It started in November 2018, three weeks after the release of the video game “DeltaRune“. I was doodling the game’s main character, Kris, in my math notebook when a pair of lines came to me:
I woke up to a heartbeat that wasn't mine
Your soul, your will, has me preoccupied
The idea for a song had hit me, and by the end of the day, I had written most of the lyrics. However, it was only last weekend that I sat down to make an instrumental for the song, using the app Medly. I finally posted a video of myself singing the song over my instrumental to YouTube yesterday, to celebrate DeltaRune’s first anniversary.
The reason I’m making a post about it here, other than self-advertising of course, is so that, when I share the song with friends and family, I won’t have to explain the meaning/context every time. So, here’s (pretty much) everything you need to know about DeltaRune to appreciate this song:
At the beginning of the game, the player goes through a brief character creation sequence, with your cursor appearing as a red heart (lore-wise known as a soul). At the end of the sequence, the “vessel” you designed is discarded. From then on, you, still represented in-game by the soul, play as the previously mentioned Kris.
Kris is a teenage nonbinary human, and a depressed, antisocial misfit. Their older brother Asriel, the town darling, recently left for college, and their remaining family seems at best unaware of and at worst apathetic towards their issues. Their neighbors see them as either a creepy weirdo or someone to be pitied. However, in your time playing the game, Kris is transported into a “real” version of their childhood fantasy world and gets to play the role of the charismatic hero, forging genuine friendships along the way.
After returning from the fantasy world, you explore the town as Kris, then head home and get back into bed. But there’s one cutscene left to watch before the credits roll…
For those who can’t/didn’t watch, long story short, Kris removes the soul (you) from their body, throws it/you into a birdcage, and threatens the camera. I guess they didn’t like having an outside force piloting their body and overriding their personality, huh? Who would have thought?
The song I wrote is inspired by and meant to take place directly after this moment, with Kris singing to the player. With all that context out of the way, I’ll let you give it a listen. Hope you enjoy!
