The world of Control through the lens of Alan Wake: Remedy is ready to reunite their two best games – Alan Wake 2

“The World of Control through the lens of Alan Wake”. That’s director Kyle Rowley’s apt description of the second and final expansion for many (and my personal) Game of the Year 2023. Where the first expansion Night Springs took a sharp left turn and served up three short episodes that alternated tonally between the deeply silly and the… slightly less silly, The Lake House promises a return to the more sinister and terrifying side of the main game. Think more Valhalla Nursing Home and less We Sing.

Prior to the launch of The Lake House, we, along with three other media outlets, had the opportunity to ask Rowley our most pressing questions after watching about 10 minutes of rather terrifying gameplay in which FBC agent Kiran Estevez quickly realizes that something is very wrong in the otherwise cozily titled lake house, which so far (unfortunately?) seems to have no connection to Sam Lake.

GamesRadar: In Control, you had an Alan Wake crossover in the form of AWE. What did you learn from that that you could bring to this crossover?

When it Control team was developing AWE, there were a lot of conversations between the two teams about how we could use the core themes of the two series in each other’s games. In AWE, it was light versus dark and used a character from Alan Wake. In The Lake House, it was pretty much the same way. We worked closely with the Control team. We asked them questions and learned about their specific audiovisual style and they even gave us assets. So it was really a collaboration between the two teams. Because we’re actually two separate teams, but we’re in the same building, so it was easy to set up meetings.

The biggest challenge was the division of labor, because they have their own projects, so it wasn’t always easy to find time for our requests. This is something we got better at.

Gamespot: This feels like the most crossover-like crossover. How do you balance the geekiness that I, and I’m sure everyone here loves, and making it easily accessible to people who may not have played Control?

Rowley: First of all, the story has to stand on its own. It was the same situation when we were developing Alan Wake 2. We were aware that not everyone had played Control or even Alan Wake 1. So we focused on making it a good experience for everyone, but especially in The Lake House we have a lot of things like files, emails, etc. that those who are in the lore can get something out of.

Gamereactor: Is this the same team that developed Night Springs? And how big is the team compared to the main game?

Rowley: Yes, it’s exactly the same team. There are probably about 40 of us at The Lake House with no outside contributors. On Alan Wake 2, there were 150 of us when it was at its peak.

Gamekult: How does the transition from working on a horror game, to working on something lighter, and then back to working on pure horror, affect the mood of the team?

Rowley: If you work on horror for too long in a row, you can get a little insensitive, so I think Night Springs was a good palette cleanser for both the team and the players. And from here it was good to get back to pure horror with the experience we got from Alan Wake 2 under our belt. So it’s been a good series for us.

Gamereactor: When you introduced the gameplay, it was with the phrase the world of Control through the lens of Alan Wake. Can you talk a little more about how you merge the two worlds?

Rowley: The architecture of FBC buildings is very unique. Very brutalist in nature. So when we built The Lake House building, we looked a lot in the direction of The Oldest House. Ashley, design director of Controls World, worked with us on the expansion to get it all right. Conversely, Control’s gameplay is very fast-paced. Jesse can fly through the air, so the spaces are spacious and open. So we looked at the architecture, but adapted it for Alan Wake’s camera. How do these spaces feel when they are a little more intimate and envelop you more than in Control ? So it’s about how we can bring certain recognizable Control aesthetics into our games so that they feel natural and fit in.

Gamespot: What does Estevez add to the story and gameplay as a character?

Rowley: As part of the FBC, she brings a new perspective to the supernatural. She reacts differently than a normal person would. If a Painted comes out of a wall, most people would panic, but she has been there before and can get irritated rather than frightened because now she has to write another report on a supernatural phenomenon.

It was interesting for us to explore another part of FBC. Control works within the context of The Oldest House, but here we have a slightly different perspective. Here we can discover what FBC looks like outside of their headquarters. How do they operate as an agency in the U.S.?

Gamereactor: Alan Wake 2 and its expansions now have seven different playable characters. That’s a first for Remedy. How come you felt like introducing that many?

Rowley: There were originally a lot more playable characters in the game for Alan Wake 2 than we ended up having, so it made sense to use more of them in the expansions. And because Alan Wake 2 is a horror game, changing characters allows us to break up the game better and change the tone, which I think makes for better pacing.

GamesRadar: I noticed that the jumpscares where a face takes over the whole screen are back here. How do you balance them so they don’t feel cheap?

Rowley: It’s tricky and I think we used them a little too much (in the main game, etc.). We use them for a number of things. Narratively, they have to affect the character who perceives them. Mental attacks if you will. And then we use them to create a flow in missions. So in the main game we had different ways to use them, but to the player they really just seemed like a jumpscare. So here we use them more sparingly, but they’re still a way to convey the mental state of the characters and present the supernatural, so we’ve kept them in our repertoire.

Gamereactor: With The Lake House saying goodbye to Alan Wake 2, how does it feel to say goodbye to something you worked on for so long?

Rowley: Yeah, it’s been a long time. Six years to January. It’s going to be… Yeah, I don’t really know. When we finished Alan Wake 2, I was almost numb because it had been a very challenging project, but because we had to start thinking about DLC very quickly, I couldn’t sustain that feeling for long. I think I’ll take a vacation and then I’ll come back and start thinking about other things. It will be bittersweet because I enjoyed working on the game, with the team, with Sam. The reception was great and it was fun to participate in the award ceremonies. But it will also be good to end it.

The Lake House is out now as part of the Deluxe Edition upgrade. We’ll be back with a review before the week is out.