After 13 years of waiting, Alan Wake 2 finally made an entry last year, keeping up with a narrative that left people with a cliffhanger. But it wasn’t an easy feat to bring the story alive, despite what appears to have ample time to develop the game. But all that effort did pay off. Remedy Entertainment saw it as their fastest-selling product. Clasping 50 percent more sales than Control in just half the time comparatively.
Recently, the team held an Ask Me Anything (AMA) session on the social media platform Reddit where the three individuals, including Nathalie Jankie, mission designer, Marko Miukku, gameplay lead, and John Crossland, lead character artist, shared how they fought the uphill battle in the making of Alan Wake 2.
Looks Like The Team Made It Through Those Challenges in Alan Wake 2
The COVID-19 pandemic made people’s lives bulwark within the walls of their homes, as Hideo Kojima unknowingly predicted in Death Stranding (which is scary). The Alan Wake 2 team was no exception to this. John explains that.
We had to develop new tech and production strategies to navigate around the remote setup. Seeing the game come together has been an awesome experience and seeing the fans really dig into the meta.
For Marko, it was a different bullet to bite. In fact, he kind of had to deal with himself, given that he worked on an action RPG before setting foot in the development of a survival horror game. “The previous title I shipped was an action RPG, so it took some time for me to re-orient myself towards the core game pillars of Alan Wake 2,” he said.
Thankfully, both individuals overcame the obstacles and gave the company their best game to date. Speaking of obstacles, Natalie appears to have dealt with more challenges than both the gentlemen, as she described in the AMA.
It Did Not Just End There
Pitching an idea to someone may feel overwhelming, especially while conveying an idea with all its meaning and emotions. “When pitching any kind of mission design, feelings or intentions can be difficult to put into words, and what one person understands to be “tense” or “hopeful” could mean something else to another,” she said.
Horror design was another area where she met with more barriers to overcome. She explains that “there is a high-level, theoretical part to it, where we try to manage the player’s intended tension levels throughout the various mission beats.”
Inspirations were drawn and barriers were overcome as Alan Wake‘s story lives on. It hasn’t ended as developers recently confirmed that the game will get a photo mode in upcoming updates. For now, players can enjoy the campaign full of twists and turns which would keep them engaged for hours.
How do you feel about these development challenges” Tell us in the comments.
