Alan Wake's American Nightmare Review
*Contains Spoilers*
Did Someone Say “Déjà vu”?
Like the full game, American Nightmare offers an interesting story and very similar gameplay. This time, Wake finds himself in an episode of the in-game Twilight Zone-esque TV show Night Springs. While Wake reads the pages of the story he’s living out, the narrator for Night Springs spins a foreboding. Just when you start making progress and it feels like the end of the game is near, you are pulled back into the loop, over and over and over again, except with each passing loop, something has changed. You are now armed with knowledge of future events and you can use this knowledge to your advantage, slowly rewriting the script.
The gameplay is very similar to the base game, but this time, there are other forces stalking Alan in the darkness. One of the enemies you’ll encounter is one of the Taken with the ability to divide and conquer. It actually splits itself in two over and over again when exposed to the light, which proves to be a pain, especially in close quarters. The other presence makes himself known early on in the game, and goes by the name “Mr. Scratch”.
The addition of Mr. Scratch (Alan’s evil doppelganger) was a fun twist in this particular story because it complements the concept of the war between the darkness and the light so successfully. Alan Wake, the well intentioned writer-turned-hero and “Champion of Light” is pitted against a copy of himself, Mr. Scratch, who embodies the darkest parts of Alan’s mind. So it begs the question… How do you outsmart yourself?
One way the story explores this is through loops in time and place, with subtle differences. While returning time and again to places you have already visited was integral to the storyline, I found it tiresome. Each time I revisited a location, enough had changed to make me feel as though I needed to explore the area fully again to ensure I hadn’t missed a manuscript page or other items.
This game, unlike the former, has optimization issues. I experienced slightly laggy performance which wasn’t present in the main game, even though I played under the exact same circumstances with the exact same settings. That said, I did not find the lag to be incredibly distracting, so it is something, for the sake of the experience, I can overlook.
Overall, I felt American Nightmare was a fun addition to the main game, providing a related, yet fresh storyline, familiar gameplay with some new twists.
[Lady played Alan Wake's American Nightmare on PC with a mouse and keyboard]
The gameplay is very similar to the base game, but this time, there are other forces stalking Alan in the darkness. One of the enemies you’ll encounter is one of the Taken with the ability to divide and conquer. It actually splits itself in two over and over again when exposed to the light, which proves to be a pain, especially in close quarters. The other presence makes himself known early on in the game, and goes by the name “Mr. Scratch”.
The addition of Mr. Scratch (Alan’s evil doppelganger) was a fun twist in this particular story because it complements the concept of the war between the darkness and the light so successfully. Alan Wake, the well intentioned writer-turned-hero and “Champion of Light” is pitted against a copy of himself, Mr. Scratch, who embodies the darkest parts of Alan’s mind. So it begs the question… How do you outsmart yourself?
One way the story explores this is through loops in time and place, with subtle differences. While returning time and again to places you have already visited was integral to the storyline, I found it tiresome. Each time I revisited a location, enough had changed to make me feel as though I needed to explore the area fully again to ensure I hadn’t missed a manuscript page or other items.
This game, unlike the former, has optimization issues. I experienced slightly laggy performance which wasn’t present in the main game, even though I played under the exact same circumstances with the exact same settings. That said, I did not find the lag to be incredibly distracting, so it is something, for the sake of the experience, I can overlook.
Overall, I felt American Nightmare was a fun addition to the main game, providing a related, yet fresh storyline, familiar gameplay with some new twists.
[Lady played Alan Wake's American Nightmare on PC with a mouse and keyboard]
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