| “ | But here's a spoiler for you; that timer isn't a catalyst to keep the action moving along. It's just seconds ticking away to your death. You're only still playing instead of watching a cutscene because I want to watch you for every moment that you're powerless. To see you made humble. This is not a challenge, it's a tragedy. You wanted to control this world, that's fine. But I'm going to destroy it first, so you can't. | „ |
| ~ The Narrator to Stanley in the "Countdown Ending". |
| “ | Hahahahaha, gotcha! Oh, come on. Did you actually think you had a loving wife? Who'd want to commit their life to you? I'm trying to make a point here, Stanley; I'm trying to get you to see something. Come inside. Let me show you what's really going on here. [If Stanley walks away:] Sorry, but you're in my story now. | „ |
| ~ The Narrator mocks Stanley in the "Phone Ending". |
The Narrator is the main antagonist of the puzzle adventure game, The Stanley Parable.
The Narrator's role as a character depends on what Stanley, controlled by the player, does, as the game allows them to form an endless amount of conclusive outcomes.
What the Narrator is exactly shall always remain a mystery, but according to himself, he is basically the writer of Stanley's life, changing the script constantly. He is aware that he is in a video game, is just a voice in Stanley's head, and has complete control over reality itself, or at least Stanley's reality. He sees how Stanley's boring life works out and always puts a sadistic and/or helpful twist before resetting it to see what happens in the next incarnation of Stanley's life. Others believe Stanley is simply insane, imagining that he is being terrorized by an omnipresent bully stuck in his head.
He was voiced by Kevan Brighting.
Biography[]
Overview[]
Stanley is simply a middle-aged man working at an unlabeled office with several other co-workers. All he does is press the keys on his computer when he is instructed to, but he is happy with his boring occupation. However, on a certain day, every single human being in the office suddenly disappears, including the hundreds of co-workers and managers.
The Narrator is with Stanley through the entire journey, being the creator of this place and the one who made his co-workers vanish in the first place. However, it's implied he's as powerless and trapped as Stanley.
Freedom Ending[]
When Stanley investigates his boss' office, with the Narrator's commentary, he stumbles upon a mind control facility, revealing that all of the workers including himself have been controlled to unquestionably and obediently work by the employers. Stanley, knowing what he must do, completely shuts down the facility's power, deactivating the mind control devices before he walks out of the office as a free man.
Countdown Ending[]
The Countdown ending truly shows the Narrator's sadistic side. If Stanley instead activates the facility's power in attempt to gain it for himself, the Narrator berates him for being so selfish and sets the office to self-destruct in two minutes. While the timer counts down, the Narrator constantly mocks and taunts Stanley, telling him out of pity why everyone disappeared. The Narrator reveals that he simply erased them from existence and set Stanley free from the mind control machine, just to see what happens. He also reveals that the story of Stanley has been completely recreated by the Narrator's god-like reality bending abilities several times, all of them differing. He sometimes allows Stanley to die a horrible, slow death, and at others gives him freedom, all depending on the Narrator's bipolar mood and cold-blooded traits. At other times, he lets the office and everyone in it burn to a crisp, the Narrator amused by how he allows reality to work out, but has it always reset for another era to begin.
The Narrator is cut off by the entire facility exploding, killing Stanley in the process.
Games Ending[]
When Stanley refuses to do anything the Narrator says, the latter displays five buttons in front of the former's very eyes, each button labeled as their respective numbers. These five buttons are used on a rating scale (1 to 5) on the Narrator's game idea. After sending Stanley to a false leader-board, the narrator teleports Stanley to a made-up game. The game is a cardboard cut-out of a baby "crawling" towards a patch of fire. Stanley loses if the baby reaches the fire, and he must constantly teleport the never-ending crawling baby back to the start by pressing a button. The Narrator orders the player to play for four hours straight. Losing results in the Narrator being angered and out of frustration have him teleport Stanley to Minecraft (Firewatch in Ultra Deluxe). However, upon realizing how open-ended the game is, he teleports Stanley to Portal (Rocket League in Ultra Deluxe), ultimately ending up in the Narrator arrogantly leaving Stanley to rot.
Coward Ending[]
If Stanley simply remains at his desk (after closing the door) desperately waiting for commands, the Narrator will call him a coward who can't decide for himself and resets the game.
Mariella Ending[]
Stanley believes he is insane after just believing the strange events in his life were simply dreams, but this theory was diminished once he couldn't wake up. Meanwhile, the Narrator ironically narrates about how Stanley is disturbed and confused how there's a random narrator narrating in his head and how odd it is the Narrator is narrating about Stanley's confusion to the Narrator narrating about himself. Stanley then begins to panic before the screen cuts to black. The Narrator then begins to follow a woman named Mariella, who is on her way to a meeting. In the street she sees Stanley, who had insanely muttered to himself saying how nothing is real before he falls down, dead.
Museum Ending[]
When Stanley attempts to escape instead of head to the Mind Control Facility to unlock the first two endings, he is thrown in a junk filled container that will be crushed and recycled. A female Narrator takes over the usual commentator's job and teleports Stanley to a clear white museum of beta elements from when the game was in its infancy. She then informs the player that the only way to save Stanley is to quit and reset the game before he is violently crushed. If they do not, just that will happen and the player will be left on a blank screen.
Confusion Ending[]
If Stanley gets lost in the underground "basement" area of the game, even the Narrator will be confused and clueless on where to continue to get back to the original story. He then resets the game several times, but cannot seem to boot the game back up into shape, thinking Stanley broke it. The Narrator then orders an entity known as The Stanley Parable Adventure Line™, being a thick yellow endless line made to lead Stanley in the right direction. The line, however, ends up leading back to the monitor room, and the Narrator gets frustrated over the circumstances, thus restarting once more. Eventually, the Narrator and Stanley encounter a large schedule detailing on how the Confusion Ending works due to the fact it's extremely complicated. The Narrator, baffled at the fact that his life has been scripted the entire time, refuses to follow the schedule and doesn't reset just to rebel against what the schedule says. The Narrator details the philosophy and annoying antics of what's been happening until he is cut off by the game actually resetting to its original form.
Phone Ending[]
If Stanley were to answer the ringing phone in a certain room, he will be teleported to an apartment building, specifically right outside his apartment's door. He hears his wife on the other side of it, but when it is opened, it is just a lifeless mannequin with a speaker built into her, just a trick by the Narrator to taunt his pawn. Stanley then enters his house and finds his computer, when he then begins what he's always done; press buttons. Every button press shifts the room to look like Stanley's office until the end where it is a complete replica of it. Meanwhile, the Narrator talks to himself about Stanley and how much of a meaningless, worthless person he is, who is seemingly incapable of telling the difference between what is reality and what isn't.
Not Stanley Ending[]
If Stanley instead doesn't answer the phone and unplugs it, the Narrator gets extremely confused, seeing how, in the script he made, Stanley wasn't allowed to do that. The Narrator then realizes that Stanley isn't Stanley, but rather you (the player themself) are Stanley. The Narrator then shows the player a decision-making guide, but quickly realizes the fabric of reality is ripping apart thanks to "narrative contradiction". The game is then reset only for Stanley to stumble back to the two doors room. Upon heading to the boss' office again, there is instead of a keypad a voice receiver, you must yell the password into the panel's mic. Stanley cannot speak (since he was trained to never speak up) and the Narrator grows uncharacteristically furious before the game resets yet again. Taking the door on the right leads to the game going worse with the "narrative contradiction" as a result of trying to merge with reality, the Narrator gets extremely frustrated over the player not having gone through the door on the left and figures he has to shut The Stanley Parable down only for it to turn itself on again, in a dark area where the Narrator eventually expresses his displeasure for the player having ruined the Narrator's story and calls them out. After both doors have been entered at least once, the player is then teleported above the two door room and out of Stanley's body, thus rendering him unable to do anything. The Narrator grows very depressed and waits for Stanley to do something before the game resets for good.
Powerful Ending[]
Near the beginning, Stanley must cross a gap via an automatically controlled lift. If Stanley were to drop off the lift into the warehouse, the fall will instantly kill him and the Narrator will praise him for his death, stating that the only reason he idiotically committed suicide was to prove he was in control.
Cold Feet Ending[]
If Stanley moves off the lift just before it leaves the platform, it moves away leaving Stanley on the platform. The Narrator encourages Stanley to jump off the platform, saying he will likely survive the fall. Once Stanley is tempted to jump off, he falls to his death. The Narrator sarcastically remarks that he was wrong about the outcome.
Zending[]
If Stanley actually obeys the Narrator when he asks him to walk through the red door, he'll get infested with overwhelming happiness and teleports the both of them to a beautiful field of colorful stars where he hopes for them to forever live there in blissful peace. However, next to the field is a realistic staircase that leads to a fatal fall. Stanley must constantly throw himself from the peak of the case (while the Narrator pleads him not to, as if he dies, the game will reset and the Narrator's memory of the starfield shall be erased) until Stanley finally dies.
Escape Pod Ending[]
All Stanley must do is find the escape pod chamber and approach one of the pods. However, a banner reminds him that both the player and the Narrator must be present for the pod to function, thus the game resets. This contradicts everything the Narrator tells about himself, as he is assumed to be an omnipresent entity.
Out of The Window Ending[]
If Stanley manages to "glitch" his way out of the window, he will drop into a white void. The Narrator then asks if the player is sick of the gag and then blurts out a detailed, overly-complicated description on what would have happened if they chose the other choice. Either way, Stanley will be left to sit in the void until it is manually reset.
Serious Room Ending[]
If the player tries to use cheats, the Narrator will teleport/banish them to the Serious Room, a room that's extremely serious. After lecturing the player on how extremely serious the Serious Room is, the Narrator leaves them there forever as punishment for (attempted) cheating.
The Stanley Parable: Ultra Deluxe[]
New content/Skip button endings[]
Upon entering a door labeled "New Content", a ride begins that explains the creation of Ultra Deluxe, while also building anticipation around the remake's new content. The Narrator expresses his excitement over the new content, and Stanley enters an elevator afterwards. The elevator doesn't start right away, which confuses the Narrator, but then the elevator starts. When the elevator reaches the top, the Narrator and Stanley find a "jump circle", which allows Stanley to jump for a limited amount of times when he stands in the circle. After leaving the room, Stanley enters another elevator. While ascending, the Narrator expresses his dissatisfaction with the content that has been shown so far. When this elevator reaches it's destination, Stanley walks across a catwalk, leading to a room with nothing but a whiteboard revealing that all the new content has been shown. Upon this sight, the Narrator rants for a moment about greedy game developers making cheap ports, but also pins some blame onto himself for building up the new content. The Narrator then decides to restart, placing Stanley in a slightly redesigned version of the office building.
Stanley begins making his way through the building, before the Narrator calls for him from within a nearby vent. While crawling through the vent, the Narrator tells Stanley that the disappointment of the new content left him thinking about how good the original Stanley Parable was, Stanley eventually comes across a large doorway placed there by the Narrator. Upon stepping through the doorway, Stanley enters the "Memory Zone", a place the Narrator created so that he can relive his greatest memories. Stanley explores the Memory Zone with the Narrator, finding a few positive reviews of the original Stanley Parable along the way. Eventually though, Stanley enters an area of the Memory Zone that is under maintenance, which the Narrator doesn't seem to recognize. While exploring, they come across multiple negative reviews from Steam, one of which suggests adding a "skip button" to avoid having to shift focus towards the Narrator's often long dialogue. The Narrator agrees with this idea, as a small building arises from the nearby water.
Inside the building is the skip button, which freezes whoever presses it in time for a few minutes, long enough to not hear the Narrator's speeches. The Narrator prompts Stanley to press the button, even going on an exaggerated example of one of his monologues until he does.
When Stanley returns, the Narrator declares the power of the skip button, before pondering if he should refer to his monologue as either a "treatise" or a "manifesto", eventually leading to him discussing the nature of choice. Afterwards, the Narrator seems to decide on "treatise", before being hooked back to "manifesto". To avoid continued discussion of this, the Narrator tells Stanley about a solution he often uses for problems like this: repeatedly saying both words until he becomes sick of one of them. Which he does until Stanley presses the button again.
When Stanley exits his stasis, the Narrator further gives praise to the skip button, anticipating the reaction from the reviewer who inspired the button's creation. The Narrator wonders if they will edit the review, or be granted the ability to edit it. The Narrator then goes on to outline his "perfect review" until the button is pressed again.
The first thing the Narrator does when Stanley returns is inform him that the time between skips is becoming increasingly longer, this one in particular being either 30 or 45 minutes. Because of this, the Narrator decides that the point has been made, and they can move on, before noticing that the door has disappeared. The Narrator tries to find another idea on how to leave, before leaving to look for a new door to put onto the building.
Should the button be pressed again, the Narrator will reveal that twelve hours have passed as he has looked for the door on every wall of the building. The Narrator then decides that if he hadn't tried to meet the demands of the reviews, all of this could have been avoided.
The next button press freezes Stanley in time for about a week or two. Upon his reawakening, the Narrator expresses his joy that he can speak with Stanley again. The Narrator shows that with the time that has passed, he has realized that being listened to gives him the true feel of existing. And without it, he feels like nothing. The Narrator then decides that he and Stanley should sit in quietness for a moment.
After pressing the button again, more than a year passes. As Stanley returns, the Narrator tells him about all the time he has had to look back on all of his experiences with Stanley, before describing to him how it feels to sit in total silence for an entire year, and the feelings that spawn from it. The Narrator then leaves Stanley within the building, to show him how he has felt all this time.
There is no dialogue from the Narrator after the seventh and eighth skips, but after the ninth, he is heard ranting about how the reviewers couldn't truly experience his story how it was meant to be seen, seeking only jokes and entertainment.
By the eleventh skip, the Narrator has seemingly gone insane, repeating "the end is never" to himself over and over again. He is not heard again in this ending after this.
Sequel ending[]
Upon entering a door labeled "NEW new content", the Narrator reveals that he placed the door there, and expresses his excitement over what he has to show Stanley. During an elevator ride, the Narrator reveals that he still hasn't gotten over the new content of Ultra Deluxe, and announces "The Stanley Parable 2". Stanley makes his way to an expo hall, where the Narrator shows off some of his ideas for this sequel, among them being collectable figurines of Stanley, and a "reassurance bucket". Stanley then goes up a staircase, which leads to a large stage. The Narrator excitedly presents a mockup of what The Stanley Parable 2 could look like with all of the new ideas, though it doesn't quite meet up to his expectations. The Narrator then decides to put some of these ideas into the original game.
Bucket endings[]
After the sequel ending is completed once, the reassurance bucket will appear near Stanley's office. Picking it up will grant access to the bucket endings, variants of the original endings themed around buckets. These range from a bucket-themed game show, to the Narrator becoming obsessed with the bucket himself.
Elevator ending[]
In this ending, Stanley repeatedly goes up and down his boss' office via it's elevator, the Narrator sarcastically calling him a storytelling genius all the while, going so far as to send Stanley to a massive stage with an adoring crowd.
Vent ending[]
By climbing a wooden plank, and walking along the edge in the warehouse, a vent can be found and entered. Stanley finds himself in a secret room, where the Narrator appears to be revealed to be nothing but a collection of tape recordings. Suddenly, the Narrator will appear and mock Stanley's intelligence.
Figurine ending[]
After the sequel ending, the Stanley figurines will be placed around the map to be collected. After all of them are collected, and the game was reset, the Narrator will halt Stanley. He expresses how fond of an experience finding the figurines was, and decides to take Stanley with him to the Memory Zone to relive the memories. After revisiting the places where the figurines were found, the Narrator resets the game so they can move on and get back on track. However, the Narrator stops the loading screen. Not ready to let go of the memories, the Narrator takes Stanley back to remember collecting the figurines again at a faster pace. After going through the figurines, the Narrator decides he wants to remember more, and takes Stanley further through the Memory Zone.
This leads to the Narrator recalling his time before he created Stanley. He used to make big and thoughtful decisions, but over time, he stopped making these decisions, created Stanley, and followed him throughout his adventures. The Narrator realizes that Stanley has grown tiresome, and desires to make his big choices again, but not before telling Stanley's story one last time.
Quotes[]
| “ | I have to say this, though, this version of events has been rather amusing. Watching you try to make sense of everything and take back the control wrested away from you... it's quite rich. I almost hate to see it go! But I'm sure whatever I come up with on the next go around will be even better. | „ |
| ~ The Narrator to Stanley in the "Countdown Ending". |
| “ | My goodness! Only 34 seconds left... but I'm enjoying this so much! You know what? To hell with it. I'm going to put some extra time on the clock; why not! These are precious additional seconds, Stanley. Time doesn't grow on trees! Oh, dear me, what's the matter, Stanley? Is it that you have no idea where you are going or what you're supposed to be doing right now? Or did you just assume when you saw that timer that something in this room is capable of turning it off? |
„ |
| ~ The Narrator to Stanley in the "Countdown Ending". |
| “ | I mean, look at you, running from button to button, screen to screen, clicking on every little thing in this room! These numbered buttons! No! These colored ones! Or maybe this big, red button! Or this door! Everything! Anything! Something here will save me! Why would you think that, Stanley? That this video game can be beaten, won, solved? Do you have any idea what your purpose in this place is? Hahaha, heh, Stanley... you're in for quite a disappointment. | „ |
| ~ The Narrator to Stanley in the "Countdown Ending". |
| “ | Take a look at the clock, Stanley. That's 30 seconds you have left to struggle. Thirty seconds until a big boom, and then nothing. No ending here, just you being blown to pieces. Will you cling desperately to your frail life, or will you let it go peacefully? Another choice! Make it count. Or don't. It's all the same to me. All a part of the joke. And believe me, I will be laughing at every second of your inevitable life, from the moment we fade in until the moment I say: Happily Ever- [everything explodes, game restarts] | „ |
| ~ The Narrator to Stanley in the "Countdown Ending". |
Trivia[]
- When entering the Boss' office, if Stanley chooses to go left instead of right, they will find the Boss' personal bathroom, which has a rhyme on the wall reading "Since the boss knows what the boss says goes, if the bosses suffered losses, then that's what the boss chose!". This could potentially mean that the Narrator is completely omnipotent, and that he's simply faking it every time he loses control over the situation.