The Stanley Parable is a First Person walking simulator set in your office after all your coworkers suddenly disappear. You then start hearing a heavily British accented voice in your head that starts giving you commands and it is up to you whether to listen to him or not. If you want you can just sit there in your office and still receive one of the various endings available. It has a very interesting premise of giving you many choices but at the same time making you feel like you are not in control of the outcome.
Making decisions is really the only control you have in the game other than walking and interacting with very few select items such as doors. This is a walking simulator in the truest sense as there are no puzzles or QTEs to spice thing up. All you really do is walk from one similar looking room to the next but the narrator and the humor are both so brilliant that you don’t really mind. You see, the narrator reacts pretty well to whatever you seem to be doing so if he tells you to go up a flight of stairs and you instead lock yourself in a broom closet he acknowledges it then begins throwing a hissy fit.
Causing the narrator to slowly lose his cool while constantly disobeying him is very satisfying and oftentimes quite hilarious. At times he will murder you in various ways since he is pretty much able to bend reality to his will though death is just another beginning in The Stanley Parable. You will just be “reborn” at the start of the game, good as new and be free to go through the same chain of events or attempt to alter the outcome. Various small details are observed by the narrator like imagine going through a scene where you need the codes for a lock but you’ve played through the scene before and now it by memory. You then enter the code while the narrator is still talking and he starts telling you to cool your jets while mockingly playing some soothing music for interrupting before he lets you through. This game will only last you for a few hours and has no replay value making it a hard sell for its full price but if you see it on sale it’s well worth it to meet and annoy your new British frenemy.
- El Panadero -The Baker- Review - August 27, 2024
- Awakened Evil Review - July 10, 2024
- Let’s Look At: Anima Flux - July 3, 2024