[Header image by Nibroc-Rock.]
Undertale, one of my favorite games released this year, made a very unlikely appearance recently on the700 Club, a Christian television program hosted by Pat Robertson. The show received a question from a viewer about a peculiar skeleton.
“Recently, I was looking through my daughter’s phone, and I found many pictures of a cartoon skeleton with one glowing blue eye and wearing a hoodie. When I asked my daughter why she had such demonic images on her phone, she told me there was nothing wrong with it because it was from a video game. How do I help my daughter not be attracted to such demonic things?”
Though the show makes no mention of which video game is being discussed, there’s no doubt that the skeleton in question would have to be Sans, the pun-loving, lazybones skeleton fromUndertale. How could anyone find such a lovable scamp like Sans demonic?
Pat Robertson urged the viewer to give their daughter something more wholesome to play. “There’s got to be some video game that isn’t so evil, but those things are filled with violence […] and brutality, it’s unreal.”
It’s rather ironic that they’re trying to dissuade this young girl from playingUndertale, a game that specifically markets itself as giving players the option to not kill anything. If played a certain way,Undertaleis all about friendship, mercy, laughter, and happy feelings, which is exactly the kind of thing Pat Robertson is suggesting they play instead.
Of course, if played a different way, then they may actually have a point aboutUndertaleharboring monstrous tendencies. But let’s not tell them about that, shall we?
