Alan Wake Remastered (2021) - Horror Video Game Impressions: 'Rotted Meat No.3'

The third in my series of horror video games I was unable to get through was the 2021 remaster of 2010 video game - Alan Wake. As I've gotten older and my years have began to advance, I find myself with little desire to re-play games I've already gotten through. Over the years, I have played Alan Wake multiple times, it is still a great game, and the remaster makes a great game even better.

The Synopsis: 

Alan Wake arrives in the lazy mountain town of Bright Falls with his wife, on vacation to try and help the famous writer get over his writer's block. They are not there long when Wake's wife gets captured by a dark presence from Cauldron Lake. A week later, Alan wakes up in a crashed car with no memory of what has happened to him during that time period. He finds Bright Falls is infested with supernaturally infected humans, and that the area is littered with pages from a manuscript that he doesn't remember writing, which eerily predicts the future with uncanny accuracy.

How the Game Felt:

This remaster is the only proper way to play the game. Having tried it like this I could never go back. Alan Wake was made before the advent of HD televisions, so going back to the original it is very dark and murky. The remaster makes everything look so much smoother and brighter, making the world come alive with details that before I wasn't able to see. It also appears to have had lore added that links the game to Control, a neat touch. The game is a combat heavy survival horror game split into chapters. It plays as well as it always did, and while I stuck with this I was having a genuine blast.

Reason for Abandoning the Game:

As much fun as this was to play, it is still the same Alan Wake that I have played countless times before. It felt like a waste of my game playing time to give this yet another playthrough, even if it did look better than it ever had before. In an age where I struggle to even play remakes, let alone remasters, I just didn't feel a strong urge to continue through the familiar story and levels.

CAPA Ghostbusters: Director's Cut (2026) - Short Comedy Horror Film Review

I have reviewed a whole bunch of films from filmmaker Nicholas Michael Jacobs (Genevieve, Urban Fears) over the past years, but his latest is something a little different. As the title hints heavily at; CAPA Ghostbusters: Director's Cut is a director's cut of CAPA Ghostbusters, a film that Jacobs made with his friends in high school. The original film was around 9 minutes long, this director's cut, cuts this down to a lean 5 and a half minutes, remastered with updated special effects.

Four students at The Philadelphia High School for the Creative & Performing Arts (CAPA) are members of a Ghostbusters club. After the school's librarian encounters a ghost, the disbelieving principal; Principal Kaufman, gives them permission to go and hunt the 'ghost'. Luckily they are ready for this opportunity, having recently created uniforms and gotten their hands on some make-shift ghost blasting weapons.

I can't say I have ever been much of a fan of fan made films, though that is typically due to them being unnecessarily long. Obviously, that is not the case with this one. It tells a familiar story in a lightning fast paced short, including some iconic moments that are recognisable from the film series this was based on. Most obvious is the library based prologue. You also get the iconic theme music, and later, the recognisable proton beams, as well as slimer being the ghost responsible. I watched some of the original short film, and this one does have much better CG special effects. The comedy is never laugh out loud funny, the friends have a decent enough rapport among themselves, and I did smile during a montage scene of the busters getting ready when one of the zips on their suits jams during a close-up shot. The addition of a 'secretary' for the four person team was good in relation to making the female character a force to be reckoned with, but their inclusion didn't really seem to fit the more stream-lined short as the character appeared in just the one scene.

It might be a little breezy, but telling a complete Ghostbusters adjacent story in such a short time frame is impressive, kudos to the tight editing. Having seen Jacobs filmmaking work improve leaps and bounds after the past five or so years, it was interesting to see where he came from, and also where he is going to go next. The director's cut includes an after credits sequence that teases his next project; True Exorcism.

SCORE: