dess is ness
and what this means for deltarune
Spoilers for Deltarune and any videö game featuring Ness, obviöusly.
Nine years and nine months before this very November ninth, YouTuber Matthew “MatPat” Patrick released a videö that would change the course of history.
In this videö, Matthew “MatPat” Patrick argues that Sans, beloved character from1 beloved videö game Undertale, is actually the character Ness, long after the events of beloved videö game Mother Two. This videö and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race. But on the plus side, people love making fun of him for it.
It is known that New English game developer and former resident of Andrew Hussie’s basement Toby “Radiätion” Fox is not above making references to absurd fan theories.
So it is not out of the question that Toby “Radiätion” Fox’s Deltarune might have a plot which consists largely of absurd kabbalistic correspondences that can only be derived through outlandish Game-Theory based analogies. Unlikely? Certainly. But not inconceivable.
It might be a little early to proclaim that we are definitely halfway from the release of Deltarune Chapters Three and Four to the release of Deltarune Chapter Five, but we’re at least sort of generally approaching the point where it stops beïng too unreasonable to suspect that we might have reached such a hypothetical halfway mark. So it seems to me a fitting time to lay out some hypotheses2.
Deltarune features a character, December “Dess” Holiday, who has long been of interest to the more tuned-in half3 of the Deltarune playerbase. If you know one thing about Dess, it’s that she’s Noëlle’s mysteriously lost sister. If you know two things about Dess, you know she’s the Knight. (Actually, there are probably some people who only know the latter one…)
Anyways, she’s obviously Ness.
Much like Sans, whose name—as established by Matthew “MatPat” Patrick—is an anagram for “Ness” except for being off by one letter, Dess also has a name which is an anagram for “Ness” except for being off by one letter. It’s a perfect fit.
This suggests one obviöus strategy for extrapolating out the remainder of Deltarune’s plot: what consequences would follow, if we were to assume that Dess somehow closely corresponds to Ness? Maybe her role in the story will somehow closely mirror Ness’s role in some game Ness appeared in, such as Earthbound or Earthbound Two. As someone who hasn’t played either of those games, I would not be qualified to speak on such a situation.
However, there is one game featuring Ness as a major character in its story which I have played.
In Super Smash Brothers Brawl: The Subspace Emissary, Wariö (a recurring antagonist) travels around, freezing characters into trophies and then stealing their frozen bodies. After Ness takes a mysteriöus dark arrow for Lucas and is turned into a trophy, Wario runs off with a Ness trophy and a Princess Peach/(Zelda/Sheik) trophy.
Later, King Dedede cleverly leaves out a Luïgi trophy as bait for Wariö, and manages to recover the Luïgi, Princess Peach/(Zelda/Sheik), and Ness trophies, which he places King Dedede–branded brooches upon. Bowser then later steals the Princess Peach/(Zelda/Sheik) trophy, leaving Luïgi, Ness, and a recently-trophied King Dedede crushed under some rubble.
Near the end of Super Smash Brothers Brawl: The Subspace Emissary, Ness and his companions (Luïgi and King Dedede) play a critical role—almost every person has been statued, but the King Dedede–branded brooches unstatue Ness and Luïgi, who then choose to unstatue King Dedede. They thus form the first members of your party for a portion of the game’s climax.
My proposal is simple: at some point, near the end of Deltarune, the lightners will (for some reason) be out of commission, or perhaps just otherwise importantly occupied, as the Roaring approaches. The darkners will, much like the trophies from Super Smash Brothers Brawl: The Subspace Emissary, be frozen into stone statues. The only characters that remain? The Knight, who is secretly December “Dess” Holiday, who as previously established is basically Ness. And Ralsei, who is secretly Asriël, a character with no noteworthy traits other than beïng the protagonist’s brother—just like Luïgi. Since these characters are actually secretly lightners4, they don’t turn into statues. Maybe King Dedede can be Gaster or something, I guess.
Well, okay, I suppose Matthew “MatPat” Patrick would tell you he’s really from Mother Two, and even some sane people would say he might well be from Deltarune.
I am unwilling to call these “predictions”.
Probably far less than half if you count all players evenly, and far more than half if you weigh by pretty much any metric of engagement you might reasonably decide to weigh by.
Shhh don't mention all the reasons it doesn’t quite make sense for Ralsei to secretly be a lightner.