Lore Expert Plays Alan Wake 2 | Talk Show

[@leonielson7138]

Ahti's Wisdom: "The work will instruct it's maker." "The more the cooks the worse the soup." "You can't be lost if you aren't worried where you are headed." "A man is a man, but a man with a tool makes two." "He who mopes about his troubles is the prisoner of his troubles." "Water is the memory of the world. Water finds its way."

[@davidr3627]

My take on the FBC's nursery rhyme experiment is that there were no children involved. The toys were simply props. They used rhymes, pictures, and dolls to convey a story that would draw the attention of the Dark Presence. Then they used props and set dressing to turn the house into the setting of that fiction. Giving the house the superficial appearance of children living there would be enough to fulfill the ritual. Using actual children wasn't necessary. As bad as the FBC can be, I doubt they would have brought in kids to use as bait to feed to whatever wolves the Dark Presence conjured up for their story. The mishandling of Dylan was terrible, but it was done with the intention of turning him into a future director. Involving kids in the nursery rhyme experiment would just turn them into wolf food. Even at their worst, I doubt Trench or Darling would have approved the budget to purchase sacrificial children.

[@christophercomtois7175]

Wouldn’t kids contaminate the testing.

[@JazzSparky]

The interview really made me think of Bret Easton Ellis and his auto fiction ‘memoir’ Lunar Park, which itself was a homage to Stephen King. In that book, he’s a twisted version of himself, stalked by his creation Patrick Bateman, interviewed by his fictional detective, Kimble, and living in the suburbs of a dark alternate New York City. Unlike his previous work, it’s a horror, and it treads the line between the story of the real Ellis and that of the drug-crazed celebrity rockstar author he was in the minds of the public. I definitely see a lot of parallels there.

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Damn that is a very specific inspiration there for sure.

[@andrewlavigne44]

Sam Lake was on the Fangoria Kingcast, a podcast for Stephen King fans, to talk about King's On Writing and I think it's highly worth a listen even if you're only a Remedy fan: he talks about the symbolism of water and also how he first found out about King on a summer vacation when he was reading by - what else - a lake.

[@delmattia96]

The "Interview with Door" scene was fantastic! This game feels truly worth the wait. Let's hope it keeps to this level! :D

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

This whole section is so mind trippy.

[@MaRaMa-ARTZ]

44:05 The way the neck crack blends seamlessly with Saga stepping on leaves and foliage. 🤣

[@delmattia96]

The second audio desynch is half fixed by 28.00, but the video got stuck. It gets fixed at 30.00!

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Thanks for time stamping it. My elgato is weird. I think it may be one of the wires. Not sure.

[@delmattia96]

@@GamingUniversityUoG Just doing my duty ;)

[@JeremyHinen]

Didn't catch this in your playthrough, but if you go back to the FBC station before you return to the car, you can see on the monitors inside that it's in the process of transmitting an AWE alert to the Oldest House - the one seen at the end of Control AWE.

[@JeremyHinen]

ALSO - just a heads up that due to a glitch of some kind - there's some fairly significant sound bites from the characters that don't play, and I wouldn't have noticed if not for the subtitles still showing up for them. In the last few chapters of Alan's story his internal monologue VO wouldn't play at all in multiple points. You might want to wait for a patch if you don't want to enable the captions. Should also mention I'm playing on PS5 so this might not affect all versions.

[@pokemonmusiclover5]

2:09:19 your whispering "my boy" to capser darling is so relatable

[@Torr3697]

I’m pretty sure that “the work will instruct its maker,” isn’t saying that Alan created Ahti, but that you learn more by doing it yourself rather than having someone else do it for you

[@shryke1013]

Another big thing with poe is she dissapeared for years. (Apparently from label issues) this is her first new work since around alan wake time, almost as if she as well has been in the dark place.

[@AngelCakeTom]

I met Olli and Marko in 2013 when they toured in the UK for the first time, I got meet and greet tickets, they genuinely spent several minutes with each person! The band signed my ticket and a T-shirt, I got a photo with them too. I fanboyed about how i heard them in Alan Wake and immediately became a fan of their music. They said they would be super excited to see more of the Old Gods of Asgard, and here we are 10 years after that gig! Absolute legends! In hindsight I wish I'd asked them to sign my ticket as Tor, Odin and Loki.

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Dude did you see that they are performing AS the Old Gods at this years game awards?

[@delmattia96]

The audio gets synched again at 11.30 ♡

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

I think we have an official fix for it now. Happened at the start of part 4 and was fixed in seconds.

[@delmattia96]

@@GamingUniversityUoG Happy to hear that! I am just doing my job of entertained viewer ;)

[@jonathancloutier4956]

I cant believe how good this game is... Im currently near the end of Part 4 and its just the best thing I've ever played. Actually it might be the most well crafted story I've encountered ever. Nothing was overlooked. Everything is so large and ambitious yet still all coherent.

[@Moonie504]

Re the experiments with the dolls - I wonder if it was less that they were experimenting on children, and more that the person doing experiments brought their child, and their poems sort of "came to life" in an unexpected way - and their child got caught up in what happened. The poems seem to tell a story which ends with a child being taken/killed by a wolf when the hero left, which seems to mirror what happened by the storytelling within the shadow. In my head hero is the scientist, and their child is the one they loved most. It feels more like a bad accident than a purposeful experiment. Sort of like what happened when Trench took his work home with him. I also like the way this could then potentially mirror what happened to Alan in the first game (and what is still happening to him), where stories become reality outside of the person's control. They don't know it's going to cause horror - but it does! I love the Talk Show bit bc while it gives a lot of lore stuff to chew on it, also seems like the devs poking a little bit of fun at themselves/us for how long it look and for all of us trying to piece together clues in the meanwhile lol. I also have a lot of thoughts about the writer of the game putting himself inside of it, even if they are technically playing a different version of themselves and what it means for THIS Sam Lake to talk to Alan. Especially since he's the one who introduces the idea of the lamp after the comment about Alan not always getting to control his characters. Ahti showing up is just... perfect.

[@daphne8406]

This is getting so good! 🤗 I truly felt like a giddy kid in a candy store! Soundtrack is also really good

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

I love how the latest end credit one repeats and that the lyrics reference the repeat lol.

[@barkasz6066]

Ah looks like you didn't go back up to the FBC station, it looks like it's sending out the alert that we receive at the end of the AWE DLC.

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

We do eventually go down there I believe. Saw it vacant with the alert going off.

[@Sky-pg8jm]

I think trying to differentiate "cult" and "theology" is a false dichotomy because not all Cults are religious in nature, political cults, cults based around businesses, etc are all cults that can and do exist. Most cult specialists would argue that cults are defined based on large scale abuse rather than any specific beliefs or practices (outside of those practices that are abusive in nature)

[@nothingness217]

How awesome it would be if there's an actual reference to the archivist series in the game

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Oh my lord. If they did I would absolutely lose it.

[@pokemonmusiclover5]

1:40:24 FINALLY someone who knows who poets of the fall are. As someone who has been listening to them for almost 7-8 years now i feel SEEN

[@hawkins347]

Unrelated, but I would pay solid money for those book props, take note Remedy 😄

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

I think they were selling them as part of the most expensive bundle. I could be wrong though.

[@untamedrose30]

That's it, I am now fully convinced that Quantum Break is canon to the Remedyverse and no one can change my mind. There's just too many easter eggs, references and now actor and character appearances across multiple games for it to not be. At this point, Remedy clearly wants it to be canon, the only problem is that they don't own it. Maybe they can buy it back, didn't they do that with Alan Wake and that's how we finally got Alan Wake 2? Also, are The Hiss and The Dark Presence working together?! WTF IS GOING ON?!

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

I was always on the side of QB being canon. Even when Sam said otherwise I didnt believe it. They are making it possible without outright saying it

[@Luemm3l]

my personal theory is that the hiss and dark presence are sorta same-ish. if they are separate worlds/entities, they for sure operate very similar and with the whole multiple planes of existences/realities, I think hiss and dark presence are ultimately just another bad entity/villain. maybe just like the former in Control.

[@user-vj4dp4xr8k]

Martti Suosalo is one of the most respected actors in Finland and Sam Lake called him to ask him to play the role of Ahti.

[@colbyboucher6391]

59:30 I REALLY hope you've picked up on how important this FBC document is. It's confirming that the sort of paradox you speculated on in your pre-release Tom Zane video (Alan writes about Thomas Zane in the 70s, causing Diver's Isle to be full of Thomas Zane stuff, inspiring Alan to write about Thomas Zane in the 70s) is entirely possible. Previously we didn't _really_ know if that sort of thing could happen.

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Oh i really focused on the ramifications of it AFTER I finished the game. Our future works acts as a source of inspiration for what we do today. Insanity.

[@Xylophytae]

So ive been playing through Shadow of War and at one point the character named Eltariel says the line "in the war against Darkness a stalemate is victory" and thats been stuck in my head for a few days now lol Additionally regarding the "overlap" and the use of said term the overlap appears to be the part of the coast around cauldron lake that gets flooded and that got me thinking about tidal zones as tidal zones are "overlaps" between land and sea and it was in the tidal zones that the first terrestrial plants and animals evolved effectively being "created" by the sea and let loose on land (maybe less dramatically) P.S. im sad i only got to see part 1 and a bit of part 2 live :(

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

I'll be doing another tonight I'd you can make it. Would love to chat. And yeah it is the idea anyone who deals with confronting dark things. It never ends. Ahti's Sankarin Tango references it. If you can stop it at each battle it is victory since darkness will always be around.

[@aettic]

Audio sync issues clear up at around 30:10, for anyone else watching who wants to skip to that point.

[@iceomistar4302]

Go to 30:00 if you want to avoid the freezing and the sound delay.

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Thanks. Yeah I hadn't used Elgato in a while and it kept being weird.

[@delmattia96]

06.40 I feel like it would be fun to hypotesize a bit on what the original manuscript could have been. There are entire paragraphs that have been added sometimes, so there might be a reason. Still, let's just focus on having fun while playing for now, let's postpone this kind of methodical analysis.

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

From what I gathered the added and changed sections are what we hear when we listen to it in Saga' Mind Place. When she picks it up it is the redacted version. But yeah there is a lot more details in it that were hand written.

[@delmattia96]

@@GamingUniversityUoG wow! Thank you!

[@dgc1570]

Finished up watching chapter 1 earlier today and just now finished watching chapter 2

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

3 just dropped live!

[@colbyboucher6391]

The Clicker being cut from Tom's lamp makes me seriously wonder what's up with Alan's absent father. It isn't something I ever cared about much but, like... the clicker _was_ from his father supposedly. Not saying his dad's Tom, that wouldn't make sense, but???

[@marcsoad09]

Anyone knows when part 4 will be available? This is the best playthrough of Alan Wake 2

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Part 4 is not yet live on YT but it is in the playlist unlisted. You can find it by clicking there. Will be live on wednesday. Going to be doing part 7 tonight live

[@aettic]

I was trapped in a thousand nights with no escape Nightmares taking me over But now I'm wide awake Now I'm wide awake Oh, I died like a thousand times Through the waves I break Nightmare's finally over And now I'm wide awake Now I'm wide awake

[@matta2399]

The black pyramid brand cigarettes from the oldest house.

[@aliteraryfrenzy]

2:34:14 Okay, so I think the Alan on the tv screen is the *real* Alan. He's wearing the outfit from the original game and he has the original typewriter on the desk. Everything that happens in Alan Wake 2 is the original Alan's story of himself writing a way to defeat Scratch.

[@everost4398]

2:04:10 I love the subtle reference to the Max Payne movie with Mark Wahlberg. Which reminds me... when are we gonna get some news of the Alan Wake tv series?? They haven't said a thing ever since that interview on May 12th 2022!

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

I still havent seen that Mark Wahlberg version. Scared to lol. And no I havent heard any news since 2022 on the tv show

[@aettic]

1:16:40 - yeah, when we use the word cult to refer to groups today it definitely has different connotations than the way we use it to refer to historical insular religious groups. My guess would be that the word started being used to refer to modern groups as being similar to ancient ones (in terms of being insular, typically small, and containing their own unique traditions, etc.) It seems like the kind of thing that would have been used by sociologists, reported on by news media, and then entered the popular subconscious with negative connotations because of the things modern cults were doing. They were cults regardless of what they were doing, but the ones that we heard about were doing awful things, and horror stories popped up surrounding the word 'cult', so we started to associate cults with what we'd now deem "cult shit". This is purely speculation.

[@delmattia96]

Congrats to Drako Fox13 !

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

He was so nervous about proposing too! The Discord tried to hype him up for it.

[@sarcasticnonsense]

So would we consider the Angel lamp an object of power?

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Hard to say. OoPs are usually things that have a collective unique image. Like the tv set or a rubber duck. I give the Clicker a pass since the fanbase basically made that an OoP. The lamp is can possibly be one. We'll see once I finish the game.

[@Valzer__]

Either an altered item or a oops.

[@tomtessendorf3428]

Just asking out of curiosity, why not turn on subtitles for sections such as when Ahti speak finnish? On an unrelated note, loved your control vids back in the day and now also your livestreams. Love from Germany!❤

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

I found out in a later section that some subtitles pop on automatically. Which helped when listening to some music in Finnish. But it is because I don't know when I would need to flip it on versus off. Would be gambling. Glad you're enjoying the play through! Cheers mate

[@mediumchungus]

​​@@GamingUniversityUoG I play with english subs and it doesn't translate the Finnish so your not missing out. Thankfully I know Finnish lol

[@skai3527]

I’m kinda sad that I haven’t been watching it live because it happenings at midnight in Thailand😅

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Time zone changes suck. Hope you're enjoying the VODs at least

[@Ezrumas]

The Dark Half by Stephen King is even more of a blueprint for Alan Wake. If it's been mentioned elsewhere, sorry to be tardy to the party, only just started watching.

[@CaptainBonClay]

Part 4? As a vod person I’m really suffering here boss

[@aettic]

Man, I can't imagine how frustrating that game-audio desync issue is for you to deal with.

[@ZombieMan4554]

I love your videos. I got one question. When you fought both the taken and you couldn't see the prompt that well (which I get) did you look into options menu on what button was what so you know ahead what buttons to press? Because when you discovered melee attacks during gameplay you sounded surprised even though if you looked in the options you would've known that already. I've noticed that with alot of people in general they don't even look at it before they play. I think it would've saved you items and bullets

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Eh considering how the melee really didnt do much we are not st that much of a loss. I am bad at that though. I rarely go into the settings for anything

[@ZombieMan4554]

@GamingUniversityUoG I can't wait to play Alan Wake II. I have to wait a couple months to afford a series x. The one game I've been impatiently patient to play lol

[@Miguel_Noether]

I can't believe you just missed the A.W.E alert, so many things you're missing from last video too. I'm just starting my first playthrough (I'm in the interview) and i was going to follow this playlist to digest every detail but it seems you don't check everything... big sadge 😔

[@MapOfEurasia]

On social media there's some activity between Remedy and Microsoft.... one man can dream! #QuantumBreak2 P.S: Or, other possibility, Epic Games (after funding Alan Wake 2) is helping Remedy to acquire Quantum Break IP from Microsoft.

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Wait there is?! Holy crap. We need a QB2 bad!

[@LapnLook]

Wait what activity? I can't see it on the Remedy account - are some of the individual employees of Remedy tweeting at MS?

[@fatidicusaeternus6498]

Hartman is really a cheap imitation of Ahti. Hartman tried to govern the ocean of creation, but Ahti is its real god and can travel through it at will.

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Hartman is probably the most hated antagonist in the series for me. Preying on vulnerable people for personal gain. I hate it

[@piratetv1]

el gato sabotaged your elgato???

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Yes. This is exactly what happened lol

[@blahblahgdp]

Me and my bro shit our pants ay the max paynr part

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

I seriously cannot wait until the Max Payne 1 and 2 remakes. You know they are going to officially explain how thet fit into the main RCU.

[@racerx6384]

Doesn't the board call 665 an object of power?

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

What the Board says is the "Objects of Power are Holders/665 to the Other/Blessing" Basically being vessels that house paranatural contents. They refer to Vessel/Holder as 665. Still doesnt answer any questions but it's interesting

[@paulomatangi]

How can people watching it just not say the stream is frozen or desynced 😩😩😩 Anyways catching up on you before I play ng+

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

And I keep asking! Lol

[@carlorazzeto]

Properly understood all religious believers are members of a cult and when the term is used in its original form its not negative and yes people refer to themselves as "the cult of". The term became negatively associated starting in the 70s with a number of high profile death and suicide "cults". It was an abuse of terms I suppose, but at the end of the day it is what it is and the term now has significant negative implications.

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

I mean they used to refer to some as the Cult of Zeus or the Cult of the Erinyes for example. I frankly havent sat down long enough to really settle my thoughts. It may just be the number of followers that determines the difference. But yeah I'll need to do more research on it.

[@nothingness217]

So, any streams in the near future, dean?

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Tonight after work

[@dgc1570]

LET'S GO!

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Got more tonight! I'm hyped!

[@elrevesyelderecho]

2:11:54 Love your girly-fan reaction!

[@elrevesyelderecho]

1:55:46 "Memento"

[@white_finch]

15:30 I don't think it's spoilers to say this, but... There's not Night Springs shows in Alan Wake 2, but one of the planned expansions is called Night Springs

[@leonielson7138]

Donuts to dollars, Warlin Door is going to show up in 'Control 2', and I'm hoping that Logan Anderson shows up in that game, too ... I'll tell you why in, like, 15 chapters.

[@aungthuhein007]

I'm not sure if this is how you intended these videos to be watched but I'm watching them as a way of playing the game because I really dislike playing new games that push graphical fidelity so much that there are ridden with graphical artefacts, glitches, not to mention the ridiculous requirements and the frame time instability (stuttering, lag, etc.), and many things that are not done well or done cleanly in my opinion. I really *really* truly hate that trend in the video game industry. (Why not scale back on the fidelity a bit in favor of rock solid performance and better accessibility in terms of more people with less powerful GPUs being able to play this?? Gamers are way past this tendency of new games wanting to put so much focus on graphical fidelity! All the RTX stuff is still not solid or polished enough, let alone the overhead.) Anyways my point was, could you please not talk over the dialogue in this game? You keep doing that and we miss crucial lines sometimes. You do repeat/explain the dialogue we miss because you switched to the Mind Place but there are way too many times when you're straight up talking over dialogue in a way where I can't hear it even if I wind back and try to listen to it again. Please, if possible.

[@GamingUniversityUoG]

Didn't even realize I was doing that at all. I'm very conscious about not speaking over dialogue.

[@aungthuhein007]

@@GamingUniversityUoG thanks! To be fair, it's only really been like two times so far. Sorry if that came across a little annoying. :)

[@ItsJuls1]

He's not actually talking over the dialouge. The reason why it appears like he does, is because there is a sync issue with when we hear the game audio. Meaning, he hears the audio before we do, so when he's talking, the audio is over from his point of view, but not for us.

[@aungthuhein007]

@@ItsJuls1 Oh, I didn't connect the dots there. My bad. I knew about the sync issue but I thought it wasn't much of a problem and forgot about it. haha

[@CallMeKes]

Am I the only person who saw Alan flicker in the first 10 minutes while the audio was still messed up? Ahti sounds... different. Is it a different actor? It sounds...emphatic. Maybe even poorly acted instead of Ahti's usual mellow tones. And he's not adding in Finnish in the same way he did in the Oldest House. Fun fact: My book club voted for House of Leaved awhile back but after a small video review I watched, and shared with the club, we decided against it. lol I was going to get angry about Dean's read of the King of Cups but then I reminded myself that tarot cards know how the reader will see it. And thus it can mean just about anything.

[@basicallyimblind6721]

Ahti sounds exactly the same, it's the same actor, and his acting is amazing.