Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-31619784-20170328162322/@comment-27701762-20170402091846

Anonymous User 03 wrote: Mabian wrote: Anonymous User 03 wrote: These comments are getting so long, it's almost funny.

I guess I'll just have to accept that I won't get my nice, "logical" explanation for why the events transpire the way they do. I still don't like the Genocide ending to be honest. I stand by my statement that it feels like something that was just added in to make for a shocking ending that doesn't make too much sense, but that's a seperate matter entirely.

You argued your points well, I must give that to you! Do you usually engage in these sorts of disscussions? I'd disagree rather strongly that the Genocide ending was added in for shock value, or that it doesn't (properly speaking) "make sense." There will be some issues with minor details here and there, such as what you are pointing to, but there is plenty of evidence that Toby put a lot of thought into the major story elements. But I won't go any further into that unless you want to, since it is tangential to the topic at hand. Sorry, I kind of forgot this thread existed. :P

I agree that it's evident Toby Fox put  lot of thought in to most plot points. However, if it's impossible to get an in-universe justification for why or how something happens (our attempts at doing so have been pretty futile), then I think that's enough to say that it was "forced".

I disagree that this is, as you put it, a "minor detail". The explanation for why the ending happens is very important, and the fact that's it doesn't fit with the rest of what we're told is a good reason to dislike it. You don't need to apologize. It's not like I'm forced to wait until you post new comments.

I'm willing to accept the characterization of "forced." At some point, though, every fictional account of events is going to be forced, particularly if that account involves magic or something similar. So what matters is what exactly is being forced in each situation.

In this case, we should step back and think about what we know: Frisk/the player kills a bunch of monsters, that killing in turn awakens Chara to their "purpose," Chara then destroys the world/universe. Narratively, the only issue is the first problem you pointed to, which was how Chara could blame the player yet also say "since when were you in control." But this issue does have some in-universe explanations, as I've mentioned above. Even if the explanation is a cop-out ("Chara didn't really mean that the player had no control whatsoever"), it is still sufficient for the purpose of not making the narrative "forced."

What is being "forced" is the notion that Chara had the power to destroy the world/universe. But at this point, the question is not why Chara destroyed the universe, but how. But even then we have a vague notion of how: something about determination, LV, or something along those lines gave Chara the power to do so. The issue is the exact mechanism. But at that point, it is a minor detail. As I mentioned, during the entire course of the Genocide Route we've been receiving clues about the growing power of the human. Chara's immense power is surprising, but not a complete 180 from what we've been experiencing. That, of course, does not mean there is not still an element of being "forced." At this point there aren't going to be any satisfactory explanations for exactly how this works. But those exact mechanics aren't necessary for the narrative integrity of the ending itself. There could be any number of explanations, ones that are consistent with the way the universe works without being explicitly stated or even hinted, or there could be an in-universe explanation that we are missing, but that explanation does not impact the basic fact that Chara has the power to destroy the world and does. Hence, minor detail.