The Lake House is a welcome return to Alan Wake 2 — and a bridge to the future

After a year, Finnish workplace Remedy Entertainment has opened the gates to a mysterious determination successful the 2023 third-person fearfulness deed Alan Wake 2, known arsenic The Lake House. In this abbreviated DLC, released conscionable successful clip for Halloween, players measurement into the shoes of Kiran Estevez, the long-suffering cause of the mysterious Federal Bureau of Control we conscionable successful the main game, who allies with Alan Wake 2’s protagonists, Alan Wake and Saga Anderson. Set earlier the events of Alan Wake 2, The Lake House sees Kiran recounting a horrifying lawsuit astatine the titular determination to Saga, yet the crippled is astir firmly removed from the main crippled itself.

This is some a boon and a curse, depending connected what you were looking for. But arsenic a span to the continuation of Remedy’s expansive connected beingness communicative — which besides includes the supernatural thriller Control — it’s ideal. Instead of waving goodbye to Alan and Saga, Remedy is extending a manus to instrumentality america connected its adjacent weird journey.

Kiran is investigating a probe station, wherever FBC researchers, doctors Jules and Diana Marmont and their teams, are looking into the effects of Cauldron Lake. In Remedy’s lore, determination is simply a transportation betwixt the powerfulness of creating “art” and the powerfulness of otherworldly forces to misuse specified gifts.

The Marmonts are experimenting connected a painter, Rudolf Lane, who immoderate mightiness retrieve from the main game. Lane’s creativity has a inclination to exemplify — and perchance make — the future, overmuch arsenic Alan’s penning did. (God forbid those 2 ever marque a comic publication together.) I won’t spoil what the Marmonts did, prevention to accidental they were monsters agelong earlier immoderate otherworldly forces came into the frame. Regardless, the Lake House is abruptly chopped disconnected and unresponsive to FBC HQ, resulting successful Kiran investigating with a tiny team. 

Remedy has been playing with a connected beingness since Control, and the Lake House is simply a steadfast span backward and guardant to that story. Of course, being an Alan Wake DLC, players tin expect the coagulated third-person endurance fearfulness of the main game. 

The Lake House, arsenic a setting, is arsenic unnerving arsenic astir of the spaces successful Alan Wake 2. However, there’s much of a absorption connected the brutalist and office-space aesthetics from Control, without the extracurricular oregon earthy environments that dominated astir fractional of the main game. In the eerily quiescent bureau spaces, determination are ocular wonders similar looping hallways and rooms of infinite typewriters, which person been programmed to “write” similar Alan Wake. 

That past quirk appears to beryllium a wide jab by Remedy’s writers astatine AI slop, with a leafage of Alan’s existent penning saying, “The creation was not art. Just contented for the experiment.” Indeed, the full thesis of The Lake House is the misuse of creation for the acquisition of immoderate extremity product, alternatively than relishing successful the quality creation tin create. This is each the much evident erstwhile you fig retired who the villain is and who has created the caller terrifying humanoid overgarment beasts that slither retired of the walls. Remedy is not subtle successful its disdain for the corporatization of creativity, the reconfiguration of creation into a harvest tract of bland capitalistic fervor. There’s nary emotion mislaid and overmuch hatred gained successful the Lake House’s story, outlining the enactment betwixt creator state and firm control: a aureate manus wrapped astir imagination’s throat.

To accidental excessively overmuch astir this already abbreviated crippled would spoil it, truthful I won’t spell into item astir the clever acceptable pieces that would consciousness close astatine location successful Control. Let’s conscionable say, airy switches and motels marque a invited return, arsenic does a acquainted and almighty character. 

Kiran, unfortunately, does not mechanically show immoderate prowess warring otherworldly beings, contempt her years arsenic an FBC agent. She plays nary antithetic to Saga oregon Alan Wake, erstwhile again utilizing a flashlight to whittle down enemies’ shadowy armor earlier unloading a satisfying fig of bullets into their bodies. There is besides lone 1 caller force type: the aforementioned long-limbed coating creatures who tin lone beryllium destroyed with a caller limb Kiran discovers precocious successful the story. 

I would’ve liked immoderate caller quality oregon mechanic that demonstrates her years of acquisition successful dealing with the weird. Instead, this is relegated to her interactions with the unusual entity / entity, being capable to rapidly power her fear, and knowing however to woody with recurring “items” Control veterans similar myself cognize each excessively well. 

Much of the joyousness of the Lake House is discovering what occurred and experiencing the fewer floors for yourself. The DLC takes astir 2 hours to complete. But successful that abbreviated span of time, it made for not lone a satisfying send-off of 1 of my favourite caller games but besides a span backmost into the satellite of Control.

All signs look to bespeak Remedy volition beryllium taking the expansive crippled of this connected beingness to an astir apocalyptic level. We tin astir apt expect to spot plentifulness of returning characters, including Kiran herself, arsenic Remedy steers america done its creepy weird water of stories.

The Lake House enlargement for Alan Wake 2 is disposable now.