Come Stanley; let's find the story!
The Narrator inviting Stanley on a journey
The Confusion Ending is the ending that occurs after going through the right door, entering the maintenance room, but going down the elevator within that room instead of continuing forward to the meeting room. This ending is a series of chained endings that, at first, do not appear to be related but are revealed to be one large ending.
Obtaining The Ending
Sub-Ending 1
Exit Stanley's office. At the 2 doors, pick the one on the right. Continue through the Employee Lounge, then enter the door on the left as designated by the Narrator. Proceed to the elevator on the left instead of walking forward, and press the button within the elevator.
When exiting into a square room and The Narrator tells you to go to the left door, walk towards it. He will close it in your face, then tell you that the story is in the door behind you. The Narrator closes that door in your face too. After searching his papers, he opens a garage door on the long wall. Proceeding through it, you will find the monitor room from later on in the game (if you had proceeded to do the Freedom Ending or Explosion Ending). He then resets the game due to it having been spoiled for you.
Sub-Ending 2
Exit Stanley's office again. The 2 doors room has changed and now includes 6 doors, with only 5 accessible due to a row of chairs blocking one of them. After 30 seconds of exploring the hallways, the Narrator will open all doors to you. No matter which door you enter, you will end up back to the 2 doors room; it is an infinite paradoxical loop going nowhere. The Narrator will reset the game once more out of frustration.
Sub-Ending 3
"I can't quite recall, but I believe my story took place in an office building... is that correct? Hm... do you remember, Stanley?"
Exit Stanley's office once again. The 2 doors room is now a dead end. The Narrator instructs Stanley to backtrack the way they came to reveal a different hallway which leads to another dead end. Going back the way you came leads Stanley to a decrepit, wooden building. When you turn the corner of this hallway, the doorway through which you entered has vanished. The Narrator, frustrated even more, pretends that Stanley won, but then changes his mind and restarts the game instead.
Sub-Ending 4
The Stanley Parable Adventure Line™
Exit Stanley's office, again. At this point in time, the Narrator has employed the usage of The Stanley Parable Adventure Line. This line winds through previously unseen portions of the office. After a bit of time, music begins to play. The line leads Stanley back to the main office building (the room just before room 417) and leads Stanley back to the Monitor Room from the Mind Control Facility. The Narrator gets angry at the Line for spoiling the game, and resets again.
Sub-Ending 5
Exit Stanley's office once again. The Stanley Parable Adventure Line™ reappears, but the Narrator closes the door through which The Stanley Parable Adventure Line™ is traveling and detours Stanley away from it through door 437. After traversing down more hallways, The Stanley Parable Adventure Line™ reappears and leads Stanley to another room with two doors (similar to the original 2 doors room but circular.) The Narrator determines that the right door is the correct door to enter through, and opens it for Stanley.
The Ending
The Confusion Ending Schedule is seen, and it lays out events that had previously happened and have yet to occur. When The Narrator refuses to restart the game, as per the schedule, he believes that he may have broken the game. He discusses more philosophy and antics about the game, but is cut off by a loud buzzer and the true restart of the game.
Afterwards, the game plays normally, though you can still see The Stanley Parable Adventure Line™ through one of the windows of the hallway before the Employee Lounge if you go through the right door, though it cannot be seen when restarting the game after this event.
Video Guide
The Stanley Parable - The Confusion Ending - Walkthrough - Indie Games on Steam - No Commentary
The Stanley Parable with Confusion Ending!
Trivia
Maxing out the Confusion Ending Timer
It is possible to watch the timer on the Confusion Ending schedule from the circular room without triggering the last event, therefore it is possible watch the timer count up without limitation. It goes up until 59:59:99 when the timer should be adding another digit and keep going with 1:00:00:00 (1 hour, 0 minutes...)
The Stanley Parable speedrun- Confusion Ending in 10-42
However, the timer won't do that, instead it will continue counting up the minutes past 59. 60:00:00, 61:00:00 and so on, it will not show the hours. If Stanley keeps waiting, the timer eventually hits 99:59:99. After this, the timer will display 40:00:00. After that, once the timer hits 99:59:99 again, it resets to 00:00:00, and it will always reset to 00:00:00 after that.
The wooden building
The building (from the third sub-ending) has a demo sign backward, and it may be part of the previous room from the demo.
The two doors
In the sub-ending 5, the two doors in the circular room lead to the same place anyway, making the Narrator's choice useless.
| Endings | ||
|---|---|---|
|
Left door |
Freedom Ending • Countdown Ending • Museum Ending • Mariella Ending • Escape Pod Ending • Heaven Ending • Broom Closet Ending • Elevator Ending • Bottom of the Mind Control Room Ending | |
|
Right door |
Confusion Ending • Powerful Ending • Cold Feet Ending • Apartment Ending • Not Stanley Ending • Zending • Games Ending • Art Ending • Vent Ending • No Buckets Ending | |
|
Does not require the Two Doors Room |
Coward Ending • Out of Map Ending • Serious Ending • Whiteboard Ending | |
|
Progression Endings |
New Content Ending • Skip Button Ending • Mostly Infinite Hole • Sequel Ending • Figurines Ending • Epilogue | |