THE DEVICE THEORY
AKA: DELTARUNE and the Fourth Wall [PARTS 1-3]
{ September 2022 - August 2024 } ; { STATUS: COMPLETE }
what is THE DEVICE THEORY?
THE DEVICE THEORY is probably the biggest reason you actually know about me circa 2023. but aside from that, this is a (currently ongoing!) series of videos i've made about known depressed quirky indie RPG, "DeltaRune". AKA Delta Rune. AKA NUTDEALER. AKA YIIK: A Postmoder
in essence, this series of videos serves two very specific purposes: one of them being to compile a lot of information about the more niche aspects of the 2018 and 2021 demos of DELTARUNE, as well as going over the Spamton Sweepstakes, all aforementioned aspects/secrets more specifically being ones that i felt could relate to the game's meta-narrative and broader message. and another one of them being THE DEVICE THEORY itself, which is the theory i've had to try to and justify said information that i've compiled!
okay, but, what IS the theory itself?
THE DEVICE THEORY more or less is my crackpot guess that, thanks to the presence of a character in UNDERTALE/DELTARUNE known almost entirely for his discovery through datamining, file manipulation, and generally getting super off-the-beaten-path/rare secrets, many of the secrets in DELTARUNE further alluding or connecting to this character, between the secret bosses, and potentially the secret egg collectibles, as well as DELTARUNE's effort to make a clear distinction in the UI and presentation between the game's Light and Dark Worlds, as if to emphasize the idea that you are playing a game within a game, and *especially* the way that specific files in the game's data have been made to stand out from the rest thanks to their naming in all caps (DEVICE_FAILURE, PROCESS_LOGO, AUDIO_STORY, etc.), that DELTARUNE as an executable is intended to be completely separate from DELTARUNE as the world that we know it as, and that Gaster is, at least in-universe, the one behind the executable's creation, with the executable being made as a means of us connecting to different instances of DELTARUNE's world, rather than the world itself being entirely contained in the executable.
and, yes, i do think that there is a genuine meta-narrative and message to get out of this that ties well into the game's themes of escapism, nostalgia, curiosity, and the way that we may interact with fiction and fictional characters/worlds, and the benefits and drawbacks that come from doing so.
essentially, thanks to the game's internal structure being set up in such a way that the menus and such are distinctly named internally from pretty much the rest of the game, and the idea that the Dark Worlds are a case of the fictional world making a fictional world within itself, that the game in the future will go further with this concept, and play further with the idea of being several layers deep into fiction; "more fictional than fiction itself", or, if you will, "darker than dark".
tl;dr: the menus are diegetic to the game and play an essential role in the foundation of the game's meta-narrative, and serve to play into the game's themes, even if in incredibly subtle ways, and it matters immensely to what the game will be like later down the line.
...definitely a lot to digest, but that's about as concise and straightforward as i can manage to make it honestly. with that aside though, it's a series i've cared a lot about! THE DEVICE THEORY is something that was on my mind since even before Chapter 2 of DELTARUNE released, and with its release, it only further strengthened my confidence in the game possibly tackling its themes from this angle. and, upon the Spamton Sweepstakes essentially making me snap and decide to finally sit down and actually work on some DELTARUNE videos, i couldn't help but just finally dive deep into it and get this damn theory out of my head already.
and so, i did!
the series did end up turning, unsurprisingly, into a MUCH bigger endeavor than i could've imagined, with an overall script that went a good bit over 100 WHOLE ASS PAGES. i started getting all the resources and the such for it, as well as writing the script for it, in September/October 2022, and began to record the audio for Parts 1 and 2 in March of 2023. it was originally intended to be just one Really big video, but upon seeing that it would turn into an overall 5-6 hour video, i decided to split it up into 3 parts.
as of writing this (August 2024), all 3 parts of the series are now finished and watchable! Part 3 [FINALE] especially took a very very long time to make since it turned out to be 6 AND A HALF FUCKING HOURS LONG, RESULTING IN THE SERIES BEING A WHOLE 10 HOURS IN LENGTH, but it is now in a state where the series can be watched from start to finish! while the first few parts are mostly just analysis and effectively just me making the citations for the theory, PART 3 is where everything comes together and where i explain the theory proper.
this is by far the biggest leap i've really taken with this style of video, and i think it's going to stay that way for a good while. but, with the series overall being met with such high regard and praise, it's a series i think i owe a lot to. DELTARUNE has always meant a lot to me ever since it playing it not too long after SURVEY_PROGRAM's release, and to think i could make something that leaves a noticeable impact on the theorycrafting side of the community, and possibly even just at large, is something i never want to take for granted. i think for that alone, it more than deserves a specific page on this site.
