The Stanley Parable is a video game that tells a story. It was created by Davey Wreden and William Pugh. In the game, players control a character named Stanley. A narrator, played by actor Kevan Brighting, guides the story. As the game progresses, players face choices that lead to different paths. If players ignore the narrator's directions, those choices become part of the story. Depending on the decisions made, players may experience different endings before the game restarts from the beginning.
The original version of The Stanley Parable was released on July 31, 2011, as a free version of the game that changed parts of Valve's Half-Life 2. Later, Wreden and Pugh created a new version of the game using the Source engine, under the name Galactic Cafe. This remake included new areas, story paths, and improved graphics. It was approved through Steam Greenlight in 2012 and released for Windows on October 17, 2013. Updates later added support for macOS on December 19, 2013, and for Linux on September 9, 2015. An expanded version called The Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe was released on April 27, 2022. This version is available on consoles and includes more content and better graphics. An iOS version of Ultra Deluxe was released on October 7, 2024.
The original version and its remakes were well-received by critics and sold over one million copies within a year of release. Reviewers praised the game's story, its exploration of player choice, and its themes about decision-making, the relationship between creators and players, and ideas about fate.
Gameplay and synopsis
The player experiences the game through the eyes of the character, Stanley. Stanley can move around and interact with parts of the environment, such as pressing buttons or opening doors, but he cannot fight or perform other action-based tasks. The Narrator tells the story to the player. The Narrator explains that Stanley is employee 427 in an office building. His job is to watch a computer screen and press buttons as instructed, without asking questions. One day, the screen suddenly goes blank, which has never happened before. Confused, Stanley begins to explore the building and finds that it is completely empty.
At this point, the story changes based on the player’s choices. When the player reaches a place where a decision is possible, they can choose to follow the Narrator’s directions or take the opposite action. The first decision involves two open doors. The Narrator mentions that Stanley traveled through the leftmost door, but this has not happened yet. The Narrator considers the player’s choices and responds with new narration or tries to guide the player back to the main path if the player chooses differently. For example, if the player follows the Narrator’s directions and enters the leftmost door, the story continues with the plot about missing employees. If the player chooses the rightmost door instead, the Narrator changes the story. The Narrator may encourage the player to return to the main path, but the player can keep choosing differently, which causes further changes to the story. In some cases, the Narrator directly addresses the player, breaking the usual storytelling rules.
In the original 2011 version of the game, there were six different endings. The creator, Wreden, said it would take about an hour for a player to experience all of them. The 2013 remake added more than ten endings. Some of the original endings were changed, and new paths were added to reach them. The remake also included extra features, such as Easter eggs and more choices that affect the story.
The Ultra Deluxe version of the game added even more endings, new paths, and new areas. Players can choose an option to skip to the new content if they have played the game before. Otherwise, they must complete several endings before the new content becomes available. As Stanley, the player finds a new area labeled "new content," which includes a bucket that can be used to change the game’s endings. Another new path leads Stanley to a place called the Memory Zone, where the Narrator shares all the praise the game has received. However, the Narrator later finds an area filled with negative reviews from players, which causes the Narrator to feel upset about the game’s reception. After completing all new content, including a path where Stanley learns that a fictional game called The Stanley Parable 2 received poor reviews, the title screen changes to show the new name. No further changes to the game’s content occur after this.
Development
The original version of The Stanley Parable was created as a mod for Half-Life 2. Davey Wreden, who was 22 years old when the mod was released, began thinking about making the game about three years earlier. He was inspired by the way most video games tell stories and wanted to explore what would happen if players chose to act differently from the story’s direction. He also hoped this project would help him prepare for a career as a game developer.
At the time, many popular, high-budget video games made assumptions about how players would experience the game and rarely answered "what if" questions players might ask. Wreden believed some recent games, such as Metal Gear Solid, Half-Life 2, Portal, Braid, and BioShock, started to address this by creating stories that made players think. Though he first planned to make the game as a personal project, Wreden discovered other players had similar questions. He aimed to create a game that would spark discussion after players finished it.
Wreden described his game design as a way to "mess with the player's head" by surprising them or pretending to give answers and then taking them away. He used an "unconventional narrator" to show what might happen if players ignored the narrator’s guidance.
With no experience working with the Source engine, Wreden learned the basics by using information from online wikis and forums. Kevan Brighting provided the narrator’s voice, which Wreden found perfect for the game. Brighting recorded his lines in one take. Wreden kept the game short so players could experience all the endings without spending too much time replaying it. He also included silly endings, like "and then everything was happy!" to avoid making players feel like they earned a reward for finishing a long game.
Some of Wreden’s ideas were not included because he could not figure out how to make them work with the Source engine. For example, he wanted players to press buttons in response to narration but could not find a way to program this. He left the broken puzzle in the game, and players later praised it for making them feel like they had no control during that part.
Wreden first tested the game with a friend before sharing it online on July 31, 2011, just before graduating from college. After graduating, he planned to open a video game-themed bar but changed his plans after the mod became popular. He received offers to work on new games and job offers from larger companies but chose to focus on independent projects instead.
William Pugh, a game developer who had experience with the Source engine, helped improve the mod after hearing about it. Pugh and Wreden worked together for two years to create a new version of the game. They decided to change parts of the original and add new content, making it a stand-alone game. The new version includes the six original endings and several new ones. Kevan Brighting returned to voice the narrator, and a new soundtrack was created by Blake Robinson, Yiannis Ioannides, and Christiaan Bakker.
Pugh and Wreden worked together on the narrator’s script, adding and refining ideas. They also designed the game’s environments to reflect the narrator’s influence. Wreden said the game focuses on the relationship between the player and the narrator, explaining that the narrator and player are trying to understand each other but struggle to do so. He noted that about half of players followed the narrator’s advice, while the other half chose to act differently.
During testing, Pugh found that players did not like a flowchart showing where choices occurred, so it was removed. However, he added color cues to help players notice when they could make choices. In the original mod, one path used settings from Half-Life 2. The new version includes a path where players enter a Minecraft world and another where they revisit the beginning of Portal before being trapped in the original mod. These additions were approved by Minecraft’s creator, Markus Persson, and Valve, the company behind Portal.
To share the new version, the team first considered letting players pay what they wanted but later used Steam Greenlight, a service that allows independent developers to get player votes before a game is sold on Steam.
Critical reception
Within two weeks of its release, the mod was downloaded more than 90,000 times. Most players responded positively, and Wreden became "an overnight internet sensation among hardcore gamers."
The Stanley Parable mod was praised by journalists as a thought-provoking game. They noted it was an unusual game that players could experience quickly. Many journalists encouraged players to try the game themselves to avoid spoilers that might affect their experience. They also wanted to allow players to discuss the game on their websites’ forums. Ben Kuchera of Ars Technica said that while the game claims to give players choices, many of these choices do not actually change the outcome, as "to feel like you're in more control than you are." The voice acting was considered a strong part of the game, adding the right dry British humor to the complex storytelling. The game was listed as an honorable mention for the Seumas McNally Grand Prize and the "Excellence in Narrative" award at the 15th Annual Independent Games Festival. The Stanley Parable received the Special Recognition award at IndieCade 2012.
The 2013 remake was highly praised by reviewers. At Metacritic, as of March 2020, the game had an 88/100 score based on 47 critic reviews. Forbes listed Wreden in its 2013 "30 Under 30" leaders in the games industry for the success and marketing of The Stanley Parable. For his work on the game, William Pugh was named one of 18 "Breakthrough Brits" for 2014 by BAFTA.
Some critics focused on the game’s themes of existentialism. Ashton Raze of The Telegraph said the game "offers … a look at, not a critique of … the nature of narrative construction" that can be seen in other video games. The remake won the Audience Award and was nominated for "Excellence in Narrative" and "Excellence in Audio" at the 2014 Independent Games Festival Awards. It was also a finalist for the Seumas McNally Grand Prize. The game was nominated for "Best Story," "Best Debut Game," and "Game Innovation" awards at the 2014 BAFTA Video Games Awards. Brighting’s performance was nominated for the "Performer" award. At the 2013 National Academy of Video Game Trade Reviewers (NAVGTR) awards, the game won "Writing in a Comedy" and "Performance in a Comedy, Lead (Kevan Brighting as Narrator)." At the 17th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards, the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences nominated The Stanley Parable for "Downloadable Game of the Year," "Outstanding Innovation in Gaming," and "Outstanding Character Performance" for the Narrator.
Wreden reported that more than 100,000 copies were sold within the first three days the game was available. This was much more revenue than he expected, as sales from these three days would allow him to live comfortably and work full-time as a developer for five years. The game sold over one million copies in less than a year. The game’s demo was also well received, and Wreden said it was a key part of the full game’s success. IGN’s Luke Reilly listed The Stanley Parable’s demo as one of the top six demos in video games, noting that it was "an entirely standalone exercise designed to prepare [the player] for the unique player and narrator relationship that forms the core of The Stanley Parable experience."
A patch was released for the game shortly after its release to replace imagery in a 1950s-style instructional video that some players found racially offensive. Wreden said, "[W]e always wanted the game to be something that could be played by anyone of any age. If a person would feel less comfortable showing the game to their children then I've got no problem helping fix that!" After the remake, Wreden began developing his next title, The Beginner’s Guide, which was released in October 2015. Pugh set up the independent studio Crows Crows Crows. Their first game, Dr. Langeskov, The Tiger, and The Terribly Cursed Emerald: A Whirlwind Heist, was released in December 2015.
The book The Ethics of Playing, Researching, and Teaching Games in the Writing Classroom analyzed the game as an example of a game "that speaks to other games." It noted that the game’s lack of player control, combined with its many choices, created tension between the game’s goals and the player’s goals. The book also said that the game’s focus on the idea that the game was created before the player arrived made players question whether they were truly in control. It analyzed an ending where Stanley is trapped
In popular culture
In May 2014, a special pack featuring the voice of the Narrator was released for the multiplayer online battle arena game Dota 2. During the same month, The Narrator became an optional announcer for Johann Sebastian Joust in the game collection Sportsfriends.
The Stanley Parable was shown in episode 7 of the third season of House of Cards, along with other games like Monument Valley. In this episode, President Frank Underwood is shown the game by a novelist and video game reviewer who is writing his biography. The game’s ability to challenge the story was used as a metaphor for the confusing political situations in the show.
The Apple TV+ series Severance was inspired by The Stanley Parable.
Date
The Stanley Parable is a video game that tells a story. It was created by Davey Wreden and William Pugh. In the game, players control a character named Stanley. A narrator, played by actor Kevan Brighting, guides the story. As the game progresses, players face choices that lead to different paths. If players ignore the narrator's directions, those choices become part of the story. Depending on the decisions made, players may experience different endings before the game restarts from the beginning.
The original version of The Stanley Parable was released on July 31, 2011, as a free version of the game that changed parts of Valve's Half-Life 2. Later, Wreden and Pugh created a new version of the game using the Source engine, under the name Galactic Cafe. This remake included new areas, story paths, and improved graphics. It was approved through Steam Greenlight in 2012 and released for Windows on October 17, 2013. Updates later added support for macOS on December 19, 2013, and for Linux on September 9, 2015. An expanded version called The Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe was released on April 27, 2022. This version is available on consoles and includes more content and better graphics. An iOS version of Ultra Deluxe was released on October 7, 2024.
The original version and its remakes were well-received by critics and sold over one million copies within a year of release. Reviewers praised the game's story, its exploration of player choice, and its themes about decision-making, the relationship between creators and players, and ideas about fate.
Gameplay and synopsis
The player experiences the game through the eyes of the character, Stanley. Stanley can move around and interact with parts of the environment, such as pressing buttons or opening doors, but he cannot fight or perform other action-based tasks. The Narrator tells the story to the player. The Narrator explains that Stanley is employee 427 in an office building. His job is to watch a computer screen and press buttons as instructed, without asking questions. One day, the screen suddenly goes blank, which has never happened before. Confused, Stanley begins to explore the building and finds that it is completely empty.
At this point, the story changes based on the player’s choices. When the player reaches a place where a decision is possible, they can choose to follow the Narrator’s directions or take the opposite action. The first decision involves two open doors. The Narrator mentions that Stanley traveled through the leftmost door, but this has not happened yet. The Narrator considers the player’s choices and responds with new narration or tries to guide the player back to the main path if the player chooses differently. For example, if the player follows the Narrator’s directions and enters the leftmost door, the story continues with the plot about missing employees. If the player chooses the rightmost door instead, the Narrator changes the story. The Narrator may encourage the player to return to the main path, but the player can keep choosing differently, which causes further changes to the story. In some cases, the Narrator directly addresses the player, breaking the usual storytelling rules.
In the original 2011 version of the game, there were six different endings. The creator, Wreden, said it would take about an hour for a player to experience all of them. The 2013 remake added more than ten endings. Some of the original endings were changed, and new paths were added to reach them. The remake also included extra features, such as Easter eggs and more choices that affect the story.
The Ultra Deluxe version of the game added even more endings, new paths, and new areas. Players can choose an option to skip to the new content if they have played the game before. Otherwise, they must complete several endings before the new content becomes available. As Stanley, the player finds a new area labeled "new content," which includes a bucket that can be used to change the game’s endings. Another new path leads Stanley to a place called the Memory Zone, where the Narrator shares all the praise the game has received. However, the Narrator later finds an area filled with negative reviews from players, which causes the Narrator to feel upset about the game’s reception. After completing all new content, including a path where Stanley learns that a fictional game called The Stanley Parable 2 received poor reviews, the title screen changes to show the new name. No further changes to the game’s content occur after this.
Development
The original version of The Stanley Parable was created as a mod for Half-Life 2. Davey Wreden, who was 22 years old when the mod was released, began thinking about making the game about three years earlier. He was inspired by the way most video games tell stories and wanted to explore what would happen if players chose to act differently from the story’s direction. He also hoped this project would help him prepare for a career as a game developer.
At the time, many popular, high-budget video games made assumptions about how players would experience the game and rarely answered "what if" questions players might ask. Wreden believed some recent games, such as Metal Gear Solid, Half-Life 2, Portal, Braid, and BioShock, started to address this by creating stories that made players think. Though he first planned to make the game as a personal project, Wreden discovered other players had similar questions. He aimed to create a game that would spark discussion after players finished it.
Wreden described his game design as a way to "mess with the player's head" by surprising them or pretending to give answers and then taking them away. He used an "unconventional narrator" to show what might happen if players ignored the narrator’s guidance.
With no experience working with the Source engine, Wreden learned the basics by using information from online wikis and forums. Kevan Brighting provided the narrator’s voice, which Wreden found perfect for the game. Brighting recorded his lines in one take. Wreden kept the game short so players could experience all the endings without spending too much time replaying it. He also included silly endings, like "and then everything was happy!" to avoid making players feel like they earned a reward for finishing a long game.
Some of Wreden’s ideas were not included because he could not figure out how to make them work with the Source engine. For example, he wanted players to press buttons in response to narration but could not find a way to program this. He left the broken puzzle in the game, and players later praised it for making them feel like they had no control during that part.
Wreden first tested the game with a friend before sharing it online on July 31, 2011, just before graduating from college. After graduating, he planned to open a video game-themed bar but changed his plans after the mod became popular. He received offers to work on new games and job offers from larger companies but chose to focus on independent projects instead.
William Pugh, a game developer who had experience with the Source engine, helped improve the mod after hearing about it. Pugh and Wreden worked together for two years to create a new version of the game. They decided to change parts of the original and add new content, making it a stand-alone game. The new version includes the six original endings and several new ones. Kevan Brighting returned to voice the narrator, and a new soundtrack was created by Blake Robinson, Yiannis Ioannides, and Christiaan Bakker.
Pugh and Wreden worked together on the narrator’s script, adding and refining ideas. They also designed the game’s environments to reflect the narrator’s influence. Wreden said the game focuses on the relationship between the player and the narrator, explaining that the narrator and player are trying to understand each other but struggle to do so. He noted that about half of players followed the narrator’s advice, while the other half chose to act differently.
During testing, Pugh found that players did not like a flowchart showing where choices occurred, so it was removed. However, he added color cues to help players notice when they could make choices. In the original mod, one path used settings from Half-Life 2. The new version includes a path where players enter a Minecraft world and another where they revisit the beginning of Portal before being trapped in the original mod. These additions were approved by Minecraft’s creator, Markus Persson, and Valve, the company behind Portal.
To share the new version, the team first considered letting players pay what they wanted but later used Steam Greenlight, a service that allows independent developers to get player votes before a game is sold on Steam.
Critical reception
Within two weeks of its release, the mod was downloaded more than 90,000 times. Most players responded positively, and Wreden became "an overnight internet sensation among hardcore gamers."
The Stanley Parable mod was praised by journalists as a thought-provoking game. They noted it was an unusual game that players could experience quickly. Many journalists encouraged players to try the game themselves to avoid spoilers that might affect their experience. They also wanted to allow players to discuss the game on their websites’ forums. Ben Kuchera of Ars Technica said that while the game claims to give players choices, many of these choices do not actually change the outcome, as "to feel like you're in more control than you are." The voice acting was considered a strong part of the game, adding the right dry British humor to the complex storytelling. The game was listed as an honorable mention for the Seumas McNally Grand Prize and the "Excellence in Narrative" award at the 15th Annual Independent Games Festival. The Stanley Parable received the Special Recognition award at IndieCade 2012.
The 2013 remake was highly praised by reviewers. At Metacritic, as of March 2020, the game had an 88/100 score based on 47 critic reviews. Forbes listed Wreden in its 2013 "30 Under 30" leaders in the games industry for the success and marketing of The Stanley Parable. For his work on the game, William Pugh was named one of 18 "Breakthrough Brits" for 2014 by BAFTA.
Some critics focused on the game’s themes of existentialism. Ashton Raze of The Telegraph said the game "offers … a look at, not a critique of … the nature of narrative construction" that can be seen in other video games. The remake won the Audience Award and was nominated for "Excellence in Narrative" and "Excellence in Audio" at the 2014 Independent Games Festival Awards. It was also a finalist for the Seumas McNally Grand Prize. The game was nominated for "Best Story," "Best Debut Game," and "Game Innovation" awards at the 2014 BAFTA Video Games Awards. Brighting’s performance was nominated for the "Performer" award. At the 2013 National Academy of Video Game Trade Reviewers (NAVGTR) awards, the game won "Writing in a Comedy" and "Performance in a Comedy, Lead (Kevan Brighting as Narrator)." At the 17th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards, the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences nominated The Stanley Parable for "Downloadable Game of the Year," "Outstanding Innovation in Gaming," and "Outstanding Character Performance" for the Narrator.
Wreden reported that more than 100,000 copies were sold within the first three days the game was available. This was much more revenue than he expected, as sales from these three days would allow him to live comfortably and work full-time as a developer for five years. The game sold over one million copies in less than a year. The game’s demo was also well received, and Wreden said it was a key part of the full game’s success. IGN’s Luke Reilly listed The Stanley Parable’s demo as one of the top six demos in video games, noting that it was "an entirely standalone exercise designed to prepare [the player] for the unique player and narrator relationship that forms the core of The Stanley Parable experience."
A patch was released for the game shortly after its release to replace imagery in a 1950s-style instructional video that some players found racially offensive. Wreden said, "[W]e always wanted the game to be something that could be played by anyone of any age. If a person would feel less comfortable showing the game to their children then I've got no problem helping fix that!" After the remake, Wreden began developing his next title, The Beginner’s Guide, which was released in October 2015. Pugh set up the independent studio Crows Crows Crows. Their first game, Dr. Langeskov, The Tiger, and The Terribly Cursed Emerald: A Whirlwind Heist, was released in December 2015.
The book The Ethics of Playing, Researching, and Teaching Games in the Writing Classroom analyzed the game as an example of a game "that speaks to other games." It noted that the game’s lack of player control, combined with its many choices, created tension between the game’s goals and the player’s goals. The book also said that the game’s focus on the idea that the game was created before the player arrived made players question whether they were truly in control. It analyzed an ending where Stanley is trapped
In popular culture
In May 2014, a special pack featuring the voice of the Narrator was released for the multiplayer online battle arena game Dota 2. During the same month, The Narrator became an optional announcer for Johann Sebastian Joust in the game collection Sportsfriends.
The Stanley Parable was shown in episode 7 of the third season of House of Cards, along with other games like Monument Valley. In this episode, President Frank Underwood is shown the game by a novelist and video game reviewer who is writing his biography. The game’s ability to challenge the story was used as a metaphor for the confusing political situations in the show.
The Apple TV+ series Severance was inspired by The Stanley Parable.
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