Remedy In Talks With Partners For 'Alan Wake 2'

Remedy Entertainment, the Finnish studio behind the wildly popular and successful "Max Payne" franchise surprised everyone when it revealed "Alan Wake." It was a radical diversion from the company's action-oriented shooters and instead embodied a moody and atmospheric survival horror theme. The game was received relatively well and managed to push 4.5 million copies between the original and the 2012 sequel "Alan Wake's American Nightmare." There have been sequel rumours floating around for a while now, but this time the developer itself has revealed that "Alan Wake 2" is still under consideration.

The idea of an "Alan Wake" sequel has always been an option at Remedy Entertainment. This was revealed by the studio's Creative Director Sam Lake in an interview with Polygon. The developer confirms that the game was made and storyboarded with the explicit intention of following it up with a series of sequels. The story, characters, and the core focus of the franchise was chalked out in a manner that would enable the team to transition easily into sequels.

Even as the first game was being shipped, Remedy was busy discussing sequel plans and the direction that the story and characters would follow. Lake revealed that the sequel would've included a revolutionary gameplay mechanic that would've allowed players to rewrite the world around them. The originally envisioned sequel was supposed to incorporate this radical new gameplay element and continue the story along the cliffhanger conclusion of the original "Alan Wake."

This particular sequel and some other ideas Remedy had chalked out for the "Alan Wake" franchise couldn't make it past the drawing board. Lake didn't mention why the ideas were rejected, but like all decisions this could've been driven by pure economics. Although impressive in their own right, it could be argued that the initial sales figures for the game may not have been good enough for the publisher Microsoft Game Studios to greenlight further projects based on the game universe.

Remedy had even created a prototype version of the sequel and pitched a concept video showcasing the ideas meant for "Alan Wake 2" to Microsoft. Unfortunately, the publisher didn't bite into the developer's proposal. The prototype and other associated ideas were later cannibalised for other projects, according to VG247.

"We are in a place where we are starting to look into the future and starting to have discussions about what is next," Lake said in the interview. "Among other things, we are discussing the possibility of an Alan Wake sequel with multiple partners, but nothing has been decided."

However, the Creative Director seems optimistic about the prospects of the sequel, and expresses his desire to work on it in the future. Lake goes on to caution that nothing concrete has been decided yet, but there could be a possibility that the team will begin work on it after it ships its current project "Quantum Break."

In case you have any feedback or wish tip us off, the author can be contacted at nachiketpg13@hotmail.com

13 minutes of gameplay from Alan Wake 2 (unreleased) (credit: Polygon)