Alan Wake 2, Remedy’s survival horror sequel, came out in late October, but if you’re already longing for another trip through the spiral, I have good news: “The Final Draft” update has arrived, and with it a new game plus mode and new story content. Not convinced? Then just watch this trailer and try not to lose your mind at the 30-second mark.
Yep, you know who that is on the TV…
Read More: Alan Wake 2: The Kotaku Review
After an excruciatingly long 13-year await, Alan Wake 2 arrived on October 27, continuing the story of the titular tortured writer trapped in a surreal netherrealm of mystery and darkness. The sequel leans more into survival horror than its predecessor, tasking players to keep close track of their inventory and decisions in order to make it through the game alive. Now with a new update that includes New Game+, you can go back to experience the horror, collect all the items you missed, and challenge yourself to a harder challenge with Nightmare difficulty.
Alan Wake 2 Final Draft adds a new ending and new story content
If you want to read the full patch notes for the Final Draft update, you can check them out here. Otherwise, let’s go over the main points regarding what to expect with new game plus:
- New ending
- New Nightmare difficulty level
- New Manuscript pages and video content
As you’d expect from a New Game Plus mode, you’ll keep everything you unlocked in your initial playthrough, including videos, charms, and upgrades. You will get all of your unlocked weapons after finding the first shoebox in the game (this game’s version of Resident Evil’s Item Boxes). Of course to access the new content, you’ll have to have played through Alan Wake 2 at least once.
Alan Wake 2 update also includes some performance fixes
Remedy Entertainment has also done some technical work to get Alan Wake 2 running a bit better (the game notoriously has very high PC spec requirements and makes use of some cutting-edge graphical tech).
The update promises performance improvements across the board, but PS5’s “quality mode” gets a shoutout in the patch notes, as it has some of the biggest improvements. If you’re on team green, though, don’t worry: The patch notes promise an improvement to texture streaming that was particularly a pain on the Xbox Series consoles.
There’s a laundry list of other improvements and some are rather specific, like shadow quality in the Valhalla Nursing home to help (and yes the patch notes specifically say this) “respect the elderly even more.” If you’re in real estate, rest assured that “broken materials on the garage building in downtown Bright Falls” have been fixed, “raising property value.”
I’m curious to see how these updates improve the experience on PC where, for me anyway, it was certainly playable and enjoyable, but suffered from regular framerate drops. I was hoping to wait until I upgrade my computer to replay this gem of a game, but I guess I’m just gonna get sucked back into that damn lake once more.