It always has, and it’s that confidence that keeps it positive in the minds of so many. It rewards my patience and hard work with its atmosphere, personality, and charm.Īlan Wake knows exactly what kind of game it is. But every long run or burst of combat inevitably leads me back to why I originally played Alan Wake in 2010. I’m exhausted getting to the narrative bits I love, the game is exhausted by its 11-year age, and, hell, even Alan Wake himself is exhausted by a simple jog. The DualSense controller’s adaptive triggers also make aiming my weapons without boosting my flashlight much easier than it was originally - the trigger has two stopping points on PS5, with a slight hold aiming the gun and a tight hold focusing your light.Įxhaustion was the theme of my Alan Wake: Remastered play sessions. The primary benefit of playing the game on a PlayStation 5 - which still feels weird, considering Alan Wake was originally an Xbox exclusive - seems to be that it’s easily accessible and has shorter load times.
In other words, there is no mistaking that this is an Xbox 360 game at its foundation. The forests and surrounding backgrounds do look gorgeous, and are better at higher resolutions, but it highlights the rest of Alan Wake’s ugliness by comparison. Character faces don’t emote well at all and cutscenes tend to stutter in certain sections. The Remaster doesn’t do Alan Wake many favors visually, either.
Memories of fending off armies of evil birds while standing on a gondola or trying not to get crushed by an evil train all hit me at once.Īlan Wake’s environments always looked good, and the remaster enhances its backgrounds Image: Remedy Entertainment/Epic Games There’s also the way the game’s charming narration sometimes disappears for minutes at a time, or gets interrupted in favor of large-scale battles with the Darkness baddies (called The Taken). Other pain points instantly flooded back when I started playing, like the way enemies often spawn behind you with no noise or signal to warn you. In the modern era, when so many games are confident enough to make combat fleeting in the service of story and tone, Alan Wake feels ancient. But Alan Wake pads each level with dozens upon dozens of enemies, each requiring the same one-two-punch tactic. The light-based combat, where Alan has to lower each enemy’s shield of Darkness by shining a flashlight at them and then blowing them away with a variety of guns, is neat the first handful of times. A good 40% of certain levels consist of just jogging through the woods or down a road, and Alan can only run for about five seconds without slowing down and huffing for air - a relatable trait, from one writer to another, but not the kind of thing that makes for fun gameplay. By today’s standards, it’s a legitimate slog. Let’s get this out of the way up front: The actual act of playing Alan Wake was already boring in 2010. However, its issues are still as glaring as they were 11 years ago, and this remaster does nothing to mitigate them. It’s rife with charm, and overflowing with a mysterious atmosphere, and both are on display in Alan Wake : Remastered more than ever before. This is easy, like ranking in last at the Olympics - which aren't really much of a challenge at all.Alan Wake is a frustrating masterpiece. Using one simply puts you on a mini-game where you time the button press with the ticker on a wheel. Generators are strewn all around the game. The ticker starts once Wake bends over (like a boss) and that shaves the ½ second that can save your sorry ass from serious injury. Once you do, you automatically end the level.Īs soon as you interact with a generator, press the JUMP (Action or A button) to struggle. Alternately, you can lure these objects (the ones that move) to charge themselves into pits or death pits, destroying them instantly.Īpart from that, your only goal is to reach a specific location on the map. Once the object's "dark HP" is drained, the object disappears. Weak beams of light will not injure enemy shields.įor poltregeist / possessed inanimate objects, use the torch and diminish the "dark presence" on the item. Spam the battery reload button to keep the light from the flashlight strong.
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