A surprising if not uncomfortable turn of events.
[To be clear; I do not believe that The Beginner's Guide is a game in the typical definition as an interactive piece of media, and instead I view it as a story vessel. As such, I'm reviewing it based on how well it communicates itself in this form and not from a gameplay standard.]
Without getting into the argument of 'are video games art', I am not the target audience for games that are focused on delivering a moral or a lesson instead of a gameplay-based experience. My own cynicism makes me rather numb to the emotions and feelings conveyed by the developer, which makes the whole experience fall flat, which in most cases is a fault of my own, not the developer. That said, I would be giving blatant spoilers if I explained why The Beginner's Guide struck something of a nerve with me, even if it was so heavy-handed that it ended up polarizing my feelings come the final act. The mixture of human thoughts and emotions that are channeled into game development is an interesting subject to tackle, but too many of the answers are spoon fed to the player instead of letting us sit and stew on the material.
The Beginner's Guide is a tale on the often fragile link between game developers and their players, or more specifically between Davey Wreden (developer of The Stanley Parable) and one of his friends, Coda, who makes many odd, brief games yet never releases them to the public ... Wreden acts as the narrator, putting up his thoughts and evaluations using Coda's games as the backdrop, often pausing to share his feelings regarding Coda, their relationship and what the games mean. The games in question are shuffled in and out in a timeline, most of them are relatively brief, yet they're padded with Wreden's discussion. The longer ones require a bit more time for you to navigate their linear paths, and Wreden provides narration to accompany you. At times though, I felt that Wreden's narration bled into the scene at hand a bit too much, being more of a distraction than anything relevant to the situation.
The games that Wreden has you traverse aren't anything to write home about, but their quality isn't the focus of The Beginner's Guide; specifically you're asked to look at the design and reasoning behind the games, to analyze not the games themselves, but the process of creating them in the first place, and where Coda was coming from as he did. However, more often than not does Wreden just out and out give you the 'answers' or the meanings, leaving little room for you to come up with your own theories. Not much is left a mystery save for Coda himself, who can only be put together in the player's mind through Wreden's depictions of him and through his games. You learn more and more about Coda as you proceed through the timeline, but it's painful how on the nose some of the revelations can be; a machine to represent the thought process. Fleeing from sliding prison bars into darkness. Repetition of a known entity. Yes Wreden, the player can see these themes and what they represent, so explaining them in fine detail is simply beating them over the head with a limp fish. Even if the player doesn't immediately understand the themes, there's something to be said for showing, not telling.
It's Wreden himself that ends up souring most of the experience for me unfortunately. While he is well-spoken and keeps the script casual, like he's speaking directly to yourself as a person and not as a player, he ends up coming across as far, far too practiced in his narration, losing much of the personal touch. This is debilitating because in later acts Wreden's analysis and discussion begins to fall apart at the seams which is both unexpected and unsettling, my comfort zone feeling threatened much in the same way as Coda's, having his games released publicly against his will. The tone shifts from discussing and analyzing the games of an introverted individual to a self-admitted confessional of a man trying to understand and fix something he cannot where it's arguably not his place, or even right, to do so. The final game the player is put through is as clear cut of a personal barrier as one can create, and the big revelation in it was such a sudden, sharp punch to the gut that it rattled me more than I care to admit. But there was still that nagging doubt in my mind about how Wreden's narration here felt disingenuous due to its practiced delivery, and by the credits roll I was left feeling a bit emotionally betrayed because of this.
I can't state enough how much my expectations were subverted partway into The Beginner's Guide. I had done nary an ounce of research about the 'game' when I purchased it, and all I expected was an essay on game development done in interactive form. While I was never able to shake that doubt regarding Wreden's unnatural narration, the surprising change in tone and message was certainly welcomed, putting my fears of the game merely being a rambling tangent on video game creation to rest. A good part of the analysis is on video game creation, namely the creative process itself and not the technical development. I can't really remember the last time I was sat down, shown and talked to about what someone was thinking or feeling when they put something into a game, generally commentary like that is reserved for developer logs filled with so much technical lingo that any person touch feels artificial at that point. Your mileage with The Beginner's Guide may vary greatly from mine; in the end my sympathy for Coda became astronomical and I had to swallow my heart back down my throat during the final act. It's the tonal shift that ends up making me give The Beginner's Guide a confident recommendation, but remember: this isn't a game that's meant to challenge you or put any of your gaming skills to the test. You're going to be listening, looking and learning - If this doesn't interest you, then by all means pass it by.
