The game had taken 17 hours. Collectables remained like gravestones untended. Unvisited. But Alan Wake 2 had been absorbing. Comforting to sit with. Like being wrapped in a blanket on a dark night. Captain Love sat at the keyboard doing his best to sum up the experience. Illness and depression had kept them in the dark place, but the game was a guiding light. It was special, but memories of each moment were fading rapidly. He had to get it down in words. Words to record. Words to make it real. He began to type.
“Everyone seems to be drawn into Remedy’s stuff through various games in various eras. I didn’t like the first Alan Wake back when I played it in 2012 apart from a few experiments within it. I’ve since been subject to the same Remedy adoration shared here after being absorbed by Control. I love how proportionally little combat there is in AW2, just exploring and plotting my boards. Board auto-completes are so satisfying. Tidy up. I kinda wish Wake’s writing board had you figuring out plotting rather than just adding element to scene (which feels more filmic than a novel but w/e). I think they probably tried figuring things out in more detail but the scene changing works better for a visual medium where reality shifts happen. Probably the best compromise of player playing and writing process simulated.
The integration of ‘Max’ ‘Payne’™️ and other IP is fun but feels purposeful beyond nods. Lake clearly wants the meta layer of a game that’s about meta circumstances’ burden on the creator to reflect the same kinds of authorial history looping in on itself. The Max Payne stuff really hit me harder than I thought it would. I never really played them but watched a friend play them a lot at sleepovers, back when they released. The monologues are the right angle to get intertextual though I couldn’t shake the feeling that a Max Payne shooting section was coming. I assumed inevitable callbacks to the FBC would be slight nods and was surprised at how much they integrated it. Kinda glad they didn’t go as far as including a direct Jesse cameo.
The levels of fiction are fun since keeping track of where the narrator/event causality begins and ends is a clear clue that that is for fun than a literal plot element. It gets a bit Stanley Parable at times but to extremes as the story is about Alan Wake who self-narrates writing about himself writing a way through a story using a character he previously wrote who is investigating the cult of a [possible self-insert] writer which
It being about art [sometimes specifically ‘bad’ art?] and the people it affects is a rich seam. Despite this and Control having a lot of mystery and dangling horror threads, the themes remain clear and human. The meta stuff can easily get lost up an orifice, but a human anchor helps link it back. I’m also impressed by how small details generally knit up even if every mystery isn’t full resolved, and why should they be?
The musical segment had that campy charm and worked as a sort of remake level of the first game. It’s probably the highlight for a lot of people but Yötön Yö was my favourite ‘media extension’. Here’s an art film, go watch it. For me it recontextualises the original game as part of the [Zane’s?] plan. I just like any time Lake is on screen. Casey is too cute.
Rewriting the ending was neat although it feels like the clicker is very easy to use if the art you make is short. I guess the details can’t be as detailed in a song vs a whole novel. Like make a haiku if you believe in it enough.
Wake left the dark place
Saga’s daughter was alive
Scratch died forever
Mr. Door kinda hints at this when he chastises Wake for self-imposing his own fussy writer’s rules on himself. The line ‘it’s not a loop it’s a spiral’ works as self-parody but also to help understand the way out. You can retrace your steps with a spiral but if you assume it’s a loop you’ll never escape. Art. Mental health. Timeline. Regrets.
Change Reality
Really wish there was a way to change the light level in the end game. I get why they do the endgame the way they do but why drop the overworld in to total darkness at the end when most players haven’t got all the shit. Not having some kind of fast travel also really hurts since you slowly sprint around the world and shoeboxes are unevenly spread out. These paths ain’t easy to see!"