>>528332016
i've been thinking about this and honestly, as hard as it is to admit as gote senpai's strongest soldier, it really sadly is true. It's very obvious Toriel was one of the very first characters toby/temmie created together for use in the game that ended up becoming Undertale, and to see all new, 2025 Ralsei sprites for brand new content stuck with the quality that was just barely passable even by Toby's "shitty on purpose to be charming and/or surprise them when the game gets way cooler" standards in literally 2014. Over a decade ago through which Toby and his relationships with his artists and ability to convey wants and needs to them have ostensibly vastly, vastly improved.

The new sprites are definitely great, with the ever-increasing amount and intensity of emotions portrayed, but to have it 'nerfed' hardstuck to this ancient face sprite base is kind of sad; the "what ifs" in regards to Deltarune and the trillions of little tiny ways it could have been even better than it is are frustrating for sure. But even then, the dude is still very young (especially compared to the oldschool game devs he keeps rubbing elbows with) and has so many decades' worth of improvement to go, and none of this weird "nostalgia schmaltz" or "shitty on purpose for reasons" should carry over into future projects. And hopefully some of them will end up being good enough, even to Toby himself that he won't forever consider Deltarune his magnum opus, no matter how good it is.

Also the absolutely endless fucking deluge of fan content this community puts out helps dull the pain of ugly default gote faces for sure. Tried to find a good picrel but this one's funny and topical