Undertale/Bad Route

The bad route of Undertale, most commonly referred to as the Genocide Route, is the one in which the player actively attempts to clear the game in the most heinous manner possible; namely, by committing genocide on the race of monsters. It is not enough to simply kill every monster that happens to get in your way; you must actively hunt down every living monster in every region of the Underground, until random encounters no longer occur.

This route is also alternatively referred to as the No Mercy Route or the Bad Time Route, mainly by those people who are too squeamish to accept the true nature of the actions you must perform to accomplish this route.


 * : This trope is used to its fullest effect in the final segment of the Genocide Route, drawing attention to the fact that Undertale is a work of interactive fiction, not merely a static story.
 * First,
 * Next,
 * And to cap it all off,
 * Alone with the Psycho: Toriel tries to keep you locked in the Ruins to protect you from the monsters outside. She realizes too late that she was really protecting the monsters from you.
 * Arc Words: But nobody came.
 * Once you have hunted down all available monsters in an area, the next time you get an encounter, you see only an empty battlefield, and those three words in tiny text.
 * Enfant Terrible: You, of course.
 * Infant Immortality: About two-thirds of the way through the route, you enter a very one-sided battle against . If you insist on continuing your descent into depravity, you must take the opportunity to kill them.
 * Moral Event Horizon: Despite gleefully murdering the downtrodden denizens of the Underground, and possibly even betraying the friendships you forged in other realities just to sate your sick sense of curiosity, there is ultimately only one Moral Event Horizon: . Cross this point, and the game will never allow you to redeem yourself.
 * The game makes it quite clear at several points on the Genocide Route that you can always choose to stop killing. First Papyrus blocks your way, and insists that you're a good person at heart; although when you kill him, . Next is a monster that you cannot fight except in this route, ; they stand their ground, trying to make you realize that you're not evil enough to be capable of, though you can of course prove them wrong.
 * Finally, you come up against, who opens up with a simple question: "Do you think even the worst person can change...? That everyone can be a good person, if they just try?" But by this point, you're too far gone, and you'll just ignore them as you menacingly advance toward your goal..


 * What the Hell, Player?: As long as you're on this route, anything you do will elicit this sort of reaction. Even examining the potted plant in the MTT Resort Restaurant brings up the caption "(The potted plant is judging you for your sins.)".
 * Zero Effort Boss: Because this route requires you to grind excessively for EXP and LV, you quickly end up being overleveled for almost every boss fight, and murder is as easy as landing a single attack. The most extreme case is ; the game builds them up to be an intimidating foe, ready to rock your socks off. In actuality, they just stand around menacingly and don't even try to attack, making it impossible to lose against them.
 * Note that we said almost every boss; there are some highly notable exceptions.