Walking simulators have always been a fascinating sub-genre of video games because their focus on exploration and atmosphere to build narrative contrasts with traditional video games whose mechanics focus on fast-paced combat or puzzle-solving. This is why I was excited to focus this Critical Play on The Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe, designed by Davey Wreden and William Pugh and developed by Crows Crows Crows. It is rated T for teen as it does make some reference to suicide and drugs, but I would say this game is intended for young adults and older who are looking to play something thought-provoking and unconventional. This game is available on a variety of platforms, but I chose to play on PC this time!
The Stanley Parable follows an office worker named Stanley who finds that everyone in his building has disappeared. With the help of the narrator, Stanley sets out to solve this mysterious disappearance.
What fascinates me about The Stanley Parable is the way in which it subverts the typical narrative structure we may be used to, especially in relation to the dynamic between the narrator and Stanley, the player. In this game, walking is a mechanism by which the player decides what story they want to tell.
At its outset, The Stanley Parable should be an embedded narrative, where the player sets out on a pre-determined narrative. Even the narrator constantly tells Stanley what he should do. But in this game, we are Stanley, and we have the freedom to walk. This mechanic allows the player to go against this pre-defined narrative and chart out on their own path, often to the chagrin of the narrator.
At certain critical points, the player has to make a choice regarding which path to take, which can lead to a variety of outcomes. In fact, the Ultra Deluxe version of this game has 46 different endings. This game certainly focuses on narrative and discovery as its types of fun, where the game is all about discovering all the potential stories to be told. In my play through, I jumped out the window, which was never “intended” to be an option. Even the narrator comments on how Stanley must have thought he had broken the game world, only to realize this was still part of the game.
In this aspect, The Stanley Parable does maintain certain hints of an emergent narrative, where player interactions can influence the direction of the unfolding narrative. Each choice the player makes can lead Stanley to a variety of different situations, sometimes obeying the narrator and sometimes rebelling. In this white room, the narrator asks Stanley to choose whether or not he is sick of this gag, given that falling into this white room soft locks the player, requiring to restart the game in order to progress on the usual trodden paths. The narrator monologues about the concept of choice, asking Stanley whether he thought things would be different if he made a different choice here (they would not).
I find this scene particularly compelling because it reveals a core truth of the game: while it may seem like an emergent narrative that subverts a typical embedded narrative structure, the game is still an embedded narrative. It is true that this game has many branching narratives, and it is true that the player can choose whether to listen to the narrator or go off on his own. Here, the player has the ability to choose how the narrative unfolds. However, every choice the player could make has already been made and accounted for. Choosing to jump out the window was a choice the player made in one specific run through, but this possibility was afforded by the game creators. The player is not “breaking the game” by doing so because this was always part of the game. Similarly, when given the choice to choose between two doors, the player can choose to go against the narrator and walk through the right door. This possibility was already calculated, and the resulting narrative from here on out is already pre-determined according to what choices the player makes next.
In this sense, the player is never really able to change the narrative directly. Rather, their choices inform which pre-determined narrative will unfold. While the narrator may act shocked when Stanley goes in an unintended direction, the game’s developers are not the least bit surprised because they had already designed the ensuing narrative.
At its core, The Stanley Parable is a sort of meta-commentary on the idea of choice, where the walking mechanism is the instrument through which the player makes their choices. This game feels so unconventional because it differs from other walking simulators like Journey and Firewatch in that each play through can be different based on which paths the player walks down on. As a whole, this game does not follow a single cohesive story but is instead a collection of branching narratives that encourages the player to play again to choose a different path, where progress in the game is measured not by the player reaching the ending but rather by how many different endings the player can discover.
The game sets out with the premise of walking to… somewhere. But in making different choices, the player is urged to ask where they are walking to and why they are walking.
In one route, the player can choose to constantly defy the narrator, leading them to a glitched out world and an out of body experience where the player sees Stanley frozen before the two doors from before. The narrator continues his monologue as usual until he realizes Stanley is not moving. He asks, then begs, then pleads for Stanley to choose. Even if it is not the left door, he must at least choose, the narrator cries out. But Stanley cannot move because we, the player, are not in control. And because Stanley cannot move, the story cannot progress, and thus must end and start a new run.
While the game sets out with the premise of Stanley finding out what happened to his coworkers, that plot line is quickly abandoned on most routes. The point of the game is not to figure out where Stanley’s coworkers went. The point of the game is to make choices and see what happens. By walking through one door rather than another or camping out in a broom closet forever, the player decides which narrative they want to follow on a single play through. While it may seem like The Stanley Parable is telling the player that their choices do not matter because everything is pre-determined, I see it differently. To me, The Stanley Parable celebrates the act of choice, showing the player that their choices can lead them down a myriad of paths, each with their own treasures to uncover.
Ethical Reflection
Compared to other games I have played like Call of Duty or Mortal Kombat, where violence is the name of the game, violence occupies a very muted role in The Stanley Parable. While there are some instances where Stanley can walk off a ledge and mortally injure himself, the game takes this option away in future runs, fencing off the platform to prevent Stanley from falling off again. In a game all about choice, it is certainly thought-provoking to take away the player’s ability to choose violence.
In many games, violence is a means to an end: it is the mechanism by which players interact with the world around them and progress through the narrative. But in The Stanley Parable there is little need for violence to progress the current narrative. After all, Stanley does not need to physically fight against the narrator or fend off enemies in the game to stay alive. Instead, Stanley confirms he is still there by walking and making choices. Here, instead of violence, walking is the mechanism by which players interact with the world around them and progress through the story. Explicitly excluding violence in this game serves to further underscore the value of walking as a tool for progression. The choices the player makes are what determine the outcome of the story, not how many enemies he can kill. It is a testament to the idea that games do not need violence to create drama and compelling stories.
Indeed, the game glosses over aspects of death, as Stanley can only implicitly die under a few circumstances. But even then, rather than saying the player has died or was killed, the game simply restarts, placing Stanley back at his cubicle, ready to discover another new story ahead of him. After all, in The Stanley Parable, the end is only the beginning.
