LogFAQs > #932433839

#58



Years of release: 2011 (PC, original), 2013 (PC, remake)
Beaten?: Seen all the endings

I have a name for this particular genre of game, or at least, the sort of thing that this game does. I call it an Easter Egg Hunt. On TVTropes, I think the term they would use is "The Dev Team Thinks Of Everything" or something like that. I love games in which a conversation between the player and the developers happen in which the player tries to think of different ways they can get the game to have a response to something they did, and in turn, the developers have already anticipated that response, and have something funny happen when you try to do it. Or, just in general, any game where there are a lot of interesting little secrets that you can find in weird nooks and crannies of the game and in the margins of things you wouldn't normally try to do. Super Mario RPG was one of my favorite games in this genre back in the 90's, and the Paper Marios after that. There's another good example of this I'll get to later in the list. The Stanley Parable is kind of like this, except the game is ONLY doing this, and it's having a big laugh out of it.

I think people mostly know about The Stanley Parable at this point? If you don't, though, it's basically a walking simulator that was originally built as a Half-Life mod, in which you take the role of a titular Stanley, walking around an office, while an omniscient narrator explains what Stanley does, and shenanigans ensue. It's really just a cute little story game with a lot of funny metacommentary, really good for a few laughs. Lots of great gags in this game. And most of all, I love that this game really expects you to try to explore and look for ways to get new story paths out of the game - even though there's almost nothing you can do in this game except walk around, there's something about that that still really gets the creative part of my brain going, trying to figure out places I haven't tried to go or things I haven't tried to do to get the narrator to give me some funny quip about my actions. I won't say too much more about that, since for one I think it's best experienced for yourself if it interests you at all, and secondly because it's been about 7 years and I don't remember the game that well, I only remember how much playing it made me smile.

I couldn't help but notice something funny when I was looking this game up on Wikipedia for the release data and such; under the reception part of the article, there's a lot of quotes about people who seem to be taking this game very seriously. Talking about themes of choice and control in narrative and how it's a pioneering game in gaming's transition into a legitimate art form. I do think that this is a brilliantly clever little game with great writing and a wonderful voice acting performance from Kevan Brighting, and there are certainly themes you can explore here, but the core of the game is all just a big joke on the player, and that's what I love about it so much. It pokes fun at artsy games a bit, and it pokes fun at itself a bit, and it's just really having a good time doing it - I doubt there's any greater meaning here, just an interesting little examination of the nature of making choices in video games.

I want to play this one again. It's been a while, and I think I've forgotten most of the gags in this game, and I think I could have another really good laugh at it and have fun trying to find all of the secrets again. Apparently in 2020 there's a new edition of the game coming out with even more new content, so I guess I'll be waiting for that!