Rule 32: Enjoy the little things in life.

Writer’s Block is a pain. Whether you’re a blogger, famous writer, or college student at 4AM, getting stuck on what words to say is never fun. It’s even worse when your name is Alan Wake. Cause then you’ve got hordes of not-quite-human-beings to take care of, the darkness literally wants to suck you under, there’s a evil woman whispering words in your ear, and your wife’s been kidnapped. Some days it’s not worth putting pen to paper.

Alan Wake is a game from the same people who brought forth the magnificent Max Payne 1 & 2. And you can kinda see the influence. Alan looks and moves a bit like Max, though their similarities end there. Where Max is a hardened cop, Alan is an ordinary writer, like Stephen King or Jim Butcher. In fact, the game opens with a quote from King, which sets the tone nicely. The makers to a good job of working hard to make the game play like a Stephen King novel. Alan narrates the story, and the world is definitely at home in a King novel. While I wouldn’t say it’s scary, it’s a bit creepy, which is good. Actually wouldn’t have minded a bit more on the fear side.

The story is the real highlight of the game. A real fantastic tale of Alan basically figuring what the hell’s going on and what he’s to do about it and how he’s going to rescue his wife from the darkness that seems to be consuming all around him. There’s enough clever twists and turns to keep you hooked, especially with the episodic setup. The game is divided into six chapters, each with its own ‘Last Time on Alan Wake…’, and cliffhanger ending. Gives the game a nice feel. Although the chapters are a bit long. They’re just a little too long to do in one sitting. I would rather have more, shorter chapters, but that’s just a minor complaint. The story is quite excellent.

One thing with thrillers, is does the story make sense as a whole? With Alan Wake, the answer is yes and no. You can get a general sense of what’s going on, but they don’t give you everything. If you make conjectures and best guesses, you can figure it out, but that’s open to interpretation, there’s no one unified Alan Wake Theory. But there’s enough explained. Tying the story directly into the gameplay is one of the more unique collectibles I’ve seen in a game. Along the way, you find pages of a novel that Alan’s written, but doesn’t remember when. What’s more is what’s written on the pages comes true. Really quite awesome, and adds a lot to the atmosphere and keeps you looking out for pages.

The gameplay is pretty fun. Most of the game involves Alan running around at night, escaping Taken (the darkness filled people and monsters, not the Liam Neeson movie), and possessed farm equipment and other dark things. To kill the Taken first you need to burn away the darkness with your flashlight, flare, car lights, or any other sources of light (see: Rock Concert). Then you can use your guns to finish it off. It’s a pretty neat mechanic I rather enjoyed. Just don’t run out of batteries. Alan’s also able to cinematically dodge attacks if you time it right. These look pretty awesome and are very useful.

The music is quite excellent, and I was extremely happy to see the return of Poets of the Fall. They wrote the song “Late Goodbye” for Max Payne 2, a very excellent song, and their music is featured twice in the game. At one point, a record with a song of theirs is a clue for what Alan needs to do next. Also, at one point while navigated through some woods, Wake comes across a shack with a radio. Turning it on, starts playing one of their songs. At that moment, Wake is attacked and a battle ensues, all the while the song plays in the background. A truly great moment in the game, I wish there were more like it.

I usually think Collector’s editions are a waste of money. Just give me the damn game. But the Alan Wake Collector’s Edition is very neat actually. The game is packaged to look like a book, and it contains a book about Bright Falls (the town in the game) and more about Wake. Also included are the soundtrack and a Bonus Features disc with more from the game devs about the game. Neat stuff. I recommend it, if you can snag a copy.

Alan Wake is a very neat game, and you really should play it, at least once for the story. It’s not terribly long, about 8-10 hours, depending how long you take exploring, and is worth your time. Take a look, you might like what you find.