Is That Max Payne in the Alan Wake 2 Trailer? Not Quite

You might have wondered why the latest Alan Wake 2 trailer, fresh from Opening Night Live 2023, includes a glimpse at a character who looks like Max Payne.

The character in question is Alex Casey, the FBI partner of one of Alan Wake 2’s playable characters, Saga Anderson. Both Alex and Saga arrive in Bright Falls to investigate mysterious murders. Developer Remedy has shown off Casey in previous videos, but in the gamescom 2023 video we see a different side – and look – to the character.

I’m calling this now, if this is a nod to Max Payne I swear I’m gonna freak. @SamLakeRMD @remedygames @alanwake pic.twitter.com/O3jx2eTr0Y

— CrystallizedSpyder.TTV (@CrystallizedSpy) August 22, 2023

This alternative version of Alex Casey we see in the trailer looks like Max Payne from Remedy’s famous action series, complete with trademark hard-boiled detective outfit. So what’s going on here? Has Remedy crossed the streams sufficiently to have Max Payne pop up in its own Alan Wake game? The answer is… not quite.

The Alex Casey we spot in the trailer is the version of Alex Casey from the Dark Place, the nightmarish world in which Alan Wake himself is trapped following the events of the first game. This is very much a deep meta play on Remedy’s part. One of Alan Wake’s own works was of a series of Alex Casey novels, and now the character is brought to life in Alan Wake 2. We can speculate that the Alex Casey in the Dark Place is the Alex Casey plucked from Alan Wake’s imagination for the Alex Casey novels.

The layers go even deeper. Alex Casey’s model is based on Remedy creative chief Sam Lake, who was also the body model for Max Payne. And in-game, Alex is voiced by James McCaffrey, who also voiced Max Payne. Still with us? The upshot is: the Dark Place version of Alex Casey is a clear reference to Max Payne, but he is not Max Payne.

In an interview with IGN, Sam Lake explained what Remedy is shooting for with Alex Casey. “The version of Casey in the Dark Place, the character come to life from Wake’s books, who is not exactly the FBI Agent Casey with Saga, is more over-the-top hardboiled and definitely drawing from the same inspirations and my love for noir as Max Payne did, including the outfit reminiscent of Brad Pitt’s character in the neo-noir film, Se7en,” Lake explained.

So there you have it. Clearly Remedy is having a lot of fun here, ramping up the meta-ness of the Alan Wake world and giving fans of all things Remedy lots to talk about in the process. Max Payne and Quantum Break are not a part of the ‘Remedy Connected Universe’, but that hasn’t stopped Remedy from tipping its hat to both games.

Earlier in August, Remedy announced a 10-day delay for Alan Wake 2 to October 27. In a statement, Remedy said October was packed with game launches and wanted to give players more space to play everything.

“October is an amazing month for game launches and we hope this date shift gives more space for everyone to enjoy their favorite games,” Remedy said.

Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.