It’s been close to a decade since I last played this game and luckily it holds up narrative wise pretty well in the big allegory of Alan Wakes writer block where he has to fight his own creations of a manuscript that later on gets more and more convoluted in a way that you don’t think is going to be satisfying until that main flashback gets revealed and ties everything together while there are still a lot of elements that aren’t explained due to the pervasive nature of the “horror media” that Alan Wake classified itself in game and stuff that gets later on revealed in American Nightmare and so on and so fourth but this still holds up pretty well especially in the ending as it leaves you fulfilled to an extent with how Alan writes the finale of his manuscript for “Departure” as we see an ominous ending line that shows that Alan is trapped in the Dark prescience that also ties into the metaphorical message of art in the endless chase that authors will try to achieve perfectionism in their bodies of work paired with Alan now being trapped and not knowing how long it will take him to get out which is pretty neat tho you can tell it is setting up for a sequel which idk if I would’ve been cool with waiting for as long as fans did for AW2 and so forth. Gameplay wise on the other hand is where most of my main complaints come in as it’s aged somewhat poorly even through the remastered version of the game that I played it on for the replay as the dodging mechanic in this game is absolutely terrible and really bites you in the ass as it genuinely feels that the dodging mechanic was not created for a multiple time use as you’ll be able to pull off a simple dodge when one enemy attacks but when it’s a wave of enemies coming at you at once you’re better off just staying still and restarting the fight because it’s not worth the effort but luckily once the flares , flashes and upgraded flashlights get introduced it is not needed as much minus the poltergeist objects but even then it’s useless against those which leads to my next point which is that the poltergeist objects while cool atmospherically in some stages of the game especially when you’re running through an open field and you start being blocked off but man they’re a pain in the ass to deal with as some stages launch multiple objects at you at the same time and unless you have a heavy duty flashlight you’re better off running away and hope the objects don’t hit you which is odd because it works well when it comes to poltergeist vehicles for the most part when paired with the wave of enemies. Overall, I still had a good time playing this, and I can’t wait to replay American Nightmare to see how the lore has aged in Remedy’s department.