NOTE: It is not possible to patch this over the previous versions of Ribbit. If you already have Ribbit installed, you'll have to patch this into another copy of Deltarune for it to work. Your save progress will be retained across versions, so don't worry about that. As always, please follow the installation instructions provided in the download.

Hello everyone. I am once again here to fix the PopGum item. But more than that, today I'm bringing you an update to the mod a league above your usual minor bug fix, featuring some new story content, a couple new fun details and secrets, and quality of life changes to some of the mod's most important placebos. If you haven't played Ribbit yet, this is the perfect time to jump in and figure out what it's all about, but returning players may also get some interesting stuff out of it too.

I chose to name this version 1.5.-F as a way to represent the middle-ground this update follows. It's not huge enough to be considered a 2.0 major overhaul of the mod, but it does feature a substantial amount of new things to at least get halfway there. The meaning behind the -F is that I wanted to confuse and annoy you, which I think is thematically in-line with what Ribbit's been doing so far.

Anyway, off we go! I'll categorize the new stuff from highest to lowest priority.

THE BIGGUNS

• A new story-based encounter has been added. Use Toriel's bed during New Game+ and select the topmost choice to access it. As save files carry over between versions, you should be able to access this right away if you've beaten the mod on previous versions.
  
  By the way, I used the term "story-based encounter" instead of "boss fight" for the sake of downscaling expectations. This is more of a "puzzle boss", where it's not about the attacks so much as it's about figuring out a set of rules. It is one of the more unconventional things I've done for the mod, but it does have a solution, and an ending. I hope you'll enjoy figuring out how to get to both.

• Five cutscenes have been added for the Violence run. These aren't massively important (in fact, you don't need to see them to get the ending), and have merely been made to add more substance to this run beyond "last 5 minutes of the mod are different".

  The way these cutscenes work is different from Undertale's genocide run. Firstly, it should be noted that the 28 ghosts you need to kill aren't per area, they're for the whole run. Meaning, if you kill 28 ghosts in the Field, you're locked into it and won't need to kill anymore ghosts. The reason why it's 28 kills specifically, is to minimize the amount of grinding. As long as you kill everything killable that you encounter across your journey, you should be able to amass 28 kills, or at least close to it, before the final boss begins.
  
  With this information in mind, the Violence cutscenes trigger based on an estimated kill counter if you were to not do any grinding. For example, the first two geno scenes require 6+ kills, while the last Violence cutscene before the ending requires 21. Once again, grinding is not required to see these scenes, and after seeing the last fifth cutscene, you'll be perma-locked into the Violence ending, even if you didn't amass the 28 kills.

• Courage placebo is now usable in EveryName fight. This means most bullets within that fight now have a chance of healing you, making the fight somewhat easier to beat.
  
  In light of this addition, certain details of the fight were adjusted. For example, failing to answer Mettaton's quiz question now has a 50% chance of providing the trio with a full heal. It sounds excessive, however that other 50% chance could deal significant damage to your party, so it's effectively a win or die dice roll. Also, this mechanic had an easter egg added onto it, which involves another easter egg... an easter egg within an easter egg. What madness...!
  
  By the way, for those who weren't aware, EveryName gives you the best defense item in the mod and a unique end cutscene if you beat the fight without using ACTs or the halfway checkpoint... with these additions however, a third stipulation has been added: You must beat the fight without the Courage placebo equipped as well.

• Focus placebo has been considerably reworked to use its own bar. That means, no more wasting TP on time-slowing powers when you could be healing, or making progress on the final boss. It no longer uses TP, and though still a bit finicky, it's much more useful now!

  To make these changes clearer, after equipping Focus, a new bar will appear in the battle UI. I've noticed most people forgot they even had Focus immediately after equipping it, so I'm hoping having it displayed here will further incentivize players into using it. The bar acts dynamically, positioning itself above the battle box, and moving away from it as needed.
  
  Lastly, to balance out these improvements, activating Focus will take exactly half of the Focus bar away, as to ensure you can't overtly abuse it.

  

• The "Haunted Point" scene that takes place early in the mod has had its ending remade. The original scene was made very early on into the mod's development, back before I knew how to do any coding. As such, it relied purely on audio and text to sell its spooky atmosphere. However, as a result of these limitations, it feels predictable, and lacking in any actual spookiness. The redone version addresses this by doing something drastically different.
  
  By the way, for those who miss the original six-feet-underground ending of this scene, don't worry, it's actually still in the mod, it's just treated as a rare event now. Because boy, don't we know I love those.

• Development notes have been added. In New Game+, enter the Dark World and interact with the red glowy point to access them.
  
  These are a series of notes and memos I've made across Ribbit's 3-year long development, which provide insight into just how horrifyingly unorganized I was. I've included the ones I've found most interesting, stuff like scrapped concepts and early versions of final scenes. It's a lot of reading. I repeat, it is a LOT of reading. But if you like that sorta thing, it's there for your enjoyment.

  THE MIDDUMS (Mostly a bunch of additional details)

• Alphys' classroom had its look somewhat altered and its characters repositioned, so they look less like they're attending class and more like my original intention of having them just hanging out. I also did a cool scrolly effect for no reason.

• A new easter egg was added in relation to the Sonic NPC. It doesn't actually take place in the room Sonic's in, but you do activate it there... I'm telling you this just so you don't spend 30 minutes in that room trying to figure it out.

• One of the Cliff wobbly things had a minor audio gag added.

• In the Definitive soundtrack, the Cliff chase sequence music has had an ending bit added once you complete the chase. The amount of time it takes to fade into the next room has been extended to time it better with the music, but if you're on New Game+, you can press Z as it starts fading to white to immediately skip to the next room.

• Completing the 60HP challenge in the Cliff chase sequence now presents you with an extra reward. I always did feel like the defib wasn't enough...
  
  In light of this reward, the DELTA difficulty was slightly rebalanced to give you +2 extra DEFENSE instead of +3.

• Noyno is a little more animated at certain intervals, including during his intro scene, and him closing the dark door.

• New battle background for the Field area. Every other area had a new one, why not this place as well? I've been meaning to do this before the mod's release, but didn't have enough time.
  
  On a related note, the ALT soundtrack has a new theme for the Field battles. DEF version is still the same. I was never satisfied with the song choice on ALT, and have actually been looking for a replacement months before the mod even came out. It's only recently that I've discovered the perfect song, which funnily enough, is from the exact same music artist who created the previous song choice!
  
  Apologies to those who preferred the original choice. I do not plan to make a habit out of replacing the mod's music, knowing that it likely means a lot to some of the people playing Ribbit. This was a special case scenario, and I don't plan to repeat it unless YouTube starts copyright claiming more of the ALT music.

• Completing the instant death beam Field challenge without using the shortcut gives you a reward. (walking halfway across the shortcut will lock you out of it)

• The "2008" scene in the Field maze room has had an additional visual gag added onto it.

• Noelle's "Phonelle" dialogue when you talk to her in the Field after defeating Big Legs Man was replaced with new dialogue.

• An alternate intro gag was added into the "Noyno trapped in cardboard box" cutscene. This gag only plays if Hearing Impaired mode is off (as it requires hearing to be understood), and if you talked to the Rabbick enemy two rooms prior. The reason is because this new intro takes longer than the original one, so I wanted to allow the choice to do the shorter one if you're speedrunning.

• Onion lab keypad was given an office-game related easter egg. I also wanted to do 0451, but a bug I'm still unable to figure out to this day prevents you from entering 0 as the first digit. What a shame. It was a good easter egg. What a rotten way to die...

• During the "YOU copy" phase of EveryName, EveryName will now randomly CHECK one out of all three characters, instead of just CHECKing YOU all the time.

• EveryName Undyne's rotating spears now disappear when coming into contact with them. This slightly eases up the attack by making the likelihood of taking rapid-fire damage less likelyhood.

• On the fifth floor of Card Castle, the room with the "painting" has a chance of spawning a new NPC. I LOVE RNG!!!!

• You know that one attack in the final phase of the final boss that takes forever to get through? With the red circle bullets? Well, I've noticed that most Ribbit speedrunners are not big fans of that attack. Which is why I'm proud to say, do not worry, because it's still in this update, completely unchanged!
  
  ... But it's possible to never see it now. The final phase has a gimmick of choosing its attacks randomly, like a regular enemy would. However, I've slightly altered the attacks you get, depending on your result in the Rock Paper Scissors attack. If you get a tie or lose, the boss' next attack will be that long red circles one. However, if you get a win, it'll never show up.
  
  To summarize, don't get a tie or a lose in the Rock Paper Scissors attack, and you'll never have to see the long red circles attack. How 'bout that for efficiency!

• The red-haired human was given additional dialogue for the epilogue. They will now randomly select one out of three things (including what they said originally) to talk about.

• The regular ending of the mod was given some new dialogue. In order to access this dialog, you must have beaten the mod at least once, and listened to Susie's story in the epilogue.

  THE LOWUMS

• Minor corrections to Onion-san related dialogue. I've recently found out Onion is also a they/them character, and I've adjusted the text to reflect this.

• The mod's normal ending and Violence ending have been renamed in order to reflect the thematic message introduced within this update. Sorry for making you update your categories, speedrunners. You can shorten it down to acronyms, if you'd like.

• Minor adjustments to Noyno's scarf for his text box expressions, primarily to remove the "teeth marks" in expressions where Noyno's mouth is positioned above the scarf.

• Lancer introduction scene has had about 6 of its lines rewritten to make more sense with the design he uses in that scene (his legs are not as hot there as they get later...)

• Fixed the one wrong note on The Lick. If you know, you know.

• Adjusted quiet_autumn.ogg loop to get rid of the popping sound.

• The lighting that EveryName MTT shoots when you fail the quiz question connects to his body a little better. It was bothering me. It still actually is 'cuz it's still off as hell, but like I said. A little better.

• During the dual shield segment in the Lodge's final gauntlet of overworld obstacles, the bullets eventually form a circular pattern that requires you to spin the shield 360 degrees. The shield's movement speed has been halved during this part to make it easier to position the shield.

• Bug fix: PopGum doesn't crash the game anymore. For real. Seriously. This is the third time I've claimed this. The PopGum curse continued, but it better have ended now.

• Bug fix: When talking to Bunji the Frog with captions enabled, characters can no longer stand on top of the caption box, obscuring the text. Additionally, the size of the caption box has been reduced by around 40 pixels.

I hope you enjoy this update, and perhaps see it as a reason to make one last return to Ribbit.

Yes, one last... surely you've read the title of this devlog, and some of you may feel confused. Wasn't there supposed to be more updates? What about that big, BIG one? I'll explain it, for those who were unaware and aware alike...

Around February of 2022, I began writing dialogue and expanding on concepts for a new update to Ribbit (unrelated to this one), after getting feedback that the current ending for the mod felt unsatisfying. This update was internally named "NOE Update". The goals were as such:

1) Add a feature that allows you to call Noelle in any room, and receive new dialogue for each room you're in. Just like the Papyrus phone calls from Undertale, this would provide you with an extensive amount of new jokes, plus additional lore that would give context to some of the unexplained mysteries of Ribbit.
2) Two new major boss fights, each one being around 10 minutes long.
3) A new sub-area consisting of 3-4 rooms that would've developed Noelle's character. This sub-area would feature one of the two boss fights.
4) Defeating this sub-area boss would've led to a new ending which I hoped would provide a little more closure towards the mod's story.

Now, the update started off smaller at first. The goal was just to do the phone calls, the sub-area, and the one boss. However, I realized the plot to it felt shoe-horned so far, and I invented a second boss that helped fill in some gaps and build up to the other boss a lot better.

Alongside this, I also had to invent a new sub-quest to reach one of the bosses, and along the way I came up with some exciting ideas for Noelle's character that made me want to expand on the update even further, and...

I realized ambition was getting the better of me, and the Noelle Update would take a long time to make, especially if I hoped to satisfy the goal of creating a better ending for the mod. So, to tide things over, I decided to create the Stop Future update first, which... also turned out to be bigger than previously anticipated.

And, as I was in the middle of creating this update, I came to a realization. I overestimated my abilities, and my time. And the way things are, it's just not possible for me to make the Noelle Update a reality. Although I wouldn't say it's "cancelled", it is most certainly "indefinitely postponed" which is slang for "Maybe it'll be rebooted one day, but it'd be best forgotten until then." There's many reasons for this. Or excuses, y'know, you pick the terminology.

1) Burnout. This one's probably no secret, it took me over 7 months just to get this one update out, when in reality it should've only taken 2-3 months. Ribbit took over 3 years to make, and with this update out, I've been working on it for almost 4 years. If I decide to keep running this one train, I'll eventually get too exhausted to really put a 110% into these updates. And I don't want my work to come off as insincere.

2) I'm a one-man team. The Noelle Update requires extensive programming for the new boss battles, plus new art assets and enemy designs that, in some ways, I want to be more stylish and high-quality than those you've seen in the mod. Art is very hard, I'm sure you know this. A team would make it a significantly smoother process, but I'm afraid I can't rely on that.

There were a number of wonderful individuals that contributed to certain areas of Ribbit in the past, however they have their own lives, and their own projects they're busy with, and I highly respect that. Asking them to commit several weeks or months of their time for this is unreasonable, especially for a mod that's as abstract and difficult-to-explain as it is.

I'd rather not work with random strangers either, as that's an insane dice roll, so please do not ask.

The 1.5.-F update has received some playtesting help from the returning Diddy, colinator27, Beethovenus, and I'm An Issue (thank you so much, your feedback made the update way better!!), alongside voice lines from Trezzy, but other than that, the whole thing was made by me, and it opened me up to just how many limitations I'm working within. Perhaps too many for something as ambitious as this. It reinforces my belief that for my future work, I'd like to make some smaller stuff.

3) I've turned 24 this July. It dawned on me that I've been making Undertale/Deltarune mods for several years now, and I'm wondering if I've been stagnating. There are many ideas floating about in my head, so many games and stories I'd still like to tell. And I can't help but feel that spending this much time on modding this one series has been tying me down from unleashing my further potential.

After finishing Ribbit, I should've moved on to my next project, but instead, I've spent more months updating the mod, and before I knew it, I'm 24. Were I to continue trying to get Noelle Update out, I'll have turned 25 and a half by then, and I'd still be in the same position I am in now.

I want to continue expanding my reach. I want to have more people see my stuff, I want to improve my writing abilities, and really tell stories that resonate with a lot of people. I'll keep hanging around and making memes on Twitter, since that's not a big investment of my time, but regarding big projects, I need a change of pace. And a change of pace I'll find.

4) This is the last, and the biggest reason for why this is the final update, and it's sort of a culmination of all 3 previous reasons. The mod did not do as well as I had hoped. And with burnout, being a one-man team, and turning 24 years old... I'm overall lacking the motivation to continue going hog-wild on this one project.

Now, I'm not Square Enix, I don't look at 6 million dollars in my bank account and say it didn't meet expectations. But I can't deny that I got way in over my head, and set up ambitious plans regarding Ribbit, expecting it to be a big success. But, here we are today, with it being moreso a modest success. And looking back on these plans, they're far, FAR too ambitious, and outweigh the actual interest for a mod like this.

Continuing to support the mod means sacrificing further dozens of months of my life for something that may not lead me anywhere worthwhile. And as much as it sucks to disappoint the people who were looking forward to a more exciting conclusion to Ribbit's story, like I said, I'm getting older, and I can't live my life on free work. That's why I wish to pursue original projects next, so I can do what I love while ensuring my bathtub still gets hot water.

I apologize for talking about the Noelle Update in the past, without realizing sooner that I couldn't feasibly deliver it with the way my life currently is. My overambition got the better of me, and it's something I wish to work on for the future.

Ribbit may not have been the huge success I wanted it to be, but I can't underestimate the reception from those who played it. Occasionally, I'll receive a message from someone who really resonated with Ribbit, and wanted to personally thank me and the rest of the members who worked on it.

I don't reply to most of these messages, but I do read them, with the stupidest smile on my face. I have difficulties expressing my happiness outwardly, but I can't stress enough just how happy these messages make me on the inside. Like what I'm doing is worth it, that there are other people out there who click with things the way I do. That I'm not alone.

The 1.5.-F update is a sendoff to the mod, to my feelings about it, and to the people who have been supporting me since Ribbit's release. It may not be as big as what I initially wanted to do, but... whereas the main mod covered a "feeling", this new update will cover a "message", and it's the one I really wanted to express. I hope you'll get something out of it. And thank you too.

I'll wrap this devlog up with dialogue excerpts from the scrapped Noelle Update. I've written down drafts for Noelle phone calls up to the Forest area, and some of these I think are actually pretty good, so I'll share them with you.