10 Years of Alan Wake

Imagine watching a thriller movie that makes the hair stand on the back of your neck. Now imagine yourself in the movie. You’re not watching it anymore. You’re in it! You experience all the plot twists and try to survive throughout. You try to save yourself from being taken over by the darkness. Who are you? You are Alan Wake!

Who is Alan Wake?

 “I am Alan Wake. I am a writer!”

Alan Wake is the main character from the psychological thriller and action survival game “Alan Wake”. The game plot is based around a small town by the name of Bright Falls, where Alan has to find pages of the manuscript of his book “Departure” in order to find his wife, simultaneously surviving the darkness that takes over all the humans and animals and turns them into “The Taken”. The only way to defeat “The Taken” is through light. Alan has to fight the darkness with light.

The Story

Did you know that it took the writer Sam Lake, 5 years to create this game? That’s an unusually long time! The game is distributed into six episodes.

● Episode 1: Nightmare
● Episode 2: Taken
● Episode 3: Ransom
● Episode 4: The Truth
● Episode 5: The Clicker
● Episode 6: Departure

Each episode has a different narrative, theme, and gameplay, but the objective remains the same – the search for his wife Alice.

The Nightmare

The story begins with Alan and his wife visiting Bright Falls for a vacation because he was going through a writer’s block. Alan had been having nightmares about a dark shadow taking over and killing him. But he also learns in these nightmares, how to fight the darkness with light.

Upon reaching their destination, he learns that their cabin’s landlord Carl Stucky was not well, and had asked a mysterious old lady to hand over the keys of the cabin to the couple. The cabin was located on an island in the middle of Cauldron Lake. During all this, Alan also finds out that his wife Alice had arranged for him to meet with a psychologist, Dr. Emil Hartman. He doesn’t take this well and gets furious. As he goes out to confront his wife, he sees her being dragged towards the lake by a mysterious force. He tries to save her but loses consciousness in the process.

The Taken

When Alan comes to, he realizes that he had driven off-road but he has no memory of it. He tries to find a gas station but is hindered by black shadows, the ones he saw in his dreams. As he knew how to fight them off with light, he does exactly the same thing and succeeds in killing them. He also sees a mysterious figure from his dreams, who leaves behind pages from one of his unpublished books. Alan has no memory of writing that book. As he gathers the manuscript and reads, he realizes that whatever he had written in the book was happening in reality. The shadowy figures were none other than the people of Bright Falls, who had been possessed by a dark force and had become “The Taken”.

After fighting off the possessed townsfolk, including the landlord too, Alan finally reaches the gas station. Here he runs into Sheriff Sarah Breaker and narrates the whole incident to her. She informs him that there is no island with a cabin in Cauldron Lake because it was destroyed by a volcanic eruption and sunk many years ago.

Ransom

While at the police station, Alan receives a call from a stranger, who tells him that he was behind the kidnapping of Alice. He asked for ransom money in order to let Alice go. Alan goes to a nearby park to meet the man but finds that he was lying. Suddenly he and the stranger are attacked by dark shadows and Alan is thrown into Cauldron Lake.

When he regains consciousness, he finds himself in a lodge with Dr. Emil Hartman, the psychologist. The doctor claimed that Alan was suffering from a psychotic break, which had caused him to imagine everything he saw earlier. Alan did not want to hear anything Hartman had to say and tried to escape. Hartman tries to stop him and Alan learns that the stranger calling him and all, was a setup. Hartman had planned everything so that Alan could be lured to the lodge.

Luckily, Alan’s friend Barry Wheeler, who had advised him to go on this vacation, comes looking for him. They both manage to escape in time, just as the darkness engulfs the lodge and everyone inside.

The Truth

Soon, Alan and Barry figure out what is exactly going on. The Dark Presence was an entity that was trapped inside Cauldron Lake. The lake had the power to turn fiction into reality and the Dark Presence was using Alan’s book to escape. It takes the form of an old woman Barbara Jaggers – the same mysterious woman who gave the keys to Alan.

The mysterious figure from Alan’s dream was a poet Thomas Zane, who was attacked by The Dark Presence for his writings. Thomas was strong and persistent, so he did not give up and used his writings to create a volcanic eruption in Lake Cauldron, causing the island to sink. As a result, he got stranded inside the lake. Do you remember Sheriff Sarah telling the same thing to Alan earlier?

Knowing the truth, Alan recalls how he was forced to write his book “The Departure”. He realizes that The Dark Presence was growing stronger and had taken over the people of Bright Falls and even created scenarios that caused Alan to end up in Lake Cauldron. It had trapped Alice in the lake so that Alan would be forced to do its bidding. It was using Alan’s writing to escape the lake.

The Clicker

Now that everything is as clear as daylight, Sheriff Sarah Breaker takes Alan and Barry to visit Cynthia Weaver, who was a hermit. She knew Thomas Zane and had prepared to counter the return of The Dark Presence. Cynthia takes them to a room known as the “Well-Lit Room”. This room contains a switch called “The Clicker”. This switch has the ability to use the power of Allan’s book and destroy The Dark Presence.

Departure

Alan takes the switch and dives into Lake Cauldron. He finds himself in an alternative dimension known as the Dark Place. In this place, thoughts become reality. Alan destroys The Dark Presence with the help of “The Clicker” and manages to free Alice. In return, he strands himself in The Dark Place. He has to do so in order to maintain the balance of the story in “Departure”.

Also, he finds Thomas Zane stranded in the Dark Place.

10th Anniversary Celebration

Alan Wake came out on 14th May 2010. This year marks its 10 year anniversary. This game
has won:

● Time Magazine’s 2010 Game of the Year award
● Best Horror Game on Xbox 360
● GameSpot’s Best Original IP award

Even after a decade, the fans of Alan Wake are excited about it just as they were in the beginning. As a thank you gift for all the fans, Remedy Games is offering Alan Wake and Alan Wake’s Collector’s Edition at a 90% discount. Also, they are giving out mini flashlights with the Alan Wake 10th anniversary logo.

So what are you waiting for? Avail these offers by keeping an eye out on the fan sites and web pages mentioned on the official website of Remedy Games.

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