Undyne Genocide/Pacifist Analysis!

Undyne Genocide/Pacifist Analysis!

SPOILER WARNING: This analysis has spoilers for Undertale's genocide and pacifist routes.

NOTE: This is just my personal analysis and opinion of Undyne's character, and how I feel about her story in the different routes of the game.

Undyne is one of the most interesting Undertale characters imo. Specifically, in how different she behaves and is portrayed in the genocide and pacifist routes. In the pacifist route, the entire Waterfall area builds her up as a highly formidable, tougher-than-nails knight. Which, in a lot of ways, she is! However, her battle is surprisingly short, especially for how much build up the fight had. Unlike all of the other boss fights, a huge part (nearly half) of Undyne’s battle is literally fleeing from her and not actively defending yourself from her attacks. And, not only does her battle end strangely anticlimactically, the short length of the battle means you don’t spend that much time with her unique battle mechanic, which is only used in her fight as far as I’m aware. That’s not to say I didn’t have a lot of fun during her fight! However, I think the lack of actual “battle” in her battle is intentional. During the genocide route, after you’ve killed enough people, you drive Undyne to want to defeat you so badly that she ends up forming her own Determination and becoming Undyne the Undying. No other monster in the game does anything similar to this (besides the Amalgams, but they were unnaturally injected with Determination; Undyne formed her own). Undyne forming this Determination, and bringing herself back from death for the pure reason of defeating you and saving all her friends, gives her a hugely tragic and also inspirational final death once you defeat her second form. This is the kind of battle that Undyne deserves to have! However, a battle like that only works in a horrific story like the genocide route. In the pacifist route, Undyne eventually becomes friends with you and realizes that humans are not as bad as she originally thought. There’s no longer a need for her to go all out to kill you. Along with this, in the pacifist route, there’s no need to protect her friends from death. She, Alphys, and all her other friends are able to simply live happily. The Royal Guard isn’t even needed anymore. If you were to want to see Undyne go all out and show her full potential, you could always play through the genocide route and fight her as Undyne the Undying. But is it really worth it? In order to see her full strength, you have to kill so many monsters in order to drive her to become a true heroine. Although her genocide fight is amazing to see as a player, within the context of the story, it’s one of the worst things that can happen to Undyne. And, within the story’s context, it’s a much better ending for her to not have to become Undyne the Undying. Even if that means you don’t see as much of her serious, heroic side.