Undertale's creators did a Japanese wrestling promo
Hopes and dreams off the top rope
From Undertale to Deltarune, it only stands to reason that the next project for Toby Fox and pals would be promoting Japanese wrestling. No, really. Released on Youtube on new year's eve, bizarre Undertale-styled video short Kenny's Quest was meant to air before Canadian wrestler Kenny Omega threw down with his rival Hiroshi Tanahashi at the Tokyo Dome on Friday. Unfortunately plans changed at the last minute, and the clip won't be shown live, so it went up early for us to enjoy. Pin your hopes and dreams on the wrestlemen below.
So, why Undertale? It was Kenny's game of the year. He missed the original PC release, but the hit Switch in 2018, so he got a chance to play it and discuss it with fellow game-enjoying wrestleman Xavier Woods over at Giant Bomb. It's a good read. I'd love to hear the story of how Kenny's Quest came to be, though - was he so taken by Undertale that he immediately got in touch with its creators? The video below credits the whole crew, with Toby Fox co-writing and directing it with Kenny, Temmie Chang on art, and Everdraed (the fevered brain behind Undertale's horrifying final boss) on video editing. They even got localisation house 8-4 (Nier: Automata, among others) to make sure it reads well in both English and Japanese.
This isn't the first time Undertale and wrestling fandoms have collided, but as far as I'm aware this is the first time it's been done officially. Back in 2015, cross-media wrestlefan Alfredo Dizon produced Undertale Wrestling, a 40-minute YouTube Epic. Without Temmie's art, he had to make do with recreating the RPG cast in a WWE game. Worth a watch though, if only to see how the combined powers of anime, friendship and John Cena can defeat anything - even The Undertaker, who is an evil undead cowboy. When you think about it, wrestling is basically an RPG already.
It's all just joyfully daft stuff. Tiny pixel-man Kenny Omega may be on the ropes at the end of the video, but in the world of wrestling, there's every chance for a comeback - even if he is meant to be the 'bad guy' in this story. The match goes down this Friday, January 4th at WrestleKingdom 13. Personally, I'm rooting for Kenny - the boy couldn't bring himself to do Undertale's harrowing Genocide route because he didn't want to hurt any of the characters. He's a good lad, really, just misunderstood. Tanahashi should stop picking on him.