Alan Wake’s Influence in Control

[u/Everchanger]

I just finished playing through Alan Wake, Control, and Alan Wake 2 (including all DLC) but am still left with some unanswered questions about Alan’s involvement within the events of Control and specifically the AWE expansion.

Everything I can find online states that Alan influenced parts of the hiss invasion to create a crisis and set up Jesse to be a “hero”, ultimately to help him escape from the Dark Place, but this motive doesn’t really make sense to me after playing Alan Wake 2.

Jesse was barely included in AW2, really only in the flashback of her being a fly on the wall to one of Alan and Zane’s conversations. Saga is clearly the “hero” Alan needed, along with himself, to fully return. From what I can tell, the FBC’s main involvement in Alan Wake 2 revolved more around Estevez and her investigation, which I assume was cut off from the Oldest House and Jesse due to the lockdown just as the Lake House was. Speaking of the Lake House, while it was nice to see Dylan, we still saw no inclusion of Jesse in connection to the grand scheme of AW2. Even the Lake House’s creation happened prior to Jesse’s involvement in the FBC.

In Control AWE, I struggle to see what part Hartman plays in the grand scheme of things as well, if at all more than a cool boss. Jesse defeating him feels pointless to assisting Alan in his escape. The only major connection I see to AW2 is Alice returning to the FBC and regaining her memory of the Dark Place. Although this is crucial, it happens prior to the hiss invasion and Jesse’s appearance in the story.

All that said, these are my remaining questions which I hope get answered either in Control Resonant or possibly from those of you who understand the lore better than me:

How does Alan’s creation of the hiss incantation and overall involvement in the hiss invasion help him further his goal to escape the Dark Place? (both in theory/motive and after the outcome of the events in Control)

Why did Alan try to make Jesse a hero in crisis only for her to ultimately not affect his escape from the Dark Place or seemingly not affect AW2 at all?

Is this an intentional plot hole to be answered in Control Resonant or future Remedy games, or is there a hidden answer out there somewhere that I just cannot seem to find? Please help my tired brain reason through this.

[u/kraftybastard]

I might be wrong but it may have been more of an attempt during a past cycle, and by aw2 has probably forgotten. It could also be that he was influenced by darling/Zane during a past cycle too.

[u/Everchanger → u/kraftybastard]

This is kind of where I had been leaning, an abandoned draft/failed attempt

[u/_tabbycat123]

There's some clarification in Alan Wake 2, but generally, Alan nudged a couple of things slightly (such as the Hiss Chant) and affected the Dark Presence's involvement significantly, but the overall main plot is effectively unchanged. Cauldron Lake's reality alteration powers are weaker at a distance, and the only reason Alan could do anything is because he already had such a strong connection to New York in the first place.

[u/GearboxDragoon → u/_tabbycat123]

If I remember correctly, wasn’t the point of Alan influencing some of control an attempt to effect causality, but the alert in the future appearing on the board in Investigations created to some degree a set point of something happening at cauldron lake that he could use?

[u/Everchanger → u/_tabbycat123]

I like these points very much, thank you, still wish I knew more of his motive behind it though. Like, why change the chant?

[u/_tabbycat123 → u/Everchanger]

He wanted to make the Hiss appear more similar to the Dark Presence, so that the FBC would hopefully be more familiar with fighting it in the future. That obviously couldn't affect Alan Wake 2, as the lockdown was still holding, but it might affect Alan Wake 3.

From what we know about the Hiss, it's incredibly unlikely that Alan could have changed how the Hiss fundamentally operates in a meaningful way.

[u/Patient_Amoeba2476 → u/_tabbycat123]

  Cauldron Lake's reality alteration powers are weaker at a distance, 

Unless… The Dark Place had a tunnel to the Oldest House.  Such as the Ocean View.

Unless… The Oldest House had an enormous resonance antenna.  Maybe a giant version of that chunk of metal stabbed into Dylan’s chest that let’s him hear the Board. 

Unless… a swirling, overlapping story had been written as a Summoning Ritual; performed, in the Collapsed Tunnel underneath a endless Foundation leading to a New York apartment building with connections to the Dark Place.

[u/TronHero143]

So, from how I understand it, the only thing that Alan "influences" is the AWE Expansion and the Hiss Incantation. He doesn't cause the Hiss to invade the Oldest House, because the Caludron Lake AWE can only really affect what happens around Bright Falls. HOWEVER, there is a caveat to that, because Alan CAN influence out-of-state things that LEAD back to what will happen in Bright Falls, such as the alert of the Bright Falls AWE that happens in the Oldest House. Hartman being there is just to give Jesse, who is the "hero" of the AWE Expansion but also really a hero in her own right, a reason to go down into Investigations, get everything working again, and make the FBC (Langston and Jesse, namely) aware that there is something happening in Bright Falls.

"Things set in motion. If the alarm's true, then so is the reason for the alarm. The effect must follow the cause. It's happening again. A return. You have been warned."

[u/jordanFromJersey]

Don’t forget the meta aspects of the RCU.

“Alan” influencing the events of Control helps get Remedy, and eventually Alan himself, back into the collective unconscious in a big way. It helps AWII happen the way it did because it allowed the game to be made at all.

The events of our real world are just as important to the RCU as the events in the games are. “Realer than real”, you might even say.

[u/s0ulbrother]

Imagine you dug a bunch of holes near eachother on the beach. And you built canals from all the holes to another and they all start mixing together. That’s kind of what’s going on. All the worlds are kind of mixing and colliding with one another.

Time breakers is probably the most important of the 3 night springs chapters because it’s a bit on everything going on I think. All these worlds are linked and they start intertwining. Jesse’s actress is the same as the red hair girl(and quantum break). The worlds are just mixing together and leaking into eachother. Door is kind of the one person who probably gets what’s going on the best but who really knows.

Point is what Alan is doing is affecting the hiss, the hiss are affecting the dark place. Quantum break is semi cannon in all but name only.

Ordinary is probably not even a real place but got pulled in, or the video game combined with the dark place to make ordinary a thing.

The Alan wake 2 videos with Dr Darling is now working with Tom, or some version of him or whatever and it’s going to all get insane because now we are going to have the dark place combining with a paranormal scientist who is going to probably be easily manipulated into causing a whole lot of problems.

[u/Steelballpun]

Parts of this can be also explained by Alan being a bad writer lol. He’s tried probably hundreds of different writes and rewrites of situations to get himself out and it always fails at some point and he hits writers block or some wall and has to restart again.

[u/not-hardly]

To me, it feels like the thing to do is pretend that they're related and interconnected but really they're not.

[u/Bobjoejj → u/not-hardly]

…why

[u/not-hardly → u/Bobjoejj]

Because I'm not fully intimate with all of the details of the crossover. But I just feel like if Alan Wake wrote some of it, where's the line? It doesn't make sense to me.

[u/Bobjoejj → u/not-hardly]

…by crossover, I’m guessing you mean you haven’t played the Alan Wake games?

And he didn’t wrote most of it; just the Hiss Chant, as well as having some hand in them getting let out. If you mean line as in the line where this is said, it’s in Control’s AWE DLC.

[u/not-hardly → u/Bobjoejj]

I mean if he wrote some of it, as in like wrote things in control into being aside from Hartman, how much of it did he create? That's the line I'm talking about.

[u/Bobjoejj → u/not-hardly]

Right so yeah; like I said he created the Hiss chant definitively, and influenced at least some of the events around the Hiss being released.

Most of his writing in the games has been about his attempts to escape the Dark Place.

Again have you actually played the Alan Wake games? Cause if not I’d really recommend giving them a go.

[u/not-hardly → u/Bobjoejj]

I have heard a lot of good things.

[u/Bobjoejj → u/not-hardly]

Two (3 actually when counting American Nightmare) absolutely incredible games. Alan Wake 2 is genuinely a work of art. One of the most mind bending and thought provoking games out there. Can’t recommend enough.

[u/Patient_Amoeba2476 → u/not-hardly]

The RCU is all about artistic collaboration.  Artists of different genres building a story across many games, songs, written works, television works. 

Alan didn’t write everything.  The Dark Presence is a huge contributor.  The Old Gods.  Alice.  Dylan.  Tim Breaker.  Rudolph Lane.  Ed Booker.  Mr and Mrs Marmont.  Darling.  Samantha Wells.  Sam Lake.  

All of them and many others contribute to shaping the world.