Alan Wake 2 was one of the most critically successful games of 2023. Releasing more than 13 years after the original, the game easily proved worth the wait. Thankfully, it seems that fans won't be waiting as long for a third game. While Remedy Entertainment has not officially announced an Alan Wake threequel, the company stopped just short of doing that. Yesterday, Remedy released its financial statements release for 2023, in which CEO Tero Virtala spoke a lot about Alan Wake 2, as well as the next game in the Control series. Virtala says the company sees both as major franchises now, and wants to have a "more regular cadence of sequels."

"With Alan Wake and Control we now have two established franchises, and our ambition is to grow them into franchises that have high brand recognition, steadily growing user base, more regular cadence of sequels and an ability to generate revenues and profits at a high level," said Virtala.

Finding an Audience and Paying Back Epic Games
Obviously, that sounds like a very good sign for a third game, and possibly much more. What also bodes well is the fact that the game is performing to Remedy's expectations. At a time where even multi-million selling games aren't making back their costs, Virtala had some great things to say about sales for Alan Wake 2. With over 1 million in digital sales, it's the fastest selling game in the studio's history, and it has "already recouped a significant part of the investments made by Epic Games Publishing, and we expect the game to be a meaningful revenue and profitability driver for the year."

Anything but a Guaranteed Success
These quotes from Virtala should help Alan Wake fans breathe a sigh of relief. Alan Wake 2 was released on October 27th, in a month absolutely packed with major video game releases. That same month also saw Marvel's Spider-Man 2, Super Mario Bros. Wonder, and Assassin's Creed Mirage. The game could have easily slipped under the radar, but positive reviews and award recognition seem to have gone a long way. Of course, collaborations with games like Fortnite and Dead by Daylight probably didn't hurt.

The first Alan Wake was a critical success, but took a long time to find significant interest, and a big part of that was due to the game's proximity to the original Red Dead Redemption. Releasing just four days before that Rockstar classic, Alan Wake was overshadowed. Over time, the game managed to find a passionate audience, and finally got a sequel after more than a decade. It remains to be seen just how quickly we'll see a sequel announced for Alan Wake 2, but if it ends up being significantly shorter than it was between the first two games, that's a big win for fans.

Posted: Mar 24, 2024 11:13 pm
Related Forum: Gaming Discussion

Source: https://comicbook.com/gaming/news/remedy-alan-wake-3-shorter-wait/