Systems: May 14, 2010, & February 16, 2012
Release Date: Xbox 360, Windows
Publisher: Microsoft Game Studios & Remedy Entertainment
I have had Alan Wake sitting in my Steam queue for many-a-year. I remember back in 2017 there was an issue with the licensing rights to some of the songs used in the game expiring and that it would end up being pulled from digital storefronts (until Microsoft renewed the rights in 2018), and I had already had that game for a while at that point. I cannot honestly say why I had not started the game as it is right up my alley. It is a third-person episodic psychological survival-horror game that takes place in the Pacific Northwest, specifically in the fictional town of Bright Falls, Washington. Although before starting the game a few days ago I did not know that it was episodic and where the story takes place, I just knew that it was a survival-horror-related game that had received a lot of good reviews when it was released back in 2010 on the Xbox 360 and then on Steam in 2012. Presently, I have am part of the way through the second of eight episodes (two of which are special DLC-type episodes), which are presented like episodes from a TV series, complete with a "Previously, in Alan Wake" recap leading into the second episode. I have gotten the basics as far as mechanics go, which does not offer anything too different from other third-person games I have played, although the slow-motion "cinematic dodge" is pretty fun to pull off when encountering enemies. I really enjoy the setting in its forested and appropriately wet-feeling locations which make sense in the Pacific Northwest. There is a bit of a Twin Peaks meets Stephen King vibes which I very much appreciate.
One thing I am not a fan of is the FIND-ALL-THE-THINGS mechanic. Your primary objective, at least in the first episode, is to find your wife Alice who was mysteriously and violently taken from a cabin (which may or may not have actually been real) and Alan is running through forested areas while trying to cross a roaring river and reach a lit up gas station off in the distance. But, you are also prompted to find pages from an eerily written and relevant manuscript, thermoses of coffee, listen to radio broadcasts, watch TVs, knock over pyramids of cans, and [something else]. And to say nothing about the manuscript pages that you can only find if you are playing on a harder difficulty level feels like a forced way to draw out the length of the game and keep aspects of the game locked behind a skill wall. There are just too many collectibles to find scattered throughout the maps that any real sense of urgency to locate Alice before something bad/worse happens to her takes the player out of the experience. In one instance, I ran into a construction trailer to escape a couple of enemies because they do not do well with brightly lit areas, where I found a TV and then spent the next couple of minutes watching 2-3 minute episode of a Twilight Zone type show on the TV. It is just a little thing that I know I can complain about.
My only other possibly premature worry is that so far, I am essentially facing the same type of enemies, shadowy figures that I have to first attack with the flashlight which then allows them to be shot. Yes, I can use a flare to weaken them or a flare gun to do both at once, but the only variance in my approach, whenever enemies show up, is how many of them there are and if there is a larger brute who takes longer to weaken and more shots from whichever gun I am using. I am only in the second episode so I would not surprise me if a new type of creature was introduced by the end of this or the next episode; the Hunters in Resident Evil were not introduced until after you get back from the little lab cabin going into the second half of the game.
I have high hopes for the rest of the game and coming off 100+ hours of Dark Souls II, I feel a sense of relief knowing that I am playing a game that could take anywhere from 11 to 26 hours, but it's me so it is likely that it will be upwards of 30 hours. But yes, I am having a lot of fun with this title so far.
~JWfW/JDub/The Faceplantman/Jaconian
I just started playing this game! I'm also right at about where you were when you wrote this article. I have some similar observations and complaints, haha.
ReplyDeleteIt took a bit to get used to the controls, I don't like that there isn't a "snap camera behind the head" button. And I got a little lost and got tired of the combat and got pretty good at running away.
I watched the TV show too! I loved it, haha :D
I think for me, the loss of urgency was kind of informed by all the dream-logic that keeps happening. Like, it is impossible to tell if anything is real. Some stuff is more obviously dreamy, but that just makes the more real moments seem more suspect.
anyway, I love it too! Honestly, the island with the lake and mountains :chef's kiss: i love a good naturalistic landscape in a game.