An outside look of Alan Wake
I don’t have an XBOX 360 for the simple fact that I honestly have enough having just the PS3. Yes, I am missing out on a lot of great titles, but I have been able to experience them none the less by means of watching playthroughs on the internet. And because I don’t have a 360 doesn’t mean that I don’t understand it or anything about it. One thing I do regret is that I’m not able to play these great titles. What I wouldn’t do to be able to play through the Halo games or the Gears of War games. They look like a lot of fun with a nifty story and a great universe.
That seems to be their target demographic, eh. The people who are after a fun time with a blockbuster feel to their game. Like previous titles that I mentioned, there’s also Splinter Cell Conviction and many others. Granted, I’m really peeved that Conviction is a 360 exclusive, but it fits that console perfectly never the less. One game though seems to be sticking out like a sore thumb. And I do hope that instead of fixing it by not doing anything with it again or multi-platforming it, I am hoping that they make more games like it for the 360.
That game is Alan Wake.
I don’t have an XBOX 360 for the simple fact that I honestly have enough having just the PS3. Yes, I am missing out on a lot of great titles, but I have been able to experience them none the less by means of watching playthroughs on the internet. And because I don’t have a 360 doesn’t mean that I don’t understand it or anything about it. One thing I do regret is that I’m not able to play these great titles. What I wouldn’t do to be able to play through the Halo games or the Gears of War games. They look like a lot of fun with a nifty story and a great universe.
That seems to be their target demographic, eh. The people who are after a fun time with a blockbuster feel to their game. Like previous titles that I mentioned, there’s also Splinter Cell Conviction and many others. Granted, I’m really peeved that Conviction is a 360 exclusive, but it fits that console perfectly never the less. One game though seems to be sticking out like a sore thumb. And I do hope that instead of fixing it by not doing anything with it again or multi-platforming it, I am hoping that they make more games like it for the 360.
That game is Alan Wake.
Overall info:
You might recognize the developer, Remedy Entertainment, by two previous titles. These are namely: Max Payne and Max Payne 2: Fall of Max Payne. Like with these two previous titles, Alan Wake is a fantastic asset to their resume and I do hope that their next game is as big a step as there was between Max Payne 2 and Alan Wake.
Released in May of 2010 and published by Microsoft, Alan Wake has received mostly positive reviews with many being as high as having more than 90/100. It has even won the Editor’s Choice Award at IGN. And I have to say that it deserves all the praise that it is receiving.
There are even plans for a sequel of the game that is supposed to be Season 2, with the DLC bridging the gap between Seasons 1 and 2.
Story:
The story revolves around the guy who’s in the title: Alan Wake. He is a writer who has hit kind of a dry patch with his writing, as he has what is known as a: Writer’s Block. Basically someone butt-plugged the inspiration part of his brain and now nothing can come through. Anyway, Alan and his wife travel to a little town known as Bright Falls. To him it is nothing more than a little vacation, but his wife has brought him there in the hopes of removing that damned plug.
As you may have guessed by now, the shit hit’s the fan rather fast. The dreams that Alan has been having seem to be closer to reality than he had originally presumed, what with creatures from the darkness actually coming out and attacking him. Not only that, but he finds himself in a rather pickling situation when his wife his kidnapped and the FBI starts hunting him down. All the while he has to face off against the supernatural and try to understand it and why it’s doing what it’s doing before it’s all too late. Not only that, but there’s something else going on as well that involves a mysterious manuscript.
To me it’s fantastic to see the story of this game and notice all of the influences like, notably, Stephen King. Alan himself is influenced by Stephen King as well.
The more that I watched of this playthrough, the more I found it to be a very entertaining and spooky story, turning more complex with each passing reveal. What I also found to be fun was that it contains a lot of clichés like the ever so present: Dumbass Cop. Like for instance the cops in Murder, She Wrote. These cops are completely and utterly incapable of even being able to handle the simplest of cases. They draw the wrong conclusions, arrest the wrong people and hunt down the wrong people. In Murder, She Wrote it’s Jessica Fletcher who has to save the day, but unfortunately she was unavailable to help poor mister Wake, best-seller author.
There are some scripted enemy encounters that had me quite spooked. Take for instance the talking ones. Scary as all hell if you ask me. Plus, it just feels so wrong to take care of them. At first anyways. After a few hours of having axes tossed at your head, I would even start killing innocents just to be on the fucking safe side.
The thing that surprised me the most was that Bright Falls wasn’t just another Silent Hill where there might as well not have been any characters at all. It really feels like everyone knows everyone and that there is a huge history in that place. Something that is also apparent in the interactive bits of the game where you can switch on radios to listen to the radio station or listen in on the cop’s radio chatter.
What was very interesting about the story was the fact that instead of doing a usual game, they made it in to a season. Like a TV show. Thus the game is split up in to episodes, giving the game a lot more influences like The X-Files and the like. Very cool thing that they put in there and it gave the game that little something extra.
Sound
I saw an episode of Columbo today where our good man had to square off with a conductor for orchestras that do music for movies. The man told Columbo that when the music is done just right, you don’t remember it at all. But, when you hear the music alone, you can put it in context. Then he started to play some iconic music like Jaws and Psycho, which are instantly recognizable even by people that haven’t seen the movie. Which is exactly the case for Alan Wake. The music is so good that I barely remember it.
The voice acting is a little dry when Alan is reading the Manuscript, but for the rest it’s A-Ok and quite good at some points. There’s nothing spectacular going on, but the voices that matter are luckily the ones that sell it the best.
Graphics
Simply beautiful and very atmospheric. The graphics are just right for the kind of game that it wants to be with the story that it has. A match made in heaven if you ask me. Buuuuuuuuuuuuuut, there’s one small problem. There’s like this huge Uncanny Valley area around their mouths and it’s really distracting at points.
Gameplay
Because I haven’t played the game, I can’t really dive to deep in to this. But, I can give you the basics.
As the game is a survival horror game, and not an action survival game like most horror games usually are, the game is pretty basic when it comes to movement controls. Alan is able to move around, but slowly, use guns, a flashlight and dodge shit. Because he’s not exactly a fighter or a trained person in any way, he behaves like you would expect a person like that to behave. There’s no fancy moves or anything.
Fighting in this game is pretty neat as the monsters can only be shot if you first disperse the darkness that surrounds them like a shield. In other words, shine a light on them. That’s where the flashlight comes in. It’s not just a fancy way of lighting the darkness like in Silent Hill, where instead of fog, you get darkness. No, the flashlight is a weapon now!
What’s so great about this game is that for portions … you don’t have anything. You just have to book it! And, as per true Survival Horror style, you sometimes are shy for ammo and batteries as well. Oh, yeah, the flashlight runs on batteries. Isn’t that neat?
For the rest there’s some variety in the gameplay like quicktime events to jumpstart shit like Safe Havens (which are basically resting zones to restore your health and areas where the darkness can’t get you) and driving sections. Controls for these seem to be responsive and smooth, from the instructions that I’ve seen on screen and the way the player handled the car.
Final thoughts:
This is a great survival horror game and one of the very few that can carry that name without crossing their fingers behind their back. It has a very great story reminiscent of authors like Stephen King and shows like The X-files. It has good music, great graphics if you count out the Uncanny Valley mouths and it has restricting gameplay, like a good horror game should.
A fantastic throwback to old games like Silent Hill and Resident Evil in gameplay and a character you’ll care for make for a very interesting experience that you just need to experience for Halloween.
You might recognize the developer, Remedy Entertainment, by two previous titles. These are namely: Max Payne and Max Payne 2: Fall of Max Payne. Like with these two previous titles, Alan Wake is a fantastic asset to their resume and I do hope that their next game is as big a step as there was between Max Payne 2 and Alan Wake.
Released in May of 2010 and published by Microsoft, Alan Wake has received mostly positive reviews with many being as high as having more than 90/100. It has even won the Editor’s Choice Award at IGN. And I have to say that it deserves all the praise that it is receiving.
There are even plans for a sequel of the game that is supposed to be Season 2, with the DLC bridging the gap between Seasons 1 and 2.
Story:
The story revolves around the guy who’s in the title: Alan Wake. He is a writer who has hit kind of a dry patch with his writing, as he has what is known as a: Writer’s Block. Basically someone butt-plugged the inspiration part of his brain and now nothing can come through. Anyway, Alan and his wife travel to a little town known as Bright Falls. To him it is nothing more than a little vacation, but his wife has brought him there in the hopes of removing that damned plug.
As you may have guessed by now, the shit hit’s the fan rather fast. The dreams that Alan has been having seem to be closer to reality than he had originally presumed, what with creatures from the darkness actually coming out and attacking him. Not only that, but he finds himself in a rather pickling situation when his wife his kidnapped and the FBI starts hunting him down. All the while he has to face off against the supernatural and try to understand it and why it’s doing what it’s doing before it’s all too late. Not only that, but there’s something else going on as well that involves a mysterious manuscript.
To me it’s fantastic to see the story of this game and notice all of the influences like, notably, Stephen King. Alan himself is influenced by Stephen King as well.
The more that I watched of this playthrough, the more I found it to be a very entertaining and spooky story, turning more complex with each passing reveal. What I also found to be fun was that it contains a lot of clichés like the ever so present: Dumbass Cop. Like for instance the cops in Murder, She Wrote. These cops are completely and utterly incapable of even being able to handle the simplest of cases. They draw the wrong conclusions, arrest the wrong people and hunt down the wrong people. In Murder, She Wrote it’s Jessica Fletcher who has to save the day, but unfortunately she was unavailable to help poor mister Wake, best-seller author.
There are some scripted enemy encounters that had me quite spooked. Take for instance the talking ones. Scary as all hell if you ask me. Plus, it just feels so wrong to take care of them. At first anyways. After a few hours of having axes tossed at your head, I would even start killing innocents just to be on the fucking safe side.
The thing that surprised me the most was that Bright Falls wasn’t just another Silent Hill where there might as well not have been any characters at all. It really feels like everyone knows everyone and that there is a huge history in that place. Something that is also apparent in the interactive bits of the game where you can switch on radios to listen to the radio station or listen in on the cop’s radio chatter.
What was very interesting about the story was the fact that instead of doing a usual game, they made it in to a season. Like a TV show. Thus the game is split up in to episodes, giving the game a lot more influences like The X-Files and the like. Very cool thing that they put in there and it gave the game that little something extra.
Sound
I saw an episode of Columbo today where our good man had to square off with a conductor for orchestras that do music for movies. The man told Columbo that when the music is done just right, you don’t remember it at all. But, when you hear the music alone, you can put it in context. Then he started to play some iconic music like Jaws and Psycho, which are instantly recognizable even by people that haven’t seen the movie. Which is exactly the case for Alan Wake. The music is so good that I barely remember it.
The voice acting is a little dry when Alan is reading the Manuscript, but for the rest it’s A-Ok and quite good at some points. There’s nothing spectacular going on, but the voices that matter are luckily the ones that sell it the best.
Graphics
Simply beautiful and very atmospheric. The graphics are just right for the kind of game that it wants to be with the story that it has. A match made in heaven if you ask me. Buuuuuuuuuuuuuut, there’s one small problem. There’s like this huge Uncanny Valley area around their mouths and it’s really distracting at points.
Gameplay
Because I haven’t played the game, I can’t really dive to deep in to this. But, I can give you the basics.
As the game is a survival horror game, and not an action survival game like most horror games usually are, the game is pretty basic when it comes to movement controls. Alan is able to move around, but slowly, use guns, a flashlight and dodge shit. Because he’s not exactly a fighter or a trained person in any way, he behaves like you would expect a person like that to behave. There’s no fancy moves or anything.
Fighting in this game is pretty neat as the monsters can only be shot if you first disperse the darkness that surrounds them like a shield. In other words, shine a light on them. That’s where the flashlight comes in. It’s not just a fancy way of lighting the darkness like in Silent Hill, where instead of fog, you get darkness. No, the flashlight is a weapon now!
What’s so great about this game is that for portions … you don’t have anything. You just have to book it! And, as per true Survival Horror style, you sometimes are shy for ammo and batteries as well. Oh, yeah, the flashlight runs on batteries. Isn’t that neat?
For the rest there’s some variety in the gameplay like quicktime events to jumpstart shit like Safe Havens (which are basically resting zones to restore your health and areas where the darkness can’t get you) and driving sections. Controls for these seem to be responsive and smooth, from the instructions that I’ve seen on screen and the way the player handled the car.
Final thoughts:
This is a great survival horror game and one of the very few that can carry that name without crossing their fingers behind their back. It has a very great story reminiscent of authors like Stephen King and shows like The X-files. It has good music, great graphics if you count out the Uncanny Valley mouths and it has restricting gameplay, like a good horror game should.
A fantastic throwback to old games like Silent Hill and Resident Evil in gameplay and a character you’ll care for make for a very interesting experience that you just need to experience for Halloween.
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