4.5/5 ★ – Jacob0lson's review of Alan Wake II: The Lake House.

Just like the base game, so close to perfect!! I loved this expansion because it felt like a more polished and focused version of some ideas from the base game. The gameplay feels much tighter. Alan Wake 2’s gameplay is essentially ripping off of Resident Evil 2 (remake), and that’s fine by me, I love that game. Except, it works better in a closed space and not a god of War Ragnarok style map. Alan Wake 2 has that style of map, but the Lake House is entirely contained in one fairly small facility. Because of this, puzzles and combat encounters feel much more tight. I have always enjoyed Remedy’s world building and the way they communicate their story (notes, videos) as it is there if you want to explore without disrupting the gameplay. This DLC just expands on the world so well with the Control connections, and fascinated me with the FBC experimentations being conducted regarding art. Kiran Estevez is a much more likable protagonist than Saga, in my opinion. She has much more personality and is quirky and entertaining in her own unique way. My only complaint with this DLC is about the survival horror elements of gameplay. I had this same complaint with AW2, it is a survival horror game but encounters never feel tense or engaging. Again, it’s inspired by RE2, but it feels more like RE4. Maybe this is because I was playing on Normal difficulty, but there was never a time where I had to conserve ammo or heals, it just felt like I would shoot and move on. On the other hand, in RE2 enemies eat more bullets, and you can come back to them, and you can think about if you wanted to kill them now and make it easier for yourself in the future or do it the other way around, that was super engaging for me. The combat is a weird mix of RE2 and RE4 that fails to capture the engagement of either.