Playing Slay the Princess marks my very first experience playing a psychological thriller visual game involving a choice-driven narrative where the lines of reality, truth, control, and morality become blurred. While I explore multiple different endings across several chapters, the ambiguity present throughout this gameplay becomes stronger and stronger. The narrative is initially driven by the narrator, who is motivated to slay the princess and tries to persuade the player that she is dangerous and that not slaying her will result in the end of the world. Slowly, we begin to hear the perspective of the Princess, who is a dynamic character that changes noticeably based on your decisions. The most interesting part, for me, was how, as the levels progressed, the player’s thoughts emerged into multiple distinct voices, such as the voice of the hero, the voice of the broken, and the voice of the stubborn. Each of these voices represents multiple facets of the player’s thoughts, giving me, as the person playing the game, an unfiltered sense of what the player is experiencing throughout the gameplay.
Each choice results in a slightly different turn of events, determining the fate of the player and the princess. Given the comic-style illustrations, I didn’t find the game particularly frightening or feel that I was actually murdering someone; however, the question still remains: is it morally permissible for video games to allow depictions and gameplay of activities that we would consider evil? From a moral standpoint, ‘slaying’ the princess is not ethical. Any crime that consists of bodily or emotional harm to another individual cannot be considered ethical in real life. So, why have we as a society accepted it as acceptable in video games? The most common argument that comes to mind is that video games are not real life. They are simulated environments that do not actually cause disruptions in real life. But are we sure about this? Meta-analyses suggest that exposure to video games can promote aggressive behavior in children and adolescents. In a world where we are constantly facing violence, hate, and political and social turmoil, should we be okay with individuals, young, old, or somewhere in between, playing simulated war and mass shooting-based games? I would argue against it. I am a big believer in the idea that the media you consume shapes the way you think and process the world around you. In a world where there is enough turmoil, I don’t find it appropriate to simulate it.
In Slay the Princess, within the first several minutes of gameplay, the narrator states, “Is slaying a princess much worse than slaying a fisherman or a miller or a seamstress? If anything, slaying a princess is much better than slaying a seamstress. Seamstresses contribute something of value to society.” This line is pretty unsettling for me because it outright reduces a human life to a measure of utility, turning violence into something that can be justified through comparison rather than being questioned outright. In that moment, the game stopped feeling like some distant simulated visual novel and instead became a reflection of how individuals are valued in societies and how easily reasoning can be distorted to make harmful actions feel actionable. Throughout the gameplay, there were multiple instances of violent dialogue and depictions, including beatings, stabbings, and repeated cycles of harm that the player can choose to engage in or resist.
Image 1: The Narrator’s reasoning about slaying the princess
Another argument that comes to mind is that if it’s acceptable for movies and television shows to freely depict violence, why isn’t it for video games? While I am not a huge fan of graphic violence in any form of media, video games enable something that movies do not: active choice for the players. As we see in Slay the Princess, violence is not just present for shock value, but is instead intertwined with the player’s choices, forcing you to confront how your own decisions shape both the Princess and the outcome of the story.
However, I must acknowledge a strong counterargument here. Games like Slay the Princess do not simply encourage violence, but instead force the player to reflect on it. As I was playing many of these routes, acting violently simply did not feel rewarding or justified, but began to feel repetitive, immoral, and honestly meaningless. The addition of the different voices of the player: the hero, broken, and stubborn also allows for reflection from varying perspectives. The game’s setup, which acts like a loop and resets at each stage to a setting dependent on the choices of the previous level, also clearly enforces that choices do have consequences.
Image 2: In Slay the Princess, every choice shapes what happens next
At the same time, this does not fully resolve the concern. While the game is clearly designed to be reflective, not all players may engage with it at that level. Some may still approach it as a series of choices to optimize outcomes, rather than as a moral or philosophical exercise. This raises an important tension: even if a game is designed with intention, its impact is ultimately shaped by how it is interpreted and played. This leaves me with a more nuanced position. While I still believe that violence should be minimized, especially in a world where we are already exposed to so much of it, I can also recognize that in certain contexts, it can serve a purpose beyond shock value. In cases where violence does appear, I think it should be designed in a way that is reflective, where it is made clear that every choice, whether perceived as good or bad, carries consequences. Slay the Princess does this effectively by refusing to let the player detach from their actions, constantly reminding them that their decisions shape not only the outcome, but also the meaning of the experience itself. Rather than normalizing harm, it forces the player to sit with it, question it, and ultimately reflect on what it means to choose at all.
Hi Varsha, I really loved reading your response about Slay the Princess, and I feel we came away with many similar conclusions to the game. I definitely agree with your reasoning that Slay the Princess invites reflection on the part of the player character about morality of actions, especially in the early part of the game, when not many ‘vessels’ have been discovered yet, and each choice is reflective of the player’s unique curiosity. I also believe that the mechanics and structure of the game in its later stage invites, as you said, the player to “approach it as a series of choices” rather than a moral dilemma, due to the structure of completing the game through finding multiple distinct endings. While I appreciate that the game had a structure to build narraively towards, I definitely found each pathway becoming less and less meaningful and reflective of my own moral value structure as I continued through the game. Perhaps this was the intention of the developers, however – that the player should grow more detached from the violence they inflict over time, as the world becomes more and more complex and unreal.
(For context I am commenting to make up for my class absence on 4/17/26!)