Day 6 ends the game, and its the worst session of them all. The gameplay is artificial and frustrating. The narrative becomes simultaneously ridiculous and incomprehensible. Almost all of episode 6 is filler that should have been cut to accelerate the movement to the climax. It’s a disappointing conclusion, but it’s been a disappointing game overall. Spoilers within.

Day 5 features some quite good and quite bad story elements. There are some nice images here, but the writing overall is quite terrible.  The end of this episode which is clearly intended to be something really dramatic falls totally flat. A couple of good fights, but more repeated challenges and also a terrible set piece in which the way to win is to act in the exact opposite manner than the scene’s emotional weight is pushing. We’re right at the end though, so I can stomach one more session.

So the title of this post in a quote from a character in the game, and it basically sums up my feelings. The story is making less and less sense, and whatever limited power it manages to not squander with stupid writing, it loses with the ridiculous spoilers. The combat is still ok, but the game is getting repetitive in all of the losing my equipment and having to regain it stuff. Things seem to be tying up, which I can only describe as a blessing. Spoilers within.

This session of Alan Wake leads me around the woods some more, and the plot thickens in mostly dorky and stiff ways. It’s trying hard to pull at me and failing. There is so much exposition I’m choking on it including tons of spoiling foreshadowing, and again, that does not scary make. There are some good fights, but the running around is really starting to get tired. Weak, but the end seems to be coming, so I’m sticking around. Spoilers within.

Day 2 of Alan Wake improves, but still has major issues. Combat remains fun and the story gets more compelling with a couple of twists. However, it remains resolutely not scary and has far too many cheesy moments.  The episode ending tropes continue to upset me and the game is just ugly in places. This episode is a big run with some nice touches but a horror game with a lame plot and nothing scary cannot be considered a success. Enough to keep me going so far, but no high marks. Spoilers within.

Day 1 on Alan Wake and I have to say it’s not promising. The game is utterly failing to be scary. It is moving too fast, it doesn’t build up enough, and it’s too obvious in the plot choices it’s making. The combat isn’t bad, but the basic controls are sluggish and finicky in ways that make the game uglier to play than a game of 2010 should ever be. There are all sorts of bad, almost TV-based narrative techniques that feel totally out of place. And it has the stupidest collectible item I have seen in a game in a long time. I’m going to keep playing, but that’s more just to see if this thing can improve at all. Spoilers within.