Gamescom 2023: Impressions from the Alan Wake 2 presentation

Last night, as part of Opening Night Live, we saw a new trailer for Survival Horror Alan Wake 2. And although Remedy doesn’t have a stand at the convention center itself, the developers brought the game to Cologne and held a presentation in a nearby cinema. I had the opportunity to be there.

Remedy was the first to show us a live-action clip, which transitions in and out of perfectly smoothly. Specifically, we saw a talk show hosted by Mr. Door, and somewhat unintentionally, Alan Wake showed up. He was completely confused, which made for some lighthearted moments, and was also a little introduction to the Dark Place. The book Initiation was introduced here, which is literally about Alan forgetting he wrote a book.

Next up was the main playthrough, about 40 minutes of gameplay from Alan himself. First of all, it should be said that the developers showed the PC version with path tracing, and the game looks absolutely fantastic. Not just in terms of lighting, shadows, or reflections, but also in great detail. The atmosphere is very strong because of this, and I think Thomas Puch’s claim that Alan Wake 2 may well be the most graphically advanced game of the year is justified. I didn’t notice any texture popping or similar issues, just a few moments of slowdown, but nothing too severe. The image was also absolutely clean, without the annoying flickering that was typical of Control’s problematic ray tracing. The recently announced DLSS 3.5 seems to help here considerably.

The Dark Place takes the form of New York City, where Alan has lived for a long time and where his book series about a detective named Alex Casey takes place. By the way, you can find that here too. He doesn’t just accompany Saga Anderson in reality, a darker version of him confronts Alan in the new trailer. At the same time, the writer contacted an unknown person through a phone booth who should help him escape from the Dark Place. And a man named Tim Breaker flashed in the demo, who, apparently, will also help Alan. Is he the brother of the sheriff of Bright Falls Sarah Breaker? It’s hard to say. Of course, when talking to him, the developers deliberately excluded the dialogue option “Who is this mysterious man.”

While Saga is actually facing cultists, in the Dark Place Alan is fighting “shadow enemies”. But they don’t always have to be real. By doing this, Remedy shows that the writer is not quite sane and doesn’t know what is real. So after covering many of them, nothing may happen at all, but some of them are real and will fight you. Alan has a pistol at the start, but the ammo for it is very limited and you need to save it. By the way, the inventory is made in the style of Resident Evil, so the number of slots is also limited.

Light was an important element in the first part, and in the sequel, it will probably play an even bigger role. Alan has a special flashlight that can turn off or illuminate certain locations, which will change their appearance. And here I really take my hat off to Remedy, because the change of assets happens absolutely instantly and there is really no texture bounce. Even the transitions in Ratchet are not so fast.

Just as Anderson’s saga has its own “thinking place”, Alan has his own writer’s room, which can be switched to at any point in the game, and the transition again happens completely instantly, without any loading. The Northlight engine seems to use some kind of dark magic. In short, it makes full use of technologies like DirectStorage. What’s important is that at this stage, Alan can look at the clues he has found and connect them. In particular, he collects information about locations and certain themes. As a result, Alan can literally rewrite reality. For example, if they connect an empty corridor and cultists, various symbols will appear in this place and a path to follow further. There is always only one correct connection (which moves you forward in the story), but the developers have stated that even the “wrong” ones can lead you to something interesting.

The demo ended with a very interesting scene where it intersected with Saga Anderson’s demo from June. Eventually, it reached a place called “The Overlap”, where two dimensions intersect. And it is here that he first meets Alan, because they both hear each other, albeit relatively intermittently and for a short time. But it will undoubtedly play a role. I remind you that in select save rooms (which work almost like in any survival horror), you can switch between characters at will, and it is up to you in what order to complete each mission. At the same time, in them you have the opportunity to explore locations outside the main story, the developers promise the same degree of freedom as in Control.

I had high hopes for Alan Wake 2, but I wouldn’t be exaggerating when I say this preview exceeded them in every way. I thought the Saga playthroughs had already shown off a lot of new, very interesting mechanics, but when you have Alan playing in a different way… I just don’t have the words to even describe how great the whole game feels. Remedy wasn’t exaggerating when they said this was by far their most ambitious project yet. And I can’t wait to start working on the full version at the end of October. I think the game of the year hasn’t been decided yet.

Alan Wake 2 will be released on October 27 on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S.