I hope you enjoyed, or at least were intrigued by my "break-up letter" with a franchise I was once extremely invested in. More content is always on the horizon. Please support my work: PATREON ► www.patreon.com/IndigoGaming BECOME A RUclips MEMBER ► ruclips.net/channel/UCTRohxutThBffdcP3H6O0Zgjoin SUBSCRIBESTAR ► www.subscribestar.com/indigogaming
i always see you around im subscribed to you but i never get notifications for your videos @Indigo Gaming i remember loving ur history of cyberpunk series maybe i need to interact more in the comments
Great video! I was a big fan of Remedy and Max Payne growing up and I remember being so wowed by the tornado tech demo when I was in high school. It's a shame the open world formula didn't get used in the end, but I still really appreciate the product we got in the end. Too often games stuck in development hell or needing a complete rewrite halfway through don't end up working out (to this day, the last game I've ever pre-ordered was Duke Nukem Forever, lol) so there's still something to be said that Alan Wake was a complete and competent game.
Like I said in my video, I think what they did was the safe move, or "the winning play." This could have easily turned into a Too Human or a Duke Nukem Forever scenario. They managed to downsize it, ship it, and after a disappointing launch, it eventually turned a profit. A success grasped from the jaws of failure.
Whenever someone does a Silent Hill needle drop I feel such elation. It's kind of weird to feel homesick for a horrible place I've luckily never visited.
I tried to do a musical nod to each game I featured (Alone in the Dark 2008 notwithstanding, even though that game's soundtrack is pretty excellent). Silent Hill is just such a vibe.
I knew it wouldn’t happen with 2, but Control gave me the hope that they would try to do the open world and side quests since the story would be a lot slower paced then 1. I just want more games like Mizzurna Falls and Deadly Premonition
I think the vast openness of the Pacific Northwest begets a large space you can traverse and explore. It's a shame Alan Wake feels so stifled and small considering how much landscape and scenery is actually in the game's data.
@@Indigo_Gamingoh I don’t know if you saw but there is a twin peaks fan game being made called Twin Peaks: Into the Night and it even has a demo you should check out
What is even crazier is that Alan Wake 2 is much more narrower than the first one... Remedy doe absolutely not understand what path they are supposed go to with Alan Wake games while this kind gentlemen explained everything in the video : make the Alan Wake 1 you were supposed to make in 2007 and that is it !
Excellent coverage. I found Alan Wake 1 to be very clever in narrative and tense in gameplay. One of the things that struck me how realized Bright Falls was, so it being originally open world makes sense.
Alan wake 1 doesn’t feel Alan wake in comparison to the sequel, it’s a lot more connected to control than it is the first game but I think that that is what Alan wake is.
20:24 Alan Wake & Max Payne...now that's a duo for an interesting video game!!! Your videos are always of the highest quality possible!!! What a joy to watch! I feel like you want to do an entire video on either Twin Peaks or Deadly Premonition. Thank you for your amazing work!!!
I did a shorter video a few years ago about the mundane aspects of games like Shenmue, Deadly Premonition, etc. This is almost an expansion on that, but more focused on Alan Wake's LACK of mundanity. I'd be open to it one day, but it's a niche topic I feel.
As much as I enjoy your long videos, I'm happy you're doing shorter and more succinct videos. I really would have love to play the original idea of Alan Wake, maybe Alan Wake 3 will do just that.
Thank you for watching! It certainly is nice to release something after a month or two, rather than having to slave away for the better part of a year in the dark and hope the video is a hit!
@@Indigo_Gaming I've only just finished it, watched it over the last couple of years, and I can see how it inspired so many games that got me to try it out. Still have FWWM and the Return to watch too. And would be great to have a Twin Peaks indigo video as well
This is just your opinion, but one I very much agree with. I always appreciated how Alan Wake did something other than clone other games. And I like that it gets a little weird with the story and such. But I never thought it was a good story.
If you think about Sam Lake being heavily into Lost during the latter part of the game's development: everything makes sense. A weird "poet god deep sea diver" is basically AW's version of the polar bear. The smoke monster is mirrored in the Dark Presence, and its mystery box-style story is all show and very little substance. That being said, I did really enjoy Lost through most of its first two seasons.
Good catch! I always like peeking behind the curtain like that, the early trailers were clearly mocked up before they had the time or budget to do new mocap animations and such.
Props for referencing Midnight Mass and In the Mouth of Madness. Two excellent and extremely different horror experiences that I demand everyone here watch 😁
I played the original game while it was free on Epic a few months ago, I tried it out before the release of the sequel, and stopped playing. The "gameplay" sequences were more like mind-numbingly boring busy work. And then the story itself was going no where and I just abandoned it and didn't buy the sequel because of it. Your explanation of the original introduction, of picking up a hitchiker and realizing he's repeating the lines from your book, with the resulting car accident and then having him hunt you down, really puts the intro "tutorial" area into context and makes way more sense. It's amazing how the finished product is this broken, disjointed, gutted version of a more open-world game.
I enjoyed Alan Wake and even replayed it once... but then I never really touched it or thought about it again. It didn't really affect how I approach gaming, which I suppose is the most damning part about it. Enjoyable, but ultimately a toothless experience.
I love the video and the analysis...even though I disagree with it completely. To me this is a clear example of what an author actually goes through themselves: you start with a lot of fluff, then you edit, trim and narrow it down. I think Alan Wake's enduring fascination stems from the experience being a tight narrative experience rather than another bloated open world RPG (which we now complain about all the time!). Less is more.
It shows strong character to experience and enjoy critique/opinions that you disagree with. Thank you for that. While I agree that tightening up a creative work and trimming the fat is generally a good thing, in Alan Wake doing that, it now leans heavily on the storytelling. And in my opinion, it does almost nothing with the "writer rewrites reality" premise, and is very choppy in its pacing. Antagonists come and go (like the ransom guy, Dr. Hartman and Nightengale suddenly get offed by the Dark presence), setups (like the clicker) are very obvious and come into play right before he needs them, etc. But I'm glad you enjoyed the game and watched my video. Happy New Year.
I have a serious soft spot for these games. And I can totally understand why they’re not everyone’s cup of tea. I remember watching the Bright Falls webisodes before the game came out and I was hooked. I just loved them.
I loved the webisodes! A lot of atmosphere and eerie mystery in such a short runtime. My disappointment was that almost none of that tone made it into the actual game.
5 minutes in and I'm already hooked. I love Alan Wake, it's DLC and American Nightmare.....I was considerably less taken with AW2 tbh. You always make the best videos, Indigo! EDIT I would love to see you cover the Shenmue we never got!
Thanks for the high praise! I enjoyed Alan Wake for what it was worth, but couldn't help but feel like we got a hollower, emptier shell of its initial premise. I've talked briefly about Shenmue before, could definitely be an interesting topic in the future, maybe along with Mizzurna Falls and other similar games.
Nice video! Alan Wake 2 fixed a bunch of the issues I had with the first game. I'd love to see a sequel with even more open space and survival elements, but they're definitely moving in the right direction. It's my favorite game from last year. Comparing Alan Wake, Alone in the Dark and Deadly Premonition was a nice insight, it was an exciting time, with many developers trying innovate the survival horror genre. All three games had similar ideas and huge ambitions. Alan Wake 1 sacrificed scope for production values, while the other two fully embraced wild mechanics and ideas without any constraints. It's a shame Alone in the Dark had such a ridiculous story and unplayable driving mechanics, cause the gameplay situations were pretty interesting. Deadly Premonition, even having the dullest gameplay of the three, was completely saved by it's storytelling/mood/vision.
Deadly Premonition has some incredibly wacky elements to it, but it's also a vastly more ambitious game than Alan Wake in terms of the type of interactive world it tried to realize. I'm an Alone in the Dark 2008 apologist, and there are still features and mechanics in that game that future games don't even come close to imitating. But you're right, the story ranged from middling to bad, and the driving was rough (incredibly ironic, because 95% of Eden Games' titles were driving games!).
After days of searching for an honest review on the misery that is Alan Wake 2 I finally stumble upon a guy who knows what he is talking about. I can not believe how much the general public endorsed Alan Wake 2 while not seeing the trashed potential and utterly bad game it is. When Alan Wake 2 was announced I thought Remedy was going to fix everything you talked about in the video over Alan Wake 1 and give us a full open world Twin Peaks like experience. And then I saw what a disaster Alan Wake 2 is in every aspect of a game. It makes me so sad and angry that I spent 13 years waiting for a masterpiece and I get a much worse game than Alan Wake 1. Good review mate.
Criticism of the second game seemed to get drowned out by unflinching praise from every corner. It was an odd phenomenon, I hardly heard about what specifically made it good, it was just fervorous praise. There are a few people who've spoken out about it, but it makes you feel crazy when that sort of thing happens.
You can turn it on via the launch options in Steam. It only works with a controller, but it took my breath away due to how HUGE each section of the world map is. steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1135506903
Aw man, Alan Wake! Still in the top 10 of my favorite games of all time. I bought Alan Wake 2 to support them week 1 but haven't sat down to play it. Glad they won an award! Thanks as always for the high quality content! =)
One of my favorite games. I always wished I could just drive around the mountains and see what there was. The free camera really showed off what was cut and would could have been.
While I'd agree, the current trend that Remedy is pursuing is pretty contradictory to open world gameplay. It's hard to have live action cutscenes and strictly linear story progression/narrative while also letting off the reins and giving the player the freedom to explore a larger world at their leisure.
@@Indigo_Gaming Yeah, you’re probably right. But you never know; somewhere down the line they might try to experiment with adapting their style into new gameplay paradigms or genres. And as long as they have vision and not trend chasing, I’d be keen to see their fresh interpretation of some established design tropes 👌
Playing through Torchlight 3 right now and it bears similar scars to Alan Wake, where they had this idea of trying to make an ARPG MMO, but the game collapsed in on itself. The end result is chopped up into linear maps, with bugs, stutters, and decapitated free to play mechanics. It's not all bad, you can still see parts of a game they wanted to make work, but now it's being sold for far more than it's worth as an unfinished game.
What a shame after Runic Games' success with Torchlight 1 & 2. I played Hob before release, and though it was good, it seemed like they put too many resources into a game that wasn't destined to be a colossal hit. Torchlight deserved better, and whatever abomination Torchlight Frontiers/3 became is a sad end to a promising franchise.
Really nice Video. Of course a good working open world game would have been excellent, but before not being able to deliver i think its the right choice to trim it down. I like the story of all the alan wake games but they also cheat by being Meta. Nice seeing you back in health Indigo!
Thank you very much, glad you enjoyed! I know my opinion doesn't reflect everyone's views, but I just thought it an interesting topic to dig deeper to find out why the original premise of Alan Wake was so changed by the time it launched.
I somehow feel like the feel of the game loops in on itself and there are no characters aside from Alan himself, I think I would of preferred a more Twin Peaks get to know the town way of things , atleast that's what I expected when I started the game
I would have preferred a cast of memorable characters, too. The only one I really recall was Barry, but he plays a small role in most scenarios. One of my favorite bad takes on this game is that the story is is intentionally poor because it's based on Alan's "bad writing."
@@Indigo_Gaming It was quite interesting that they tried to imitate some characters like the log lady from Twin Peaks, but she just became a check point. I mean it's kind of hard to relate to any character in general if you think that they are all just written characters and not actual people in an actual town but some sort of manifestations. I gues that's the reason why I couldn't really finish Alan Wake 2. I just didn't care for any of the characters since it felt like they weren't actual people in an actual world.
I still remember clearly being pissed when it became console exclusive and eventually removed the open world. It was a sad time for PC gaming, considering I was a huge Max Payne fan. I didn't touch another Remedy game until Control.
We've all had our "popular PC studio goes console exclusive" moment. For me, it was when Bethesda switched to the Xbox as lead platform, and had to divide locations into tons of zones, remove levitation, and muck up the UI to optimize Oblivion for consoles. Fun times!
@@Indigo_Gaming The games that really represent it for me are Deus Ex 2 and Thief 3. I'm sure I've heard you comment on those too in a podcast or somewhere. The Oblivion shadow removal was definitely a big deal. There are many videos waiting to be made about the death of AAA pc exclusives because of the switch to Xbox as lead platform, but I guess it's an unpopular opinion.
I'm a Deus Ex 2 apologist, but I agree, there were some very poor decisions made in the making of that game in terms of UI and simplification. Universal ammo is a cool concept in theory but it absolutely sucks in practice.
I understand your position on this series, and agree with almost everything that was said. But I like what we have now (AW1 is one of my favorite games because of the story and atmosphere, and AW2 is the same, and more) (American Nightmare was good, but weaker than other games in the series). Maybe the original vision of the first game will be realized in Control 2 or, if it's in the plans, AW3. Who knows? Sam knows. We can only wait and hope. Or not. Anyway, great video.
Glad you enjoyed the video, despite having disagreements with it. While I fully understand their decisions to trim down the scope of the game, in doing so, their rewrites undermined the entire premise of the game for me. And as much as I enjoy the setting and lore of Control, mixing the two is as obnoxious as Alien vs. Predator in my opinion.
@@Indigo_Gaming I read some of your responses to comments and didn't see anything fishy in them (you didn’t call your opinion the only correct one and whatever). It's your opinion, and pretty well expressed. If you hated AW games like AngryJoe hated AW2 (because it won 3 awards at the TGA), then it would be a completely different story. Anyway... I see. Now that I think about it, I'm not that hyped about this Remedy Connected Universe. I'm not against it, but, don't know. Pretty hard to explain my thoughts about it. Wasn't stoked to see FBC in AW2, and the way they were portrayed... maybe it was intentional, but eh. So, you do not like Aliens vs. Predator too? Oh man, I think it's time for me to look for another RUclipsr to watch... Joking. Anyway, again.
I haven't watched Angry Joe in ages! He's had some incredible hot takes, giving 10/10s to pretty awful shows/games/movies while dunking on some good ones. I'll come out and say I've loved some of the AvP games, but I think lore-wise (and movie wise) it's a bit of an abomination. It makes the Predators into weakling fodder, while also turning the Aliens into more like mindless animals. Both are very powerful and intimidating in their original respective source material (Alien, Aliens, Predator, to a lesser degree Predator 2 and Predators), but come off as dull and boring in the AvP movies. Though I'll admit I haven't read the comics.
2:12 Alan Wake’s my absolute favorite game of all time but I’ll never understand Remedy’s decision on giving Wake SNIP-TOED COWBOY BOOTS on his vacation to the PNW. 💀
Horror is not really my strong suit (because I'm a coward), but that is what makes it so alluring. Horror in video games have not even breached the surface of this vast ocean of possibilities. Its sad to see the sector of this industry become a farce that not even a coward like myself is scared off.
There have been some great horror games in the past, and we got a revival of sorts in the 2000s with titles like Dead Space, Penumbra and Amnesia. I haven't played a game since Alien Isolation that legitimately scared me.
Not really a fan since I never played Alan Wake except a version that came out for PSP a long time ago, don't know if was spin off or the game itself ported there. But I certainly got super interested in the setting, specially about the writer with insomnia breathing life to nightmarish creatures when he writes. Kinda like the Goosebumps movie, but not silly at all lol. Now "In the Mouth of Madness" is in my watch list for movies thou, I almost always watch every movie you reference in your videos. An awesome one as usual Indigo, I've always been a fan of how you present the topics, be it a documentary or a shorter version like this one.
By "PSP" do you mean Playstation Portable or Playstation Plus? I don't think they did any portable versions of Alan Wake, but it eventually came to the Playstation and the Switch. I'm happy to recommend movies and shows. In the Mouth of Madness is one of my favorite Carpenter films, despite its shortcomings. Such an interesting premise, partially fulfilled by a low budget 90s flick. They had to redo parts of the movie including special effects due to budget constraints, but considering most of it is practical and (decent) optical effects, I think it still holds up.
@@Indigo_Gaming You're absolutely right I was mixing things, it was the Remaster on PS+. Still never got into survival horror myself, even if the plot is interesting. I'm still get surprised of what they were able to make with practical effect back in the 80s and 90s. I do like some of Carpenter films, and I specially love Vampires, so if you say it holds up that more than enough for me.
I think that's one of the biggest takeaways of this video. By numbers, it seems more and more people are simply WATCHING these games through let's plays and longplays. When half your game is just walking around or cinematics, this problem is going to get worse and worse.
Finally got around to watching this one. There's been a lot of backlash against AW2 and it's a shame to see it. I really liked the first one. It's a quintessential Remedy experience. Great to see a new video from you 😊
I don't dislike everything that Alan Wake 2 tried to do, but I think it's a bit all over the place in terms of tone and story, and feels like it belongs almost like a completely different genre let alone a franchise. I'm not completely sold by Remedy's new direction where they're tying everything together into a shared universe, and heavily leaning on dubbed live action cutscenes. But I hope you enjoyed my take on the games at least.
I don't really get what you mean by AW2 getting backlash at all? Critics loved it, fans loved it, it won 3 games awards, and the franchise popularity has been shooting up as it's been tying in with other games like Fortnite and DBD. I've seen very little negativity thrown towards the game at all
The internet has many bubbles in it, and depending on which community you go to, it will feel like a different reality. I've seen forums and Reddit posts which worship the game in almost a fervorous, cult-like manor, then I've seen other threads excoriate the game as if it sacrificed their firstborn to Moloch. I'm somewhere in the middle, but I can identify why the game is divisive amongst its superfans and haters.
Before playing the first Alan Wake, I was expecting it as Luigi mansion style gameplay, emphasize on exploration, puzzle solving , intersting twist on combat, and a much mature theme on the story.
Yeah, that was most likely due to American Nightmare reusing some of the unreleased Alan Wake 2 prototype's maps and assets. There's an alternate universe where we got Alan Wake 2 in 2012 or so, which would have been a completely different beast than the 2023 release.
I think it was ultimately for the better, open world is not something Remedy specializes in, we saw this In CONTROL and, despite how much I adore it, the openness only hurts it imo. Sure, I loved exploring The Oldest House... But it was kind of a drag for most of it, and I don't think Alan's original vision would be any better. Plus, in this world we live in, I don't have to choose between two nigh identical projects and the smaller one managed to survive because of it! I don't want to find myself in a workd where Deadly Premonition isn't really a thing, heh.
I mean, Deadly Premonition was coming out regardless of Alan Wake (different studio, different continent, etc.). But I could see it getting treated more negatively had Alan Wake fulfilled more of its promise.
@@Indigo_Gaming Yeah that's what I meant more or less, just typed it confusingly. I don't see DP having any life left in the universe where Alan Wake's original vision is realized, aye.
love the resource management i consider it as a survival horror back then, maybe that made me enjoy Dyinglight and 7 Days to Die. ill check Alone in The Dark, i had no idea Alan Wake had other games took similarities to it. from Quantum Break to Control is such a progress for Remedy.
I don't think I agree with a single one of your points. This "wiki warrior, too complicated, shared universe (derogatory)" complaint is just you not liking an artistic choice that anybody who played Max Payne would know was always Remedy's thing. Your (arguably incorrect) interpretation of the original pitch for Alan Wake has a really ambitious scope and gameplay unlike anything else that had ever been successfully made up to that point. Those interviews, if you aren't picking through them for tidbits to make your video, emphasize how while they wish they had gotten to make the game bigger and better, they still made the game that they fundamentally intended to. If your main problem with a game is that it isn't what you think it should have been, then that's your problem, not the game's. Every complaint you have is basically just that the video game should have been the thing you imagined it was going to be instead of what they actually made, and you're framing that as artistic criticism.
I feel like Remedy is losing it slowly. Control was an absolute bore-fest of a story with absolutely one dimensional protagonist. Absolutely fun gameplay and powers but the story and pacing made me want to get to the ending just for the sake of it. Gone are the days of Max Payne and the artistic license to symbolize the pain of a man who lost his wife and child.
I agree on the character part whole heatedly. Sam Lake has been really bad at his protagonists as of late. Jack and Beth from Quantum Break, Jesse from Control, and Saga from AW2 are all gigantic planks of wood. There's something to be said about an empty pair of boots the players can fill, but these characters are SUPPOSED to be deep and compelling. Why else would they have hours of cutscenes and inner monologues?
@@Indigo_Gaming I mean I think Max Payne is the best character Remedy has made and he had ton of inner monologue too but I would like to know what makes him different than say Jesse or Alan. Max talks to himself in the comic book strips (that used to show up when a chapter ended) all the time, if anything, in a more poetic/metaphorical english rather than normal everyday language and even then, as a teen growing up on it, it felt personal. It felt sad to have to go through his pain and man that theme song felt so heart wrenching. How is he or the game fundamentally different than their recent publishes?
Would be an interesting thing to tackle for sure. Superficially, I'd say Max actually has conflict, loss, sanity, going over the edge of the law and what is morally right, while struggling with inner demons--all the while hiding behind a layer of cynicism and sarcasm. He's more of an anti-hero than the other characters. Don't mean to pick on the ladies, but Beth and Jesse stand out to me as just being "strong and stoic." There's really nothing else going on for the most part.
@@Indigo_Gaming will definitely look forward to a character comparison essay of all of remedy's protagonists! Btw thank you for the cyberpunk 3 part series, hands down THE BEST historical breakdown of the genre ever done online. I always point people to it whenever we are talking about cyberpunk. Keep up the good work ❤️
I like Max Payne and Control was pretty cool, but I can't say Alan Wake is a favorite of mine. I like the basic concept but the burn with flashlight/shoot with gun encounter design just wasn't very fun to me. And if you're going to center a game on a writer, you better make sure the game's writing is sharp and I don't think they got there. As a writer Alan Wake seems closer to Garth Marenghi than Stephen King or Lovecraft.
That's actually a theory that some people have, that the writing in Alan Wake is intentionally bad, because Alan Wake (the writer) is hacky and writes lowbrow pulp material. "It's supposed to be bad!" 😄
It was scaled back from what was originally going to be a full sequel to basically "horde mode with cutscenes." Still, I think there is some merit to where they were taking the story.
I think it would have elevated the game, and you could have spent more time learning about the characters and world, rather than having to create a bunch of side plots and twists in a fixed level by level progression.
Man ... thats really dissapointing. I never played Alan Wake and planned to do it but when i see that they scrapped ALOT of potential away , i pass this game and rather watch a longplay . Its a huge shame that this game turned out into a linear third person shooter with some horror by the side .
#IndigoGaming it took me years to finish Allan wake it gave an eerie feeling chrostophobic feeling not having enough batteries the noises playing in pitch black getting sucked into the story 🙏🙏
I'm glad Remedy pared down the original concept from open world to level-based. The driving sections (which I assume are the leftovers from when the game was open-world) are the worst part of the game.
You mean one of the most surprising sleeper hits of 2010, that critics bashed but many enjoyed? web.archive.org/web/20100411210505/www.gamasutra.com/view/news/28032/Saling_The_World_Cabelas_Deadly_Premonition_Lead_US_Charts.php
@@Indigo_Gaming many enjoyed yes, but too this day, it's barely a cult hit. Even user reviews are split down the middle. Either you love it's weird quirkiness, or hate the broken game mechanics.
The base Alan Wake 1 experience was a walking simulator with bad combat. Enemy variety was unsatisfying. The checkpoint system was kind of awful, making me feel I could soft-lock the game. It sucked that the game would immediately switch to the next episode after finishing one, hitting the player with a recap! They should've taken the player back to the main menu lol The Special episodes were an improvement, and American Nightmare was finally enjoyable.
I never understood that game. Casualdery at its finest. Alan Wake is when casuals started lowering the standards and people could no longer think for themself. The game might be bad BUT THE MEDIA SAID... you know the deal.
True. Many games that were ambitous fall into the streamlining trend and it ends up being rather mediocre or even total waste . I can understand to streamline some games of the same genre and some aspects because to bring variation of gameplays that underlines the IP but since its taken as a trend suddenly every game must streamline everything because the casuals or many gamers complain about the smallest aspect that had value for different approaches in gameplay or opened up alternative paths and approaches that cant be opened up in a normal way . This already took much enthusiasm in gaming away and made games way too samey at the end . Nowadays is gaming in its worst way possible . Except indies , the tripple A industry is just extremly uncreative and many "gamers" just have no expectations and value at all in gaming . Its very sad .
@@Snyperwolf91 Bro I couldn't say it better. Older games, AA and Indie are the best. Strategy games, rpgs, rogue likes/tes, card games. There is so many great games but most people prefer to waste money on AAA which is bad. If we want to find good games we just need to look for them.
I was there when the first Alan Wake trailer dropped and I was sooo excited...then a few years went by without nothing and when the new version of Alan was announced I stil knew it will be something, so I got it day one for the good X360 and loved it. Was the first draft more ambitious? Definitely! Did it almost kill Remedy? Definitely! So I will gladly take streamlined experiences instead of them going under any day!
As I said in the video, "A solid release is infinitely better than a cancelled game." I had a similar experience while watching, waiting and learning all I could about Alan Wake...then finally it came out and I was enjoying it, but had an unshakable feeling of underwhelming throughout.
Alan wake 1 was interesting but went on for too long, was too easy/samey and the meta writing was just cringe, it's absolutely not immersive and I would like to never see it again.
I was initially impressed by the cinematic presentation of the game, but I think the writing is designed to kind of trick you into thinking it's a lot more clever than it really is. It goes immediately meta, referencing Stephen King, and how endings are almost always unsatisfying, while telling a tired TV show-like plot with forced cliffhangers at the end of every "episode," only to conclude with (you guessed it) a fairly unsatisfying ending. So much is overexplained, while many plot threads (especially the antagonists') go underdeveloped. The whole author angle almost served to lampshade the problem, rather than address it.
@@Indigo_Gaming I agree it does think it's clever but does nothing actually clever. The gameplay is even less so I don't know why it was even moderately popular and I can't emphasize how tropeish meta writing is. Absolutely 0 immersion in the game, some games break the 4th wall but at least it has a payoff (mostly comedic).
Seeing the original Alan Wake 2 trailer with the original saga, then the released version and the stinky nails of sweet baby inc all over it, I'm glad I didn't buy it
It feels pretty unfair to view the game and more recent remedy games through this lens only because they're gone into a specific direction. The real question is do we really need every game to be open world? How do you concile strong focus narration with an open world design? Few games managed it well and always with compromise especially in the time of AW developpement. All the flaws you pointed in final AW are mostly pointed as unique qualities that create a very unique game for the time despite the repetitive gameplay. . Every new remedy game since Max Payne brings a lot of new things on the table of video gaming. Quantum break being the weakest imo. The gameplay may not be as profound as it could be but the sum of all the parts create really innovative story driven games. AWII despite a lot of mechanical flaws really elevate what video game story telling can be if push it the right direction. Sure maybe there is a world where Remedy release open world alan wake and it became a masterpiece and a new standard for the industry. Why not. Dreaming projects is easy, making realeased games is not.
I think you may be looking at this concept from a person burnt out on open world games. Bear in mind, Alan Wake was announced before Minecraft, Grand Theft Auto 4, Far Cry 2/3, and Assassin's Creed. It was ambitious and fresh at the time. As you said yourself, the gameplay was repetitive, and instead of letting us explore and investigate the world ourselves, it instead firmly put us on a linear narrative path, therefore leaning very heavily on the quality of the storytelling. I think Alan Wake pulls a trick by having a very "cinematic" look, and lots of references to Stephen King, writing in general and narratives, and its TV-show presentation makes you THINK your watching one of the best stories ever made in gaming. However, my criticisms of the story still stand: the horror author aspect takes a backseat to roaming the woods at night shooting lumberjacks, many of the plot threads don't go anywhere, the antagonists all come in and out of the story anticlimactically, and there are so few memorable characters or interactions. If you're going to focus so strongly on the storytelling, you have to make sure your script is great!
I care about why everyone has bad taste and likes shit games, just not about the shit games themselves. I'm also subbed to this cuck for some reason, fixing that.@@vikingguitar
Just because something doesn't meet your made up fantastical expectations, doesnt mean it should have or ever could have been what you want, or even if you would actually want it at all. Of course you feel like you really want it, so you feel like it must be real somehow, this is as simple as comparing something in the real world to your most made up bestest game ever, it makes for poor criticism and comes off as whiny. BTW didn't even play the new Alan Wake, not a fanboy.
If you watched a movie trailer that you fell in love with, with later trailers confirming that attraction to the premise, but five years later got a different movie with the same name, with a different cast, script and in an entirely different genre, would you be disappointed?
I hope you enjoyed, or at least were intrigued by my "break-up letter" with a franchise I was once extremely invested in. More content is always on the horizon. Please support my work:
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you should do a review on jagged alliance 2
i always see you around im subscribed to you but i never get notifications for your videos @Indigo Gaming i remember loving ur history of cyberpunk series maybe i need to interact more in the comments
Great video! I was a big fan of Remedy and Max Payne growing up and I remember being so wowed by the tornado tech demo when I was in high school. It's a shame the open world formula didn't get used in the end, but I still really appreciate the product we got in the end. Too often games stuck in development hell or needing a complete rewrite halfway through don't end up working out (to this day, the last game I've ever pre-ordered was Duke Nukem Forever, lol) so there's still something to be said that Alan Wake was a complete and competent game.
Like I said in my video, I think what they did was the safe move, or "the winning play." This could have easily turned into a Too Human or a Duke Nukem Forever scenario. They managed to downsize it, ship it, and after a disappointing launch, it eventually turned a profit. A success grasped from the jaws of failure.
Whenever someone does a Silent Hill needle drop I feel such elation. It's kind of weird to feel homesick for a horrible place I've luckily never visited.
I tried to do a musical nod to each game I featured (Alone in the Dark 2008 notwithstanding, even though that game's soundtrack is pretty excellent). Silent Hill is just such a vibe.
I knew it wouldn’t happen with 2, but Control gave me the hope that they would try to do the open world and side quests since the story would be a lot slower paced then 1. I just want more games like Mizzurna Falls and Deadly Premonition
I think the vast openness of the Pacific Northwest begets a large space you can traverse and explore. It's a shame Alan Wake feels so stifled and small considering how much landscape and scenery is actually in the game's data.
@@Indigo_Gamingoh I don’t know if you saw but there is a twin peaks fan game being made called Twin Peaks: Into the Night and it even has a demo you should check out
What is even crazier is that Alan Wake 2 is much more narrower than the first one... Remedy doe absolutely not understand what path they are supposed go to with Alan Wake games while this kind gentlemen explained everything in the video : make the Alan Wake 1 you were supposed to make in 2007 and that is it !
Excellent coverage.
I found Alan Wake 1 to be very clever in narrative and tense in gameplay. One of the things that struck me how realized Bright Falls was, so it being originally open world makes sense.
I too was interested in Bright Falls. It's just a shame that we see so little of it in the final game. Thanks for watching, as always, Hemang!
That one hurts, after all theses years waiting for Alan Wake 2. And here it comes finally and it doesn't feel like Alan Wake.
How so?
Alan wake 1 doesn’t feel Alan wake in comparison to the sequel, it’s a lot more connected to control than it is the first game but I think that that is what Alan wake is.
The AW2 Resident Evil inventory system kinda pissed me off. Great game nonetheless.
20:24 Alan Wake & Max Payne...now that's a duo for an interesting video game!!!
Your videos are always of the highest quality possible!!! What a joy to watch!
I feel like you want to do an entire video on either Twin Peaks or Deadly Premonition.
Thank you for your amazing work!!!
I did a shorter video a few years ago about the mundane aspects of games like Shenmue, Deadly Premonition, etc. This is almost an expansion on that, but more focused on Alan Wake's LACK of mundanity. I'd be open to it one day, but it's a niche topic I feel.
As much as I enjoy your long videos, I'm happy you're doing shorter and more succinct videos. I really would have love to play the original idea of Alan Wake, maybe Alan Wake 3 will do just that.
Thank you for watching! It certainly is nice to release something after a month or two, rather than having to slave away for the better part of a year in the dark and hope the video is a hit!
I love the whole aesthetic.
One of my favourite RUclips channels talking about Twin Peaks, one of my new favourite shows! What an excellent day!
One of my all-time favorite shows. I didn't want to spoil much here, but I'd like to talk about it more in depth someday.
@@Indigo_Gaming I've only just finished it, watched it over the last couple of years, and I can see how it inspired so many games that got me to try it out. Still have FWWM and the Return to watch too. And would be great to have a Twin Peaks indigo video as well
@@Indigo_Gamingoh please do a video on it. One of the all time great shows.
this confirmed my thoughts seeing the uncanny similarities of AW to Twin peaks, always thought of that but never bothered checking
This is just your opinion, but one I very much agree with. I always appreciated how Alan Wake did something other than clone other games. And I like that it gets a little weird with the story and such. But I never thought it was a good story.
If you think about Sam Lake being heavily into Lost during the latter part of the game's development: everything makes sense. A weird "poet god deep sea diver" is basically AW's version of the polar bear. The smoke monster is mirrored in the Dark Presence, and its mystery box-style story is all show and very little substance. That being said, I did really enjoy Lost through most of its first two seasons.
Indigo gaming just posted a new video on January, see you back on June bro
I love that in the early versions they used Max's running animation from the second game lol
Good catch! I always like peeking behind the curtain like that, the early trailers were clearly mocked up before they had the time or budget to do new mocap animations and such.
Props for referencing Midnight Mass and In the Mouth of Madness. Two excellent and extremely different horror experiences that I demand everyone here watch 😁
Great show (aside from a dodgy finale), and one of the most underrated Carpenter films. Glad to see others have good taste as well!
I played the original game while it was free on Epic a few months ago, I tried it out before the release of the sequel, and stopped playing. The "gameplay" sequences were more like mind-numbingly boring busy work. And then the story itself was going no where and I just abandoned it and didn't buy the sequel because of it.
Your explanation of the original introduction, of picking up a hitchiker and realizing he's repeating the lines from your book, with the resulting car accident and then having him hunt you down, really puts the intro "tutorial" area into context and makes way more sense. It's amazing how the finished product is this broken, disjointed, gutted version of a more open-world game.
I enjoyed Alan Wake and even replayed it once... but then I never really touched it or thought about it again. It didn't really affect how I approach gaming, which I suppose is the most damning part about it. Enjoyable, but ultimately a toothless experience.
Here we go!
I love the video and the analysis...even though I disagree with it completely. To me this is a clear example of what an author actually goes through themselves: you start with a lot of fluff, then you edit, trim and narrow it down. I think Alan Wake's enduring fascination stems from the experience being a tight narrative experience rather than another bloated open world RPG (which we now complain about all the time!). Less is more.
It shows strong character to experience and enjoy critique/opinions that you disagree with. Thank you for that. While I agree that tightening up a creative work and trimming the fat is generally a good thing, in Alan Wake doing that, it now leans heavily on the storytelling. And in my opinion, it does almost nothing with the "writer rewrites reality" premise, and is very choppy in its pacing. Antagonists come and go (like the ransom guy, Dr. Hartman and Nightengale suddenly get offed by the Dark presence), setups (like the clicker) are very obvious and come into play right before he needs them, etc.
But I'm glad you enjoyed the game and watched my video. Happy New Year.
I have a serious soft spot for these games. And I can totally understand why they’re not everyone’s cup of tea. I remember watching the Bright Falls webisodes before the game came out and I was hooked. I just loved them.
I loved the webisodes! A lot of atmosphere and eerie mystery in such a short runtime. My disappointment was that almost none of that tone made it into the actual game.
5 minutes in and I'm already hooked. I love Alan Wake, it's DLC and American Nightmare.....I was considerably less taken with AW2 tbh. You always make the best videos, Indigo! EDIT I would love to see you cover the Shenmue we never got!
Thanks for the high praise! I enjoyed Alan Wake for what it was worth, but couldn't help but feel like we got a hollower, emptier shell of its initial premise. I've talked briefly about Shenmue before, could definitely be an interesting topic in the future, maybe along with Mizzurna Falls and other similar games.
@@Indigo_Gaming I just wanted to second the idea of covering Mizzurna Falls.
Only 20 minutes? What is this scam??? (Seriously though, great work as always dude!)
I'm a hack fraud!
Nice video!
Alan Wake 2 fixed a bunch of the issues I had with the first game. I'd love to see a sequel with even more open space and survival elements, but they're definitely moving in the right direction. It's my favorite game from last year.
Comparing Alan Wake, Alone in the Dark and Deadly Premonition was a nice insight, it was an exciting time, with many developers trying innovate the survival horror genre. All three games had similar ideas and huge ambitions. Alan Wake 1 sacrificed scope for production values, while the other two fully embraced wild mechanics and ideas without any constraints. It's a shame Alone in the Dark had such a ridiculous story and unplayable driving mechanics, cause the gameplay situations were pretty interesting. Deadly Premonition, even having the dullest gameplay of the three, was completely saved by it's storytelling/mood/vision.
Deadly Premonition has some incredibly wacky elements to it, but it's also a vastly more ambitious game than Alan Wake in terms of the type of interactive world it tried to realize. I'm an Alone in the Dark 2008 apologist, and there are still features and mechanics in that game that future games don't even come close to imitating. But you're right, the story ranged from middling to bad, and the driving was rough (incredibly ironic, because 95% of Eden Games' titles were driving games!).
After days of searching for an honest review on the misery that is Alan Wake 2 I finally stumble upon a guy who knows what he is talking about. I can not believe how much the general public endorsed Alan Wake 2 while not seeing the trashed potential and utterly bad game it is. When Alan Wake 2 was announced I thought Remedy was going to fix everything you talked about in the video over Alan Wake 1 and give us a full open world Twin Peaks like experience. And then I saw what a disaster Alan Wake 2 is in every aspect of a game. It makes me so sad and angry that I spent 13 years waiting for a masterpiece and I get a much worse game than Alan Wake 1. Good review mate.
Criticism of the second game seemed to get drowned out by unflinching praise from every corner. It was an odd phenomenon, I hardly heard about what specifically made it good, it was just fervorous praise. There are a few people who've spoken out about it, but it makes you feel crazy when that sort of thing happens.
super underrated video
It's not a lake, it's an ocean
It's not a Joe, it's a Coffe
I'm not a horse im a broom
It's not a loop, it's a spiral
It’s not a fart, it’s a shart
Even If I like this game, It doesn't get less frustrating to see what It could have been.
Your voice is similar to that of the narrator of the channel GVMERS. Glad I found this channel.
I've heard that comparison before. Thanks for stopping by!
The sound design was incredible
How in the hell have I never activated free cam in AW?!?!?!?!!!!! That would have given my video so much dope B-roll!
You can turn it on via the launch options in Steam. It only works with a controller, but it took my breath away due to how HUGE each section of the world map is.
steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1135506903
Aw man, Alan Wake! Still in the top 10 of my favorite games of all time. I bought Alan Wake 2 to support them week 1 but haven't sat down to play it. Glad they won an award! Thanks as always for the high quality content! =)
Glad you enjoyed the video! Thanks for watching.
Ah damn, I really wanted to watch this but haven't played Alan Wake yet and don't want to spoil myself.... Will be back once I do
looking at the dialogues and script of the sequel and i'm like "t's not Sam Lake, it's sweet baby inc take"
One of my favorite games. I always wished I could just drive around the mountains and see what there was. The free camera really showed off what was cut and would could have been.
Same feeling for me.
It's not an ocean, it's a lake
This is so simple and clever, I wish I had thought of this for the video's title, although I do point out the irony of that line toward the end.
While I’m not huge on most open world games; I’d be interested in seeing what particularly current Remedy’s take on one would be.
While I'd agree, the current trend that Remedy is pursuing is pretty contradictory to open world gameplay. It's hard to have live action cutscenes and strictly linear story progression/narrative while also letting off the reins and giving the player the freedom to explore a larger world at their leisure.
@@Indigo_Gaming Yeah, you’re probably right. But you never know; somewhere down the line they might try to experiment with adapting their style into new gameplay paradigms or genres. And as long as they have vision and not trend chasing, I’d be keen to see their fresh interpretation of some established design tropes 👌
Playing through Torchlight 3 right now and it bears similar scars to Alan Wake, where they had this idea of trying to make an ARPG MMO, but the game collapsed in on itself. The end result is chopped up into linear maps, with bugs, stutters, and decapitated free to play mechanics. It's not all bad, you can still see parts of a game they wanted to make work, but now it's being sold for far more than it's worth as an unfinished game.
What a shame after Runic Games' success with Torchlight 1 & 2. I played Hob before release, and though it was good, it seemed like they put too many resources into a game that wasn't destined to be a colossal hit. Torchlight deserved better, and whatever abomination Torchlight Frontiers/3 became is a sad end to a promising franchise.
Really nice Video. Of course a good working open world game would have been excellent, but before not being able to deliver i think its the right choice to trim it down. I like the story of all the alan wake games but they also cheat by being Meta.
Nice seeing you back in health Indigo!
Thank you very much, glad you enjoyed! I know my opinion doesn't reflect everyone's views, but I just thought it an interesting topic to dig deeper to find out why the original premise of Alan Wake was so changed by the time it launched.
I somehow feel like the feel of the game loops in on itself and there are no characters aside from Alan himself, I think I would of preferred a more Twin Peaks get to know the town way of things , atleast that's what I expected when I started the game
I would have preferred a cast of memorable characters, too. The only one I really recall was Barry, but he plays a small role in most scenarios. One of my favorite bad takes on this game is that the story is is intentionally poor because it's based on Alan's "bad writing."
@@Indigo_Gaming It was quite interesting that they tried to imitate some characters like the log lady from Twin Peaks, but she just became a check point. I mean it's kind of hard to relate to any character in general if you think that they are all just written characters and not actual people in an actual town but some sort of manifestations. I gues that's the reason why I couldn't really finish Alan Wake 2. I just didn't care for any of the characters since it felt like they weren't actual people in an actual world.
I still remember clearly being pissed when it became console exclusive and eventually removed the open world. It was a sad time for PC gaming, considering I was a huge Max Payne fan.
I didn't touch another Remedy game until Control.
We've all had our "popular PC studio goes console exclusive" moment. For me, it was when Bethesda switched to the Xbox as lead platform, and had to divide locations into tons of zones, remove levitation, and muck up the UI to optimize Oblivion for consoles. Fun times!
@@Indigo_Gaming The games that really represent it for me are Deus Ex 2 and Thief 3. I'm sure I've heard you comment on those too in a podcast or somewhere. The Oblivion shadow removal was definitely a big deal.
There are many videos waiting to be made about the death of AAA pc exclusives because of the switch to Xbox as lead platform, but I guess it's an unpopular opinion.
I'm a Deus Ex 2 apologist, but I agree, there were some very poor decisions made in the making of that game in terms of UI and simplification. Universal ammo is a cool concept in theory but it absolutely sucks in practice.
I understand your position on this series, and agree with almost everything that was said. But I like what we have now (AW1 is one of my favorite games because of the story and atmosphere, and AW2 is the same, and more) (American Nightmare was good, but weaker than other games in the series). Maybe the original vision of the first game will be realized in Control 2 or, if it's in the plans, AW3. Who knows? Sam knows. We can only wait and hope. Or not.
Anyway, great video.
Glad you enjoyed the video, despite having disagreements with it. While I fully understand their decisions to trim down the scope of the game, in doing so, their rewrites undermined the entire premise of the game for me. And as much as I enjoy the setting and lore of Control, mixing the two is as obnoxious as Alien vs. Predator in my opinion.
@@Indigo_Gaming I read some of your responses to comments and didn't see anything fishy in them (you didn’t call your opinion the only correct one and whatever). It's your opinion, and pretty well expressed. If you hated AW games like AngryJoe hated AW2 (because it won 3 awards at the TGA), then it would be a completely different story. Anyway...
I see. Now that I think about it, I'm not that hyped about this Remedy Connected Universe. I'm not against it, but, don't know. Pretty hard to explain my thoughts about it. Wasn't stoked to see FBC in AW2, and the way they were portrayed... maybe it was intentional, but eh.
So, you do not like Aliens vs. Predator too? Oh man, I think it's time for me to look for another RUclipsr to watch... Joking. Anyway, again.
I haven't watched Angry Joe in ages! He's had some incredible hot takes, giving 10/10s to pretty awful shows/games/movies while dunking on some good ones.
I'll come out and say I've loved some of the AvP games, but I think lore-wise (and movie wise) it's a bit of an abomination. It makes the Predators into weakling fodder, while also turning the Aliens into more like mindless animals. Both are very powerful and intimidating in their original respective source material (Alien, Aliens, Predator, to a lesser degree Predator 2 and Predators), but come off as dull and boring in the AvP movies. Though I'll admit I haven't read the comics.
2:12 Alan Wake’s my absolute favorite game of all time but I’ll never understand Remedy’s decision on giving Wake SNIP-TOED COWBOY BOOTS on his vacation to the PNW. 💀
Something something Finnish folks making games set in America, I imagine.
@@Indigo_Gaming That doesn’t sound far off ngl.
Horror is not really my strong suit (because I'm a coward), but that is what makes it so alluring. Horror in video games have not even breached the surface of this vast ocean of possibilities. Its sad to see the sector of this industry become a farce that not even a coward like myself is scared off.
There have been some great horror games in the past, and we got a revival of sorts in the 2000s with titles like Dead Space, Penumbra and Amnesia.
I haven't played a game since Alien Isolation that legitimately scared me.
Not really a fan since I never played Alan Wake except a version that came out for PSP a long time ago, don't know if was spin off or the game itself ported there. But I certainly got super interested in the setting, specially about the writer with insomnia breathing life to nightmarish creatures when he writes. Kinda like the Goosebumps movie, but not silly at all lol.
Now "In the Mouth of Madness" is in my watch list for movies thou, I almost always watch every movie you reference in your videos. An awesome one as usual Indigo, I've always been a fan of how you present the topics, be it a documentary or a shorter version like this one.
By "PSP" do you mean Playstation Portable or Playstation Plus? I don't think they did any portable versions of Alan Wake, but it eventually came to the Playstation and the Switch.
I'm happy to recommend movies and shows. In the Mouth of Madness is one of my favorite Carpenter films, despite its shortcomings. Such an interesting premise, partially fulfilled by a low budget 90s flick. They had to redo parts of the movie including special effects due to budget constraints, but considering most of it is practical and (decent) optical effects, I think it still holds up.
@@Indigo_Gaming You're absolutely right I was mixing things, it was the Remaster on PS+. Still never got into survival horror myself, even if the plot is interesting.
I'm still get surprised of what they were able to make with practical effect back in the 80s and 90s. I do like some of Carpenter films, and I specially love Vampires, so if you say it holds up that more than enough for me.
_”It’s not a scratch. It’s an edit.”_ - Alan Fake
What a great point about the games feeling more like b-movies. Remedy is a company obsessed with movies...but they're making games instead.
I think that's one of the biggest takeaways of this video. By numbers, it seems more and more people are simply WATCHING these games through let's plays and longplays. When half your game is just walking around or cinematics, this problem is going to get worse and worse.
@@Indigo_Gaming Oh wait, you're the miami vice channel! Thanks again, i'm on season 5 already!
Right on! Glad you're enjoying the series. I know my topics are pretty eclectic. Going from Miami Vice to Alan Wake is quite a whiplash.
great video !
Finally got around to watching this one. There's been a lot of backlash against AW2 and it's a shame to see it. I really liked the first one. It's a quintessential Remedy experience. Great to see a new video from you 😊
I don't dislike everything that Alan Wake 2 tried to do, but I think it's a bit all over the place in terms of tone and story, and feels like it belongs almost like a completely different genre let alone a franchise.
I'm not completely sold by Remedy's new direction where they're tying everything together into a shared universe, and heavily leaning on dubbed live action cutscenes. But I hope you enjoyed my take on the games at least.
I don't really get what you mean by AW2 getting backlash at all? Critics loved it, fans loved it, it won 3 games awards, and the franchise popularity has been shooting up as it's been tying in with other games like Fortnite and DBD. I've seen very little negativity thrown towards the game at all
The internet has many bubbles in it, and depending on which community you go to, it will feel like a different reality. I've seen forums and Reddit posts which worship the game in almost a fervorous, cult-like manor, then I've seen other threads excoriate the game as if it sacrificed their firstborn to Moloch. I'm somewhere in the middle, but I can identify why the game is divisive amongst its superfans and haters.
Excellent writing and narration. Great work, greatly enjoyed.
Thanks very much, glad you enjoyed.
Before playing the first Alan Wake, I was expecting it as Luigi mansion style gameplay, emphasize on exploration, puzzle solving , intersting twist on combat, and a much mature theme on the story.
Well, we've had some of that open world, in American Nightmare, although it was rather limited in scope.
Yeah, that was most likely due to American Nightmare reusing some of the unreleased Alan Wake 2 prototype's maps and assets. There's an alternate universe where we got Alan Wake 2 in 2012 or so, which would have been a completely different beast than the 2023 release.
i will come back to this when i finish AW2 as i want 0 spoilers HOWEVER, i see you man, i support, keep up the banger work as always.
Thanks very much! I hope you enjoy the video when you get back to it.
I think it was ultimately for the better, open world is not something Remedy specializes in, we saw this In CONTROL and, despite how much I adore it, the openness only hurts it imo. Sure, I loved exploring The Oldest House... But it was kind of a drag for most of it, and I don't think Alan's original vision would be any better.
Plus, in this world we live in, I don't have to choose between two nigh identical projects and the smaller one managed to survive because of it! I don't want to find myself in a workd where Deadly Premonition isn't really a thing, heh.
I mean, Deadly Premonition was coming out regardless of Alan Wake (different studio, different continent, etc.). But I could see it getting treated more negatively had Alan Wake fulfilled more of its promise.
@@Indigo_Gaming Yeah that's what I meant more or less, just typed it confusingly. I don't see DP having any life left in the universe where Alan Wake's original vision is realized, aye.
Great video. I love this game!
love the resource management i consider it as a survival horror back then, maybe that made me enjoy Dyinglight and 7 Days to Die.
ill check Alone in The Dark, i had no idea Alan Wake had other games took similarities to it. from Quantum Break to Control is such a progress for Remedy.
Good shit
15:55 homeboy had to cram some DP in there, huh? :D
I did a double take until I realized you meant Deadly Premonition... 😄
I don't think I agree with a single one of your points. This "wiki warrior, too complicated, shared universe (derogatory)" complaint is just you not liking an artistic choice that anybody who played Max Payne would know was always Remedy's thing. Your (arguably incorrect) interpretation of the original pitch for Alan Wake has a really ambitious scope and gameplay unlike anything else that had ever been successfully made up to that point. Those interviews, if you aren't picking through them for tidbits to make your video, emphasize how while they wish they had gotten to make the game bigger and better, they still made the game that they fundamentally intended to. If your main problem with a game is that it isn't what you think it should have been, then that's your problem, not the game's. Every complaint you have is basically just that the video game should have been the thing you imagined it was going to be instead of what they actually made, and you're framing that as artistic criticism.
I feel like Remedy is losing it slowly. Control was an absolute bore-fest of a story with absolutely one dimensional protagonist. Absolutely fun gameplay and powers but the story and pacing made me want to get to the ending just for the sake of it. Gone are the days of Max Payne and the artistic license to symbolize the pain of a man who lost his wife and child.
I agree on the character part whole heatedly. Sam Lake has been really bad at his protagonists as of late. Jack and Beth from Quantum Break, Jesse from Control, and Saga from AW2 are all gigantic planks of wood. There's something to be said about an empty pair of boots the players can fill, but these characters are SUPPOSED to be deep and compelling. Why else would they have hours of cutscenes and inner monologues?
@@Indigo_Gaming I mean I think Max Payne is the best character Remedy has made and he had ton of inner monologue too but I would like to know what makes him different than say Jesse or Alan. Max talks to himself in the comic book strips (that used to show up when a chapter ended) all the time, if anything, in a more poetic/metaphorical english rather than normal everyday language and even then, as a teen growing up on it, it felt personal. It felt sad to have to go through his pain and man that theme song felt so heart wrenching. How is he or the game fundamentally different than their recent publishes?
Would be an interesting thing to tackle for sure. Superficially, I'd say Max actually has conflict, loss, sanity, going over the edge of the law and what is morally right, while struggling with inner demons--all the while hiding behind a layer of cynicism and sarcasm. He's more of an anti-hero than the other characters. Don't mean to pick on the ladies, but Beth and Jesse stand out to me as just being "strong and stoic." There's really nothing else going on for the most part.
@@Indigo_Gaming will definitely look forward to a character comparison essay of all of remedy's protagonists! Btw thank you for the cyberpunk 3 part series, hands down THE BEST historical breakdown of the genre ever done online. I always point people to it whenever we are talking about cyberpunk. Keep up the good work ❤️
I like Max Payne and Control was pretty cool, but I can't say Alan Wake is a favorite of mine. I like the basic concept but the burn with flashlight/shoot with gun encounter design just wasn't very fun to me. And if you're going to center a game on a writer, you better make sure the game's writing is sharp and I don't think they got there. As a writer Alan Wake seems closer to Garth Marenghi than Stephen King or Lovecraft.
That's actually a theory that some people have, that the writing in Alan Wake is intentionally bad, because Alan Wake (the writer) is hacky and writes lowbrow pulp material. "It's supposed to be bad!" 😄
Twin Peaks can't ever be topped (the main plot of course, so all of season 1 and most pf season 2 to me)
The atmosphere, the coziness, the sheer horror of its darker scenes. Such a unique and powerful piece of media.
14:50 im 24 years old and today is my first time ever hearing sam lakes actual voice and it threw me completely off😂😂😂
There's a reason you hear him dubbed most of the time. Super nice guy, but doesn't exactly sound like the "gritty noir detective."
@@Indigo_Gaming 😭😭😭😭 good to know
American Nightmare was pretty lackluster for what I remember.
It was scaled back from what was originally going to be a full sequel to basically "horde mode with cutscenes." Still, I think there is some merit to where they were taking the story.
Alan Wake was so good, but it would've been cool to see it as an open world game.
I think it would have elevated the game, and you could have spent more time learning about the characters and world, rather than having to create a bunch of side plots and twists in a fixed level by level progression.
The Corey Feldman we never got
Man ... thats really dissapointing. I never played Alan Wake and planned to do it but when i see that they scrapped ALOT of potential away , i pass this game and rather watch a longplay .
Its a huge shame that this game turned out into a linear third person shooter with some horror by the side .
Please do an episode on crosscode
#IndigoGaming it took me years to finish Allan wake it gave an eerie feeling chrostophobic feeling not having enough batteries the noises playing in pitch black getting sucked into the story 🙏🙏
ayyyyyy alan wakeee
I'm glad Remedy pared down the original concept from open world to level-based. The driving sections (which I assume are the leftovers from when the game was open-world) are the worst part of the game.
Deadly Premonition shows that Remedy made the right move in simplifying Alan Wake.
You mean one of the most surprising sleeper hits of 2010, that critics bashed but many enjoyed?
web.archive.org/web/20100411210505/www.gamasutra.com/view/news/28032/Saling_The_World_Cabelas_Deadly_Premonition_Lead_US_Charts.php
@@Indigo_Gaming many enjoyed yes, but too this day, it's barely a cult hit. Even user reviews are split down the middle. Either you love it's weird quirkiness, or hate the broken game mechanics.
The base Alan Wake 1 experience was a walking simulator with bad combat. Enemy variety was unsatisfying. The checkpoint system was kind of awful, making me feel I could soft-lock the game.
It sucked that the game would immediately switch to the next episode after finishing one, hitting the player with a recap! They should've taken the player back to the main menu lol
The Special episodes were an improvement, and American Nightmare was finally enjoyable.
I never understood that game. Casualdery at its finest. Alan Wake is when casuals started lowering the standards and people could no longer think for themself. The game might be bad BUT THE MEDIA SAID... you know the deal.
True. Many games that were ambitous fall into the streamlining trend and it ends up being rather mediocre or even total waste .
I can understand to streamline some games of the same genre and some aspects because to bring variation of gameplays that underlines the IP but since its taken as a trend suddenly every game must streamline everything because the casuals or many gamers complain about the smallest aspect that had value for different approaches in gameplay or opened up alternative paths and approaches that cant be opened up in a normal way .
This already took much enthusiasm in gaming away and made games way too samey at the end . Nowadays is gaming in its worst way possible . Except indies , the tripple A industry is just extremly uncreative and many "gamers" just have no expectations and value at all in gaming . Its very sad .
@@Snyperwolf91 Bro I couldn't say it better. Older games, AA and Indie are the best. Strategy games, rpgs, rogue likes/tes, card games. There is so many great games but most people prefer to waste money on AAA which is bad. If we want to find good games we just need to look for them.
I was there when the first Alan Wake trailer dropped and I was sooo excited...then a few years went by without nothing and when the new version of Alan was announced I stil knew it will be something, so I got it day one for the good X360 and loved it.
Was the first draft more ambitious? Definitely!
Did it almost kill Remedy? Definitely!
So I will gladly take streamlined experiences instead of them going under any day!
As I said in the video, "A solid release is infinitely better than a cancelled game." I had a similar experience while watching, waiting and learning all I could about Alan Wake...then finally it came out and I was enjoying it, but had an unshakable feeling of underwhelming throughout.
Alan Would've
Alan Woulda Coulda Shoulda
👌
Cool history. Gotta say I completely disagree with the conclusion though. Alan Wake 2 was my 2023 game of the year
12:41 is that mf jakko koskela?
Could be the same reference model! I know Remedy likes to use a similar group of friends for a lot of their projects.
When will cyberpunk part 4 will be released?
The new game plus ending of alan wake 2 is basically him going from alan wake to alan lake
I'm going to need to read 900 wiki articles to fully appreciate this comment... 😄
Is there any new info here?
*i consider Control a Top 20 game of all time and I love how it revived the Alan Wake franchise* 👌
Alan Wake 2 sucks.
Yeah . Extremly too .
Alan wake 1 was interesting but went on for too long, was too easy/samey and the meta writing was just cringe, it's absolutely not immersive and I would like to never see it again.
I was initially impressed by the cinematic presentation of the game, but I think the writing is designed to kind of trick you into thinking it's a lot more clever than it really is. It goes immediately meta, referencing Stephen King, and how endings are almost always unsatisfying, while telling a tired TV show-like plot with forced cliffhangers at the end of every "episode," only to conclude with (you guessed it) a fairly unsatisfying ending. So much is overexplained, while many plot threads (especially the antagonists') go underdeveloped. The whole author angle almost served to lampshade the problem, rather than address it.
@@Indigo_Gaming I agree it does think it's clever but does nothing actually clever. The gameplay is even less so I don't know why it was even moderately popular and I can't emphasize how tropeish meta writing is. Absolutely 0 immersion in the game, some games break the 4th wall but at least it has a payoff (mostly comedic).
It'd not just bad, it's giant crap
First
Last Alan wake was garbage Lol.
Seeing the original Alan Wake 2 trailer with the original saga, then the released version and the stinky nails of sweet baby inc all over it, I'm glad I didn't buy it
It feels pretty unfair to view the game and more recent remedy games through this lens only because they're gone into a specific direction. The real question is do we really need every game to be open world? How do you concile strong focus narration with an open world design? Few games managed it well and always with compromise especially in the time of AW developpement. All the flaws you pointed in final AW are mostly pointed as unique qualities that create a very unique game for the time despite the repetitive gameplay. . Every new remedy game since Max Payne brings a lot of new things on the table of video gaming. Quantum break being the weakest imo. The gameplay may not be as profound as it could be but the sum of all the parts create really innovative story driven games. AWII despite a lot of mechanical flaws really elevate what video game story telling can be if push it the right direction. Sure maybe there is a world where Remedy release open world alan wake and it became a masterpiece and a new standard for the industry. Why not. Dreaming projects is easy, making realeased games is not.
I think you may be looking at this concept from a person burnt out on open world games. Bear in mind, Alan Wake was announced before Minecraft, Grand Theft Auto 4, Far Cry 2/3, and Assassin's Creed. It was ambitious and fresh at the time.
As you said yourself, the gameplay was repetitive, and instead of letting us explore and investigate the world ourselves, it instead firmly put us on a linear narrative path, therefore leaning very heavily on the quality of the storytelling.
I think Alan Wake pulls a trick by having a very "cinematic" look, and lots of references to Stephen King, writing in general and narratives, and its TV-show presentation makes you THINK your watching one of the best stories ever made in gaming. However, my criticisms of the story still stand: the horror author aspect takes a backseat to roaming the woods at night shooting lumberjacks, many of the plot threads don't go anywhere, the antagonists all come in and out of the story anticlimactically, and there are so few memorable characters or interactions.
If you're going to focus so strongly on the storytelling, you have to make sure your script is great!
Thank god Allan Wake 2 was soo good.
I'm still lost as to who ever cared about this crap or why.
“Who cares about this crap?”
*cares enough to click on the video and leave a comment*
I care about why everyone has bad taste and likes shit games, just not about the shit games themselves. I'm also subbed to this cuck for some reason, fixing that.@@vikingguitar
Just because something doesn't meet your made up fantastical expectations, doesnt mean it should have or ever could have been what you want, or even if you would actually want it at all. Of course you feel like you really want it, so you feel like it must be real somehow, this is as simple as comparing something in the real world to your most made up bestest game ever, it makes for poor criticism and comes off as whiny.
BTW didn't even play the new Alan Wake, not a fanboy.
If you watched a movie trailer that you fell in love with, with later trailers confirming that attraction to the premise, but five years later got a different movie with the same name, with a different cast, script and in an entirely different genre, would you be disappointed?
Alan Wake was a perfect game and I will never see anything wrong with it
Then you're both blessed to enjoy games more than most, but cursed to not know their true quality.