Alan Wake Could Have Scared Us with the Sand in Its Box

After a long line of delays, while Microsoft has finally a set launch date for Alan Wake, one that it might just keep to this time, just a few days ago, the publisher announced that the survival thriller wouldn't be making an appearance on the PC anymore. But with the game now an Xbox 360 exclusive title, it looks like a platform isn't the only thing that it lost along the way. During Microsoft's recent X10 convention, CVG had a chance to talk to Wake's developers and found out that the title was pretty close to becoming another sandbox release.

"We were constantly trying different gameplay elements to see which would end up in the game and which would work well together," Sam Lake, one of Remedy's writers for the game, said. "We were constantly trying different gameplay elements to see which would end up in the game and which would work well together." And while some things were lost along the way, at least we know for sure that the flashlight is most definitely here to stay, considering how much we saw from it, even from the earliest stages of development.

As for the things that didn't make it, Lake explained that, "For example, early on we tried out sandbox elements. With them we were constantly running into situations where we had to [endure] big compromises in our thriller pacing and our thriller storytelling. At the end of they day we decided it wasn't worth it. We wanted to do a story-driven game – that's what we feel Remedy games are supposed to be."

And, as other developers also came to this conclusion, like Square Enix with its Final Fantasy XIII, it seems like it's really hard to tell a story when the player is given too much freedom. It's just too hard to keep their attention focused on the plot elements when they've got an entire world to distract them. "[Sandbox] was one thing we decided to abandon and go in a different direction. Some of these things look good on paper, and then when you try them out they don't work as well," Lake concluded.