I finally got around to trying out the DLC for Control, and I have to say that I’m really enjoying it. The first portion, The Foundation, was interesting enough. It added a new sector and gave new insight into the origins of The Bureau and their relationship with The Board. Control thrives on giving its players interesting things to mull over, so the questions raised in this DLC helped smooth over the overall lack of gameplay innovations; That’s only one expansion though. The other, AWE, is where the real meat and potatoes are at. Not only is it providing more Control, but it also gives us the return of ALAN WAKE after almost a decade-long absence!

As excited as I am to delve even deeper into the mysteries of The Oldest House and the Federal Bureau of Control, I absolutely cannot wait to finally (hopefully) get some closure on Alan Wake’s story. We haven’t seen anything at all for the series after 2012’s Alan Wake’s American Nightmare, and I’ve been losing hope for it even more with every year that passes. See, the previous game left-off on a quasi-cliffhanger.

On the surface, the ending looked like it wrapped everything up nicely. Alan got what he wanted and ended the threat posed by “the Dark Presence” and his evil double “Mr. Scratch.” However, there’s a strong implication that this is an illusion of some sort. Alan Wake is likely still trapped and Mr. Scratch may just have been loosed on an unsuspecting world. It’s all rather murky to be honest, and is thus hardly a satisfying conclusion.

Remedy had originally planned for an Alan Wake sequel and they even showed Polygon their in-house demo for it. For one reason or another though, Alan Wake 2 never got made, and the release of Control made its demise all but certain. Here we are anyway though; Alan Wake 2 may never be a thing, but we’ve at least got a crossover capable of giving Wake fans what we’ve longed for the most: closure at long last! I’ve only just started AWE, but my hopes are pretty high. I’ll be sure to check back in with you all again once I’ve seen the credits roll!

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Have you tried Control yet? Did you play Alan Wake back in the day? What do you think of this?

Image from Epic Games Store page