Thirteen years. I don’t think I’ve waited longer for a sequel to a game I loved and after being invited to try the game early, I can say that Alan Wake 2 is a real game and is shaping up to be an exciting sequel.
Check out two slices of gameplay from our preview demo below:
Saga Anderson (The Local Girl) Gameplay
Alan Wake (Room 665) Gameplay
Set thirteen years after the first game, my demo started with FBI agent Saga Anderson who travels to the town of Bright Falls to investigate a string of murders committed by a cult, and Alan Wake, who’s been missing this entire time, is suspect number one. I was plopped in a town not far from Bright Falls called Watery to begin my investigation and I immediately began poking my head in every corner of it. We were already clued into it with the second expansion of Control, but we’re definitely in a connected universe as I followed a familiar singing into a café where our favorite janitor, Ahti, was performing karaoke just like he said he would in Control. It was definitely an exciting reveal, as I expected Remedy to sort of continue teasing the idea, not outright confirm it right off the bat.
Interestingly, everyone in town seems to know who Saga is despite her never stepping foot in Bright Falls in her life; some folk even saying they grew up with her their whole life. Another mystery to pocket, but right now comes the murders to solve. After poking my head around the town for a bit, I made my way down a bridge to find the Koskela brothers: owners of the local trailer park where a clue towards the cult could be. This was where I was first introduced to Saga’s “mind palace” mechanic. A quick button press will take you to a quaint cabin that functions as Saga’s mental space where you can piece together clues from the crimes you’re investigating on her evidence board or complete profiles of characters you meet. Doing so will allow you to unlock new dialog options, such as getting one of the Koskela brothers to tell me where the key to my (supposed) childhood trailer is: Coffee World. With my goal set, I made my way through the woods that were littered with taken who were eager to bury an axe in me. Combat felt very familiar to the original, but it’s definitely been refined and nowhere as clunky as the 2010 game used to be.
After fighting my way through the forest, I finally made it to the local theme park full of bean juice related rides like the Espresso Express. Conveniently enough, the gift shop where the safe with the key to Saga’s trailer is hiding was locked shut so I had to go find something to break the lock with. This eventually led me to a fight on a carousel ride where a taken chucked sickles at me from a tower while others pursued me on the ground floor of the ride. After a hectic fight, I finally earned my reward of a screwdriver to jimmy the lock open. After entering the gift shop, I was greeted with a puzzle to the safe combination with a cryptic note telling me the answer was hidden in the gift shop itself. After searching around, I found an employee board that clued me in on the answer and I was swiftly rewarded with my prize. I made my way over to the trailer park and unfortunately for you dear reader, this is where this story ends.
Probably the biggest takeaway I got from this slice of the game was how influenced by Silent Hill it felt, what with you in a peculiar town and to solve its many puzzles you had to actually listen to dialog and pay attention to the environment to find clues to the solution. Saga was also a refreshing character to bring us back into the world of Bright Falls, as an outsider confused at the town’s eccentricities, and I was just as excited to get to know her more as I was to see what our good friend Alan Wake has been up to.
Speaking of, Alan’s demo was a bit more focused than Saga’s more open area, but no shortage of the scares. I opened with the man himself trying to make his way into the Oceanview Hotel, which Control fans will remember was a modest motel previously and is another hard affirmation that we’re officially in a shared universe between the two games. After a phone call with a mysterious individual wanting to meet in the hotel, I made my way there and immediately felt at home as Alan Wake began somberly monologuing to himself about his current predicament. Matthew Porretta and Ilkka Villi are still fantastic as both halves of Alan Wake, with Porretta providing the voice and Villi the face; the two were clearly able to slip into those shoes like no time has passed. I made my way through the city streets, drenched in rain and neon light from towering buildings, and upon reaching the hotel I found my path obstructed by some supernatural element. Trying to enter from the lobby just made me loop back to the outside which meant something didn’t want me in so it was time to find another way in.
I wandered the streets, fending off taken as they came, and through some environmental storytelling Todd Howard would be proud of, I noticed an alley with a sign that had an arrow and lightbulb clueing me in on where to go. I soon was able to use a new tool called the angel lamp to transfer light from one area to another, changing the environment in the process. The proceeding rooftops basically functioned as a tutorial zone for the angel lamp as I used it to solve various puzzles to help me get closer to the hotel. I eventually stumbled upon a friendly sheriff, Tim Breaker, who was played by Shaun Ashmore. It seems he and Wake have been working together but our favorite writer seemed to be having memory issues. After exchanging pleasantries I finally came upon my goal: the Oceanview Hotel.
As I cautiously entered the hotel I was treated to a live-action cutscene that was fantastically done, and you could tell all involved were having fun shooting those moments. During the said moment, Alan finally meets face to face with Thomas Zane himself, the infamous poet from the first game who helped set you on your path. He eventually set me on my path to escaping the Dark Place by manipulating a murder site with my writing and like Saga Anderson, Alan was going to need to go into his mind palace to solve it. Now Alan’s version of this is called the “writer’s room” but it essentially functions the same way as a place to house all your collected clues and solve puzzles. After wandering the hotel some more, I learned about a cursed play that took place in the hotel and how, through my writing, I could manipulate scenes from the play. Exploring the hotel earned me “plot elements” I could slap onto a scene to change it like “Pre-Show Ritual” or “Haunted”; doing so would drastically change the area I’m in and lead to further clues. This eventually led me to a ballroom where I stumbled into a massive fight with the taken before my demo was eventually ended and I had to say goodbye to Mr. Wake, for now.
My time with Alan Wake 2, while brief, was everything I’d been hoping for from a sequel to the original. The wait almost seems worth it as a lot of this game is clearly influenced by Remedy’s time working on Control and almost makes me wonder what an Alan Wake 2 might’ve looked like if they didn’t work on Quantum Break or Control before this. You won’t have to wait long to join Saga and Alan in the Dark Place, as Alan Wake 2 launches just in time for Halloween on October 27th.
