I found it kinda funny that when we saw Mr Scratch's evil Deerfest world, it isn't some dark hellscape or pit of suffering. It's this place where everyone is an idiot who mindlessly praises Alan and his work. Mr Scratch is the worst parts of Alan's personality. He's a petty, angry, manipulative egomaniac who only cares about himself. I feel like Alan will finally "win" at the conclusion of the series when he confronts his own flaws, accepts responsibility and becomes a better person. We saw a tease of that when Saga confronted her (much less severe) flaws and was able to escape her loop. Alan will escape his spiral when he does the same and, since she was always his muse, Alice will be his guiding light.
That's the coolest thing, in my opinion, about the series. At its core it takes a deeply flawed man and puts him through a series of trials to become a better person.
seriously, this was the most terrifying thing ever. the idea of a loop. I've lived it in an indunced coma. I've litterally been in a "dark place" in my mind when I was under. Hard to explain. Things kept repeating, just like in the game. I kept forgetting what I needed to do, and kept repeating the same science experiment (it was some science lab). It felt like 4 years in there, but it was 2 weeks. (this took place 2016, way before control or AW2 was even like...known).
@OB.x Reading your story about suffering loops, under coma, no less, made my skin crawl. It felt relatable to me, because occasionally I have dreams that feel like loops, too. I don't remember the events of the dreams that well, but I think they typically involved going to some place and doing something, and then at some point during my hazy half-asleep dream the scene would reset. That loop would go on for the whole night, and I'd feel really really tired in the morning. I can only imagine how exhausting it would feel to go through it for two weeks straight.
It is interesting how one of the Deerfest attendant's line is, paraphrased, " I didn't understand anything, but Alan Wake's work is perfect and I loved it." It states indirectly that they don't really Understand the Work, so they cannot *"really"* love it. They can only "say the Words". Like the Taken.
During the nursing home chase scene with Scratch, you can stay in the light while Scratch “talks” to Alan outside the door in the monitoring station. It plays more into Alan’s insecurities.
What blows my mind is that the hidden message from Dylan in Control about seeing a woman as the sun, and a spiraling moon with a smile akin to spider webs might've been him seeing possibly this experience Alan has. Dylan said "there's a festival, everyone was smiling and chanting, and the street leads off a cliff into a void. Did I fall in? This dream has ended". The people here are very much in this state, and it's all a fabricated reality from within the dark place, and it's something that takes place within Return. And we know that if the events of return play out, then Mr. Scratch i.e. the dark place will be able to manipulate reality as a whole in the real world in a far greater scope than the localized reality shifts taking place in Bright Falls since Alan came out of the lake, like people's conflicting memories of Saga and her daughter, and the threat of it becoming reality of Saga believes she actually drowned, even though we know her husband saved her daughter from almost dying in the bathroom before the reality shift distorted the reception of Saga's phone calls. If Dylan had a vision of a possible reality being similar to what Alan experienced, I wonder if the woman as bright as the sun is Alice or something else, and if that's the case, maybe the moon was Mr. Scratch/the dark place, since it's the source of the spiraling time loops we see from individual's time spent in the dark place. Time is essentially meaningless there, maybe that's what he meant by a smile like a spider's web, since it's Mr. Scratch using Alan's disconnected memories to their advantage to help them escape through "Return"
Alan Wake's subtext was always that. A mirror of how human beings are and how we can try to solve our flaws. At the end of this game, I couldn't hold back my tears when I felt sorry for Alan and all of us. It is very likely that Sam Lake wrote the story about his thoughts and emotions around this idea. There are many analyses to do about Alan Wake II, but one of them is how Alan's ego took Alice ahead of so many times that the only way to recover her was through redemption. Alice knew how to forgive him and help him get out of the spiral. And definitely, all this also surrounds through the structure of the hero's journey (Or the anti-hero). How Alan's trauma changed him and in turn, his ideas changed the world and turned him into this egotical nightmare madness. Of course, conflict has also been part of the stories since Shakespeare's time. Art, at its best, has a spiritual and redemptive purpose of the Human Being, as Andrei Tarkovski explored in his works, but it is rarely achieved and most artists are consumed through their ego and move only for an economic purpose. I've had the misfortune of meeting some people like that. There is room for improvement. This is one of your best videos, Dean and perhaps, if I may dare, the one that contains the most important idea. When you explore the universe of Twin Peaks, you will realize that there are many of these concepts around what David Lynch wanted to tell us (I won't spoil you because I know you haven't got into it yet). I recommend the following readings to understand the role of Art: - Room to dream (David Lynch). - Sculpting in Time (Andrei Tarkovski). - The Magic Lantern (Ingmar Bergman). Greetings from Spain.
it makes me wonder, with Alan being a parautilitarian and being able to glimpse into other people's lives, was his writer's block due to not being able to glimpse into anyone else's life other than Casey's, or did he subconsciously block it off with the impostor syndrome?
When I was in the Air Force, I received an Airman of the Year award that I didn't feel was deserved ... It wasn't until I was talking about it with one of my friends that I understood why I'd received the award: upon arriving at my new duty station, I processed more documents than any of the other airmen. When I was assigned a supervisor, I had to train him how to do his job. In order to let the other airmen process documents, I wasn't allowed to process documents until after noon, so to pass the time I helped train the new airmen. One of the other airmen and I got into an unofficial competition to see who could process more documents - between us, we averaged 100 documents a day (we were only required to process 20 documents a day). Before I really spelled it out to myself, I felt like an impostor every time I looked at the award on my desk.
I only understood half of it but I loved every minute! :D Thanks for the video and prompting the question, what our deerfests would look like. Great thought-experiment!
I mentioned this on stream but this exercise is basically Shadow Work. Meditating on this and learning to understand more of what we have under the surface
@@GamingUniversityUoG I understand everything. It's too real. I lived it. Almost exactly the same as in the game, except my "Deerfest/Dark Place" manifested from a car accident/induced coma. There were even overlaps, occasionally I'd hear my mom, or the doctors, or the news on the TV.
Huh. When I walked into it: i thought it was very funny. The darkness was in Alex Casey now, and we were about to get HIS worst nightmare. I thought we'd see this mashup where alan walks into a bright falls that was mixed with the grimy new york Casey came from. So when it turned out to be a bright cheery deerfest that celebrates alan wake, with all the townsfolk present and happily getting along - that would be Casey's worst nightmare. (+ maybe the saltshaker joke being: not alex casey's favorite joke.)(how would alan know about this detail, if it's a real world event that grounds Saga?! Maybe this is proof it's Alex Casey's nightmare and not Alan's? ... or maybe proof that saga's "real world connections" are not real world, just more detail from Alan). (... though i also remember someone talking about "justice for Barry". That would support idea this is alan's perspective, not Casey's). I don't think you're wrong. just chewing on the idea it might be some mix of both thier nightmares. or alan getting his version of horror within alex casey's. ie, his new book finally finding his audience - and their embrace of his new work revealing that they are just a scary cult. (kind of echoes how Rose celebrates him all wrong.) anywho. suffering a head cold. still working through replay in Final Draft. but enjoying the chewing
I like the theory that Alan rewrote the Dark Presence to be his own shadow self, so that he could defeat it. That would mean it's still Mr scratch, even when possessing Casey.
This game has many levels of reading, the one you are reading in this video specifically is the psychological one. Well done! The only thing I'd like to add here is that, the fears, the doubts, the ego etc.. That Alan is facing here is what an artist faces, because we have Alan, of course but Alan is the representation of an artist, in the grand scheme of things.
The resolution and fidelity of the video captures are fantastic! Also, the author knows what his audience wants with the spectacular editing using the font used in Alan Wake for the chapter titles as well as their recognizable intro and outro!
Good job as always Dean! And you too Yellowbat! I remember discussing this during the last Livestream. It is interesting how a lot of the parts that they focus on important narrative beats but at the most superficial level. Like the lady talking about the salt shaker joke, narratively that was an important moment for Saga because she was reminded that Casey valued her as a partner and person.
Excellent analysis. It’s funny to me that while my music and art has never come close to that of Alan’s, I have nearly the same insecurities about my creations
Great video! The first time I played AW2 I was kind of put off by the Deerfest scene because the things which the citizens were shouting seemed so obvious and obtuse - and it felt like it was meant to be a parody of critique of the game's plot itself (since Return is a big part of the game's plot). But when I revisited it, I think it clicked how terrifying the concept of that fame and worship for something really is. So while it is certainly important for each of us (especially artists) to look inward, I think it's also crucial to think about how we as consumers talk about and share the media we enjoy.
I still think the Scratch entity is Writers block given consciousness through Alan diving back into Cauldron Lake. There never was a physical body or form of Scratch, not even in AN. Your videos are so interesting, I love how you tie reality into game theory. Nobody does it better than you. Great video !
I feel like a major point of the Deerfest scene in this game though was to reflect on us the audience. If you listen to what the readers have to say, all the “disgusting” praise, given to Alan, I imagine if Sam Lake was at a launch party for his game filled with people that watch this channel for example he’d have a similar experience. I swear everything I see relates back to Sam Lake idk if I’m lazy or crazy at this point.
This analysis was EXCELLENT, thank you for always giving us these quality videos! I'm kinda speechless because this aspect about Alan's character and Alice's videos, particularly the last one, has been sticking with me since I put the controller down. It's hard to put into words what it feels like to experience the surreal nature of fiction reflecting everything you're feeling simultaneously in real life and how it can bring things into perspective in a way that only great storytelling can. Needless to say, AW2 came out at a time when I really needed it and it continues to inspire me to move forward. I've noticed others in the community saying similar sentiments about how it helped them. Keep up the great work, Dean!
The Horror of Deerfest/Dark Place, is that it is a real thing. I;'ve lived this, literally. In an induced coma. Felt like years, kept repeating the same task, trying to get out of it, but failing, kept forgetting.... This is the most terrifying game/story to me I've ever experienced. My Deerfest was... insane. I was in a lab, and we were working on something...some weird medical weird gooble science. But we kept failing. All i knew is if we succeeded, I'd get out. I knew I wasn't in reality, I knew I was asleep. Eventually I woke up, and "Mr Scratch" got out (I immediately stood up, tried to run out of the hospital room, and crapped my and fell down). It was terrifying in there, I remember it very clearly that "space". Kinda looked like the ship from one of the star tracks, but instead of a bay window, there was a bay window, but a lab inside....that was not endless, but a giant room like in starfield floating around. Pray you never end up in a state. (this happened in 2016...before AW2, Starfield). It truly wasn't a loop, it was a spiral I got out of...even when I woke up, I still kept thinking I was asleep...for over 3 years, questioning reality.
Something else I really liked about the Deer Fest scene is the book review video by Illmo. Have a look at the review again. It is literally a BOOK review, i.e. it is entirely about the BOOK ITSELF not its content. It's a rave review ... of an object, not of a vessel for artistic work. A literal review of a book. At first I thought maybe it reflected Scratch's artistic and creative bankruptcy. But I also wonder, after watching your video, whether it is a reflection of Alan's fear of his art being judged, because that would be necessarily subjective, which he is afraid of. But judging the book on qualities such as its dimensions, weight, paper stock, typography and so on, would be objective.
I try to focus on the moral of the story rather than the story itself. It feels like every game Alan is involved with is him dealing with an aspect of his personality. It is slow motion therapy.
I know this may seem odd to say, but thank you to you up at Gaming U for *not* subscribing to the notion that Alan isn’t actually a good writer. I’ve seen too many people-newcomers, really-who look at Alan and automatically want to villainize and vilify him, when the events of AW 1 and 2 aren’t his fault (consciously, at least). You all seem intent on keeping with the facts as they’re presented within the “text”, and I wholeheartedly respect that. Keep up the good work, and here’s to another 4-5 years-or however long it takes to get to the next Remedy title after the AW2 DLC-of Theorizing and Gaming U Lectures.
Great video analysis.. loved every minute of it. Thanks to you I can see much more in this game than meets the eye and I feel the urge to play it again ❤
you could say ive been fighting in a dark place for the last 16 years of my life. Ive finally reached a point that I reached out to an association for help but its been an extremely daunting, lonely battle
It might be in question if Wake became the next great American authors but Alan Wake 2 is the newest classic horror game belongs in the conversation with other classics like Resident Evil and Silent Hill
Its funny how similar this section of the game for Alan and Saga being stuck in her mind are functionaly the same as how the Investigation Squad in Persona 4 awakened their personas. The squad members were confronted with their shadow and had to accept and acknowledge that piece of their psyche to overcome it.
I feel pretty dumb, but on another playthrough last week I finally realized that AW2 Scratch is only ever referred to as Scratch, and never Mr. Scatrch. We all know they aren't the same, but the precise use of names is another piece of proof. Mr. Scratch was in AW1 and AN. Scratch is in AW2. Mr. Scratch's name is always scratched over, but Scratch's isn't.
"The death of Saga's daughter perfectly represent the difficulty a woman has to face in balancing work and private life in America" - Random woman during deerfest. Of course Saga was pissed, they take her life and ruined it just to introduce some cheap social commentary in the story.
Answering the question at the end: I’m sure my own Deerfest would be way worse than Alan’s. Just thinking about it made my skin crawl. I understand we are our own worst critic but as someone who has a concrete hard time discerning a genuine compliment from a lie, I find myself constantly questioning my talents and abilities. I like to write stories too but I feel like whatever I create is utter garbage and that it’ll be seen as just another attempt at sounding amazing but it uses empty words. I want people to just ‘like’ what I create all the while trying not to reinvent the wheel I feel like my own standards are so high even I can’t reach them.
Love the way you ended the video. I am still playing my way through The Final Draft, I am excited for the changes, but I kind of expect a disappointment. Is the new ending really that different from the first playthrough or is it something that teases Alan Wake 3 or the DLCs? I really long for a true ending for Alan, he deserves it. I don't like everlasting franchises that are not allowed to end with dignity.
I initially resisted the premise of this video. I thought to myself "when confronted with 13 years of being trapped in a Lovecraftian nightmare, with not just your own life but the actual fate of the world in the balance, would you really still give two shits about praise for your art?" But then I remembered a definition for an artist I heard once. Not just the desire to create, but a burning need to create that is fundemental to your soul. I've never had that so guess I can't fully understand how something like that could still be present when more 'pressing' matters are at hand. And considering the nature of both the Dark Place and Alan's best weapon against it I suppose it makes a bit more sense. Still, I don't think it's quite that straightforward, is this Alan's dream or Scratch/Jaeger/the Dark Presence's dream? There's obviously more at play here than simply Alan confronting his character flaws, but it does add to the tapestry a bit and on reflection makes a kind of sense
Nice vid. I'd also argue or talk about the fact that deerfest has nothing to do with Alan really. It was just a small thing that bright falls would put on each year for their community. The fact that alan/scratch wants to make it all about him says somthing about ego/shadow in a way that is pretty dispicable and selfish for better or worse imo
Yeah, that artist personality is somewhat addicted to quasi-exhibitionism one can never quite get rid off. The worst part is refusing to uitilise the talent you were born with will destroy you slowly from the inside anyway. You have to hone it until you're proud of it, or it will become your curse if yout ry to abandon it.
1:48 "you see the splinter in your brother's eye but not the [wood] beam in your own" Edit: this has nothing to do with the video but its been burning a hole in my brain so i need to say it. The Danish Crown-prince Frederik the 10th looks eerily similar to casper darling and it bothers me so much just look up frederik 10th with glasses
@@GamingUniversityUoG I think this applies to all of us who really appreciate and deep dive into Remedy games. We’re all frustrated creatives of some sort. You’re actually doing something creative based on it, so be proud of that.
They explain it in the first game. Most people are just Taken. But alan is only touched so that he can produce a story that frees the dark presence. Taking him over completely would make it unable to make use of him. It did the same when it influenced Rose.
![[TH] JFT vs RLF - VCT Ascension Pacific - Day 2](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/PuIH7w_jO6c/mqdefault.jpg)
![Control Explained - Who is Ahti? [Spoilers]](/img/n.gif)
I found it kinda funny that when we saw Mr Scratch's evil Deerfest world, it isn't some dark hellscape or pit of suffering. It's this place where everyone is an idiot who mindlessly praises Alan and his work.
Mr Scratch is the worst parts of Alan's personality. He's a petty, angry, manipulative egomaniac who only cares about himself. I feel like Alan will finally "win" at the conclusion of the series when he confronts his own flaws, accepts responsibility and becomes a better person.
We saw a tease of that when Saga confronted her (much less severe) flaws and was able to escape her loop. Alan will escape his spiral when he does the same and, since she was always his muse, Alice will be his guiding light.
That's the coolest thing, in my opinion, about the series. At its core it takes a deeply flawed man and puts him through a series of trials to become a better person.
seriously, this was the most terrifying thing ever. the idea of a loop. I've lived it in an indunced coma. I've litterally been in a "dark place" in my mind when I was under. Hard to explain. Things kept repeating, just like in the game. I kept forgetting what I needed to do, and kept repeating the same science experiment (it was some science lab).
It felt like 4 years in there, but it was 2 weeks. (this took place 2016, way before control or AW2 was even like...known).
@OB.x Reading your story about suffering loops, under coma, no less, made my skin crawl.
It felt relatable to me, because occasionally I have dreams that feel like loops, too. I don't remember the events of the dreams that well, but I think they typically involved going to some place and doing something, and then at some point during my hazy half-asleep dream the scene would reset.
That loop would go on for the whole night, and I'd feel really really tired in the morning. I can only imagine how exhausting it would feel to go through it for two weeks straight.
It is interesting how one of the Deerfest attendant's line is, paraphrased, " I didn't understand anything, but Alan Wake's work is perfect and I loved it." It states indirectly that they don't really Understand the Work, so they cannot *"really"* love it. They can only "say the Words". Like the Taken.
i found it creepy. but also on point. Because they just kept repeating it.
During the nursing home chase scene with Scratch, you can stay in the light while Scratch “talks” to Alan outside the door in the monitoring station. It plays more into Alan’s insecurities.
What blows my mind is that the hidden message from Dylan in Control about seeing a woman as the sun, and a spiraling moon with a smile akin to spider webs might've been him seeing possibly this experience Alan has. Dylan said "there's a festival, everyone was smiling and chanting, and the street leads off a cliff into a void. Did I fall in? This dream has ended". The people here are very much in this state, and it's all a fabricated reality from within the dark place, and it's something that takes place within Return. And we know that if the events of return play out, then Mr. Scratch i.e. the dark place will be able to manipulate reality as a whole in the real world in a far greater scope than the localized reality shifts taking place in Bright Falls since Alan came out of the lake, like people's conflicting memories of Saga and her daughter, and the threat of it becoming reality of Saga believes she actually drowned, even though we know her husband saved her daughter from almost dying in the bathroom before the reality shift distorted the reception of Saga's phone calls. If Dylan had a vision of a possible reality being similar to what Alan experienced, I wonder if the woman as bright as the sun is Alice or something else, and if that's the case, maybe the moon was Mr. Scratch/the dark place, since it's the source of the spiraling time loops we see from individual's time spent in the dark place. Time is essentially meaningless there, maybe that's what he meant by a smile like a spider's web, since it's Mr. Scratch using Alan's disconnected memories to their advantage to help them escape through "Return"
Alan after that sequence and having to reflect on himself: "Oh deer..."
Oh Deer
🤣@@GamingUniversityUoG
What a perfect video
This video will be studied as one of the deepest and most profound literary analysis ever done
*Unsteady Deerfest Voice*
Lmao!
I DIDN'T UNDERSTAND WHAT WAS GOING ON HALF THE TIME BUT I LOVED IT!
Alan Wake's subtext was always that. A mirror of how human beings are and how we can try to solve our flaws. At the end of this game, I couldn't hold back my tears when I felt sorry for Alan and all of us. It is very likely that Sam Lake wrote the story about his thoughts and emotions around this idea. There are many analyses to do about Alan Wake II, but one of them is how Alan's ego took Alice ahead of so many times that the only way to recover her was through redemption. Alice knew how to forgive him and help him get out of the spiral. And definitely, all this also surrounds through the structure of the hero's journey (Or the anti-hero). How Alan's trauma changed him and in turn, his ideas changed the world and turned him into this egotical nightmare madness. Of course, conflict has also been part of the stories since Shakespeare's time. Art, at its best, has a spiritual and redemptive purpose of the Human Being, as Andrei Tarkovski explored in his works, but it is rarely achieved and most artists are consumed through their ego and move only for an economic purpose. I've had the misfortune of meeting some people like that. There is room for improvement.
This is one of your best videos, Dean and perhaps, if I may dare, the one that contains the most important idea.
When you explore the universe of Twin Peaks, you will realize that there are many of these concepts around what David Lynch wanted to tell us (I won't spoil you because I know you haven't got into it yet).
I recommend the following readings to understand the role of Art:
- Room to dream (David Lynch).
- Sculpting in Time (Andrei Tarkovski).
- The Magic Lantern (Ingmar Bergman).
Greetings from Spain.
I thought the joke with illmo going on about the paper of the book, was him not wanting to admit he hadn't read it.
You know what let's head canon that!
Yeah I thought the same, especially since he only talks about the text on the back of the book cover being incredible
it makes me wonder, with Alan being a parautilitarian and being able to glimpse into other people's lives, was his writer's block due to not being able to glimpse into anyone else's life other than Casey's, or did he subconsciously block it off with the impostor syndrome?
Really good video. Now I understand more about why Alan didn't really like Rose in the first game. She was reflecting all that he hates.
Rose is cool
When I was in the Air Force, I received an Airman of the Year award that I didn't feel was deserved ...
It wasn't until I was talking about it with one of my friends that I understood why I'd received the award: upon arriving at my new duty station, I processed more documents than any of the other airmen. When I was assigned a supervisor, I had to train him how to do his job. In order to let the other airmen process documents, I wasn't allowed to process documents until after noon, so to pass the time I helped train the new airmen. One of the other airmen and I got into an unofficial competition to see who could process more documents - between us, we averaged 100 documents a day (we were only required to process 20 documents a day).
Before I really spelled it out to myself, I felt like an impostor every time I looked at the award on my desk.
I only understood half of it but I loved every minute!
:D Thanks for the video and prompting the question, what our deerfests would look like. Great thought-experiment!
I mentioned this on stream but this exercise is basically Shadow Work. Meditating on this and learning to understand more of what we have under the surface
@@GamingUniversityUoG I understand everything. It's too real. I lived it. Almost exactly the same as in the game, except my "Deerfest/Dark Place" manifested from a car accident/induced coma. There were even overlaps, occasionally I'd hear my mom, or the doctors, or the news on the TV.
Huh. When I walked into it: i thought it was very funny.
The darkness was in Alex Casey now, and we were about to get HIS worst nightmare. I thought we'd see this mashup where alan walks into a bright falls that was mixed with the grimy new york Casey came from. So when it turned out to be a bright cheery deerfest that celebrates alan wake, with all the townsfolk present and happily getting along - that would be Casey's worst nightmare.
(+ maybe the saltshaker joke being: not alex casey's favorite joke.)(how would alan know about this detail, if it's a real world event that grounds Saga?! Maybe this is proof it's Alex Casey's nightmare and not Alan's? ... or maybe proof that saga's "real world connections" are not real world, just more detail from Alan).
(... though i also remember someone talking about "justice for Barry". That would support idea this is alan's perspective, not Casey's).
I don't think you're wrong. just chewing on the idea it might be some mix of both thier nightmares. or alan getting his version of horror within alex casey's. ie, his new book finally finding his audience - and their embrace of his new work revealing that they are just a scary cult. (kind of echoes how Rose celebrates him all wrong.)
anywho. suffering a head cold. still working through replay in Final Draft. but enjoying the chewing
I like the theory that Alan rewrote the Dark Presence to be his own shadow self, so that he could defeat it. That would mean it's still Mr scratch, even when possessing Casey.
This game has many levels of reading, the one you are reading in this video specifically is the psychological one. Well done!
The only thing I'd like to add here is that, the fears, the doubts, the ego etc.. That Alan is facing here is what an artist faces, because we have Alan, of course but Alan is the representation of an artist, in the grand scheme of things.
The resolution and fidelity of the video captures are fantastic! Also, the author knows what his audience wants with the spectacular editing using the font used in Alan Wake for the chapter titles as well as their recognizable intro and outro!
Please and thank you! This world is bereft of Alan Wake 2 deep dive lore videos atm. Can’t wait for more
The True Horror of Deerfest are those bloody Deer Masks lol.
Can't wait for a video on Controls Operation there.
Respect and keep up the epic work.
Good job as always Dean! And you too Yellowbat! I remember discussing this during the last Livestream. It is interesting how a lot of the parts that they focus on important narrative beats but at the most superficial level. Like the lady talking about the salt shaker joke, narratively that was an important moment for Saga because she was reminded that Casey valued her as a partner and person.
Excellent analysis. It’s funny to me that while my music and art has never come close to that of Alan’s, I have nearly the same insecurities about my creations
I've studied music and done live performances since I was like 12. The anxiety never goes away.
@@GamingUniversityUoG oh that’s awesome! Music grads unite ✊
It's because you're an artist, and people who create, all face this type of feelings.
"Horror, horror, tongue nor heart cannot conceive nor name thee." - Hamlet Act 2,Scn 3
My most horrible nightmare is dementia, literally losing my mind, losing my self
Same. The inability to trust my own mind anymore is horrifying.
Great video! The first time I played AW2 I was kind of put off by the Deerfest scene because the things which the citizens were shouting seemed so obvious and obtuse - and it felt like it was meant to be a parody of critique of the game's plot itself (since Return is a big part of the game's plot). But when I revisited it, I think it clicked how terrifying the concept of that fame and worship for something really is. So while it is certainly important for each of us (especially artists) to look inward, I think it's also crucial to think about how we as consumers talk about and share the media we enjoy.
Great video Dean. Can't wait to watch the 24 hour Tom Zane theory video!
Lmao that will be a real doozy
I got a PS5 for Christmas. Downloading Alan Wake 2 right now! 💜
Nice! You enjoy it!
I still think the Scratch entity is Writers block given consciousness through Alan diving back into Cauldron Lake. There never was a physical body or form of Scratch, not even in AN.
Your videos are so interesting, I love how you tie reality into game theory. Nobody does it better than you. Great video !
Like an evil twin, feel it scratchin’ within.
Like an insane sovereign ranger!!!
I feel like a major point of the Deerfest scene in this game though was to reflect on us the audience. If you listen to what the readers have to say, all the “disgusting” praise, given to Alan, I imagine if Sam Lake was at a launch party for his game filled with people that watch this channel for example he’d have a similar experience. I swear everything I see relates back to Sam Lake idk if I’m lazy or crazy at this point.
10:42 uff!! What an end!!! Love that final sentence!!! Love your deep dive analysis mate!!
This analysis was EXCELLENT, thank you for always giving us these quality videos! I'm kinda speechless because this aspect about Alan's character and Alice's videos, particularly the last one, has been sticking with me since I put the controller down. It's hard to put into words what it feels like to experience the surreal nature of fiction reflecting everything you're feeling simultaneously in real life and how it can bring things into perspective in a way that only great storytelling can. Needless to say, AW2 came out at a time when I really needed it and it continues to inspire me to move forward. I've noticed others in the community saying similar sentiments about how it helped them. Keep up the great work, Dean!
The Horror of Deerfest/Dark Place, is that it is a real thing. I;'ve lived this, literally. In an induced coma. Felt like years, kept repeating the same task, trying to get out of it, but failing, kept forgetting.... This is the most terrifying game/story to me I've ever experienced. My Deerfest was... insane. I was in a lab, and we were working on something...some weird medical weird gooble science. But we kept failing. All i knew is if we succeeded, I'd get out. I knew I wasn't in reality, I knew I was asleep.
Eventually I woke up, and "Mr Scratch" got out (I immediately stood up, tried to run out of the hospital room, and crapped my and fell down).
It was terrifying in there, I remember it very clearly that "space". Kinda looked like the ship from one of the star tracks, but instead of a bay window, there was a bay window, but a lab inside....that was not endless, but a giant room like in starfield floating around.
Pray you never end up in a state.
(this happened in 2016...before AW2, Starfield).
It truly wasn't a loop, it was a spiral I got out of...even when I woke up, I still kept thinking I was asleep...for over 3 years, questioning reality.
Something else I really liked about the Deer Fest scene is the book review video by Illmo. Have a look at the review again. It is literally a BOOK review, i.e. it is entirely about the BOOK ITSELF not its content. It's a rave review ... of an object, not of a vessel for artistic work. A literal review of a book.
At first I thought maybe it reflected Scratch's artistic and creative bankruptcy. But I also wonder, after watching your video, whether it is a reflection of Alan's fear of his art being judged, because that would be necessarily subjective, which he is afraid of. But judging the book on qualities such as its dimensions, weight, paper stock, typography and so on, would be objective.
Thank you for making this video. So far it is the only one that I have connected with on how I felt the story was portrayed.
I try to focus on the moral of the story rather than the story itself. It feels like every game Alan is involved with is him dealing with an aspect of his personality. It is slow motion therapy.
I know this may seem odd to say, but thank you to you up at Gaming U for *not* subscribing to the notion that Alan isn’t actually a good writer. I’ve seen too many people-newcomers, really-who look at Alan and automatically want to villainize and vilify him, when the events of AW 1 and 2 aren’t his fault (consciously, at least). You all seem intent on keeping with the facts as they’re presented within the “text”, and I wholeheartedly respect that. Keep up the good work, and here’s to another 4-5 years-or however long it takes to get to the next Remedy title after the AW2 DLC-of Theorizing and Gaming U Lectures.
Very interesting. Thanks for this video!
Great video analysis.. loved every minute of it. Thanks to you I can see much more in this game than meets the eye and I feel the urge to play it again ❤
There is a ton in this game. Can't wait to dive into it fully with you all!
you could say ive been fighting in a dark place for the last 16 years of my life. Ive finally reached a point that I reached out to an association for help but its been an extremely daunting, lonely battle
Just know you're not fighting alone. Hope things get better with time and change.
@@msmoon6011 Thanks, its taken a long time to let feeling of connection in again, and I tear up everytime I feel it again.
I just finished the game and just in time for dean to start putting out videos. Awsome timing
It might be in question if Wake became the next great American authors but Alan Wake 2 is the newest classic horror game belongs in the conversation with other classics like Resident Evil and Silent Hill
Wonderful analysis.
The things you neatly pointed out and explored shook me to the core.
Deepa thought. Very educational. Great job, guys!
Mentioned this in Discord, but The Shadow work Journal is an amazing way to integrate your shadow as long as you're honest with yourself.
Great review ❤
Its funny how similar this section of the game for Alan and Saga being stuck in her mind are functionaly the same as how the Investigation Squad in Persona 4 awakened their personas. The squad members were confronted with their shadow and had to accept and acknowledge that piece of their psyche to overcome it.
I feel pretty dumb, but on another playthrough last week I finally realized that AW2 Scratch is only ever referred to as Scratch, and never Mr. Scatrch. We all know they aren't the same, but the precise use of names is another piece of proof. Mr. Scratch was in AW1 and AN. Scratch is in AW2. Mr. Scratch's name is always scratched over, but Scratch's isn't.
Great work, Dean. Thanks for the lecture.
"The death of Saga's daughter perfectly represent the difficulty a woman has to face in balancing work and private life in America" - Random woman during deerfest.
Of course Saga was pissed, they take her life and ruined it just to introduce some cheap social commentary in the story.
True Horror indeed!
Your deerfest would be pretty rad then! Someone who believes they have the power to explain to us mere peasants the inner workings of everything haha
I wouldn't even want to know mine lol
Answering the question at the end:
I’m sure my own Deerfest would be way worse than Alan’s. Just thinking about it made my skin crawl. I understand we are our own worst critic but as someone who has a concrete hard time discerning a genuine compliment from a lie, I find myself constantly questioning my talents and abilities. I like to write stories too but I feel like whatever I create is utter garbage and that it’ll be seen as just another attempt at sounding amazing but it uses empty words.
I want people to just ‘like’ what I create all the while trying not to reinvent the wheel I feel like my own standards are so high even I can’t reach them.
Love the way you ended the video. I am still playing my way through The Final Draft, I am excited for the changes, but I kind of expect a disappointment. Is the new ending really that different from the first playthrough or is it something that teases Alan Wake 3 or the DLCs? I really long for a true ending for Alan, he deserves it. I don't like everlasting franchises that are not allowed to end with dignity.
Nice Dean! Excited to see this one.
That final line was one of the cporniest pieces of text you ever wrote.
I'm sure I can find cornier text I've spoken. Challenge Accepted!
9:00 love the editing!!! It's the opposite of the dark place. In here, everyone adores you...but the shadow screams you are a piece of garbage.
I initially resisted the premise of this video. I thought to myself "when confronted with 13 years of being trapped in a Lovecraftian nightmare, with not just your own life but the actual fate of the world in the balance, would you really still give two shits about praise for your art?" But then I remembered a definition for an artist I heard once. Not just the desire to create, but a burning need to create that is fundemental to your soul. I've never had that so guess I can't fully understand how something like that could still be present when more 'pressing' matters are at hand. And considering the nature of both the Dark Place and Alan's best weapon against it I suppose it makes a bit more sense. Still, I don't think it's quite that straightforward, is this Alan's dream or Scratch/Jaeger/the Dark Presence's dream? There's obviously more at play here than simply Alan confronting his character flaws, but it does add to the tapestry a bit and on reflection makes a kind of sense
Man I enjoy your takes on this game
Nice vid. I'd also argue or talk about the fact that deerfest has nothing to do with Alan really. It was just a small thing that bright falls would put on each year for their community. The fact that alan/scratch wants to make it all about him says somthing about ego/shadow in a way that is pretty dispicable and selfish for better or worse imo
Yeah, that artist personality is somewhat addicted to quasi-exhibitionism one can never quite get rid off. The worst part is refusing to uitilise the talent you were born with will destroy you slowly from the inside anyway. You have to hone it until you're proud of it, or it will become your curse if yout ry to abandon it.
I enjoy a good Silent Hill: thank you, Deerfest and Remedy, for doing what Konami's failing to.
Great video as always
Do you expect that we will see a Jesse on The DLC ?
Damn, I didn't know TH-cam demonetizes people for saying "Mr. Scr*tch"
Could you please consider doing a video on Die-Hardman's survivor's guilt in Death Stranding?
Never played death stranding. Probably a long ways out for that one.
@@GamingUniversityUoG I understand, I just thought it'd be a cool idea
Great video
1:48 "you see the splinter in your brother's eye but not the [wood] beam in your own"
Edit: this has nothing to do with the video but its been burning a hole in my brain so i need to say it. The Danish Crown-prince Frederik the 10th looks eerily similar to casper darling and it bothers me so much just look up frederik 10th with glasses
At 6:48 the analysis becomes an individual attack on us all 😂
Throwing myself under the bus on this one too lmao
@@GamingUniversityUoG I think this applies to all of us who really appreciate and deep dive into Remedy games. We’re all frustrated creatives of some sort. You’re actually doing something creative based on it, so be proud of that.
I wouldn't want anyone to see my Deerfest 😬
Can you do on one Beerfest?
Absolutely. I may need to do some market research
The true horror is the friends we made along the way
Real friends or memory altered friends?
Wake up to the best Christmas gift 🔥
9:26 Sounds a lot like some of Zack Snyder's more obsessed fans.
I am still waiting for someone to explain when and how people get taken and what that does. Why is alan kinda saveable but others not
They explain it in the first game. Most people are just Taken. But alan is only touched so that he can produce a story that frees the dark presence. Taking him over completely would make it unable to make use of him. It did the same when it influenced Rose.
Can we have a video explaining the Final Draft ending?
It won't be specifically about the ending but will explain it. It is in the pipeline.
Alan wake lore
Nah mine would be way more twisted
The only spooky thing, and its at the end of the game...
That lame, lame mindplace...
Gonna replay the original to make me feel better ;x;
Crange
ne censoring of scratch is annoying
Weirdly enough the games themselves started the tradition of censoring his name. It was only AW2 that didn't for some reason.