Weird Route/Chapter 5
Tell me...
Tell me to grow wings...
And let's fly out of this stupid town!
To somewhere no one has ever been before!Noelle, Chapter 5
Chapter 5 features an alternate story route that continues the Weird Route from Chapter 4. Like the Weird Routes in Chapters 2 and 4, this route changes key aspects of the Chapter and revolves around Noelle. Uniquely, it starts from the very beginning of the Chapter, and ends the Chapter substantially earlier, skipping the Dark World segment.
The Weird Route in Chapter 5 can only be pursued if the Weird Route was completed in Chapter 4.
- Once Toriel begins talking to Kris at the start of the Chapter, the player must repeatedly mash their directional inputs to make Kris leave their bed and stand up.
- The player must exit the Dreemurr residence and walk with Susie to Sans's ice cream stand situated outside his grocery store, and talk with him to obtain the Bread.
- The player must walk with Susie to the lake, where after a brief confirmation prompt, she leaves Kris alone.
- If the player attempts to go to the lake without having first visited Sans, Susie will comment about Noelle wanting Ice Cream, asking Kris to help her look for some.
- It is impossible for the player to leave the lake room once they have entered.
- After Noelle's monologue, the player must select either option on all 8 of the choice prompts they are presented with.
- It does not ultimately matter for the cutscene whether "Stop" or "Proceed" is chosen, as the events continue regardless. However, the game does store how many times "Stop" was chosen via flag
1742in the code.[1]
- It does not ultimately matter for the cutscene whether "Stop" or "Proceed" is chosen, as the events continue regardless. However, the game does store how many times "Stop" was chosen via flag
- Once Kris and Noelle's faces are submerged, the player must begin to quickly select either of the "Proceed" options on all ~70 of the choice prompts they are presented with afterwards. From this point onwards, a hidden timer will immediately abort the route if it is allowed to expire. Each selection of "Proceed" makes the timer reset, but makes its duration (starting at 8 seconds) get progressively shorter, until it only takes 1 second to expire.
- The timer's progression is signified by the entire screen quickly fading to white, alongside a constant static noise getting louder and higher-pitched as the timer gets closer to its expiry.
- The choice prompts will become gradually harder and harder to see as the cutscene reaches its final stage, but the SOUL will remain (albeit barely) visible until the last few choice prompts.
- If the player completes the cutscene, the screen will then fade to the ending CRT screen. Waiting for 10 seconds or pressing any non-directional input after the text has finished typing out will end the Chapter, thus successfully continuing the route.
The chapter begins with the red dot previously seen in Chapter 4's Weird Route and Noelle slowly saying "THANK YOU".
Kris sleeps in, skipping the Festival entirely. Toriel asks if they are okay before asking them to come downstairs and eat. Kris gets out of bed very slowly, heavily resisting the player's directional inputs. Their movement once they get out of bed is similarly slow, and all dialogue boxes that are not spoken by another character are blank, with the exception of the narration when interacting with the Bread.
Kris leaves their house, with Susie telling them that Noelle wants to see Kris at the lake. Susie then offers to explore the Festival with Kris, even though everyone has left by now. Interacting with the different stands at the festival prompts Susie to tell Kris about how the day went and what her and Noelle were up to while Kris was asleep.
After obtaining the Bread from Sans, Kris can go to the lake, where Noelle expresses her gratitude to Kris for helping her break free from her usual routine that she felt forced into ever since Dess's disappearance. She reminisces that she and Kris had always wondered what was on the other side of the lake when they were younger and states that she wants to do "something crazy" together with them before the pair enters the lake. If the player selects "Stop", Noelle will force Kris to "Proceed" instead. As they both hold hands and cross the lake, the screen gets increasingly shakier, the textbox border becomes increasingly redder and Noelle's face sprite becomes increasingly darker the deeper they are submerged. All the player can do at this point is to select "Proceed" over and over. If "Proceed" is not selected fast enough, the route is aborted, with Noelle saying, "I was wrong. Kris hadn't changed after all."
After a while, the screen cuts to black, and an old television screen opens up, with text instructing the player to "Insert Chapter 7 Side B". The game then exits back to the file select screen. No SAVE points are accessible during this Chapter.
Internally, a unique Completion FILE is generated within the game's files upon completing the Chapter, appending "_b" on the end, which does not fulfill the completion star on the in-game Chapter Select screen. In addition, the dr.ini file (also within the same directory as the newly-added "_b" files) is edited to set the "[side_b] complete=" variable to "1.000000", indicating that the Weird Route for Chapter 5 has been completed.
snd_ominous_cancel.oggdoes not play upon aborting the route. While the internal flag associated with aborting the Weird Route (flag916) is still set to 1, another previously unused flag is set (flag1743), which also triggers several changes later in the Chapter.- Noelle says that she was wrong, and that "The dream never happened." Kris then wakes up with Susie and Noelle at the table singing the French Fry song. It then cuts to Noelle saying "Nothing changed." and Susie holding her while standing in the lake, before cutting to Noelle saying "Nothing changed." again and again, each time showing a different section of the cutscene with Susie and Noelle at the lake. Eventually, it cuts back to Kris sleeping on the table as Susie walks in holding ice cream, with Noelle missing.
- After Carol calls Noelle about Rudy's fall, the screen cuts to black one last time, with Noelle narrating "Nothing changed. Because a Noelle is just a Noelle."
- Kris takes longer to get up from the bench than on the normal route and actually collapses shortly after getting back up on their feet, necessitating Susie to help lead them around. Once Kris breaks away from Susie shortly after, they collapse once again.
- Susie expresses concern for both Kris and Noelle, noting how they have been acting strange.
- Unlike the normal route,
ocean.oggloops until entering the Dark World, overlappingwind_highplace.oggafter leaving the lake area. Susie has to help Kris get up multiple times at the lake. - After meeting Ralsei in the Garden, he is ecstatic that Kris is okay.
- During the Chapter's Dark World segments, Kris's title is changed to "Shattered Rose", with the description "Only one knows the rose's meaning." Getting a "Walkerstar" will switch it, however.
- Further in the Chapter, after the "Castle - Left End" SAVE point, selecting "Walk Over and see Susie Normally" and then "..." after Susie asks Kris if they have ever liked anyone, will prompt the music to cut and Susie to talk about how she thought Kris and Noelle were a couple due to the events prior in the route. Susie will then ask if she is getting in the way of Kris and Noelle's relationship. Selecting "Don't get inbetween me and Noelle" will cause Kris to jump into the water after "Don't" as to not to finish the sentence.
The Thank you survey teased a screenshot of Kris facing away from the lake for any correct answer.
1st sprite
2nd sprite
3rd sprite
4th sprite
5th sprite
6th sprite
7th sprite, notably the darkest
8th and final sprite
Unused 9th sprite
The CRT screen displayed after the route is completed
Alternate, unused face sprites labelled as "old" exist in the files of the game. Four of these differ from the final sprites in meaningful ways. Notably, Noelle sinks gradually lower in each sprite, something that does not happen in the final sprites. In addition, air bubbles appear in the sprites, and the last two sprites become darker than any of the final sprites.
"Old" version of the 6th sprite
"Old" version of the 7th sprite
"Old" version of the 8th sprite
"Old" version of the 9th sprite
Snd_next's spectrogram.- Deleting the appended "
_b" on the end of the completion file and launching it will result in a Dogcheck. Disabling Dogcheck returns the player to the prologue. - When running
Snd_next(which plays during the CRT scene at the end of the Route/Chapter) through a spectrogram, it reveals an image of what appears to be a figure, possibly Noelle, in a lake.[2]- Additionally, doing the same but at 666% speed reveals another image of a body of water, possibly the lake where the preceding scene took place.[3]
