You’re in a cabin. There’s a knife on the table. A Voice tells you that if you don't kill the Princess, the world will end. Most players, on their first run through Black Tabby Games’ psychological horror hit, try to be the hero. They talk. They hesitate. But if you decide to be defiant—specifically, if you try to leave or treat her like a literal monster—you stumble into the Slay the Princess The Tower route. It’s a jarring shift. Suddenly, the damsel in the basement isn't just a prisoner anymore. She’s huge. She’s divine. She is, quite frankly, terrifying.
Honestly, the first time you see her grow to fill the entire basement, it changes how you view the game's mechanics. You realize the Princess isn't a static character. She is a mirror. If you fear her power, she becomes powerful. If you think she’s a goddess, she becomes one. The Tower is the ultimate manifestation of that power dynamic shift, where the protagonist—and the player—loses every ounce of agency they thought they had.
What Actually Happens in the Slay the Princess The Tower Route?
To get here, you have to be a bit of a jerk, or at least very stubborn. In Chapter 1, you need to go to the basement but refuse to kill her. When she asks you to leave with her, you don't just say no; you show her that you hold all the cards. Or you think you do. If you try to leave the cabin while she's still locked up, or if you treat her with a specific kind of coldness, the Narrator loses control.
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When you return in Chapter 2, everything is different. The stairs feel longer. The air is heavy. The Princess has transformed into The Tower. She is massive, towering over you, and she doesn't want to escape the cabin anymore. She wants you to kneel. It’s a complete subversion of the "slay the dragon" trope because the dragon is now a cosmic entity that views you as an ant.
Tony Howard and Abby Howard, the creators, really leaned into the "Voice of the Broken" here. While other paths might give you the Voice of the Hero or the Voice of the Smitten, The Tower route introduces the Broken. This voice is pathetic. He’s given up. He wants to worship her. It creates this incredible friction in your head because while you, the player, might want to fight back, one of the literal voices in your skull is screaming at you to just obey.
The Power of Perception
The game runs on a very specific logic: your expectations shape reality. If you go into the basement thinking she’s a victim, she stays small. But in Slay the Princess The Tower, your character's internal fear of her potential for violence manifests as physical scale.
She doesn't just look big; she feels heavy. The art style, which is all hand-drawn pencils, uses thick, dark lines to emphasize her dominance. You aren't just looking at a tall woman. You're looking at an architectural force of nature. She literally tells you that her breath is the wind and her voice is the law.
Why the Broken Changes Everything
Most people playing Slay the Princess focus on the Princess herself, but the Voices are the secret sauce. In the Tower path, the Voice of the Broken is your constant companion. He is arguably the most controversial voice among fans. Some find him annoying because he constantly undermines your attempts to resist. Others see him as a tragic representation of how people crumble under overwhelming pressure.
If you try to resist The Tower, she can literally force you to move your own body. It’s one of the few moments in the game where your "choice" is stripped away by the narrative itself. You click a button to "strike," but your hand won't move. Why? Because the Broken believes you can't. And because you believe the Broken. It’s a meta-commentary on how we limit ourselves, wrapped in a horror game about a girl in a basement.
Branching Off: The Apotheosis and The Fury
The Tower isn't a dead end. It’s a bridge. Depending on how much you grovel or how much you fight, you end up in even weirder places.
- The Apotheosis: If you fully lean into the worship, she ascends. She becomes a galaxy-sized entity that literally steps out of the cabin and into the cosmos. It’s beautiful and horrifying. You become nothing.
- The Fury: This happens if you try to kill her after she’s already reached her Tower form. You can't just kill a goddess with a knife. If you try to defy her authority, she doesn't just get mad; she gets disgusted. The Fury is a skinless, raw manifestation of hatred. It’s a much more visceral, "fleshy" horror compared to the "divine" horror of the Tower.
Most players prefer the Tower over the Fury because the Tower feels more "structured." There’s a weird comfort in the Broken's submission, whereas the Fury is just pure, unadulterated chaos.
Navigating the Meta-Narrative
One thing people get wrong about Slay the Princess The Tower is thinking it’s a "bad" ending. There are no traditional bad endings in this game. Every death and every transformation is just more "data" for the Shifting Mound. The Narrator wants a very specific outcome—the permanent death of the Princess—but the Tower is a direct middle finger to his plans.
She is too big to stay in the box he built for her.
If you're trying to see everything the game has to offer, you have to sit with the discomfort of this route. You have to let the Voice of the Broken talk. You have to feel the frustration of clicking a dialogue option only to have the Princess ignore you because you're "too small" to be heard. It’s a lesson in humility, or maybe just a lesson in how scary the Howard duo can make a pencil drawing.
Subtle Details You Might Have Missed
Look at the background when you’re talking to her. The cabin usually reflects the Princess. In the Tower route, the walls seem to stretch. The ceiling disappears. It stops being a house and starts being a temple. Even the knife—the one thing that is supposed to give you power—looks like a toy in your hand.
Also, listen to the music. The score shifts from the tense, creeping strings of the early game to something more choral and booming. It’s meant to make you feel insignificant. It works.
How to Handle The Tower Without Losing Your Mind
If you're playing through this right now, don't just rush through the dialogue. Slay the Princess is a game about the vibes.
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- Listen to the Broken, but don't trust him. He’s a coward. His dialogue is meant to provoke you. If you find yourself getting frustrated, that’s the intended effect.
- Experiment with the "Look at her" options. The descriptions of her physical form are some of the best writing in the game. They describe her not in terms of beauty, but in terms of weight, gravity, and inevitability.
- Check your ego. The Tower route is designed to punish the player's desire for control. If you go in trying to be the "alpha," the game will humiliate your character. Lean into it. See how far the "submission" path goes. It leads to some of the most trippy visuals in the entire experience.
The Tower is a reminder that we aren't always the protagonist of every story. Sometimes, we’re just a footnote in someone else's ascension. That’s a bitter pill to swallow in a video game, where we’re used to being the most important person in the room. But that’s exactly why this route is so memorable. It refuses to let you be the hero.
Actionable Steps for Completionists
To fully experience the depth of the Slay the Princess The Tower and its branches, follow these specific paths in your next sessions:
- To reach The Fury: Encounter The Tower, but keep your knife and try to slay her even after she has asserted her dominance. Your defiance in the face of her godhood triggers the transformation into a being of pure, flayed rage.
- To reach The Apotheosis: Fully submit. Do not hide the knife, do not resist. Acknowledge her as your superior in every dialogue choice. This will trigger the transition to Chapter 3, where she outgrows the concept of the cabin entirely.
- The "Secret" Dialogue: Try staying silent during some of her grander speeches. The Narrator and the Voices will fill the silence with increasingly panicked theories about why you aren't responding, which adds another layer to the "Broken" atmosphere.
The beauty of this game lies in its lack of a "correct" way to play. Whether you end up worshiping a goddess or being ripped apart by a vengeful spirit, you're uncovering the truth of the Princess's nature. Or, more accurately, you're uncovering the truth of your own. Your choices don't just change the ending; they change the soul of the person you're talking to. Don't be afraid to be the villain or the coward—sometimes those are the most interesting stories to tell.