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[Uncle]

Is there a list of all the writers that Nightingale mentions? I'd like to see if they could be tied into the game or Remedy in a way that makes at least a bit of sense.

- Stephen King & Lovecraft are pretty obvious.
- James Joyce - Finnegans Wake?
- Breat Easton Ellis - Lunar Park?
- Raymond Chandler - Max Payne/whatever the name of Wake's character was.

For Hemingway I have no idea. Ditto for Dan Brown. Maybe the cliffhanger endings for every chapter? :lol

 

[Squall ASF]

That's what I figured...I just wish they had appeared in the game somehow. You find her body by a tree trunk or fight him as one of the fast moving infected.

Yeah, that would have been neat. Maybe throw in an extra manuscript or two that drops when you defeat him so you know it was him and gives a little more detail connecting the two.


Dax,

That portion is independent, he was working for Hartmann who had his own agenda seperate of the darkness.

 

[soco]

Ditto for Dan Brown.

the shitty writing. he's about on par with Alan Wake.

i doubt there's any significance to the comparisons. it's probably just "insert some big writer people might know" to work as a slight insult to Alan.

 

[Doodis]

Something interesting came to my mind. Zane was in love with Cynthia Weaver

I thought this is the way the story was going to go. In the middle of the game, we see written in the "light writing" something along the lines of "C.W. loves T.Z." I figured Tom had betrayed Barbara and that was why she was out to get everyone. But after we learn more in the second half of the game, I think it's apparent Cynthia was just a huge fan of Tom.

Barbara was his muse and his love. We're never led to believe that Tom and Cynthia were together. Much like Rose was a huge fan of Alan's (and subsequently takes Cynthia's role as the light lady in Alan's version of the story).

Hartman is luring writers to Brightfalls with his books and programs. Alan is just another option. The webisodes are helping here, he even forces Jake to write.

Just before I read this post I realized the webisodes mirror a lot of the game. We've got Jake, a writer, who is married but is having some troubles with his wife (like Alan and Alice). He meets up with a girl from Bright Falls who is clearly in love with him (taking the role of Cynthia/Rose), etc. I need to go back and watch all of them to see if there are any other nuggets to take away. And I think it's safe to say that Mott pulls Jake's body out of the lake in the body bag (on orders from Emil).

 

[The_Inquisitor]

Ok just finished game. Where does Scratch come into play. I did not see him at all. Is he mentioned in nightmare pages?

 

[Veelk]

On the topic of Alan Wake's writing:

I feel that there is one element that's being ignored in the discussion of Alan Wake's talents as a writer. You have to keep in mind that he's written this entire manuscript in a single week. Barbara Jagger probably doesn't care about the quality of the writing so long as the plot develops in the way she wants it to.

I just want to point this out because people seem to write off Alan Wake's writing as a definitely bad. While there are plenty of reasons why that may still be true, going off the manuscript pages alone is an unreliable indicator of his true writing ability as even the most skilled writers can't get it right on their first draft, much less one they rushed through in a weeks time.

 

[Sinatar]

Ok just finished game. Where does Scratch come into play. I did not see him at all. Is he mentioned in nightmare pages?

He's pretty much the focal point of a cutscene shortly before you finish it, you can't miss it unless you skip the cutscene.

 

[Larsen B]

On the topic of Alan Wake's writing:

I feel that there is one element that's being ignored in the discussion of Alan Wake's talents as a writer. You have to keep in mind that he's written this entire manuscript in a single week. Barbara Jagger probably doesn't care about the quality of the writing so long as the plot develops in the way she wants it to.

I just want to point this out because people seem to write off Alan Wake's writing as a definitely bad. While there are plenty of reasons why that may still be true, going off the manuscript pages alone is an unreliable indicator of his true writing ability as even the most skilled writers can't get it right on their first draft, much less one they rushed through in a weeks time.

A defence for [the author] Alan Wake's writing.

Now I've seen everything.

 

[Veelk]

A defence for [the author] Alan Wake's writing.

Now I've seen everything.

Except I'm not defending it, I'm just pointing out that the manuscript pages aren't really an accurate indication of his quality as a writer.

The fact that he's put out 6 books in 7 years raises an eyebrow as few good authors make books that fast. There are plenty of ingame hints that indicate that his writing sucks, and it's very possible that people only like it because it was written to be so.

However, you are reading the first draft of what may be a lengthy novel that was put together in a single week. Find me any author in the whole history of the world that can produce quality novels (atleast +200 pages) in a single week with no revisions, and I'll withdraw my arguement.

 

[Hela]

On the topic of Alan Wake's writing:

I feel that there is one element that's being ignored in the discussion of Alan Wake's talents as a writer. You have to keep in mind that he's written this entire manuscript in a single week. Barbara Jagger probably doesn't care about the quality of the writing so long as the plot develops in the way she wants it to.

I'm sorry, but that is one of the worst excuses for poor plot development I've ever heard.

 

[derFeef]

I'm sorry, but that is one of the worst excuses for poor plot development I've ever heard.

I´m sorry but the plot development is not poor. Well, except the last hour or so

 

[Squall ASF]

Seriously, all I read when I see people trying to complain about the plot is "owwww, thinking hurts!"

 

[kodt]

As interesting as the story may be when written out as bullet points or summarized in one paragraph, I still think the writing is poor. The characters are just not well written in my opinion.

The FBI agent is especially bad, any purpose he serves does not really matter as he is just a poorly written character.

This is part of the problem with using a game to tell a convoluted story. Most of the game is spent fighting enemies, doing this in no way helps you understand the story, but it provides good game-play which is essential in a game. As a result the story suffers, not in terms of plot points, but in terms of writing.

Take any classic novel, reduce it to a bulleted list of plot points and then have a bad writer pen a story from it. It is going to be bad, even though the plot points are interesting. I think it is very difficult for a game to avoid this issue given that it still needs to be a game.

 

[Shrennin]

I posted this in the OT but I'm going to post it here as well because this is technically the plot discussion thread and hopefully it'll get more discussion going:

There were theories regarding Barbara Jagger cheating on Tom Zane and Zane killing Jagger over it rather than Zane simply killing the Jagger taken over by the Dark Presence.

I think I noticed an extra clue with the story:

Did anyone notice the tree stump with the initials carved in it? It looked like a "B" and "E". Could that be Barbara Jagger and Emil Hartman? This could confirm that Jagger did cheat on Zane (and with Zane's assistant no less) which could lead to Zane killing the real Jagger

 

[Shake Appeal]

I'm sorry, but that is one of the worst excuses for poor plot development I've ever heard.

If it's an excuse for anything, it's an excuse for the quality of Wake's manuscript pages and his dialogue. And it's not really an excuse, because the idea that he isn't actually a good writer is seeded throughout (at the very beginning, the hitchiker in his dream pursues him with a rant about how bad he is, about how he's a fraud).

The plot is not poorly developed. At all. It's one of the better videogame plots out there, given that it's genre pulp. And it's actually more coherent and better realized on the whole than, say, LOST.

 

[Solo]

Im in the camp that says Wake is a Zane character written into reality. The only thing Im lost on here, because its been mentioned a lot in here, and I dont recall seeing his name in the game, is Mr. Scratchy. Who? Ive been able to surmise from this thread that you are talking about the second Alan we see, but whats the deal with him?

Game was fucking incredible, by the way.

 

[Uncle]

The only thing Im lost on here, because its been mentioned a lot in here, and I dont recall seeing his name in the game, is Mr. Scratchy. Who? Ive been able to surmise from this thread that you are talking about the second Alan we see, but whats the deal with him?

Zane introduced him as Mr Scratch and tells Alan that his firends will be interacting with him from now on, or something like that. And that's all there is about him in the game. He might be mentioned in the Alan Wake files, though. The writer (who in turn is the guy who got killed in the dream sequence in the beginning) says he saw someone who looked just like Alan after all this happened.

 

[Korey]

I just want to say that this game is one of the most unique and well presented ones I've played in a long time.

But if the story made more sense, or was made more clear by the ending, then it ultimately would have been more enjoyable and satisfying to the average gamer...it's a shame they couldn't pull the plot together more tightly by the last chapter.

 

[SCHUEY F1]

Im in the camp that says Wake is a Zane character written into reality. The only thing Im lost on here, because its been mentioned a lot in here, and I dont recall seeing his name in the game, is Mr. Scratchy. Who? Ive been able to surmise from this thread that you are talking about the second Alan we see, but whats the deal with him?

Game was fucking incredible, by the way.

 

[Coverly]

maybe I missed it somewhere early in this thread but my question:

In the Ransom(?) episode, where Alan goes to meet the kidnapper for a second time, as you approach the kidnapper you could hear him say something like " I don't know where she (alice) is, we just made that up so that we could get the script". Once you got to where he was, you saw that he was talking to the darkness. Why would the darkness question the kidnapper on Alice's whereabouts if the darkness didn't have Alice already?

 

[Shrennin]

maybe I missed it somewhere early in this thread but my question:

In the Ransom(?) episode, where Alan goes to meet the kidnapper for a second time, as you approach the kidnapper you could hear him say something like " I don't know where she (alice) is, we just made that up so that we could get the script". Once you got to where he was, you saw that he was talking to the darkness. Why would the darkness question the kidnapper on Alice's whereabouts if the darkness didn't have Alice already?

There's also the fact that when the kidnapper calls I believe Wake hears Alice on the other line as well. It could be that the kidnapper thought that The Dark Presence wanted Alice, but in reality it was hoping the kidnapper would use Wake to get the manuscripts and continue writing. The kidnapper may have assumed that The Dark Presence wanted Alice. That doesn't account for Alice being on the other end of the phone when the kidnapper calls, though.

 

[Manos: The Hans of Fate]

All of Barry's discourse was fantastic. Best character in the game, easily.

The thought of Barry now not being really is just so depressing.

Seriously he was one of the characters that is fun to have around, for once doesn't get killed off, and is useful.

 

[Shake Appeal]

That doesn't account for Alice being on the other end of the phone when the kidnapper calls, though.

Her "phone call" is a composite of snippets Hartman recorded in telephone conversation with her. You can hear the unedited recordings at the Lodge in Episode 4.

 

[Scarecrow]

small qeustion: why is Tom in a diving suit?

 

[Shrennin]

Her "phone call" is a composite of snippets Hartman recorded in telephone conversation with her. You can hear the unedited recordings at the Lodge in Episode 4.

Wow this game is awesome. That's all I'm going to say. I even heard those recording but didn't piece it together (only played it once, may have seen it the second time through or I might have missed it again).

 

[Tokubetsu]

Her "phone call" is a composite of snippets Hartman recorded in telephone conversation with her. You can hear the unedited recordings at the Lodge in Episode 4.

Such a great moment when you piece that together yourself before Alan even narrates. The only way to play this game through the first time is to just take your time. Seriously.

 

[Shrennin]

Such a great moment when you piece that together yourself before Alan even narrates. The only way to play this game through the first time is to just take your time. Seriously.

Wait, does Wake say that the recordings were part of the kidnapper's call? I can't believe I didn't remember that - although I am starting to recall it.

 

[Tokubetsu]

Wait, does Wake say that the recordings were part of the kidnapper's call? I can't believe I didn't remember that - although I am starting to recall it.

Yea, pretty sure he makes a comment about it being familiar.

 

[Shake Appeal]

small qeustion: why is Tom in a diving suit?

He used to go diving in the lake in the 70s; presumably this is how he first discovered its powers. His first appearance in the suit is Alan's dream in Episode 1, although there is also a photo showing him in his diving suit in Bird Leg Cabin, if you check the bedroom before turning on the generator. The cabin, incidentally, is on 'Diver's Isle'.

You can also insert all sorts of figurative shit about artists drawing from the 'well' of artistic inspiration; Zane is someone who travels into the depths blah blah.

This is a pure guess, but I'd also say the suit conveniently hides the fact that he strongly resembles Alan Wake.

 

[FrankT]

So great to be able to come in here. What a mind-bending story.

 

[Uncle]

small qeustion: why is Tom in a diving suit?

Tom was said to be an amateur diver and the lake one of the deepest in the world. Hell, even the island was called Diver's isle.

Edit: replied in an old tab.

 

[Coverly]

Did anyone figure out who's breathing it is when you near a secret weapons cache? You know, the one under the torch symbol that you follow the yellow arrows to get to. As you get near you hear breathing, and as you stay near you still hear it. Why is there breathing and who's is it?

I thought it might come from a woman, but it might also be the breathing noise a diving suit makes so it could also be tom. But as to why there is breathing to begin with, I don't know.

 

[derFeef]

Did anyone figure out who's breathing it is when you near a secret weapons cache? You know, the one under the torch symbol that you follow the yellow arrows to get to. As you get near you hear breathing, and as you stay near you still hear it. Why is there breathing and who's is it?

I thought it might come from a woman, but it might also be the breathing noise a diving suit makes so it could also be tom. But as to why there is breathing to begin with, I don't know.

You hear a light breath whenever some yellow paint is uncovered by the light. I do not think it is someone specific, but wh knows, maybe it´s the young mrs. weaver.

 

[CrazedArabMan]

Reading the discussions in here has made me realize just how great the plot was, now I need to go back on nightmare and figure things out for myself.

 

[derFeef]

Hm, I know there is the theory that Tom is Alan, Alan is Tom´s son or Alan resembles Tom - but Cynthia would recognise him I think. She had a crush on Tom and shows it. She said "What a good looking man he was" (or similar) in the powerhouse.

 

[Hammer24]

I like to think, that Zane basically created the darkness.
His beloved wife cheated on him, and his fury went out according to his character, as writing. The darkness definitely has an "inky" look and feel. So he wrote the darkness into existence, mainly to punish his wife. But when he killed her that way, he started to regret it. But by now the darkness had gotten too strong, feeding on the creative sources around Bright Falls. He tried to "write it back", but in the end it wasn´t that simple. So he created Alan, as a means to finish what he wasn´t able to.
Makes sense to you guys?

 

[Dries]

I'm starting to think Zane is Alan's father..

 

[seady]

Just beat the game and don't really understand 100% wth is going on.

So, is the relationship between Thomas Zane and Alan Wake = Alan Wake to Mr. Scratch?

 

[BruceLeeRoy]

maybe I missed it somewhere early in this thread but my question:

In the Ransom(?) episode, where Alan goes to meet the kidnapper for a second time, as you approach the kidnapper you could hear him say something like " I don't know where she (alice) is, we just made that up so that we could get the script". Once you got to where he was, you saw that he was talking to the darkness. Why would the darkness question the kidnapper on Alice's whereabouts if the darkness didn't have Alice already?

This might sound totally off but I thought Motts was talking to Mr Scratchy. I also thought the manuscript page that talks about Alan locking Hartman in his office and hearing the Dark Presence take him and having a grin on his face was about Mr Scratchy as well.

The last spot I thought it was talking about Mr Scratchy was when it describes the guy driving his truck up to the farm and seeing someone(Mr Scratchy) on the porch.

Game was phenomenal though.
As a total side point I have shown the BrightFalls episodes to several people that don't even play games and it scared all of them. I would love if there was a actual show with that kind of presentation and setup.

 

[XiaNaphryz]

maybe I missed it somewhere early in this thread but my question:

In the Ransom(?) episode, where Alan goes to meet the kidnapper for a second time, as you approach the kidnapper you could hear him say something like " I don't know where she (alice) is, we just made that up so that we could get the script". Once you got to where he was, you saw that he was talking to the darkness. Why would the darkness question the kidnapper on Alice's whereabouts if the darkness didn't have Alice already?

From what I've read from the manuscript pages, I thought he was talking to Hartman?

 

[adamsapple]

First image from the forthcoming DLC

http://gallery.thatvideogameblog.com/alan-wake/alan-wake-dlc1.jpg.html

Shit looks fucked up.

 

[plagiarize]

first DLC looks cool.

thought i'd throw in my own two cents here about Alan Wake the character.

I don't think that TZ invented him. I think he invented a detail of his childhood and pointed him on a path.

TZ's writings were all lost apart from that one single page, so I don't think TZ's influence on the story goes beyond what we see in that single page. He's obviously still around, but I don't think he holds any 'power' beyond a bit of a link to Alan that could be genetic (though I'd be a bit disapointed if they reveal Alan to be his son).

Alan isn't a terrible writer, or a great writer. Like a lot of authors, he's sort of stuck writing about the same character, to the point that he resents it and kills it off. Think of any author who has something similar to 'An Alex Casey story' on the cover of all their books.

Often they're only adequately written, and it's devotion to that character that keeps people coming back. Alan only hit trouble when he killed off Casey... and i think a lot of his anger stems from the fact that he felt stifled by Casey and got rid of him to free him up to write something new, and then spent two years unable to write a word.

The 'critiques' that the hitchhiker throws at Alan in the beginning of the game I don't think truly represent the quality of Alan's writing. I write fiction as a hobby and am just coming out of a really LONG period of writers block (five godforsaken years), and I absolutely recognise in that dialogue the self doubt of an author, something which I'm sure Sam Lake found very easy to write.

The most succesful authors feel that way about their stuff at their worst moments.

I'm okay with calling him a 'hack' though... but I don't think the notion that he was only any good because of what TZ wrote holds.

The themes that we get hints of in the bits we see of the Alex Casey novels, and the stuff from the Alan Wake Files demonstrates that a lot come from his childhood. I honestly think that Alan existed before TZ wrote those words. His father had already left him.

That brings you back to the notion that TZ might be his father (which I just don't want to find out for a fact), to know of his existance and his potential.

If Alan didn't have to write for a living, he'd probably be a better writer. But he was trapped into writing a popular character, and then on putting that character to bed discovered that he had nothing else. I'd bet that even though they sold less, that the first couple of Alex Casey books were a lot better than the others.

All that we know of Alan, other than that moment in the rainstorm, is Alan the frustrated writer. Alan the failed writer. The Alan who hasn't written a word in years, which definately makes the best writer rusty.

One thing I wonder about a lot is Clay. Most people are hung up on Mr Scratchy... but for me... it's Clay. I haven't finished the Alan Wake files yet, but why does he share Alan's nightmare?

And furthermore, did he write the Alan Wake files in Bright Falls... is Alan setting him up to take over from him further down the line?

He's the third writer in the story.

As for the darkness as we know it... that was the extreme unbalanced version that stemmed from TZ's careless writing. Before that, there was probably as much light as dark. TZ let it get to the strength it's at when we meet it.

I presume it goes back to being balanced, so long as Alan can keep it so.

Another question... do we know when the Poet and the Muse was written? Do we know for a fact that it was written AFTER TZ unleashed the darkness? I can't remember the dates.

One final thought, if Rose is the new lamp lady, why is there still darkness behind her eyes? I presume she represents the new balance of light and dark, compared to the extremes TZ provoked.

I like to think that TZ is an empty diving suit. With nothing inside it but light. That he uses the suit to interact with the world since he wrote his physical self out of existance.

 

[op_ivy]

You hear a light breath whenever some yellow paint is uncovered by the light. I do not think it is someone specific, but wh knows, maybe it´s the young mrs. weaver.

its zane in the diving suit.

Maybe I missed it somewhere early in this thread but my question:

In the Ransom(?) episode, where Alan goes to meet the kidnapper for a second time, as you approach the kidnapper you could hear him say something like " I don't know where she (alice) is, we just made that up so that we could get the script". Once you got to where he was, you saw that he was talking to the darkness. Why would the darkness question the kidnapper on Alice's whereabouts if the darkness didn't have Alice already?

i think "the kidnapper" thinks alan, being the author, is in control of the darkness. he is basically confessing to wake so that he'll call off the darkness

 

[plagiarize]

Okay, so kind of freakishly, I've just been going over a story I wrote over six years ago. I admit that it's a bit of a pastiche of some of the same things that Alan Wake obviously draws from (Twin Peaks, The Twilight Zone, Stephen King, John Carpenter's In The Mouth of Madness...)

but... wow are there other huge similarities.

I was an author. Maybe somewhere I’m still thought as one. Success had not come easily, and it hadn’t been an easy cross to bear once I’d achieved it. Countless weeks went by where I wouldn’t write a word, even in those early days.

Then, finally, in a flurry of work in a short space of time I’d create… Whole universes out of thin air. Lives plucked from the nothingness and set in motion like clockwork mice that I got to wind up, set down, and let go.

It was all so easy. It just…

It just happened.

Why I could just hold my fingertips over the keyboard and let it happen, as if the story was being projected through me rather than created. A storm could pass by and I wouldn’t notice… and those worlds… Tragically beautiful and perfect.

Enclosed in a single tome, ready to be printed and put onto a shelf if I could only make the sale.

It took me three years of trying to find a publisher, and when I did, I remember thinking… this is it. This is it. I’m an author now. Now. This is my job.

But a job it became. They wanted the three worlds I’d create, to be revisited, and so, back I went… but it was hard. It was almost as if I wasn’t wanted back. As if I wasn’t welcome in my own creations. These children of mine, had turned away from me, ashamed.

But the shame was mine, for the weakness I’d shown at agreeing to it.

As hard as it was…

I wrote. And while it no longer felt as if it flowed from me, I made it work. I sweated. I bled. Hardwork and life spilled into those books and they shone on the shelves, eclipsing even my earlier works.

The reviews stayed glowing, even if lamenting for some of the originality that was lost. I condoned it to myself by saying three universes was more than god created.

And yet, as vibrant and full as they were, they seemed to fade, until they felt like empty stages. Facades of life, populated only with puppets. Where once real life had seemed to be… where things had seemed to just happen, was now just a world of my bidding.

Being a god of a world is hollow and boring. When only what I choose to happen happens, what is the point anymore?

Where does the life and the energy and the emotion come from?

I can’t be that much, not knowingly.

And so I set off. I packed a lap top into the car and started driving.

I told my publishers that I just needed inspiration, and that the big wide world contained more than enough.

If I couldn’t make the life anymore, maybe I could capture some, and anyway, journeying around the world had always been a dream.

First, I saw everything there was to see in England, from the oldest city steeped in history, with strong, yet crumbling ruins, to the worst industrial waste of a place… the factories like some martian landscape. Like some mining city on the red planet burrowing into its sandy red soil to find new treasures, and the plumes of the great machines choking the air above.

I saw much, but the spark, the spark I was hoping that would set me off as freely as I had before, was nowhere.

There were stories I could tell. There were stories I could write. There were situations I could take and place into my worlds, but being all defined and laid it, in the writing at least they felt lifeless.

Telling the tale became a chore.

A bore.

Forgive the punctuation and the mistakes in it. I never finished it. This is all first draft stuff.

There was little time for inspiration, let alone writing. Yet somehow, I hoped that at the end of it all, when I reached the shores of America, an idea would flourish, that I could craft into a story. That would fit in one of my worlds and blossom.

As I slowly drove the car off the ferry onto the shores of America, my heart sank.

There was no story, and none was coming.

A blank page would forever be my tormentor. The images might be in my head still… but they didn’t move. Like a single picture in a picture book, with a story to tell, but no book can be a mere thousand words.

Few stories could be so short, even the shortest ones.

Not knowing what else to do, I drove on, across America, not sure what I’d do when I reached the ocean. Not knowing I never would.

Stopping at motels, or sometimes, just sleeping on the back seat, dropping innocuously into every little back end town I found along my way.

Until I reached this one.

And so, ends my beginning, and for me, in a way, it was my end as well.

Small town America.

I’d seen over a dozens town like it.

The diner. The church. The school. The motel. The small shopping precinct around a pretty grassy square shared with the town hall.

And on.

Having stowed and secured my belongs safely in my room, I drove back to the diner I’d drove in past…

Or at least I thought I did. Either I took a wrong turn somewhere or it was a different diner, but the road that went past it back out into the night, curled into nothing but two tire tracks, and then just fields of corn.

In fact, it was a most unusual location for a diner. I turned right into the small car park outside into the final space empty, climbed out and wandered in.

It was a perfect picture of small town America, like an amalgamation of every small town diner I’d been into along the journey, and like the son of every diner that ever was.

The round stools bolted along the front of the bar. The jukebox in the corner. The plush red seats, swept around a shiny metal table, almost gleaming like a mirror.

I could imagine the menu. There’d be bacon, sausage, and egg. There’d be a number of pies. There’d be hot coffee and hot chocolate. There’d be milkshakes and cream sodas.

And so it was, like the American cliché you think is reserved only for films.

The man behind the counter, was exactly as I would have described such a worker. His dark, greased back hair, over a pair of flat eyes, and lips that curled up in the middle and at the edges.

“I think I know you sir.”

I smiled, as reservedly as I could, not wanting to look like a grinning loon. After all it had been many weeks since I’d been recognised, and once you got used to it, going a long time without it happening kind of felt like sliding off the face of the earth.

“Chuck.”

I said, smiling at my own Americanising of my own name.

“Charles Bromwell. I’m a big fan of yours sir. Actually, maybe you could sign one of my copies of your book.”

He tucked the pencil he’d produced to take my order back behind his ear and turned towards the back room.

“No one try anything while I’m gone.”

I smiled, thinking how unlikely it would seem for anyone in a place like this to try anything as ludicrous as leaning over the counter and helping themselves to pie.

They seemed a quiet sort, and for some reason, the traffic buzzing past bothered me... before I could place why, the door opened and the man ambled out with three well thumbed books.

My first three books. The Night is Long. The Pleasance of Nothing. Stars of the Morningchild. All perfectly original and all perfectly different. Yet all stamped with a style so very much my own I knew they were mine.

I wrote them all before I got published of course, and had forged successful franchises out of the three very different worlds encapsulated in these obviously much loved tomes.

The writing in them was a little creaky, and the plots and characters not as well developed and thought out as my later works, but it was hard not to feel fondness for the 3 sparks of inspiration that had forged my career.

Of course, I felt lament for the ease of which I’d written them, now that I was struggling to even open a new document to start work on. Nearly petrified by the blank page.

Indeed, I stared at these pages for a while before my fingers began to flow over them… but my motivation for this… is so different to it was for those.

He handed me the pencil behind his ear, and though pencils normally make me cringe as they scrape across paper, I signed my signature below my name on the first page of all three books.

“Who shall I make it out to?”

“No one, but the names Norm. Your signature is mighty fine by itself. You’re quite an author. When do we get a new book Mr Bromwell?”

I half laughed, but only I knew about the half part.

“You’ve read all my books then?”

“Of course, they’re all here aren’t they? You’ve kept us waiting a long long time sir.”

My mind bounced. I knew my books had been published in America. Many of them New York Times best sellers. I’d toured America before for promotion. I’d signed copies of my later books.

“I don’t mean to sound rude Norm, but I’ve written quite a bit more than these three books.”

And then he looked at me. A look of mistrust. As if he didn’t believe I was me anymore. As if I was lying.

“No Mr Bromwell, I’m fairly certain these three are all you’ve written. I don’t mean to be rude myself, questioning you and all, but I’ve been waiting your next novel for twelve years. You don’t think I’d have missed it if you publish even so much as one?”

Another car buzzed past and my stomach turned, reminding me that I was hungry, but confusing me as to if I should eat.

These are only sections of it.

Like I say, clearly we've drawn from similar influences here... but I'm beginning to wonder if one of the reasons that the game speaks so much to me, is because it's about certain emotions and fears that I myself harbour.

Doubt about the quality of my writing. Doubt about how many stories I have to tell.

I think it's universal to anyone that writes.

 

[Byshop]

This is a pure guess, but I'd also say the suit conveniently hides the fact that he strongly resembles Alan Wake.

Seems fair. The old coots in the diner briefly refer to wake as "Tom" when he helps with the jukebox upon their initial meeting. I didn't notice this on my first playthrough but caught it on my second.

He's pretty much the focal point of a cutscene shortly before you finish it, you can't miss it unless you skip the cutscene.

To be fair the dialog for that scene can be a little bit difficult to understand with Tom's diving suit reverb effect. Immediately after beating the game I replayed that cutscene from the movie viewer with the subtitles on.

-Byshop

 

[Axiom]

Sorry if I've missed it being mentioned but from the Night Springs shows I remember, they seem in reflection to comment on the plot, reality and fiction in general. Hell one even features a dude who loses control of his reality due to arrogance. Except there's that doppelganger one, which seems to reflect on Mr. Scratch. If so, I don't exactly trust the Alan Wake in the DLC is gonna be a good guy in the end.

 

[Coverly]

i think "the kidnapper" thinks alan, being the author, is in control of the darkness. he is basically confessing to wake so that he'll call off the darkness

I looked on youtube for a walk through that shows this section but the best i could find is one with really annoying commentary from the player. I did manage to take some screens, in succession:

What you're saying is probably correct. The kidnapper thinks he hears Alan before the actual Alan makes himself aware to him, and is surprised by the Darkness. Probably thinking the Darkness was sent by Wake to collect his wife, the kidnapper confesses.

 

[Neuromancer]

Just beat the game. All I can say is, what the fuck just happened? :lol

You know what, I don't want to know, I'm out. :lol

 

[stuminus3]

EDIT: I will say first that I haven't got my hands on the Alan Wake Files, nor have I seen the preludes. This is based entirely on the content of the game itself, and the game alone.

Here's my take on it. I get more of a Donnie Darko vibe than a Twin Peaks one.

There's Bright Falls the real place, and there's Bright Falls as written by Alan Wake after he and Alice get to the cabin. This Bright Falls is the world of a book called "Departure", which Alan gets the inspiration to write after getting mad at Alice about the typewriter.

None of what the characters do after Alice apparently gets pulled into the lake is actually real, just what Alan writes about them. He does not know them, but if you'll notice, every major character after the initial trip to Alan is revealed to Alan before the point where he apparently starts writing. Everything he writes about these characters is a work of fiction based on whatever experience he had with them to that point. For example, Hartman - everything you see of him is a work of fiction written by Alan Wake, based on the book that Alice had and his feelings about it. Rose, Rusty, the Sheriff, the brothers, crazy lamp lady, he meets them all in the diner, and creates their entire back stories out of that brief meeting, that's the only time you see the "real" them. There was a writer called Thomas Zane, but not the one that Alan creates, he just got the name from a pile of books that you can examine in the cabin. The parts of the manuscript that make it seem like Zane knows/wrote Alan? That's actually just Alan writing about Alan. You meet Mott on the boat, but he's not really called Mott in real life, he's just some random asshole that Wake bases a character on. Barry doesn't really come to Bright Falls, Alan just writes a character into his book that's based on the real Barry who calls him on the way to Bright Falls. The only one I can't figure out is the FBI guy - it's like he's a character in a completely different story, everything he does and everything that's written in the manuscripts about him is completely at odds with the rest of the story. Maybe that was deliberate. I think he's actually like the lead character of Alan's previous books, and that story (or some other story) has somehow gotten mixed with the "Departure" one. Kind of writing two sets of lyrics then putting them together into one song.

The ending where everything seems to go back in time is where I get the most "Donnie Darko". In the "real" Bright Falls, life is going on as normal, the festival is happening... but then there's subtle hints as to how the "imagined" world has effected the real world (crazy lamp Rose), similar to how Patrick Swayze is seen crying at the end of Donnie Darko after the story goes back in time, even though the events that lead to him being found out as being a pedophile didn't actually happen. I think this indicates that the supernatural stuff does actually exist, that Alan's battle with the darkness was real, but only to Alan (hence why "Barbara" gives him the key to the cabin at the start - you'll notice that no other character actually sees "Barbara" at the start of the game, and for that matter, the "Barbara" that you learn about isn't actually the weird lady that gives you the key because Alan invented her).

The entire thing, really, is just Alan getting his groove back. Take what you will from the supernatural stuff. Real? Metaphorical? Both?

Yeah, I know there's holes in this. I'm having a really hard time articulating what I'm trying to say here. Ironic! :lol