The team behind Alan Wake 2 has confirmed that the game is in "full production" and "is playable from start to finish".
Remedy Entertainment updated us on its progress in its most recent Investors Report. Whilst acknowledging a "revenue decline" in the last quarter of the 2022 financial year, the studio says that "the extended scope and budget related to the development of Alan Wake 2" should make for better results this year.
"Alan Wake 2 is in full production. The game will soon have all content in place, and it is playable from start to finish," said CEO Tero Virtala.
- The Remedy Connected Universe that ties Alan Wake 2 and Control is "just getting started" with no endgame in sight, says Sam Lake
- After Alan Wake 2 and Control, FBC: Firebreak represents a bold new frontier for Remedy: "It's time to expand the Remedy Connected Universe into shared spaces and brave something new"
"We will then move onto polishing the experience. Alan Wake is a unique brand that holds high value for the company today. Alan Wake Remastered has not yet generated royalties. However, we expect the sales to increase as the release of Alan Wake 2 becomes imminent and fans and new players want to experience the original story on new generation consoles."
The report didn't bring us any closer to a release date - or even a release window, for that matter - but it did reveal that Control 2 has "detailed concepts on the game vision and all creative areas including the gameplay, narrative, and art", whilst its secret live-service game, Codename Condor, "remains in the proof-of-concept" stage.
In a recent interview with GamesRadar+, Alan Wake 2 game director Kyle Rowley confirmed that players won't need to have played Remedy's other games – including the first Alan Wake game or the remastered version – in order to enjoy Alan Wake 2.
"When we were creating the concept for Alan Wake 2, it was very much on our mind that we wanted to create an experience that was welcoming to all," Rowley says, "both new players who may not be familiar with Alan Wake or the Remedy Connected Universe and our fans, who have been on the journey with us and enjoyed earlier Remedy games."
"After 13 years trapped beneath the suffocating depths of Cauldron Lake, Remedy Entertainment is about to break Alan Wake free of the darkness that has taken ahold of his mind," wrote Josh in his excellent Big in 2023 feature, After a decade of dreaming, Remedy is finally ready to write Alan Wake 2 into reality.
"After such a lengthy departure, few expected to see Alan Wake 2 to be written into reality – thankfully, creative director Sam Lake never lost faith that we would, one day, once again wield the light. 'I feel like I never left Alan Wake behind. There was always the full intention to return to him; there was always more story to tell, and the characters and the setting were too precious to be forgotten.
'The story kept growing and evolving through the years, and we created a new concept between every project. This time, after Control, everything finally clicked into place'."
Alan Wake 2 is set to launch sometime later this year in 2023 and is scheduled to release on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X.
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