The Beginner's Guide

 PC
User Score
7.5

Generally favorable reviews- based on 335 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 225 out of 335
  2. Mixed: 55 out of 335
  3. Negative: 55 out of 335

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  1. CptnKR4KEN
    Sep 7, 2023
    10
    A masterclass in powerful storytelling and liminal environments from the creator of the critically acclaimed "Stanley Parable." A somber, modern classic!
  2. Eyean
    Aug 6, 2023
    6
    The whole "exploring someone else's unfinished game's" idea was cool, but the story ends up fizzling out by the end, really just making me wonder why I played the game in the first place.
  3. TKSwiz
    Jul 15, 2023
    10
    A delightful and thought-provoking experience that truly challenged the way I view art, art criticism, games, and the creative process. You can spend hours thinking about this game and still have more layers to uncover, which is especially impressive given that the game only takes around 90 min to complete. This game constantly has a lot happening at once with a lot of different ways toA delightful and thought-provoking experience that truly challenged the way I view art, art criticism, games, and the creative process. You can spend hours thinking about this game and still have more layers to uncover, which is especially impressive given that the game only takes around 90 min to complete. This game constantly has a lot happening at once with a lot of different ways to think about what is happening, which makes the replay value quite high in my opinion. Overall, I highly recommend this game to anyone willing to go in with an open mind.… Expand
  4. HydrophobikFish
    Jun 9, 2023
    7
    A short indue game with an interesting premise. It's very unique and worth experiencing just for the moral that it offers and the way that it gets there. Gameplay wise there's almost nothing to speak of but the unconventional story is strong enough to be worth it on its own.
  5. GDChrome
    Dec 31, 2022
    10
    Holy hell, this game's story is awesome. I actually didn't know that this stuff didn't happen for a while, the writing is that realistic. this game's atmosphere is an absolute marvel, calm and serene at points while saddening and worrying at others. the writing in this game is absolutely phenomenal, I'm talking DGS2 levels of well-written. And oh boy! Davey's voice acting is some of theHoly hell, this game's story is awesome. I actually didn't know that this stuff didn't happen for a while, the writing is that realistic. this game's atmosphere is an absolute marvel, calm and serene at points while saddening and worrying at others. the writing in this game is absolutely phenomenal, I'm talking DGS2 levels of well-written. And oh boy! Davey's voice acting is some of the best I've heard. even though it's a very short game, I can safely say it was worth every penny, and I couldn't recommend it enough… Expand
  6. hileger
    Dec 9, 2022
    4
    херь собачья херь собачья херь собачья херь собачья херь собачья херь собачья
  7. CodaHensley
    Jul 14, 2022
    5
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. I'm not exactly the person to delve into the types of games that don't really include gameplay. The misnomer 'walking simulator' has always been one that as hard as I try to omit, I find myself using to discredit these types of interactive narratives. While there does seem to be a very interesting story at play here, there are a few things that handicap that experience in my opinion. One being; this game would be completely incomprehensible if not for the narrator. While there is a meta aspect to this, it stands to reason that in an interactive media, a game that is unable to convey its story internally seems a bit detrimental. Second, I would like to state that when the turn in the story happens and the game enters a bit of meta discussion between the games creator and the narrator, I'd argue that the interactions experienced by the player become irrelevant. The main aspects that will stick with me will be a few of the visuals, fortunately detached from the rather cringey and ham-fisted dialogue the game repeatedly offers to the player.… Expand
  8. johc
    May 17, 2022
    8
    In the beginning, you feel completely engrossed in the experience, wondering where the story will to take you. As it progresses that sense of wonderment builds and builds in an incredible way, walking you through completely unique and wonderful experiences. But then, it ends. Leaving you feeling slightly hollow inside. Yet, this may be the point.
  9. FinnberlyRobin
    May 10, 2022
    9
    An emotional gut-punch more moving, thought-provoking and terrifying than anything I've ever experience in media. If you liked the darker, more brooding endings of The Stanley Parable, you'll probably like this. And I garuantee you'll be thinking about it for a good while afterwards.
  10. PublicNuisance
    Apr 11, 2022
    9
    The Beginner’s Guide will probably either be loved or hated by many. I happened to love it. It’s difficult to describe exactly what it is and one thing I enjoyed was that you will find a great deal of theories on the story to it and all of them could be right or wrong. What the game basically boils down to is you get shown various short games made by “Coda” and get given backstory throughThe Beginner’s Guide will probably either be loved or hated by many. I happened to love it. It’s difficult to describe exactly what it is and one thing I enjoyed was that you will find a great deal of theories on the story to it and all of them could be right or wrong. What the game basically boils down to is you get shown various short games made by “Coda” and get given backstory through narration by Davey Wreden, who is the developer of this game. Through it you learn of how Coda and he met and his interpretations of Coda’s games and life. What works wonderfully here is that, while I believe this is all a fictional story, you could easily believe that it is real. Davey Wreden does a great job at the narration and without that the game would fall apart. The game play itself is pretty simple. Some parts are walking simulator; some are light puzzles; but really the goal is just to learn more about Coda. The game’s themselves are nothing amazing, if these were actually released games I doubt anybody would praise them but as it is they simply serve as a back story and a way to further the plot. I don’t want to comment on the graphics too much because these games are supposed to be Source engine games made by a single person so graphics isn’t the point. The music is fairly well done though.

    I played The Beginner’s Guide on Linux. It never crashed and I didn’t notice any bugs or glitches. You can’t manually save, the game saves at the start of each chapter but they’re pretty short chapters. Alt-Tab works. There are four AA settings; six AF settings; a v-sync toggle; and four other graphics options. The game ran great, often times at 144 FPS with a few drops but even then was well above 60 FPS.

    Game Engine: Source
    Disk Space Used: 3.32 GB
    Input Used: Keyboard and mouse

    Game Settings Used: 8x AA; 16x AF; v-sync on; multi core rendering on; all highest
    GPU Usage: 19-98 %
    VRAM Usage: 1006-1233 MB
    CPU Usage: 5-20 %
    RAM Usage: 3.8-4.8 GB
    Frame Rate: 74-144 FPS

    You can get a lot out of the story to A Beginner’s Guide depending on how you look at it. It can be a tale of depression; misunderstood creativity; friendship; the struggles of indy game development; I even have a theory involving stalking. At the end of the day all and/or none of these could be correct. That’s the beauty of the game in my eyes. In any case it’s an interesting way to spend eighty seven minutes and is well worth it’s current $10.99 CAD price.

    My System:

    AMD Ryzen 5 2600X | 16GB DDR4-3000 CL15 | MSI RX 580 8GB Gaming X | Mesa 22.0.1 | Samsung 970 Evo Plus 500GB | Garuda Soaring White-tailed-eagle | Mate 1.26.0 | Kernel 5.17.1-zen1-1-zen | AOC G2460P 1920*1080 @ 144hz    … Expand
  11. fr1m0900
    Nov 14, 2021
    10
    Отличная история как люди раньше старались делать игры для людей а не кошельков
  12. Rich45682
    Jun 17, 2021
    10
    I can understand why some people don't like this game, I also thought this game would be boring as this game comes from the same guy who created the Stanley Parable, which I didn't really like. However, this game is truly a masterpiece, if you give it a chance, the narrator will get you involved in a clever story that you can even apply to real life.
  13. FRIST_008
    Jun 14, 2021
    7
    Странный симулятор ходьбы повествующий о психологии разработчика игра, и творческой импотенции.
  14. KevLooney
    May 25, 2021
    8
    The game is enjoyable. I never got lost. I never got confused. The game isn't boring.
  15. datoneguy246
    May 13, 2021
    10
    I understand why people would be upset with this game. It isn't really a game, it's a story. However the interactivity that this specific medium gives to the story amplifies what is already an incredibly powerful and well-written experience into something truly incredible. While the game may not be traditionally fun, it is still something special to experience that I would recommend to anyone.
  16. dakizu
    May 5, 2021
    9
    A very interesting ~art~ game. Seeing as The Beginner's Guide aspires to be interpreted as art, what follows is a subjective reading of the game. The game is mainly, as I see it, an examination of the separation between art and the artist in the medium of indie game development. This idea has been explored thoroughly many times (see: Death of the author), but I believe this is the firstA very interesting ~art~ game. Seeing as The Beginner's Guide aspires to be interpreted as art, what follows is a subjective reading of the game. The game is mainly, as I see it, an examination of the separation between art and the artist in the medium of indie game development. This idea has been explored thoroughly many times (see: Death of the author), but I believe this is the first time it's been the central focus of a video game. The Beginner's guide beckons the player, whether intentionally or not, to reflect on the mediums previous clashes with this concept (Phil Fish and Zoë Quinn in particular). Davey Wreden managed to strike a thematic balance between the personal (His depression, impostor syndrome) and the wider reaching implications of reading art as an autobiography of the artist. This game should, in the opinion of this humble ape, be regarded as a key example of video games as an art form.… Expand
  17. tufekciero
    Mar 12, 2021
    4
    KIRIK zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
  18. Calamity_Jones
    Jan 18, 2021
    0
    Boring overhyped garbage. The game might be original and creative, but that does not automatically make it good.
  19. ErayTellezi
    Nov 17, 2020
    5
    Biraz gereksiz bir oyun, olmasa da olur. Neyse ki süresi kısa ve sıkma noktasına geldiğinde bitiyor.
  20. Haeder
    Aug 9, 2020
    7
    The nature of this game makes it hard to recommend, Even tho I really liked it, but that doesn't make it worth what you are paying for because of how short it is only 110 mins? that's too short even for a game of this type.

    But if you like this type of games you will certainly find the joy of this one.
  21. Parik
    Aug 7, 2020
    2
    This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. I've just spent 90 minutes of my life for nothing. This game is a story about some guy (alter ego of the creator) who makes games. And we will see part of his life through his games. Maybe this story is not the worst and someone will love it, but as for me, if you want to open your inner world to your audience you don't ask them to pay fot this.… Expand
  22. kezzyhko
    Jul 28, 2020
    6
    ‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍
  23. Kujin
    Jun 29, 2020
    7
    This game is a unique way for a human man to directly vent about his problems and expressing his thoughts through a videogame. The gameplay, the story and the visuals are nothing but okay, but the mere premise of The Beginner's Guide and the way it delivers it's narrative are exceptional. It's not the best, but even the best game ever won't make this game disappear from my memory
  24. bancandrei
    May 27, 2020
    6
    It was an experience. Although not the most pleasant one, nor that memorable, and kind of niche and self reflexive. New ways to shape a narrative will always be welcome, but this is not even a good walking simulator
  25. XLazer
    Apr 28, 2020
    9
    Very beautiful and unique experience that i would only recommend to certain type of people. It portrayed what it wanted to.

    Enjoyment - 10
  26. Xzenor
    Mar 4, 2020
    3
    I loved "The Stanley Parable" so I was pretty anxious to try this game.
    Wow, big mistake.. It's an odd story, and I'm all for odd stories but this story just isn't my thing.. I could have seen it in the trailer. It's just like the trailer shows. You're walking through a load of weird gaming levels with hardly a puzzle to solve.. The narrator tells some deep story but it's not fun at all    I loved "The Stanley Parable" so I was pretty anxious to try this game.
    Wow, big mistake.. It's an odd story, and I'm all for odd stories but this story just isn't my thing.. I could have seen it in the trailer. It's just like the trailer shows. You're walking through a load of weird gaming levels with hardly a puzzle to solve.. The narrator tells some deep story but it's not fun at all and it doesn't pull you in or make it believable. The games aren't fun at all since you can hardly call them games.. Then at the end there's some lesson to be learned and that's it. Not worth a replay, not worth keeping, not worth sharing..

    Others may love this, (it has a pretty high rating for a reason) but I didn't. Not at all.. It was a boring experience and I only finished it hoping there was some 'wow' at the ending.

    If you like the trailer, go ahead and buy it. It's a cheap game and maybe this is something for you..
    If you didn't like the trailer, don't buy it. It's really not worth your time. It's not getting better and the fact that it's from the writer of "The Stanley Parable" means nothing. I think they just say that because the game wouldn't sell otherwise..    … Expand
  27. ChoicestGames
    Feb 27, 2020
    7
    The Beginner's Guide is about as far removed from The Stanley Parable as you can get with respect to its sombre tone and linear gameplay, however there are several ingenious games within games here and as a work of art that grants you several opportunities at introspection, it delivers.
  28. Wiebe
    Feb 27, 2020
    10
    Insane storytelling combined with great game design, an unique experience, a must play if you love storytelling games
  29. Vsevolod_KH
    Nov 6, 2019
    10
    That's an absolute masterpiece. I don't think thet games like this one were made before. I don't know how to tell about it without spoilers,you just need to feel it.
  30. Dion_
    Mar 25, 2019
    9
    Absolutely devastating and absolutely brilliant. Trigger warning for mental disorders though..
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Awards & Rankings

37
#37 Most Discussed PC Game of 2015
3
#3 Most Shared PC Game of 2015

Critic Reviews

All reviews »
Metascore
76

Generally favorable reviews - based on 35 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 24 out of 35
  2. Mixed: 7 out of 35
  3. Negative: 4 out of 35
  1. The Escapist
    Feb 10, 2016
    90
    The Beginner's Guide is an incredible art piece of a game that gets you thinking your relationship with the games you play.
    Read full review
  2. CD-Action
    Feb 4, 2016
    30
    Instead of engaging interactions, great animations or wonderfully crafted characters The Beginner’s Guide offers empty, amateurish, uninteresting environments and a story about two immature game developers. [01/2016, p.54]
  3. Power Unlimited
    Dec 10, 2015
    88
    The Beginner’s Guide is as fascinating as The Stanley Parable is hilarious. One of the most intriguing ‘games’ that we’ve played in recent history and an easy recommendation for everyone who likes weird game experiments. [dec. 2015 / page 062]
See all critic reviews »