I can't be the only one who feels this way.

[Kernel]

I understand that it took much effort to port the entire game to unity for the sake of console ports and a desire to upgrade the game's visuals. For that a modicum of the charging price is understood. I also understand that since the original game was nearly 10 years ago that there are many who have yet to experience any of The Stanley Parable. Despite this loyal payers are still charged ~16.60 USD for the game.

Am I the only one who feels generally underwhelmed by the new content for this release? I'm really trying to look past that and appreciate the coy joke at the industry against re-releases and sequels, but it really just feels like the game is trying to have it's cake and eat it too. Changing a good portion to nearly all of the original endings to tie a bucket into them dialogue wise is pretty cool to gawk at in terms of scripting, but once realizing that being nearly all of the new content save for a couple of endings leaves a bad taste in my mouth after multiple years of delay. I love the original and still enjoy all of the old content, and what little new written content there is is admittedly really funny and well done, but once that pond of content has run dry it leaves me. Having played the original feeling like I'd paid for a $16 engine change with a couple of changes. Have I missed some memo in the marketing where this re-release is intended for new players only? Have I missed some specific door, ending, or path that leads me to a well of new content and endings to blow me away in a similar manner to the original?
I'm not looking to flame the discussion board with hate or general negativity towards The Stanley Parable, as I absolutely love the game itself, but I want to come to some understanding with what has actually been done with this release.

TLDR; I feel the charging price (for 2013 players) is too much for how little new (actual) content there is, despite the numerous delays over the course of multiple years. I think for new players the asking price is acceptable.

[Cruxin]

Originally posted by Piano man:

My point is that there now seems to be less innovation, and more of an attempt to slap a new coat of paint on something and ask for more money.

this speaks to such a fundamental misunderstanding of... basically everything about TSP, and everything about the New Content, I'm not even going to bother

[Piano man]

Originally posted by Cruxin:

I'm not even going to bother

GOOD... then don't bother.

[Cruxin]

Originally posted by Piano man:

Originally posted by Cruxin:

I'm not even going to bother

GOOD... then don't bother.

might keep replying for no reason though, it seems to irk you which is kinda funny

[candyking24]

I completely agree with you, and I was just coming to the community tab to ask the same question. this really blows :/ EDIT: actually i just thought of something, they cut out endings where you were holding the bucket just so you could have some short bucket ending. man why could this have not been better. def refunding if nothing comes up in the next few days.

[sleepygaymer]

I have been really trying to figure out why the new content just isn't clicking for me, then it came to me. The new content doesn't follow the same gameplay as the old content.

The fun of the original game was to do everything you weren't supposed to do. The narrator would tell the player to do something, the player would do the opposite, and in turn the narrator would get pissed/sad/frustrate with the player. The fun was to trying all the things you weren't supposed to do.

The new content is literally just following what the narrator says. For example: In the new content there comes a point where you are presented with a machine that was built to destroy the bucket. You can't actually put the bucket in the machine. There is no choice" . There are hints of things being done outside of what the narrator wants like when you get the broken achievement machine working and the narrator doesn't understand how that's possible but those are far and few between and they never really go anywhere.

[Defective Dopamine Pez Dispenser]

No. The game delivered exactly what I felt was advertised to me, and I got exactly what I expected out of it: the original experience remastered and, with the added content, slightly more than double the scripted dialogue and areas.

The game was always very brief, people just remember it as being deeper and more substantial than it was at the time due to going in blind originally, experimenting, and finding it to be a for-its-time very novel experience. It was born as a mod and expanded upon for a commercial release, and has been remastered and expanded somewhat again for this wider commercial release.

[DaVince]

Originally posted by Touchdown:

One more vote for the disappointed camp.

The store page says: "dramatically expands the world of the original game with new content, new choices, and new secrets to uncover. The labyrinth has just gotten bigger." Maybe it's my fault and I was expecting too much but to me that implied that there would be completely new routes, maybe new additions to old paths, more random changes like alternative office layouts. Instead there's just a few new sections behind the "new content" door and alternative dialogs for the existing paths.

No no, the game has all of the things you expected. Keep in mind that the gameplay literally is an easter egg hunt for endings, so they're not going to be immediately obvious.

I feel that the main gripe people have comes from the fact that the new content is not all in your face, and they then fail to discover how much content there really is. But it takes time and effort to discover, much like a lot of the original endings did. If you stop playing well before that point, it's going to feel like a cash grab. But being the completionist that I am it just doesn't feel like that at all to me.

And then there's little stuff like being able to rescue the bucket and bringing into the far future, or the cat/dog magazine article that changes depending on if you made them befriend each other. Details like these had me amazed they had even thought of that.

[Jay30mcr]

It's simple.

You are effectively paying £5 per hour for the new content.

If you are fine with that then go nuts.

If not then you probably played the original and can see this was a very blatant attempt to pass the same product off as something with a few more bells and whistles.

Put simply £19.99 just wasn't the price the Devs should've gone for because 2 hours is just not worth £10. You wouldn't even pay that to watch a 2 hour movie.

£14.99 may have been acceptable but personally I think they should've just included it as a DLC for around £3-4 seeing as its basically the same game with a little bit more at the end. Also doing that would appeal to those who already bought TSP.

[Kernel]

Surely this discussion can continue civilly, lots of good points for both sides, however.

[MPO]

Originally posted by Tony Snark:

Calling it a game is rather generous. It's mostly just wandering around until your hear a snarky voice line and then wandering around some more.

This is off-topic, I think you're looking for the original Stanley Parable forum 9 years ago.

[MPO]

To the 2013 players who refunded or didn't like the discount, what price should you have paid, in your opinion?

If it's only a matter of a few dollars, you are probably taking this too seriously.

[Perturbed Pendejo]

I would say no. You aren't alone. It is banking on it's former fame. So what? It deserves it. You can buy in or wait 24 months to get it in a humble bundle. The choice is yours as always. I chose to buy it because we need more games that break out of the current mold, patterns. And this still, IMO, does it which is sad, I think. We haven't progressed very much in gaming at all since 2013. I would argue it stagnated and even regressed.

[Kernel]

Originally posted by MPO:

To the 2013 players who refunded or didn't like the discount, what price should you have paid, in your opinion?

If it's only a matter of a few dollars, you are probably taking this too seriously.

This is a good question, I think I would've been much more pliable to paying roughly ~5-10 USD, asking for half of the original game's price for those who have already played a bulk of the original content would be reasonable. $16.33 to me, does not seem reasonable in our case.

[DaVince]

It was more than I thought, but I justified it as supporting a studio who has given me extremely silly newsletters and free games for the years leading up to this.

[Piano man]

Originally posted by Cruxin:

Originally posted by Piano man:

GOOD... then don't bother.

might keep replying for no reason though, it seems to irk you which is kinda funny

Dear God man... it seems you just like to provocate people because you have nothing better to do. Read the thread man - lots of people have the same opinion.

DaVince out a very good point:

Originally posted by DaVince:

I feel that the main gripe people have comes from the fact that the new content is not all in your face, and they then fail to discover how much content there really is.

THAT'S the flaw with the ultra deluxe edition. It was the DISCOVERY of finding the different paths. In the original you had to constantly try and either go with the narrators instructions, or find multiple and interesting ways to ignore them and do your own thing.

In this version, they literally have a door that says "new content" where you're forced to find some of the new content (notice I didn't use inverted commas there) without any luck, skill or even effort on your part.

THEN, when the bucket trigger is introduced, most of the endings offer nothing else to discover. You're then forced to do many of the same endings and following the same paths you did years ago in the original game which a lot of us have beaten before in the past... except your now holding a bucket. This isn't new content. Check a lot of the bucket endings to their non bucket counterpart.

The fun aspect of this game was the discovery, trying to glitch out the window, ignoring every instruction the narrator gives you and discovering more of the game world. That's what made it fun.

Travelling through the same world with a bucket is not new content. so most of those bucket endings aren't new content... they're recycled content at best... and a rather poor attempt to recycle it. Over the last few days I've watched that whole video I posted - there's so much repetition with the bucket 'trigger' I can see why people are miffed.