Stanley Parable: Ultimate Deluxe

[brain melted image]

The Stanley Parable: Ultimate Deluxe is a mind melting game.

At least, it melted my brain.

Be warned, however, that this article will have spoilers for both the Stanley Parable, and the Ultimate Deluxe version. Both these games are best played with no prior knowledge. Seriously. If you plan at all to play these games, don't read this article. Don't read any articles. Stop and play it. Go.

Now that those soon to be brain puddles are gone, let's talk about...

[The Stanley Parable title]

The Stanley Parable is a game, not about a man named Stanley, but about the journey. Sure your goal in the game is to get to the end of an ending, but the ending of each run is not what's fun about the game, in fact often when i was playing the original game in 2016, i was left wanting more in each run. That's because the Stanley Parable is a game about the journey, the player and the narrator having this dialogue, this back and forth. The narrator saying one thing, you reply by doing something. A discourse between a recording and a player.

[The Stanley Parable: Ultimate Deluxe title]

The Stanley Parable: Ultimate Deluxe is a game, not about a man named Stanley, but about the Narrator. A man who wants to tell a story. But we'll get into that. Because it's also about content.

When I started playing TSP:UD, i was confused. "New Content!!" is what was advertised. "More then double the size of the script!".
But i couldn't find it. i ran through the true ending, nothing. i ran through the window ending, nothing. i ran through the art ending, something! They had changed the art ending! Previously, you visited Minecraft, the narrator talked about creation and such, But now you were taken to Firewatch, and Rocket League!
Still, it wasn't much. I felt disappointed.
I started my next run, walking to the first choice, and then I saw a new door, "New Content!"
Finally! Through the door i found... the jump circle! and that was it. thank you for enjoying the new content.

The Narrator is, justifiably, upset. He takes us to a small place he has created and curated. The Memory Zone. In it we relive the good ol' days, the shining reviews of the original game. How amazing it was! That is until we stumble upon the steam reviews. They talk about how he is annoying, and so he creates a skip button!
The skip button however, progressively skips longer and longer periods of time, minutes, to hours, to years, to... well we don't really know, because the narrator is gone. The room destroyed. We keep skipping until one time we are in a desert, maybe centuries have gone past, who can know. The game eventually resets.

Once it has reset, we find ourselves once again at the new content door, but it is instead...

[New New content sign]

The narrator had put together this whole exhibit of new content he wanted to put together in the game. The button that says your name, if it's Jim, new office decorations, the mostly infinite hole (an amazing experience), and of course the bucket.

I thought the bucket was a funny goof, loved it, at first i was a bit annoyed how much screen space, and that i couldn't put it down. i worked my way through the rest of the exhibits, and soon the game reset.

Then it was back! On my way through to the first decision, i saw the bucket. I remembered how much screen it took up and did two more runs, ignoring it both times with some funny quips from the narrator. I closed down the game, and took a break.
During my break i saw one of my favourite YouTubers had made a video about it. thinking i had seen most of what the new stuff was like, i decided to watch it. then they started talking about the bucket. i immediately stopped watching and realized i missed something with it. back to the game i went.

The bucket. It's genius. i picked it up and continued on and immediately i knew this was new content. Every line that i have had burnt in my head for years suddenly replaced with lines about the bucket. i decided to do the true ending with the bucket and the whole thing was different, but the same. I loved it.

i decided to do the confusion ending, my favourite, with the bucket. Excited to hear what the adventure line would be like with my new friend.
Instead, i was met with an intervention. The narrator was worried i was spending too much time with the bucket. This bucket. My friend put it well. "The bucket just completely derails every ending."

I'm not going to lie to you, the Stanley Parable 2 (as it had become since the narrator showed me all his new features) made me experience so many emotions. from when i set the bucket free and cried, to when i killed the bucket and felt horrified, not just of myself but of the buckets many war crimes.

The bucket is exactly what TSP:UD needed. it doubled the content, made you think it was going to be a cheap bit, and then completely flipped the universe on your head.
But the game was Not Done.

Every time you started the game, you were asked to set the time. Then you got to meet the text, just a fun little character a first, lots of emotion, how they wanted to collect data, how they were thankful for you setting the time, even if it wasn't correct.
The fifth time you started the game, the text got a bit deep.

They don't really know you, even with all this data you've given them. You don't really know them. In the end we are alone.

[ You like playing games alone, don't you?]

The text told me, it will see me later.

In the Stanley Parable 2, there are these collectables, the name changes often but Stanlerines™ is my favourite. You collect these Stanlerines™, 6 of them, and the Narrator who has been insisting there is no reward every time you picked one up, gets sad. it's done. there's no more. so you and he go on an adventure through the memories, collecting them all again, and again. in the end the game does reset, and you are left feeling the narrator.

Through this whole thing, through all the bucket endings, the tone has been very different from the original endings. Themes of unreality, of recycled content, of caring too much about others opinions. In the original endings, the narrator feels like he wants to tell a story but it's escaping him, but for the most part he's ok with it. But these endings. They feel more Hopeless. More out of control. The original endings focus mostly on humour, with a few heavier ones. But these new endings have a tone of gallows humour to them. I don't think i can remember a bucket ending without that tone.

And then, i discovered the epilogue.

It opens in a desert. Time progresses. Day, Night, Clear, Storms. Wandering.
We come across the memory zone, covered in sand, decrepit, abandoned. We walk into it, and through it into a cave lit by buttons that say your name only if your name is Jim.
It's filled with reviews of the Stanley Parable 2, mostly negative.
There's a press release, no more Stanley parables.
You walk down the mostly infinite hole, sparkles floating from it. And drop into an office. With a single computer.

The text returns, It talks about the fact that the developers won't make another Stanley Parable. They propose a solution. We make a new Stanley Parable. Of course, making more content is too hard, so we just change the name. every time we boot the game up we change the name and add a number onto it.

At this point, I'm not sure i know what is going on, who i am, what game i am playing. Stanley parable Ultimate Deluxe? Stanley Parable 2? Stanley Parable 3: Return of Hole? Stanley parable 4: Danger of Telephone? I don't know any more.
I don't know How Much it comes across in text, but my brain at this point has melted. It doesn't exist. I have suffered Ego Death. The game itself has too.

This is a game, not about a man named Stanley, not about the Narrator, not the player, or the text.

This is a game, about buckets.

[The Bucket Image]