Alan Wake's American Nightmare - General Guide

American Nightmare is an expansion to the original Alan Wake game. This guide will focus on the new aspects that weren't in the previous games as well as useful tips.

Introduction

Alan Wake's American Nightmare is, as opposed to its prequel, focused heavily on combat - many new enemies and weapons are the major part of this change. Being specifically focused on shooting, this game also has an arcade mode with two sets of difficulties (normal, nightmare).

Don't be mistaken that this is all that there is to this game, no. It wouldn't be an Alan Wake game if there were no story in the first place... oh and manuscripts, those play larger part in this game rather than "just" telling a story. Before we get into it, here's a guide for the original game Alan Wake.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=818124419

Story & Characters

To say the truth, the story seemed slightly confusing at first. Was I in a dream or was any of it real (but then again the word real is hardly definable in Alan Wake's universe)? The story starts with a shot of Barry, sleeping on a bed in motel with the Old Gods of Asgard truck outside. While he is sleeping, the TV is on and The Night Springs show is on. We get introduced into the game as if we were in Night Springs this time, the narrator talks of us, of Alan Wake and refers to him as to Champion of the Light, while Mr. Scratch is the Herald of Darkness.

What happens is that Alan is able to rewrite reality, that's how he escaped Cauldron Lake but ended up in the Night Springs show. It is later explained that Night Springs is eventually called any place that has strange things going on. As you can see in the screenshot below, this little place we start in ACT I is not actually called Night Springs, it's simply called that now because the actual, unnatural story of Night Springs takes place there right now.



Without giving out too many spoilers, I can safely say that Alan is trapped in this world of Night Springs and fights his own, evil and twisted copy called Mr. Scratch, who was created by Thomas Zane in order to keep balance but he got out of control.
You will still be able to find TV shows and radio stations throughout the entire game, usually 1 of each per act, they tell the story that happens in the real life of Alan Wake's universe. Barry is now the agent of Old Gods of Asgard and refuses to talk about Alan as well as Alan's wife, Alice. It's been 2 years since he's been gone but Zane created Mr. Scratch for that reason, to replace Alan, yet Alice points out that she sometimes thinks she sees Alan, but who she sees is Mr. Scratch who taunts her... I'll let you play through the game first actually, instead of breaking it all to you right now!

The 3 most important characters that you will see (apart from Mr. Scratch) are Emma Sloan, Dr. Meadows and Serena Valdivia. Emma Sloan is the first one you will encounter in the first ACT. She works as a mechanic, is very, very calm (most likely due to the "pills" and possibly drugs she takes), also she's a little accent. At the start she seems to trust you more than one would expect her to. She seems to not be somehow surprised too much by all the events happening around her.
Dr. Meadows is occupying the observatory and is very skeptic about what you're trying to tell her (remember, no spoilers!), she does try to help you even though she doesn't quite believe what you'll be telling her.
Serena Valdivia is probably the least notable person of the 3 as she has only very small amount of dialogue and is under the influence of Mr. Scratch.

Mr Scratch is Alan's evil double, his dark dopplegänger that goes around and causes mayham, going by the name of Alan Wake. As I said above, he was created by Zane in order to keep one version of Alan in the real world, while the other is, sadly, trapped in the dark world. But it wasn't Thomas' intention to create this kind of Alan. Mr. Scratch shows up on numerous TVs throughout the game, showing how dangerous he is.

Weapons

Compared to the original Alan Wake, we have received over a dozen of new weapons to fight the creations of the Dark. These weapons can be found in both arcade mode and story mode alike, altough they require specific amounts of found manuscripts to be opened. Finding manuscripts isn't all that hard as it might've been with some collectibles in the prequel. Here, your compass will start popping white circles and points out the location of nearby manuscript once you're close to it, I've only missed 2 manuscripts in the whole game on my first go.

Now, aside from getting to know more of the story, you will also be able to wield stronger weapons but honestly, I really liked the basic 9mm or the Nailgun well enough. Never really used any other weapons apart from Carbine, Crossbow or a Magnum.

Instead of writing down a list of weapons myself, I've screencapped them and their descriptions in the game's collection tab. One could read it themselves but I believe they won't pop up if you haven't found the required amount of manuscripts. If they do, however, let me know in the comments.

Enemies

Since we got a greater variety of weapons to choose from, there's also more enemies to test our weapons on.

Grenadier - The only Taken in the game that is capable of ranged attacks. Normal Taken are no longer able to throw axes or knives at you as they got replaced by Grenadier. His shield is very weak but throws dark versions of flashbangs at great distances.

Spiders - only appear in the story mode and only move around in large groups. think of them as the crows of the original game. If I recall correctly, one of the manuscript refers to those spiders as something as a collateral damage - they weren't part of the whole overtake-humans-and-kill-Alan type of thing. They are present in the first map as you go down into the mine.

The Biker - A simple variation of the assault Taken. Large, bulky Taken with a jacket with Old Gods of Asgard on its back.

The Splitter - At first, slowly moving Taken without a darkness shroud, but once pointed with flashlight at, he cannot withstand the light and splits into 2. These two can split into another 2, making total of 4 splitters that, however, act like weaker flankers as they don't have a shield.

The Birdman - Taken capable of transforming into a flock of ravens. Highly mobile but with no shield!

The Giant - Understandably the strongest, meanest and biggest of the Taken out there. Has thick shield and can absorb a great amount of shots. Your regular version of Assault Taken, but stronger.

Arcade Mode

Arcade Mode is a new addition to the Alan Wake universe. We were used to the slow-paced, story-oriented type of gameplay but that changes with American Nightmare. With more weapons and enemies, comes great opportunity to go wild with your weapons and unleash the light onto the enemis in the arcade mode.



Each map can be played in on either normal or nightmare difficulty, whereas the nightmare difficulty maps unlock only after obtaining specific amount of stars on normal-difficulty maps. Since there is a leaderboard system, your score will be added there. Arcade mode-related achievements are covered in the next section but still, I will point out couple of things that are good to know before you jump in.

• Dodge every time you can! Sometimes, you'll be better off intentionally waiting for that opportunity to dodge enemy attacks as this will increase your hit streak significantly, make sure to throw one or two dodges every now and then (10-15s) to keep the combo going
  
• Regarding the first point, dodging in the first 2-3 minutes is also considered a good idea. Simply run around and while you collect flashbangs, ammo, flares and locate other weapons, you will be chased by Taken so dodge their attacks often and after 2 minutes in, deal with them, you'll find yourself with a hit streak of 7-8 which increases the score gain incredibly.
  
• Learning the location of weapon boxes is essential for majority of the maps. That also includes previously mentioned looting and picking up items in the first minute or two.
  
• Take out Grenadiers first of all the Taken. It's only a matter of time once you get a grenade thrown under your feet to interrupt your hit streak or, in the worst scenario, to kill you. Use flare to create yourself some space and take out Grenadiers immediately.
  
• Personally, I don't advice using flashbangs at any time because flashbang kills do not yield score from killed Taken. Use flashbangs only when surrounded heavily with no way of escape, while still wanting to preserve your 6+ streak.
  
• Try out all the weapons and see which one fits you the best. For me it quite frankly was 9mm and Carabine. Nailgun works fine too in normal mode. A lot of people seem to like the Combat Shotgun, Magnum and the rifle. I completed 90% of all levels with just 9mm (Nailgun when I ran out of ammo) combined with either Carabine or Crossbow.

Achievements

All the achievements that I've listed are mostly related to the Arcade Mode. The remaining few are story-related and will be automatically obtained once certain point in story has been reached. Manuscripts, however, show up on your radar so that makes it a lot of easier to track them down even without a guide.

Survive until dawn in any Arcade Mode level.
Self-explanatory. Simply complete an arcade level without dying, which shouldn't be an issue.

Unlock all of the Nightmare Arcade Mode levels.
Complete all the normal mode levels, preferably on 3 stars, to unlock the nightmare levels.

Defeat 2,000 Taken.
For this, I simply suggest finishing the story first. Kill every taken you come across and then move onto arcade mode's achievements. If this achievement hasn't popped by then, go to the very last checkpoint of ACT 3 and stay around the couple Taken tower-like structures that summon enemies and get your achievement there.

Get 70,000 points in any Nightmare Arcade level.
Using the previously mentioned tips for arcade level will get you this achievement easily. Make sure to especially start off by dodging to get at least 6-7 hit streak, while you run around and collect ammo. Remember it's better to use a flashbang to kill a few Taken than to lose 8 hit streak! Never become surrounded and always be on the move, also look out for grenadiers! This really just takes practice.

Survive an Arcade level using nothing but the flashlight and handheld flares.
There are two ways to do this. First, naturally harder one - run around using only flares. Go from one lightpole to another, shine your flashlight on enemies occasionally to stun them. Repeat for 10 minutes.
Or pick Cemetery and right as you spawn, walk to the little wall on your left. Sprint and spam jump button on the barrel. Once you are on top of it, just climb onto the end of the wall and stay there for the rest of the game. Some say you can walk off and just leave it as it is. I suggest you to stay around and shine flashlight on them from time to time because your hitbox allows them to hit you on occasions.





Get a six-minute survivor streak and over 100,000 points in an Arcade level.
Most likely the hardest achievement out of these, altough not as much as you get familiar with your surroundings, weapon and ammo locations and little ins n' outs. As before, there are two ways to do this. From personal experience, I'd suggest Oil Field because it is an open map with a lot of space to maneuver unlike for example Cemetery or Trailer Park with its vision blocking. Getting the highest hit streak is essential, make sure to stay on 8 all the time, either start killing enemies right off the start, but make sure to never lose your streak, or at least for the first 6 minutes, once that's done, focus on your score. All this achievement is about is not getting hit for 6 minutes while managing to keep your streak at 8 to maximize your score (you can get your streak to 9 but it depletes too quickly for you to be able to hold it there steadily for a longer period of time).
The other way is more cheesy type of way, an exploit if you will. If you don't have enough time to be bothered with this, do the following. After you spawn, head straight-right untill you reach a shack with a Crossbow inside. Climb the first flattened rock on your right side, jump on the ones placed higher and then finally, one more stone. Stay there for 6 minutes, make sure to NOT kill Grenadiers - their dark flashbangs will injure the Taken and give you both streak and points. All you gotta do is stay up there and occasionally flashlight the Taken down from your left side as they make attempt to go up, but most likely won't hit you.

Personal View

To say the truth, I didn't really have high expectations of this game, knowing how amazing the original game was, I simply didn't think too highly of this but I was wrong. It was all made just so fittingly for it being a "mere" content expansion or a standalone sequel, if you will. Story mode's lenght just about right, finally bringing an ending to Alan's nightmare, offering more of a combat than in the first game so we got something new with that as well, arcade mode and leaderboards? An excellent way to bring some sort of a closure to the original way.

Alan Wake franchise being over 7 years old now still feels timeless. Alan Wake with its deep story, symbolism and narration and American Nightmare having live-action scenes were both amazingly executed. Apart from the story, that I keep babbling about all the time, soundtrack is the next most amazing thing here. If you've made it this far into the guide and/or if you've read my first guide to Alan Wake as well, you are looking for more than just a game to kill time and you are clearly interested in it. Therefore I suggest you to check out the following songs that are present in the game. They all carry meaning and references to the game.



Poets of the Fall - The Poet and the Muse
The Poet - Thomas Zane
The Muse - Barbare Jagger
Lady of the Light - Cynthia Weaver

Old Gods Of Asgard - Balance Slays The Demon
This song (according to wiki) was written by Berry Wheeler when he was an agent for the Anderson brothers. When was this song played, it actually influenced Alan Wake and helped him fight Mr. Scratch. Somebody also pointed out the following: "Ba(Alan)nce Slays the Demon"

Old Gods Of Asgard - Children of the Elder God
Simply too amazing, great timing for such a powerful song. Stage fight with fireworks, loud music, weapons and hordes of enemeis? Damn, yes.

Closure

It's been a few weeks since I posted a guide for a game that I have already fully finished but I was still trying as hard as I could to not miss out on anything I'd want to share.

As usual, if you used this guide and found it helpful, that alone makes me feel good about my work. If you have anything you'd want to ask simply do it in the comments or if there's something that would require a longer discussion, simply send me a friend request. I'll be happy to help.

[Lisan Al Gaib]

@Reinborn ahhh okkk, it makes sense now!

Thank you very much!

[Reinborn]

@CEOofTheAbyss Now, the video I've seen includes a guy with more of a straight-forward approach, much like the one I've described in the first paragraph. It mostly involves abusing dodging to get streak points and not killing the Taken for a while only to get points from them.

I'm not 100% sure but I believe I've tried staying up for 6 minutes while also killing the Taken while being up there, safe, but they won't spawn as quickly or come to you fast enough to get bonus from them via streak as it depletes before they get to you.

[Reinborn]

@CEOofTheAbyss Hey, it's been many years since I've played it successfully but it just so happened that I've recently watched someone else do this achievement on YouTube, for old time's sake, I finished the vid.
Now, it should still be doable, I don't remember there being any randomizer to enemy spawn locations or amounts. Staying up there for 6 minutes is only to get yourself one of the two tasks "ticked" so that you can then only focus on killing and getting the 100k point mark. So after 6 minutes, go down and kill.

[Lisan Al Gaib]

OP, is the "cheesy" way in Oil Field still available? I went there (Nightmare) but the Taken will only spawn if I kill another one and I run out of bullets pretty quickly :/

Any tips?

[Reinborn]

@[Judge] GeneralDodanna Valid point, not sure what lead me to calling it a DLC, while it can easily be taken as a standalone game, small but nevertheless "above" being called a DLC.

[GeneralDodanna]

yeah... this isnt a "DLC"... its a standalone expansion but eh

[Noysono]

A well made Guide. Good Work :)