Up until this latest Alan Wake title I have been pretty pleased with down loadable titles whether it be on Xbox Live or Playstation Network. We have seen some great releases of past hits and classics like NFL Blitz or Daytona USA to name a few. I would also like to mention the original titles Fat Princess and Stacking which kept me happily busy, but still something seemed missing. All the while I just could not shake the feeling that these down loadable titles games were great and all but missed the knockout punch that comes with a killer retail release. This all changed for me within the first 15 minutes of Alan Wake's American Nightmare.
I was a massive fan of the first Alan Wake title and played it through enjoying almost every moment. Remedy had a lot of responsibility because the fans like myself loved the story style and gameplay which seemed to mesh so well. This game is not a direct sequel to the 2010 smash hit but more side story that is explored following the conclusion of the first game. Alan again is the main character still plagued by the nightmare of his own creation. He is trapped in an episode of Night Springs, which is the in game version of a favorite we all know as Twilight Zone. Alan had written this episode long before he became the accomplished writer we saw in the past.
This time around you play as Alan, who is playing The Champion of Light, as the game refers to you throughout. Your arch enemy Mr. Scratch, who is a clean cut murderous version of you, has trapped you in this Nightmare like cycle which you must escape. Escape will come in the form of finding manuscript pages and rewriting the episode to eliminate the Taken and hopefully Mr. Scratch before it is too late.
This should seem pretty familiar to any AW players saddling up for another ride. The campy quirkiness of the first game is here again and will see a little abrupt, maybe even forced, but remember this is a short title and Remedy did not have the same amount of time in game to build as the first game did so well.
Personally I loved the Pacific Northwest location of the first. There is something so much more scary about pine trees and a forest compared to the desert locations of American Nightmare. This did not take away from the game but gave it a sense of being separate from the original as you really had three areas to visit: The motel, a drive in movie theater and an observatory. All carry a similar level of detail as the last game did.
A lot of people were worried that Remedy was going to make the game more action oriented than the last and with good reason, the story was a main focus along with how it unfolded. Wake now has tighter controls when moving and overall his actions look a lot smoother. Wake's duck move has returned and combined with the tighter over all controls, battling a horde of the Taken can be a real treat. We also see the addition of new weapons and enemies. This gave the battles more variety because now we have added brute like enemies, fast moving spiders and even enemies that split in two when shot. Pick your weapon type and go to town. Personally I loved the sawed off shotgun and it sounded great.
At times you are doing a lot of retrieve this item treks, which of course will be littered with different enemies, rinse and repeat. It seems we also stuck to the core of using the flashlight to break down an enemy and then finishing them off with bullets. I had no issue with this in the first title and it is even better now with the revised controls.
If the story mode was not enough for you we also have the Fight Til Dawn mode, which is a horde style mode, where you must remain alive for 10 minutes while battling waves of enemies. You have a total of 5 maps from a grave yard to an oil field that once a single one is defeated the next will unlock. Each level is laid out with weapons and pick ups scattered for use until the sun rises. In order to score high and hopefully make the leader boards you will need to string together kills and score the multipliers.
The concept here is interesting because you have the choice of killing as many enemies as you can to score high and impress the XBLA world, or just skirt the enemies for 10 minutes until the sun comes up and you can move on to the next level. This mode became real heart racing as you frantically scrounge weapons, all while dodging enemies attacks and stringing together kills. This mode will lead to some serious smack talking among those on your friends list, I know it has on mine.
If you loved the first game this one is a no brainer at 15 bucks. The inclusion of the Fight Til Dawn mode is just a bonus really and also shows how you can do something fun without it seeming like a tacked on no interest mode. This game is easily one of the first to give me the same feeling as a retail release or in this case the original AW did. Yes, the story was not the main focus here but with great combat and smooth controls I can hardly complain about anything in this title.
Pros
Improved controls
Fight Til Dawn mode
Same great Alan Wake feel
Cons
Story was co pilot to the action
Campy, quirkiness seemed forced in story
4/5
