I did Episode 2 of Alan Wake today. The screenshot is of the sawmill in the park. My assumptions were right about it ramping up in difficulty on nightmare. I found myself dying a lot more in this episode, and enemies are bullet sponges I feel like. Rusty alone took up about 3 clips of headshots. I think it may have been a lot harder if I didn’t use actual strategy (saving ammo by running away, not always hard pressing the flashlight to aim, and using the flares to chokepoint areas to escape, etc.). Overall though I found the difficulty a fun challenge, especially since I usually play on Normal Mode. I ended up taking a detour and also collecting all the Manuscript pages. I’m hoping to wipe out a good chunk of the Achievements and finally 100%. Something that has evaded me in all my past play throughs.
Gameplay wise, I think I prefer Alan Wake 1/American Nightmares Much More with the battery management and controls. Having to keep an eye on it like that instead of just being able to go “oh. I have 3 flashes left”. Story wise I don’t think I could pick a favorite though I love how II added to the story, at least as far as I got