10 Recent Video Games Sent Out To Die
4. Alan Wake II
Sometimes, a game comes along that proves why we can't have nice things in this industry.
Alan Wake II was a decade in the making. The follow up to a cult classic that didn't sell as well as it deserved, it took developers Remedy years before they got a chance to revisit Alan's story and the strange, charming town of Bright Falls. Naturally there was a huge amount of expectation surrounding the long-sought-after project, but that only seemed to galvanise the studio, which arguably delivered its best game to date when the sequel launched at the end of October.
A genuinely unique survival horror experience that threw everything at the wall, including live-action musical sequences, a heady story-within-a-story-within-a-story narrative structure and fascinating crossovers with other Remedy titles, it was a bona-fide critical darling, a dominant Game of the Year contender, and a beacon of originality in a sea of safe-bet releases.
But... well, you know where this is going. Despite the lavish critical praise and word-of-mouth hype from fans, Alan Wake II repeated the fate of its predecessor, reportedly selling poorly across its first few weeks on storefronts. Annoyingly though, the major issue had nothing to do with the quality or appeal of the game itself, but rather the decision to sell the title exclusively as a digital release, which many fans suspect severely limited the reach and visibility of the AAA game.
Hopefully there's a glimmer of hope with this one though. Despite suffering that major handicap, the response to Alan Wake II could see it become a slow-burner sales-wise, with the console numbers reportedly rising to nearly 900,000 by the end of December. Here's hoping it can remain steady into 2024.