The Stanley Parable

The Stanley Parable is the previous game from Davey Wreden, which was released to great public success in 2013. Even though it uses an indirect and metaphoric way to create the dialogue, it is widely considered to be an exploration of the dynamics between game design and players inside a game. There are many similarities between The Stanley Parable and The Beginner's Guide, including both of them being "narrative-driven walking simulators" and prominently featuring narrators as the main narrative agent.

There are many differences between both of them, too, with The Stanley Parable being much more humorous, game-like (at least in comparison) and lighthearted; while The Beginner's Guide is more serious, even more metaphoric and disorienting and attempts to expose itself as very true-to-life, with no less than the real-life Davey Wreden acting as the narrator, playing himself (although whether he's a fictional version of himself telling a true story is debatable and need not necessarily be taken at face-value).

Another important distinction between the two games is that in The Stanley Parable, the main dynamic happens between the narrator and the player, through voice and actions, respectively, whle in The Beginner's Guide, the dynamic is actually threefold - with Davey as the narrator, Coda and his levels as the subject-matter, and the player as the person Davey is talking to and also acting as a (mostly unwilling) witness to his desperate attempt to reach Coda.

The Stanley Parable is only mentioned by name at the very beginning of the game, in Intro, when Davey says that it "tells a pretty absurd story".