We got our first real look at the upcoming Alan Wake 2 expansion Night Springs at tonight's Summer Game Fest showcase, and even better, we also got a release date—and even better than that, it's tomorrow.
Night Springs debuted as a Twilight Zone-like television show in the original Alan Wake (and also appeared in Quantum Break), and Remedy is really running with it for Alan Wake 2. As you'd expect from a Remedy game, it gets a little weird (okay, very weird), but basically the expansion works out like this: Beleaguered author Alan Wake seeks to escape the Dark Place by writing scripts for the television show Night Springs, but by doing so (and you'd think he would've figured this out by now) he accidentally unravels the fabric of reality.
The result is three "highly stylized episodes, each offering a unique slice of the Alan Wake universe," featuring familiar—but also very different—characters to play: The Actor, The Sibling, and The Waitress.
The Actor, who looks an awful lot like Bright Falls sheriff Tim Breaker—who looks an awful lot like Quantum Break hero Jack Joyce—headlines Time Breaker, the tale of a "multiversal hero" who must prevent the murder of his different selves in parallel universes by tracking down the villainous Master of Many Worlds.
The Sibling, a newcomer to Bright Falls who could easily pass for Federal Bureau of Control director Jesse Faden, is on the hunt for her missing brother (who for some reason is being held at Coffee World) in the episode entitled North Star. Try the coffee!
Finally, The Waitress—a dead ringer for Oh Deer Diner waitress Rose Marigold—takes the lead in Number One Fan, the story of a woman saving her idol, The Writer, from dangers including critics and his evil twin, the Bad Boy.
It's fair to say there's a lot going on here, and whether or not it results in Alan Wake's salvation (and my money is very much on "not") Night Springs looks set to continue, and even deepen, Remedy's commitment to its "connected universe," the narrative world shared by Alan Wake and Control, and probably Quantum Break. And maybe Max Payne, too—I know that's a Rockstar thing now, but I'm not letting it go.
Anyway, Jesse Faden's the most overt example of that crossover here, but Night Springs presenter Mr. Door is perhaps a bigger player in the grand scheme of things: Mr. Door was named by Jesse's brother Dylan in Control—he apparently explained the nature of the multiverse to Dylan at some point. He may also have appeared, under a different name and appearance—because that's how shapeshifting multidimensional travellers roll—in Quantum Break.
Alan Wake 2: Night Springs will be out on June 8, and yes, that is tomorrow. It's not being sold separately, interestingly enough, but is available through the expansion pass that's included with the Alan Wake 2 Deluxe Edition—if you have the standard edition, you can upgrade to the deluxe (which also includes the second expansion, The Lake House, coming in October) for $20.
The Night Springs expansion is the big news here, but it's not the only news: Alan Wake 2's photo mode, with "preset and custom preset picture settings, full-frame camera lens ranges, selection of effects, lighting settings and frames, and the ability to hide characters," is also coming on June 8 as part of a free update, and Remedy also has separate physical and limited collector's editions of the game coming later this year—sadly, those will only be available for the console versions of the game.
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