Game news Alan Wake 2 is a bitter commercial failure! Is the lack of a physical version the real culprit?
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Excellent multi-award winning game and in the running for the title of game of the year 2023, the observation is clear: 6 months after its release, Alan Wake 2 is not profitable. The reason according to the community? The game is only available in digital format. But is this really the one and only reason for this commercial failure? We discuss it in this JV Fast!
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Go after Alan Wake first of the name
The curse that affects the development studio Remedy Entertainment has struck again, since in fact, despite its enormous qualities, Alan Wake 2 did not sell enough to make a profit. And one of the reasons for this commercial failure is due in particular to its title. Fact, play a game called Alan Wake 2necessarily implies having made the first of the name. And it is necessary here, since as a game largely focused on its narrative, this new opus allows itself to branch out with the first title, assuming that players know and remember it. It therefore appears complicated, for new players, to even try their hand at the title knowing that, to discover Alan Wake 2it is necessary to do the first.
And as long as we are talking about the said original opus, if it enjoys a success of esteem, it is different regarding its sales. Indeed, when it was released, 11 years ago, the title also sold relatively poorly, with copies selling out over the years that followed. It was these sales and seniority issues that led to the title failing to find funding for a decade.
When money gets involved
To finally succeed in being financed, Alan Wake 2 had to get closer to Epic Games. This same Epic needed a new exclusivity in order to highlight its online store. Epic's entirely dematerialized activity and its exclusive statusAlan Wake 2 then imply the uselessness of releasing a boxed version of the title. In response to this, many players have called for a boycott of the titledenouncing in particular a desire to kill the second-hand market, wrongly attributed to Remedy.
It is therefore the lack of financing which will have started everything, and giving up the game out of activism may well harm not only Remedy, but the market as a whole. In fact, if the biggest studios have the necessary funds to ensure the development of a game, others, smaller ones, need the kind of compromises that Epic Games offers, in the hope of creating titles, sometimes little or not known at all. If the activism of players to safeguard their heritage is an opportunity for the community, it also participated in producing an excellent game that just needed to be financed. To go even further, don’t hesitate to consult our dedicated column available at the top of the page!