How Many Chapters Does Deltarune Have, anyway?

Are there 5 chapters in Deltarune? Are there 7chapters in Deltarune? Does Deltarune have 10 chapters?? And what is chapter 0 in Deltarune? Let's unravel this mystery that no one thought was a mystery together, shall we?

0:00 Intro
0:08 Why is this even a question? Deltraune website...
0:46 Chapter Select Menu
1:07 Wait... why are there 10 chapter menu icons?
2:47 Toby only mentions up to Chapter 5... but why???
3:44 Chapter 0 Lore Implications
5:08 Chapter 0 as Placeholder Code
8:17 Calling it now, we're spelling out ♪ W. D. Gaste-
10:04 What are the implications of this?
11:12 Theme of "WAKE"
12:01 Wrap up
12:16 Credits!

Mollystar's video: DELTARUNE and the Fourth Wall || THE DEVICE THEORY

[ivythay]

Since we're only able to access Ch2 for now, I'm very baffled, scared and excited for how chapter 6 and beyond are handled.

[donvid]

Extremely suspicious that you can also skip to the dark worlds in each chapter by immediately going back to bed, whereupon you 'wake up' in the Dark World.

[GabrielUltraDIE]

it’s crazy how it’s been 8 years and people are still losing their mind about gaster

[jacquespaught]

Toby also has a tendency to use 1-letter, vague filenames for spoiler songs. For example, most of the songs that play when you fight Asriel in Undertale are labeled "x", and Chara's theme is just called "c".

[Keitoded]

Another connection to the wake dream stuff beyond the "dark worlds being dreams" thing is in the weird route susie and queen have this exchange.

Susie: "Noelle needs to wake up!"

Queen: Wake? No She Has Already Awakened Too Much
Let Her Close Her Eyes And Sleep Away
Into a Darker, Darker, Dream

Beyond the darker darker obviously, queen also seems to be happy about this as she's smiling?? And right before this she also says noelle needs to rest... Interesting...

[Kyrikrliy]

Maybe the reason the chapter amount is so unclear is because player choices impact which chapters you can acess? Like maybe the story ends sooner under specific circumstances.
Just a small theory.

[CyborusYT]

D playing when Noelle "wakes up" might be Gaster getting upset in some way. Since W plays when he is interrupted by the other speaker, these songs may signify when we don't do what he wants.

[characookie]

I feel like any chapters besides 1-7 would be like the Photoshop Flowey fight, outside of the ordinary gameplay.

[Deku]

That last sentence about the possibility that the 7 melodies are supposed to be played at the same time reminds me a lot of the Mother series. Specifically how the first 2 games have you collect 8 melodies that are supposed to be played in order. Considering how much inspiration Undertale and Deltarune take from those games it wouldn’t surprise me if combining them yielded something interesting (just that the way they’re combined would would be different).

[mystery]

A thought I had when you suggested the Snowgrave Route could be the "Gaster" route: Toby Fox has insisted that Deltarune only has one ending, but what if the second route never reaches that ending?

In Undertale, Sans' final attack is trapping you in the battle, and specifically his turn, forever. It didn't work, but think about what would have happened if it did: the Underground would be permanently locked in a state where Frisk and Chara are unable to act, with a trail of destruction left behind them, but all of the monsters that lived in/evacuated to New Home would be safe.

Life would go on for the monsters left alive, but from our perspective as the player, the game would never actually have an ending: you fight the final boss, but you never beat them, and you never get a chance to try again.

I think that the Snowgrave Route could have a similar ending, where Kris/the player gets trapped in a process that never ends, like a battle or a cutscene. There would be no "End of Chapter 7/8/9/n" screen; the only way to leave would be to close the game, and there would be no other choices for you to make upon reopening the game. The result of your poor choices throughout the game is a stalemate.

There's a popular theory that Deltarune is a cyclical world, trapped in a time loop, where the world ends and then starts over forever. If that's the case, and there's only one ending, then there might be three routes in the game.

The first, and the only one that would be called a proper ending, is the route where you escape the loop and take control of your own destiny. The system bending time into a donut is destroyed, and there's pie for all.

The second would be remaining in the loop, repeating the events of the game forever. You would reach the end of your adventure, only to do it again, and again, and again, for all time.

Finally, the third would be the stalemate I described: the world never loops, but progress is never made. You successfully stop time from repeating, but that's because you failed to conclude your journey. You got stuck along the way because of your terrible actions, and the world is paying the price for it by stalling forever.

Anyways, that's my crackpot theory/prediction, thanks for reading!

[inkblooded]

There's also the possibility that these single-digit songs are hints towards the "secret routes" in each storyline. That would require further chapters before a conclusion could be reached. But if it's right, then that would imply that the moment the other entity claimed control from Gaster, they began the "alternate route" for Chapter 1. Which makes sense; it's pretty easy to assume that Gaster's plans were muddied by this other entity claiming control...

[camchameleon]

As a programming student (not a great one though) it never ceases to amaze me how you’re better at reading and interpreting code than I am despite not knowing how to write it

[cah-ys]

I did want to give one small correction: when Toby said that "these numbers can be somewhat deceptive" at 0:44, he almost certainly was referring to the completion percentages, not the chapter numbers. Elsewhere in the quote he talks about how he tends to change his mind about certain details late in development, so it can be hard for him to estimate how close to being finished any given aspect of a work in progress is. Other than that, though, another fantastic video as always!

[multigrandmarquis]

Until it is disproven, I have chosen to believe that there are 7 total chapters, an intermission after the third, two chapter-chapters of chapter five, a second intermission afterwards, and in chapter six, six chapter-chapters, and six more chapter-chapter-chapters. Not to mention chapter six's five intermissions, six intermission-intermissions, and chapter six chapter six's five additional intermissions.

[Derpy-Smol]

at the VERY end of chapter 4, it actually shows text which says that you are halfway through your adventure already, which HEAVILY implies that there actually only 7 or 8 chapters in total. Its also important that asriel is coming back after 1 week, (or on chapter 7) which means that its basically confirmed that there are only 7 chapters.

[FlareBlitzBanana]

Both one-letter songs appear at a point where control over another is lost, W for when the hijack happens and D for when Noelle breaks out of her trance. Not much to add to that, but it's worth noting.

[paperaleks]

Gonna add on that d.ogg uses the same rhythm as the Merry CD from Omori (which Toby composed) and if you know anything about Omori “waking up” is a pretty central game mechanic/theme

[aarongrant]

Since Chapter 3 could take place during night, its possible that 3 & 4 happen in the same day, meaning that Chapter 8 would be the logical final chapter
Edit: Look, I don't wanna be that guy, but HOLY CRAP I HAVE NEVER GOTTEN THIS MANY LIKES BEFORE

[buzzfoster]

At the beginning of chapter 1, Toriel mentions that Asriels' coming back from college in a week, so I assumed that something would happen when he came back. However that wouldn't make sense if there was only seven chapters cause he would arrive by the eighth, so if there were more chapters that would explain that.

[aimonishe]

About chapter icons:
Chapter 3 icon changes after we complete this chapter from Tenna smile, to Knight Smile.

I think, this is reason, why we have 10 icons. Some chapters will have 2 icons except 1.