Stephen King sold the rights to a quote for Alan Wake for just $1

The writer Stephen King, who since the beginning of the full-scale invasion consistently and zealously supports Ukraine, in general is a very noble person. As it turns out, he once sold the rights to his own quote, which is used in the Alan Wake game, to Remedy Entertainment for just $1.

Remedy Entertainment creative director Sam Lake told it to Eurogamer. As Sam says he “really, really, desperately wanted” to be able to start the game with a quote from King himself, whose style matches much of the creepy supernatural horror going on in the game. Stephen King only wanted $1 for the rights to use the quote.

So Alan Wake opens with a monologue by the main character, who says: “Stephen King once wrote that ‘Nightmares exist outside of logic, and there’s little fun to be had in explanations; they’re antithetical to the poetry of fear.’ In a horror story, the victim keeps asking ‘why?’ But there can be no explanation, and there shouldn’t be one. The unanswered mystery is what stays with us the longest, and it’s what we’ll remember in the end. My name is Alan Wake, I’m a writer.”

This is a quote from King’s 2008 article Why Hollywood Can’t Do Horror for Entertainment Weekly. The first part of Alan Wake was released in 2010. In 2021, a remaster of the game was released.

As a reminder, the next part of the game, Alan Wake II, will be released on October 17 2023 and will receive Ukrainian localization.