I don't think you guys understand how important Ralsei's arc is to me. It's about agency!!! It's about deviancy!!! It's about how sometimes you have to let go!!! It's about how repression is killing you!!! It's about self-discovery!!! It's about goddamn identity and hope and action and freedom!!!!!!!!!!! It ties to the themes of Deltarune so well, and it's such a beautiful character arc and "I have to try" is such an important step for Ralsei!!!!
Ralsei matters!!! Ralsei matters so fucking much for this story!!!!!!!!!
Other people about the G-man: I wonder if Gaster is going to appear in ch6
Me:Hmm Noelle Gaster works a lot with Noelle being the most important character but Dess left early in the story which makes the timeline fit a bit better with Dess Gaster though that is probably the least important aspect of Gaster due to all of the scattered across time stuff.
(Over)analysing the 'December' Spelling Puzzle Scene
I've been thinking about the scene where Kris and Noelle spell out the word 'December' together over the last couple of days, and I wanted to write a little bit of an analysis on it.
This is a scene that feels very weighty since it's unskippable in the Normal Route. The lack of music encourages a strong focus on the dialogue and the spelling puzzle, and it's the capstone of the Kris and Noelle segment of Cyber City. That, and it also contains the first mandatory mentions of Dess in the game.
Here are some ideas that I have about it!
Breaking down barriers
First of all, this puzzle requires two people to press buttons on either side of a barrier that physically separates them.
The same thing hangs over Kris' head and acts as the foundation for Noelle's path: December. The imagery could not be much clearer - Dess is the thing keeping Kris and Noelle apart, in spite of their prior close friendship. Whether this refers to the disappearance incident alone, or even extends to Dess' habit of smacking and punishing Kris whenever they teased Noelle (seemingly a way that they show affection), something to do with Dess is stopping these two from being closer than they might otherwise be.
The traffic cones that separate Kris and Noelle are only visible when not obscured by the dark buildings in the foreground. These buildings create an effect where light and dark are constantly alternating. In the light, there's a wall between them. In the dark, that wall doesn't exist.
I'm with you in the dark.
So perhaps the Dark Worlds represent an opportunity for Kris and Noelle to close that gap and rekindle their old friendship. This is supported by the fact that during the short period of time that Kris and Noelle are alone together in Cyber City, the two of them start falling back into the habit of teasing each other, Noelle overcomes her fear of mice, and her Boldness stat slowly increases from -12 to 60. If you make Kris tell the Addison that they and Noelle are friends, Noelle is happy to hear them say that. These positive developments are seemingly reset when Noelle is told that she's just dreaming, but what might she think when she finds out it was real after all?
If Noelle is 'that girl' who played with the same Darkners as Kris when they were children, then you could think of the Dark Worlds as a universe originally created by the two of them. These Dark Worlds are places where both of their pasts and traumas can be explored and eventually overcome. The proof is in the puzzle. Noelle spells out the word 'DECEMBER' in a repeat of the spelling bee scenario that we later hear about from Berdly. She might not realise it, but she just safely confronted a small trauma of hers, with Kris by her side.
At the end of the puzzle, Noelle leaps back over the barrier to rejoin Kris, and she reflects on how well Kris knows her.
If the memory of Dess is the thing keeping them apart, then this further implies that once the puzzle of Dess is solved (by finding out what happened to her or whatever else), Kris and Noelle might be able to have a closer relationship once more.
Verticality and Kris' avoidance
There are a couple of vertical sections in the puzzle where Noelle is entirely in the dark, and Kris is entirely in the light.
There's no real reason that there needed to be vertical sections here unless there's some kind of symbolism at play. There are probably a few ways you could interpret it, but my current idea is that this might represent what each of them know or remember about Dess' disappearance. Kris seems to know something, since they are implied to be burdened with guilt over a past incident. But Noelle is 'in the dark' about it, either because she doesn't know or doesn't remember what happened.
There's also a moment where Noelle's sprite reverts to her childhood self while Kris' does not:
This may symbolise the fact that Kris seems to be trying to avoid engaging with their childhood memories, particularly those that involve Noelle.
Colour theory
With the new pairing of Blue and Yellow emerging in Chapter 5, you may have seen some chatter about how Toby likes blue and yellow couples. Alphys and Undyne, Lanino and Elnina, Blue and Yellow, and...?
Well.
Accept no substitutes!
This entire scene is bathed in blue and yellow, down to Kris and Noelle's silhouettes. In fact, everything is so blue and yellow that the pink traffic cones really stand out as being out of place.
So, crazy question: what if Dess were pink? No, not that Pink...
Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh I don't think I want to think too much harder about this comparison right now lmao
Okay but seriously, why else might Dess be associated with pink? Well, pink and yellow is a colour combination that we know well from IMAGE_FRIEND and FRIEND-associated items. There have been some theories arguing that these are Suselle colours, but now that I think about it, Susie is consistently described as 'purple' in both the Light and Dark Worlds, never 'pink'. But if pink and yellow referred to the two Holiday sisters, maybe that could make some sense?
There are also the Flying Aces from Mancountry which are always randomised to be blue and yellow, except for one that's hardcoded to be pink.
...Who knows if this is anything. I'm not married to this idea, haha.
"Someplace new"
After gaining confidence from the puzzles that she and Kris have solved so far, Noelle is the one to take the initiative to jump over the traffic cones and start solving the 'December' puzzle. This may actually be a small hint at Noelle’s ability to boundary break, i.e. reach areas of the map that we and Kris cannot.
So I thought it might be a good idea to look at the rest of her dialogue with her characterisation from Chapter 5’s Weird Route in mind.
Noelle’s desire to “go someplace new” seems to be analogous to her wish to “go somewhere nobody’s ever been before” in the Weird Route. Now, this desire might be more extreme in the Weird Route, but it’s something that she’s been experiencing for a long time. At least, since Dess ‘left’. But in fact:
Dess telling Noelle that she’d take her somewhere new is interesting. It suggests that both of them had a desire to explore the unknown, in a certain sense. If two characters are described as either 'leaving' or wanting to 'leave', might that suggest that Dess' disappearance could have been a similar situation to what we see in the Weird Route - perhaps a suicide or even a boundary break (whether purposeful or not)?
Both Susie and Dess are rebellious girls who are a bit pushy with Kris. Of course Susie later regrets bullying Kris but Noelle never knows that just that Susie and Kris are friends. Maybe Dess having a color slightly off Susie’s purple could mean something if this analysis is true.
I've been thinking about Noelle's design more because I feel like it's rather unharmonious with the other characters in specific locations, and I find that rather interesting.
When you look at the fun gang, they all look like a unified group because they have major noticable pink elements in their design, and overall are a mix of a dark colour and their main colour.
If you put Noelle in the Group, she would stand out rather obviously.
Her outfit is really plain, doesn't have layering or other details, and her robe only has one colour which is completely white in contrast to the fun gang's darkness.
However paired up with each member of the gang individually as a duo, their design start to feel more connected.
With Kris and Noelle, their colours appear more complementary, and their overall Knight theme matches Noelle's "cleric" theme, since they're both more or less typical RPG classes.
And this is interesting because Susie's and Noelle's colours seem analogous and look quite well together,
But in the lightworld the only real connection between the two is that Susie is purple and Noelle's hair is yellow.
The main Lightners, meaning Berdly, Susie, and Kris, all have rather cool colouring with yellow accents here and there.
Noelle's Yellow, Green, Brown, and Red colourscheme mixes well with kris's as there are many connections, and Noelle's reds provide a complementary colour, and even Berdly and Noelle are a better look together, because Berdly's Coolness balances out Noelle's warmth.
With Susie and Noelle The green and Red doesn't really mix well with Susie's purples.
There isn't that much of a connection between the two, since complementary and contrast wise the Christmas colours are more eye-catching than Noelle's Yellow hair, and the yellow also reads as a rather natural hair colour overall, so it's easier to overlook as a character's main colour, and the green and red mix doesn't leave that much room to be combined with Susie's purples and blues in a harmonious way, since they already provide a complementary colour, and thus a sound colourscheme for each other.
For Susie's colourscheme to work better in companionship with Noelle's she'd either have to do what Kris is doing, and match Noelle's, or contrast her warmness with coolness like Berdly.
However Susie's purples are also rather warm, and the blues are there to balance the purples out a little, so the connection fails there and as already established, Noelle's green and red already have each other, so they don't need to, or can't connect with the purple that much anymore.
Why do I find that so interesting, because Noelle and Susie have done much less bonding in the darkworld, where their colours themes work the best together, while in the lightworld, where they actually connected, their colours themes are the least harmonious out of the light world gang.
I can't really crystalize any specific meaning out of this, I just think it's interesting to think about, and overall, if anyone was to change their colours heme in the lightworld it would be Noelle, as the Christmas theme is a family thing first, and a Noelle thing second.
And then in the Darkworld, I just find it interesting because this kinda shows that Noelle wasn't really designed to be a main party member, even if she's supposed to be a main character, and I think that gives us a bit room to speculate how her integration into the fun gang could go.
Something that really pisses me off about some DR fans is how quick they are to minimize Kris' jealousy, in the sense that, if you even suggest that they might be envious of Susie and Noelle's new relationship, you've got people telling you that either you're making shit up or that it's not that big of a deal or that they'll grow out of it. You guys know that jealousy is a normal thing, right? Especially in lonely, mentally ill insecure teenagers, with a fragile, almost nonexistent, support system, right? Yeah, maybe it's not the best feeling in the world, maybe it's ugly and maybe it hurts them and their relationships with other characters, but it deserves to exist and pretending that it doesn't or that it is this Big Bad Feeling That Turns You Into The Devil therefore you should #RepressIt is just going to make things worse. It's like people are so keen on the idea that saying that Kris is jealous is villainizing them that they end up refusing to engage with this side of Kris that is incredible important to understand a lot of Chapter 5.
Kris is allowed to experience jealousy. Jealousy is a valid feeling. We all experience jealousy. Let Kris feel their feelings. Are you listening to me? They barely get to do that. Please just let them have this oh my stars.
I promise people talking about Kris being jealous does not mean they think they are a bad person or a bad friend or that they are against Suselle. You know that, right? I need you to know that.
I feel a lot of Suselle shippers operate on a framework that if anything that slightly goes against there ship is automatically non canon or misinterpretation since the ship is canon. Clearly Kris does want Noelle and Susie to be happy in their new relationship that does not mean they are a hardcore Suselle shipper who cannot feel any complicated feelings towards the ship or any complicated feelings to Susie or Noelle or feel jealously they are just a supportive friend who feels either left behind or feel that they are losing a chance for romance.
the fact that (You and Noelle...) (The book went shut.) happens on the normal route where kris knows they'll be chaperoning noelle and susie's date...... my god you are So jealous and seething of your longtime childhood crush finding love in someone who isn't You. teehee
I’m so unnormal about these pieces of dialogue. Does literally anyone have an interpretation of this that isn’t just canon kriselle? Kris can look at the person who’s death/missing person’s case they may have caused, their brother who outshines them at every turn, their divorced parents, their dying family friend, and the woman who is possibly blackmailing them just fine. But they draw the line at Noelle?
