Alan Wake 2 Is About The Pain Of Realizing You Might Not Be Good Enough

gamespot.com:

Protagonist Alan is maybe not as good a writer as he once thought, and it's fascinating to watch Remedy work through those same feelings.

By Phil Hornshaw on

Warning: We're spoiling here. We're trying to keep it light but it's probably best you play Alan Wake 2 before reading this.

Captivating as Alan Wake 2 often is, it can occasionally get a bit… cringey. But not in the wild, over-the-top moments where cheese and kitsch meet murderous intent (you know the scene I mean); Alan Wake 2's funny, weird moments channel the best of stories such as Twin Peaks, leveraging an absurdity and surrealism that actually makes the story more human. It's when Alan Wake 2 takes itself seriously that it starts to become a little hard to stomach.

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Now Playing: Alan Wake 2 And The 13 Year Journey To Make It

There's a whole level that really encapsulates this feeling of near-goofy grittiness: the Oceanview Hotel. A shifting location in the alternate reality of the Dark Place, the Oceanview is not strictly an actual place, but rather manifested from some combination of forces, including eponymous protagonist Alan's writing. He is, of course, trying to free himself from the Dark Place by using its power, which can make art into reality both within the Dark Place itself and back out in the real-world town of Bright Falls, Washington.

The Oceanview changes as you venture through it as Alan is inspired by «echoes,» which seem to be some combination of half-remembered past story ideas, things he's read or written, and glimpses of actual events in