Alan Wake Dev Fears Spoilers And Contemplates Hiding The Ending

15 Comments Posted October 30, 2009 - By Patrick Klepek

Alan Wake Dev Fears Spoilers And Contemplates Hiding The Ending

I recently combed through my notes from Tokyo Game Show and found something very interesting.

The developers of the highly anticipated, closely guarded Alan Wake are understandably secretive about the story for supernatural thriller. So secretive, in fact, that during a hotel demo for a new area of Alan Wake at TGS, one of the developers told me he'll be discussing with Microsoft about potentially leaving the game's ending off discs sent to the media when the game's closer to release.

"I think we're going to be insanely careful about how much of the story we reveal," said Remedy Entertainment managing director Matias Myllyrinne. "We'll clearly discuss with some of our friends at Microsoft whether we even give the ending of the game for anybody's preview. I'd like to hold it back, [I] don't want anybody to spoil it for the audience. That's just my personal feeling."

Myllryinne's paranoid approach to spoilers is well founded. The Internet loves to spoil big surprises for fans (see: Harry Potter), whether it's movies, books, TV or video games. The open availability of spoilers can even tempt someone who wouldn't ordinarily week out a spoiler to find one. As a huge fan of Lost, I know what that's like. It's really disappointing to accidentally read a spoiler.

"An analogy -- maybe I use it too much -- is it's kind of like, if you go to see The Sixth Sense and I whisper in your ear 'Bruce Willis is dead,'" explained Myllrinne. "I don't want to do that. I think there's more to it than that, but people can piece these things together. They start to gather the puzzle and then all of a sudden [the whole story is] online..."

In the end, it's extremely unlikely the ending for Alan Wake won't be on the discs that end up in the lap of reviewers, but it's worth discussing. What do you think?

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Tags: PC Gaming, Videogames, Xbox 360

Comments

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Displaying 1–15 of 15

AwayFromKeyboard

Eh, let it go. Spoilers are avoidable. The best they can hope for is all the people involved keep their mouths shut. Keep a close eye on the interns!

Posted: October 30, 2009 10:05 AM | Reply | Report

+1 thumbs up thumbs down

0 Replies
Not_FAT

cool stuff

Posted: October 30, 2009 10:22 AM | Reply | Report

+1 thumbs up thumbs down

0 Replies
ProjektX13

On one hand you spoil the game for so many people, but on the other hand you have the followers desperately want to know more about the game. Just pick a side what happens, happens.

Posted: October 30, 2009 10:29 AM | Reply | Report

+1 thumbs up thumbs down

0 Replies
daltaya

thanks for ruining the sixth sense for me

Posted: October 30, 2009 10:49 AM | Reply | Report

+5 thumbs up thumbs down

0 Replies
brentc76

I just hope that this game turns out to be worth the long wait.
for what I have seen so far it looks to be worth it.

Posted: October 30, 2009 10:50 AM | Reply | Report

+1 thumbs up thumbs down

0 Replies
GreedyMcNasty

Yes it is about time. Here is an idea don't let the media get a hold of a early copy. Make video games old school. I remember when the reviews didn't come out till after the game was released for a while. I am all for the idea of giving the media a disk without the ending.

Posted: October 30, 2009 11:55 AM | Reply | Report

+3 thumbs up thumbs down

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199ALLSTAR

Alan Wake is the great mistery of the xbox. It's an ubrban myth like Bloody Mary, Bigfoot, Count Chocula, and Duke Nukem Forever. Since the launch of the 360 there have been whispers, and some "sightings" if this game, but yet no one can truly confirm that this game does indeed exist. This is all smoke and mirrors. Saying this game exists is just as believable as Microsoft telling us that Vista was a good OS. I think when it comes to the game Allen Wake..as Kevin and Olivia would wisely say.... "BRAND IT!!!!!"..SHENANIGANS!!

Posted: October 30, 2009 11:59 AM | Reply | Report

-1 thumbs up thumbs down

1 Reply
rrodmicroshaft

this games gona be a disappointment its easy to see.

Posted: October 30, 2009 12:33 PM | Reply | Report

0 thumbs up thumbs down

0 Replies
Drop_Six

I hear about this game every now and then and I just keep wondering, "Is this thing ever going to be released?"

Posted: October 30, 2009 12:58 PM | Reply | Report

+1 thumbs up thumbs down

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SirCitadel

its a dream. its virtual reality. he's his own brother. theyre all clones. everyone's a ghost. they think its the future but its really set in the past. its not earth. spoiiiiled.

Posted: October 30, 2009 3:59 PM | Reply | Report

+1 thumbs up thumbs down

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thesilentmole

I like this idea. I'm so tired of spoilers and leaks all over the internet. One of the E3 Mass Effect 2 trailers just kept showing all of these awesome moments, and I swear just before I turned it off the guy said "And in one of our endings, Shephard-". It's getting ridiculous.

I also think video game Reviews need to stop mentioning things like that. There should be easy ways to convince me a game is good without telling me every scenario that's awesome.

Posted: October 30, 2009 4:00 PM | Reply | Report

+1 thumbs up thumbs down

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jkroblez

nooooooo i havent seen the sixth sense yet!!! curse these darn spoilers, why g4, whyyyy D:

Posted: October 30, 2009 7:38 PM | Reply | Report

+1 thumbs up thumbs down

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grayk47

tell you the truth, i dont blame them. i have a feeling if they do get their wish, this might be the new standard for realeasing video games to media

Posted: October 30, 2009 9:00 PM | Reply | Report

+1 thumbs up thumbs down

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Tmidiman

This is just what I was saying. I think the gaming media exsposes TOO MUCH about what's in games just to get or show something exclusive. I ruins the surprise and even the value of the games. Reviews covering the basics is fine, but news every three days makes for gamer burnout.

I am loving Brutal Legend and GTA:TBoGT by not reading every article on the games. I'mdoing the same with Bayonetta,Mass Effect 2, and The Sabatour.

Games are FUN and SURPRISING again!

Kill The HYPE!!!!

Posted: October 31, 2009 7:42 PM | Reply | Report

+2 thumbs up thumbs down

0 Replies
Ninjasnake

This could mean one of two things. One, the ending sucks and they know it so they want to keep people who want to buy it from finding out or two, that they are hoping the ending is spectacular and want to keep us from hearing about it until we see it ourselves. I'm hoping that it's the latter.

Posted: November 2, 2009 3:06 AM | Reply | Report

+1 thumbs up thumbs down

0 Replies