Alan Wake has turned 10 years old and Remedy’s Sam Lake has the major difficulites developing this stunning game. Sam Lake has also revealed why Remedy decided to ditch its open-world/sandbox design in favour of a more linear approach.
After a year since the release of Max Payne 2, Remedy was trying to figure out what its next game would be. After numerous prototypes, Remedy landed with the idea of the open-world concept of Alan Wake. Remedy felt the need to move away from linear games after Max Payne and Max Payne 2. However, and despite presenting a tech demo, the team could not realize its vision.
After presenting its E3 2005 PC trailer, the team was trying to figure out ways to implement gameplay elements to it. However, Remedy felt to drift away from its original open-world concept. To put it simple; while the E3 2005 PC demo looked great, it could not translate to a full game. That was the main reason why Remedy decided to re-design Alan Wake, and not its publishing deal with Microsoft. Oh, and speaking of publishing deals, when Remedy presented the game’s E3 trailer, it had not signed any deal with any publisher. No one was funding this game at that time. Ouch.
For a long while after that E3, Remedy didn’t have anything at all. There wasn’t a game, just the tech demo with its huge map. Microsoft attempted to help Remedy by suggesting different things, however, Remedy was drifting even further than its original concept. Remedy was missing milestones and the pressure was becoming bigger and bigger. Remedy was also failing delivering what it had promised to Microsoft. It was a dark time for Remedy.
Thus, the team decided to form a group that would go through every aspect of the game and make difficult decisions. Thankfully, this group was able to figure out solutions to the game’s main problems. Unfortunately, though, the group also decided to ditch the open-world concept. Instead, Alan Wake would be a more linear experience. However, Remedy would create – and expand – the game’s levels from its original open-world map.
Sam Lake concluded that small studios should have a strong vision of what they are building. He also said that it’s not just enough to have a high level vision; you have to be able to realize it. And while some game elements (like the open-world idea) may look cool and work as individual aspects, they should be all working together in harmony.
[youtube]https://youtu.be/AoHkGDu0_Hw[/youtube]
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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I would suck sam lake’s c*ck so hard and fast dude, not that i like his games or i’m into men or something like that, he’s just a hot hot man.
Dagoat,a gay in denial…
-would suck Sam lake cooky so hard and fast
-admit Sam lake is hot hot man
-not into men or something
Maybe he’s afraid someone will report him to Pakistani authorities for this thing…
Glad it wasn’t open world, I don’t feel that design would’ve worked well with the game (and apparently Remedy didn’t either). I love Alan Wake, despite it getting repetitive by the end.
it was super repetitive and boring, but at least the last part of the story was good
I really liked the gameplay, despite it being repetitive.
Yeah it was good for it’s time.
WHERE IS THE SECOND ONE YOU LAZY F…
They don’t have the bugdet.Inform yourself more before you judge
if only there was a open world mod on pc.
if only there was anything like it in order to compare it, oh wait deadly premonition 2 starring some black woman.
Oh look, its Max Payne
“It was a dark time for Remedy”
Now they take Timmy Tencent’s money so little has changed.
He’s pretty cool, shame he sold his soul.
The War Stories series is pretty good. I recommend the AvP and Dead Space episodes.
I am asking this in all honesty with no ulterior motive …
did anyone find Control interesting? if so what exactly did you like about it?
because after about 6-7hours into the game I couldn’t help but quit, the story although allegedly complex -at least on the surface- did not convince me, neither did the shooting mechanics, the pseudo RPG elements, the character model or the animations (found them extremely wobbly with no weight to them)
to be truthful, it had nice albeit inconsistent visuals
so
if persuaded I might go back to it later this month 🙂
You are not alone, i endured 2 hs and quit it…the game is a nice showcase for the potential of raytracing reflections…and that’s it. Is like slightly more interesting Quantum Break 2.0.
The last good game from Remedy was Alan Wake 🙁
Story is awesome except the ending.If your a story guy Control is for you.But I think after 6-7 hours you have the right to quit if you want.If you really like Remedy Games and story based games in general,the game is worth it.
Story always is my top priority, but this game was particularly disappointing because after 7 hours there was not much story to maintain my interest and keep me invested in the game.
Make sense.Your call man.At least if you liked Alan Wake you can give the AWE Control dlc a chance,it’s super Alan Wake related :d
thanks. you may be right but at this point I don’t think I am gonna spend more on something I am not sure of.
the main character was bland with something off-putting about here, the gun play was horrible and the animations felt like leftovers from other projects (oh god the reload animations in all remedy games are just the worst, look it up, you’ll be amused).
you see I don’t think they changed all of those in the DLC