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CJacobs
Apr 17, 2011

Reach for the moon!
Latest Update: The Writer, Part 2 - Leave a Light On (09/05)
Latest Supplemental Material: (03/31)





Alan Wake is a third person survival horror/thriller developed by Remedy Entertainment, the brilliant minds behind the Max Payne series. It was released in late May 2010 for Xbox 360, and mid-February 2012 for PC.

The story- well, at least, at first -follows best-selling novelist Alan Wake as he tries to uncover the mystery behind his wife's disappearance during a vacation in the small rural town of Twin Peaks, I Mean Bright Falls, Washington, all while experiencing events from the plot of his latest novel coming to life. The game is structured similarly to a television series, with episodes that contain plot twists and cliffhangers and even a "previously on" recap at the start of each. Having played Hotline Miami 2 recently OVER A YEAR AGO WHEN THIS LP WAS FIRST CONCEPTUALIZED gently caress, I decided to structure the OP to match. There are also two DLC episodes that extend the game's ending which I will be doing after the main LP concludes.



Alan Wake is a fantastic game that does quite a few things that many video games are scared of. The story is perfectly willing to sit back and let you interpret it how you want, and the open-endedness of it all makes room for a lot of questions and speculative answers. The gameplay is varied enough to be fun, the setpieces are varied enough to stay fresh, and the graphics are just plain great. What's not to love?



As always, there will be two versions of every video: One with cut commentary so you don't have to hear me and my buddy Skippy Granola blabbing over Alan, and one with uncut commentary that is pretty self-explanatory. Keep in mind when choosing which one to watch that Alan Wake is at times a walking-through-the-woods-in-the-dark simulator and there are extended periods where Alan has nothing to say, so let that affect your decision accordingly.



Please don't. As a horror/thriller game with a plot twistier than a pretzel made out of klein bottles, it thrives almost entirely on being presented as-is. If I haven't talked about it or it hasn't shown up in the videos yet, please don't talk about it. Yes, technical wink-and-nod spoilers do count. I know the game's been out for like five years but for the sake of the thread readers don't just go CAN'T WAIT FOR THE MONSTER TRUCK RALLY BOSS FIGHT IN THE SECOND DLC or something.







































CJacobs fucked around with this message at 16:07 on Sep 5, 2017

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CJacobs
Apr 17, 2011

Reach for the moon!



FINALLY. It feels like Alan has been planning this vacation for years!

CJacobs fucked around with this message at 23:17 on Aug 18, 2017

Tuxedo Ted
Apr 24, 2007

I am excited to watch Alan Awake.

Sally
Jan 9, 2007


Don't post Small Dash!
Woo! Been waiting for this one for a while.

Stormgale
Feb 27, 2010

Holy Smokes Cjacobs and Skippy Granola in once place, that's the kinda added character you could only get with an oddly forced christmas special.

Yapping Eevee
Nov 12, 2011

STAND TOGETHER.
FIGHT WITH HONOR.
RESTORE BALANCE.

Eevees play for free.
Oh hey, guess I should finally watch a LP of this game. It's clearly pretty ripe for mockery. :allears:

Also yes, a conversation between Alan Wake and Max Payne would be awful/amazing.

biosterous
Feb 23, 2013




This isn't Alan Wake

poo poo what joke do i do from now on

CJacobs
Apr 17, 2011

Reach for the moon!

biosterous posted:

This isn't Alan Wake

poo poo what joke do i do from now on

This is in fact Alan Wake! I checked to make sure and everything!

Blind Sally posted:

Woo! Been waiting for this one for a while.

Me too! I am pumped.

Fish Noise
Jul 25, 2012

IT'S ME, BURROWS!

IT WAS ME ALL ALONG, BURROWS!
What kind of a place is a town called Bright gently caress, and what sort of game would take place there?

KeiraWalker
Sep 5, 2011

Me? Don't worry about me...
Grimey Drawer
I played through this game years ago and loved every minute of it (except for the ending, until I played the DLC, then I loved every minute of it again). Revisiting it in this format is going to be great.

Kind of wish Remedy would quit dangling Alan Wake 2 in front of us. Just tell us you aren't going to make another one, and stop with the cryptic "well, we really want to make another one, there's like a 50% chance we're going to make another one, maybe, you know, when we have the time to devote to it. Possibly."

Shei-kun
Dec 2, 2011

Screw you, physics!
I remember when this LP was first hinted at being a thing.

I was an unemployed student back then! Now I'm moving into a house that I own with money I earned from a job that I have.

And yet, after all of this, I still can't swim in three jackets, two t-shirts, and a pair of jeans :(

But somehow, Alan can. That man is made of magic.

Hostile V
May 31, 2013

Solving all of life's problems through enhanced casting of Occam's Razor. Reward yourself with an imaginary chalice.

Ahhh, Alan Wake. I played this game back in 2013 because I picked it up for cheap on a Steam bundle and I ended up looking at old reviews of it before I was done. A lot of people basically called the game an adaptation of a bad Stephen King book. At the time, I disagreed. I'd grown up on a lot of his short stories and felt A: no it really wasn't and B: it really felt more of a homage to horror writers in general, with the occasional Lovecraft reference and some feeling that evoked Clive Barker at a point I can't remember.

Well that was three years ago and after reading Under The Dome and a few of his other books proper (or tried to, in the case of The Tommyknockers) and some of his more recent fiction, I have to say that yeah this game is probably the most accurate adaptation of a Stephen King book that doesn't exist. In fact it actually has some added benefits that King doesn't, such as: no weird views of minorities as Literally Magic, no weird idiosyncratic sayings for kids and teens, no weird sex scenes in general, a pretty rad soundtrack and how this game was most likely not written under the influence of hard drugs or written as part of a half-baked pseudo Grant Morrison soul exercise where you write about that time you nearly died to deal with the demons of your past.

This isn't to say that Alan Wake doesn't have problems (it totally does) but the older I get the more I realize that yeah this game is pretty much Peak Stephen King back when he was allowed to have editors and didn't do drugs.

Also the music is really good.

grandalt
Feb 26, 2013

I didn't fight through two wars to rule
I fought for the future of the world

And the right to have hot tea whenever I wanted
Ah this game. It has some very interesting ideas with some question on if it sticks the landing. The music however is quite good indeed.

Gloomy Rube
Mar 4, 2008



I can't decide what I think about this game. It's not as horrific as some horror games, and not quite as quirky and fun as Deadly Premonition... but I think it hits a pretty good middle ground. I think them not being afraid to add some levity into situations really helps the game, and makes you care more about what's going on.

Anyway, looking forward to the rest of this LP!

Scalding Coffee
Jun 26, 2006

You're already dead

Alan Wake has a ton of invisible walls, except you can find ways to bypass them. He can't swim unless it is a cutscene.

I spent way too much time trying to do everything I can to mess with the game. Beside meeting the other people on the boat (I think you missed a plot point) and having extended conversations with several characters in the game, there is a bug where you get five batteries as you entered the cabin and lose them all when you exit and come back in.

nine-gear crow
Aug 10, 2013





Well, this has sure been a long time coming.

Instruction Manuel
May 15, 2007

Yes, it is what it looks like!

Oh awesome. I love Alan Wake! Can't wait to see you go through this whole thing :)

EponymousMrYar
Jan 4, 2015

The enemy of my enemy is my enemy.
SUBJECT VERB OBJECT! ADVERB OBJECT! ADJECTIVE SUBJECT VERB OBJECT OXFORD COLON ADVERB SUBJECT!

I am a master writer :downs:

Fish Noise
Jul 25, 2012

IT'S ME, BURROWS!

IT WAS ME ALL ALONG, BURROWS!

EponymousMrYar posted:

I am a master writer :downs:
Oh?

ingwit posted:

Johnny Fiveaces powered down the magnabike with a not quite unhearble hum and checked his chronometer. “drat.” he hissed threw his clinched teeth which were surrounded by the stubble of five days where in he had not shaven himself at all. It was almost chromodawn at Clashpoint. Alreddy the sun was sitting Walliston’s Hill ah blaze like so much molten meddle or a coin, gyreating in the air, tossed there by the uncaring hand of an imaginary god that doesn’t exist, borne from the interior minds of the hobbled masses. The sky was the color of a television tuned to a dead channel that was orange. drat, he, Johnny, thought. We thought we were opening a new beginning with our mad dreams of time travail but ironically the only time now is the time of which we’re out of. It’s almost humorous. Yeah, I could almost laugh, if I hadn’t cried that part of me away when my parents were maccasared by Dr. Malaprop and the government sanctioned murderers of “CAPITAL”.

He lit a Nicosheen brand swaggerette and took a dip drag, sinking farther into his inferior horologue. He thought of Nina and her mellifluous buttocks that he used to love to bang. Even now his nano enhanced hearing could almost hear her vagina lips quivering with moisture and also pleasure, like a slice of synth-ham being tongued by one of Malaprop’s slamhounds. When he got back to City5, he was going to do some sex, no doubt about that. “That’s right doll” he said to nobody and the wind. They were going to do it hard. He smiled, blowing smoke from his nostrils. They were going to do it cyber hard.

DJ Fuckboy Supreme
Feb 10, 2011

And when you stare long into the abyss, you become aggressively, terminally chill

CJacobs, one of the things I liked about your previous LPs is that you've a good idea of when to provide commentary and when to let the game do its thing. There's been a lot of commentary (by virtue of two commentators) in the first "cut commentary" episode of Alan Wake, which takes away from the heavyhanded and cliched but seemingly integral narrative of the game. I'm probably not part of the core audience for this LP, since I've never played the game, want to, but lack a means to do so - it's difficult to pay attention to the dialogue in game versus you and Skippy's commentary. It's not so challenging when it's just Alan being a dick to everyone, but the more colorful characters had some interesting scenes the commentary detracts a little from.

That all said I'm still on board, good show otherwise.

mandatory lesbian
Dec 18, 2012

Hostile V posted:

Ahhh, Alan Wake. I played this game back in 2013 because I picked it up for cheap on a Steam bundle and I ended up looking at old reviews of it before I was done. A lot of people basically called the game an adaptation of a bad Stephen King book. At the time, I disagreed. I'd grown up on a lot of his short stories and felt A: no it really wasn't and B: it really felt more of a homage to horror writers in general, with the occasional Lovecraft reference and some feeling that evoked Clive Barker at a point I can't remember.

Well that was three years ago and after reading Under The Dome and a few of his other books proper (or tried to, in the case of The Tommyknockers) and some of his more recent fiction, I have to say that yeah this game is probably the most accurate adaptation of a Stephen King book that doesn't exist. In fact it actually has some added benefits that King doesn't, such as: no weird views of minorities as Literally Magic, no weird idiosyncratic sayings for kids and teens, no weird sex scenes in general, a pretty rad soundtrack and how this game was most likely not written under the influence of hard drugs or written as part of a half-baked pseudo Grant Morrison soul exercise where you write about that time you nearly died to deal with the demons of your past.

This isn't to say that Alan Wake doesn't have problems (it totally does) but the older I get the more I realize that yeah this game is pretty much Peak Stephen King back when he was allowed to have editors and didn't do drugs.

Also the music is really good.

peak stephen king was doing drugs tho, Misery is his only good book

Kibayasu
Mar 28, 2010

Not only is Max Payne in this game, everyone's favourite mascot costume wearing escort quest subject, Vinne Gognitti, voices Barry.

By the way you can get a look at the island if you turn around before the bridge and climb back up the hill. There's coffee and a "focus" thing up there that goes to an overhead view of the island.

SirSamVimes
Jul 21, 2008

~* Challenge *~


I love this game despite its flaws.

Samovar
Jun 4, 2011

I'm 😤 not a 🦸🏻‍♂️hero...🧜🏻



Wasn't there supposed to be an add-on to this game or am I just going doo-lally?

Edit: So, by bad writer, are we talking Garth Marenghi-esque or worse?

Also, I think I've got the twist of the game already. Light heals you, so Alan is secretly part plant!

Edit edit: Dangit, that'll teach me to make comments about Dark place before watching the drat video in full.

Samovar fucked around with this message at 10:47 on Dec 4, 2016

IronSaber
Feb 24, 2009

:roboluv: oh yes oh god yes form the head FORM THE HEAD unghhhh...:fap:

Samovar posted:

Wasn't there supposed to be an add-on to this game or am I just going doo-lally?

There was some DLC, yeah.

Antistar01
Oct 20, 2013
Nice; enjoying this so far, looking forward to the rest. Alan Wake is a fun game.

White Coke
May 29, 2015
Is there really a MONSTER TRUCK RALLY BOSS FIGHT? If so then I've got to finish playing the game.

CJacobs
Apr 17, 2011

Reach for the moon!

Hell yeah! This is my poo poo right here!

Cakefarts Carol posted:

CJacobs, one of the things I liked about your previous LPs is that you've a good idea of when to provide commentary and when to let the game do its thing. There's been a lot of commentary (by virtue of two commentators) in the first "cut commentary" episode of Alan Wake, which takes away from the heavyhanded and cliched but seemingly integral narrative of the game. I'm probably not part of the core audience for this LP, since I've never played the game, want to, but lack a means to do so - it's difficult to pay attention to the dialogue in game versus you and Skippy's commentary. It's not so challenging when it's just Alan being a dick to everyone, but the more colorful characters had some interesting scenes the commentary detracts a little from.

That all said I'm still on board, good show otherwise.

Yeah, I get what you mean. For the cut commentary version I just, uh, cut the commentary out of only the actual cutscene-cutscenes. I'll make sure to cut it or otherwise edit around the general dialogue too in the future.

White Coke posted:

Is there really a MONSTER TRUCK RALLY BOSS FIGHT? If so then I've got to finish playing the game.

:iiam:

eating only apples
Dec 12, 2009

Shall we dance?
I did not really like this game but I am hype for this LP anyway because My Friends Together At Last. :h:

Spudd
Nov 27, 2007

Protect children from "Safe Schools" social engineering. Shame!

I hope you teach us all a new word every episode because I need to make a punk band called The Defenstrators now. Throwing people out of windows is punk right?

Hostile V
May 31, 2013

Solving all of life's problems through enhanced casting of Occam's Razor. Reward yourself with an imaginary chalice.

mandatory lesbian posted:

peak stephen king was doing drugs tho, Misery is his only good book
Well, yeah, hence the caveat of him being sober. I dunno. King really hasn't aged well to me nor have I found his more recent stuff to be as engaging as the old stuff (because, again, he was really good when he did drugs).

Honestly this game tonally feels like his take on Von Trier's show "The Kingdom" which became Kingdom Hospital which was...interesting but kind of hamstrung by being a thirteen episode show so there was a lot of padding and just general shenanigans.

CJacobs
Apr 17, 2011

Reach for the moon!

Cakefarts Carol posted:

CJacobs, one of the things I liked about your previous LPs is that you've a good idea of when to provide commentary and when to let the game do its thing. There's been a lot of commentary (by virtue of two commentators) in the first "cut commentary" episode of Alan Wake, which takes away from the heavyhanded and cliched but seemingly integral narrative of the game. I'm probably not part of the core audience for this LP, since I've never played the game, want to, but lack a means to do so - it's difficult to pay attention to the dialogue in game versus you and Skippy's commentary. It's not so challenging when it's just Alan being a dick to everyone, but the more colorful characters had some interesting scenes the commentary detracts a little from.

That all said I'm still on board, good show otherwise.

Quoting this again to say that I have recut and re-uploaded the cut commentary version of the first episode. It now has much less talking over the characters. In later episodes of the LP (and episodes of Alan Wake) this will not be as much of a problem because it's mostly Alan by himself, but the game's introduction and other parts where you're just walkin' around Bright Falls are pretty full of dialogue for us to jabber over. So I have rectified the issue by cutting/changing some of the commentary to not be in the way of the game anymore. :)

Stormgale
Feb 27, 2010

CJacobs posted:

Quoting this again to say that I have recut and re-uploaded the cut commentary version of the first episode. It now has much less talking over the characters. In later episodes of the LP (and episodes of Alan Wake) this will not be as much of a problem because it's mostly Alan by himself, but the game's introduction and other parts where you're just walkin' around Bright Falls are pretty full of dialogue for us to jabber over. So I have rectified the issue by cutting/changing some of the commentary to not be in the way of the game anymore. :)

This is why you are a cool dude, unlike Alan Wake who is both uncool and kinda a Jerk (but interesting).

DJ Fuckboy Supreme
Feb 10, 2011

And when you stare long into the abyss, you become aggressively, terminally chill

CJacobs, LP'r of the people!

chitoryu12
Apr 24, 2014

This is absolutely one of my favorite games. It hits all the sweet spots for me regarding dialogue and creativity, and the soundtrack is wonderful (it helps that I'm a huge Poets of the Fall fan). The combat isn't perfect, but it's not bad enough that it does anything to drag down the quality of the game; the game could never last 100% on the combat, but it does so much else right that you can ignore any minor quibbles.

CJacobs
Apr 17, 2011

Reach for the moon!

Stormgale posted:

This is why you are a cool dude, unlike Alan Wake who is both uncool and kinda a Jerk (but interesting).

Thanks. It's all in the name of quality. :)



By the way, here's the overhead shot of the island that Kibayasu mentioned. Alan even has a blurb to say about the island and the lake being on top of a volcano :psyduck:

Technowolf
Nov 4, 2009




CJacobs posted:

Thanks. It's all in the name of quality. :)



By the way, here's the overhead shot of the island that Kibayasu mentioned. Alan even has a blurb to say about the island and the lake being on top of a volcano :psyduck:

Is Bright Peaksmouth supposed to be in the northeast U.S. or the northwest U.S.? 'Cause I don't think there are many caldera in loving Maine.

(Fun side note: Yellowstone National Park is the caldera of a supervolcano, which is a volcano massive enough that its eruption would seriously threaten all life on Earth!)

CJacobs
Apr 17, 2011

Reach for the moon!
Bright Falls is in Washington. Also, holy crap, that's terrifying!

Scalding Coffee
Jun 26, 2006

You're already dead

Kibayasu posted:

Not only is Max Payne in this game, everyone's favourite mascot costume wearing escort quest subject, Vinne Gognitti, voices Barry.

By the way you can get a look at the island if you turn around before the bridge and climb back up the hill. There's coffee and a "focus" thing up there that goes to an overhead view of the island.
There were a few he missed in the tutorial segment, like by the bridge straight from his car and that pillbox. I was very thorough and only found 85 without a guide and it was for an achievement anyway. I SAM'd that. Some achievements are just wastes of time. I really wanted them to affect his stamina and make NG+ better. A fatty has better stamina than him.

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chitoryu12
Apr 24, 2014

CJacobs posted:

Bright Falls is in Washington. Also, holy crap, that's terrifying!

Not as terrifying as it seems, if I remember correctly. It's only ever erupted a few times in millions of years and we can't figure out if we're "due" in our lifetimes, or even any reasonable distance into the future.

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