Alan Wake (Windows)

Alan Wake
Developers: Remedy Entertainment, Nitro Games Publisher: Remedy Entertainment Platform: Windows Released internationally: February 16, 2012 This game has unused areas. This game has unused graphics. This game has unused cinematics. This game has unused music. This game has debugging material. This game has anti-piracy features. This game has a prototype article This game has a prerelease article

To do: Get screenshots of the anti-piracy stuff and the unused areas visible with the -freecamera option. demo06 -files demo08 -files gdc09 -files Explore the debug folder more thoroughly. Wolf animations. Leftovers from the racetrack and museum.

Alan Wake is essentially a hybrid of Twin Peaks and Silent Hill 2.

Unused Cinematics

To do: Check for more.

The game's data/videos folder has a couple of unused .bik video clips.

ingame_tv_placeholder.bik	startup_mgs.bik	test_surround_sound.bik
A placeholder for the in-game TV movies found throughout the game.	The Microsoft Game Studios logo was carried over from the Xbox 360 version. The PC release was published by Remedy.	A surround sound test for the loading screen videos.

Unused Textures

To do: There's more. A lot more.

Missing Mesh

A placeholder texture, presumably used with some sort of debug cube to indicate models which hadn't been finished yet. Found in the debug folder.

Museum

To do: There's more files for the museum, such as higher quality textures, the model itself in Bright Falls and various unused props.

A LOD texture for the museum. The building itself remains in Bright Falls, although unseen.

Race Track

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  LOD image of a parade stand.

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  Barrel texture.

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  Bench texture.

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  Chipped paint.

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  Tires.

A bunch of textures from a cut race track, which once housed a minigame during the game's open-world period of development.

Unused Music

To do: Check for more unused audio.

The game's files have some unused tracks.

manuscript_music_01

This unused track was audible in the E3 2009 demo, after Alan finds the manuscript page on the back of a car. The cutscene and this following moodpiece were both removed from the final game.

Map Leftovers

Various filenames for map chunks make references to locations that are no longer in the game.

• An area to the north of Bright Falls is called nw_militaryharbour. This used to once host the saw mill and a small harbor.
• An area to the northeast of Bright Falls is called nw_militarybase. It used to once host an army base, according to prerelease materials.
• The area directly to east from Bright Falls is called ne_graveyard. It used to have a graveyard at one point.
• An area in the northwestern side is called nw_radiostation. The radio station in the final game is located in the southwestern quadrant, close to Stucky's Gas Station.
• A large, flat area which remains unseen in the final game is called se_junkyard.
• The area directly to the west of Cauldron Lake is called sw_wakescabin, after the original location of the Bird Leg Cabin. Diver's Isle and the cabin itself are located in se_cauldronsouth in the finished game.
• The area to the south of se_wakescabin is called se_anderssonfarm [sic]. While the location of the final Anderson farm is never specified in the game, the farm is located in the northwestern quadrant of the map, far outside Bright Falls.
• The area directly to the east of se_anderssonfarm is called se_coalmine. The coalmine you visit in Episode 3 is some 2 tiles east of this area.
• The southwesternmost corner of the map is named se_lighthouse and se_lighthousesea, named after the original lighthouse seen in prerelease trailers. The lighthouse seen in the intro of the game exists on its own landmass outside Bright Falls, and isn't loaded into the game outside of the nightmare sequence.

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  nw_militaryharbour

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  se_junkyard

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  sw_anderssonfarm

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  sw_coalmine

Anti-Piracy Features

As of v1.05, if the game detects that it was installed in a not quite legal form, a few minor aesthetic changes are made to the game in response: Alan wears a pirate eyepatch for the entire game (Barry, on the other hand, wears two!) and the messages shown during loading screens are replaced with a message politely encouraging the player to buy the game if they like it.

There was a survey in 2012 on whether there should be a command line to get this legally, such as "-legaleyepatch". Such an option does not exist in the final game.

(Source: Steam User Forums)

Free Camera Mode

To do: Capture the random misplacements. Cut buildings can be seen in Bright Falls, such as the museum and a bank.

Patch version 1.04 added a "-freecamera" debug command-line function that replaces the camera side toggling when clicking in the right stick with toggling a free camera mode. This lets you move the camera around the entire map.

• In one of the New York episodes, it's possible to find a floating cottage and a piece of powerline over a nearby forest. It is also possible to see that the house Alan lives in reuses textures from Max Payne 2.

• Every field in the game has crop circles.

(Source: Remedy forums)