Developer: Remedy Publisher: Microsoft Game Studios Designer: Petri Järvilehto(Thanks Wiki) Engine: ? Platform: Xbox 360, PC Release date: May 21st 2010 Genre: Action (Psychological thriller) Official Site:http://www.alanwake.com/
Collectors Edition Information
Preorder this item today and it should ship on 05/25/2010
In this long-awaited exclusive Xbox 360 title, fill the shoes of one Alan Wake, a man who makes his living from the terror of others as a best-selling suspense novelist. Trapped in the deceptively peaceful Washington town of Bright Falls, where he came to escape the trauma of losing his fiancée, Alan must piece together a mystery to prevent himself from being trapped inside a nightmarish world forever.
Hardbound in quality linen, the Limited Collector’s edition is designed to resemble a hardcover book. The Limited Collector's Edition will include: # Game Disc in box with unique art # Exclusive In-Game Audio Commentary and Hints by Remedy # “The Alan Wake Files” – a 144pg book that includes a short story written by Alan Wake and compiles the FBI dossiers investigating the events in Bright Falls, WA # Exclusive Audio Disc with Soundtrack and Score # Game Add-on token redeemable on Xbox LIVE for the first Alan Wake add-on content pack # Exclusive Xbox disc with special content: Alan Wake Xbox Live Theme and Alan Wake Avatar for Xbox LIVE
From Xbox.com
In this long-awaited exclusive Xbox 360™ title, fill the shoes of one Alan Wake, a man who makes his living from the terror of others as a best-selling suspense novelist. Trapped in the deceptively peaceful Washington town of Bright Falls, where he came to escape the trauma of losing his fiancée, Alan must piece together a mystery to prevent himself from being trapped inside a nightmarish world forever.
An intense psychological thriller from Remedy, the creators of Max Payne, Alan Wake looks to raise the bar for future games, creating a true cinematic experience. Explore an expansive world filled with missions, unique puzzles, intense combat, and horrifying enemies. Dig into a twisting and multi-layered story filled with suspense, engaging characters, and shocking revelations.
Gameplay Details and Structure
Episodic content: The mission-based structure of Alan Wake creates an episodic narrative similar to the very best of dramatic television. As the episodes progress, gameplay evolves to introduce new elements and characters, drawing the player deeper into the experience.
Realistic environment: Experience an immersive reality like never before, as weather and light changes affect gameplay. Explore every aspect of a hyper-detailed Pacific Northwest town as you look for the truth behind the horror around you.
Massive world: Explore and roam free in an open environment as you investigate the mysteries of Bright Falls. Pay close attention to detail as you look for clues scattered through the town.
Brutal combat: As night falls, creatures begin to attack, and the longer Alan spends in Bright Falls, the longer the nights get. His enemies seem to draw their power from the darkness, and light soon becomes his greatest ally. Combine use of light with more conventional weapons to drive back the forces that hide in the dark.
From Wiki:
The dark-forces (enemies) coming to 'take care of' Alan Wake are vulnerable to light. So the most useful weapon of all is actually the flashlight. You will be able to place booby traps which will illuminate when executed, etc. Light will weaken or hurt Wake's enemies, and creatively taking advantage of any and all light sources within Alan Wake's grim world ought to be one of the interesting aspects of play.
Like Max Payne before it, the title Alan Wake has a double meaning. Combining the main character's first initial with his last name forms "A.Wake," or "Awake".
Remedy Entertainment also promised a free-roam 3-dimensional city, similar to the Grand Theft Auto series.
"The basic idea with the free-roaming world is that we give the player goals, and then the player can go about achieving those goals in the way he chooses. Alan Wake is more tightly character-driven and story-oriented. Meaning that the player’s goals and missions are closely focused around Alan Wake and his story. Also, the setting, the tone and the game being an action thriller all set it clearly apart from the GTA games." – Sam Lake
"Intense cinematic action is something that we love to do, and Alan Wake features tense combat gameplay as well, but all things considered the game has a lot more emphasis on adventure and exploration than what Max Payne did. Driving is an integral part of the game" - Petri Järvilehto.
There will be no multiplayer in this game. "We'd much rather give the players a great single-player game, than a mediocre single and multiplayer game." -Petri Järvilehto.
After more than five years in development, Alan Wake is -- finally -- almost finished. And while developer Remedy won't confirm the heavily rumored May 2010 release date -- sticking to the less fun "Spring 2010" -- they are now ready to reveal new details about some of the game's key features, such as how the light and dark mechanics work. [For more on the game, check out this week's 1UP Cover Story.]
"Light and darkness [present] a central theme in the fiction of Alan Wake," says lead writer Sam Lake. "Darkness is the enemy; it represents terror, danger, and nightmares. Light is your ally; it represents the waking world, sanity, and safety."
Remedy has succeeded in keeping many of Alan Wake's narrative specifics under lock and key, but as previously detailed, the game focuses on the titular novelist, who finds himself searching for lost pages of one of his thrillers after his wife goes missing on a trip to the Pacific Northwest. While Wake cannot recall writing the novel, the pages he finds indicate that the paranormal events held within are unfolding in his real life, with a "dark presence" possessing both objects and living beings to thwart his quest. So of course, light becomes an essential tool.
"The darkness protects those that it possesses," explains Lake. "They cannot be harmed with conventional methods before the protecting dark presence has been destroyed with light. In some cases, the possession is so strong that the dark presence regenerates in darkness, and you have to keep your light on them long enough without interruptions to be able to destroy it. In addition to people and animals, the darkness can also take over vehicles, machines, and other objects, all of which it uses as weapons against you. It can also take over doors and gates that block your way until you can find a source of light to destroy them."
While the recent press demo of the game at the Tokyo Game Show showed Wake hiding in the shadows to evade human pursuers, most of the game will find you seeking or creating light to protect yourself from possessed foes and open them up to attack. And though one of the game's many flashlights may be bright enough to remove the darkness from a human enemy, the amount of light needed for larger subjects will scale with their physical size. According to Remedy, Wake will find himself in the midst of a "surreal bullfight" with possessed farm equipment during at least one point in the game.
Additionally, some light sources will not only remove the darkness from a possessed attacker, but also serve as the weapon used to destroy the being. Wake will have access to a flare gun, which can cleanse and kill an enemy with a single shot, trigging an explosion of screen-filling special effects in the process. He can also command numerous vehicles, and use their headlights to remove the dark presence before the front bumper takes out the unlucky roadkill in front of it.
"The primal fear of the dark is something that has attracted me as a writer for a long time," says Lake. "It seems so fundamental and pure in a way. It's almost as if the whole concept has been programmed into our DNA as people. It's something that has been with us for a long time and has been explored in the works of fiction from theater to books. Also, the symbolism of light as a savior and a safe haven is so cooked into our collective subconscious that it offers a lot of interesting fiction to work with."
More than half of the game will take place at night, but the daytime segments also hold a lot of significance, and most of the game's "episodes" -- inspired by television serial dramas like Twin Peaks and Lost -- will include both daytime and nighttime gameplay. While most action will be relegated to the darkness, Wake has many important tasks to complete during daylight, including interacting with the locals and investigating (and learning the layouts of) the environments. Lake is keen on avoiding spoilers, but teases that the daylight segments will also see Wake driving to meet contacts, and turning the power on so the lights will work when night sets in.
The idea is that these segments will help unravel the mysteries in the game, and also help structure the experience so that the nighttime events hold more weight.
"The daytime scenes are definitely more about character development and story progression than combat," says Lake. "More often than not, they are there to give contrast and to foreshadow the horrible things to come when the night falls. Just as with any thriller -- be it a book, or a movie or a TV series -- you need to pace things right. If you are constantly hurdled forward at a hundred miles an hour, it all gets exhausting, and you become numb to it all."
And with a statement that can just as easily be applied to the game's lengthy development saga as its accompanying hype, Lake concludes, "Building a thriller is all about a good buildup."
We feel we owe you all a small heads up, and our apologies for lack of updates. This is just part of our psychological thriller, is it all real or imagined... Seriously, yes, we're still here and working hard on getting Alan Wake for you to enjoy. Sure, we've been in development for a long time and if everything had gone perfectly smoothly there probably would be a game out for you guys to play already. But designing a completely new game can be hard, and sometimes you need to take a detour to find the best route forward.
We want to entertain you guys in the best possible way and our team is putting in every effort possible in order for that to happen. That is the way Remedy wants to do things. I'm sure you will enjoy Alan Wake when we're done.
We feel we owe you all a small heads up, and our apologies for lack of updates. This is just part of our psychological thriller, is it all real or imagined... Seriously, yes, we're still here and working hard on getting Alan Wake for you to enjoy. Sure, we've been in development for a long time and if everything had gone perfectly smoothly there probably would be a game out for you guys to play already. But designing a completely new game can be hard, and sometimes you need to take a detour to find the best route forward.
We want to entertain you guys in the best possible way and our team is putting in every effort possible in order for that to happen. That is the way Remedy wants to do things. I'm sure you will enjoy Alan Wake when we're done.
"Race drivers don't really care how fast they're going..we keep going faster and faster until we approach that limit of control and that's when we balance ourselves..that's how we make good time." JOHN FITCH 1950's Le Mans driver
Fairly sure this will turn out to be something special. I dont think it will be a dissapointment. Just look at it! It does not give off the same negative vibe that say, Alone in the Dark did.
Hulohot wrote:Fairly sure this will turn out to be something special. I dont think it will be a dissapointment. Just look at it! It does not give off the same negative vibe that say, Alone in the Dark did.
I reckon this will fail like AITD
I hope you are wrong. Then again, we need more new gameplay footage to tell if its on the same level of fail as AITD. (I did love AITD however.)
Hulohot wrote:Fairly sure this will turn out to be something special. I dont think it will be a dissapointment. Just look at it! It does not give off the same negative vibe that say, Alone in the Dark did.
I reckon this will fail like AITD
I hope you are wrong. Then again, we need more new gameplay footage to tell if its on the same level of fail as AITD. (I did love AITD however.)
As did I, I thought it did quite a few things very well...it's just a shame they weren't able to iron out the bugs & improve the controls before release.