lot of familiar characters in Deltarune, like Sans the skeleton, the goat-like Toriel, and Alphys the lizard-like teacher. But you don’t need to have played Undertale to appreciate the story in Deltarune. And by chapter 4, the story threads started to tie together in ways that had me unexpectedly glued to my screen. (I haven’t even seen the game’s secret bosses or alternate story route.)

It will be a long time until we know if Deltarune will stick the landing. Chapter 5 is supposed to come out in 2026, and if we assume that one new installment comes out per year, that means the seventh and final one won’t be released until 2028. That’s 10 years after the launch of the first episode. Fingers crossed this isn’t a Winds of Winter situation, but even if it is, Deltarune’s first four chapters stand up on their own.

^{Deltarune’s first four chapters are now available as a paid purchase on Nintendo Switch, PlayStation, and PC. New chapters will be added for free later on.}