The reason why Alan Wake 2 doesn’t have a physical version

It has been more than 13 years since we first encountered the tormented Alan Wake on the Xbox 360 as an exclusive title from Remedy Entertainment. A lot has changed in the video game industry, and one of those things is the embrace of digital formats. As much as we would love to have the newly released Alan Wake II on our shelves alongside the first game, that will not be possible as this game will not have a physical release.

Why is Alan Wake 2 digital only?

This is a case that Remedy Entertainment has already resolved since May of this year, when more details about this new release were given. At the time, the reasoning was simple, according to their Frequently Asked Questions page: “There are many reasons for this. For one, a large number of have shifted to digital only. You can buy a Sony PlayStation 5 without a disc drive and Microsoft’s Xbox Series S is a digital only console. It is not uncommon to release modern games as digital-only.”

Furthermore, another justification they give is the price, keeping it a bit lower than what is becoming the norm in the current generation consoles and keeping the price low on PC: “Secondly, not releasing a disc helps keep the price of the game at $59.99 / €59.99 and the PC version at $49.99 / €49.99.”

Finally, Remedy ends by explaining that they don’t want the disk to be just a key to a download: “Finally, we did not want to ship a disc product and have it require a download for the game — we do not think this would make for a great experience either.”

Will Alan Wake 2 be released on physical media in the future?

On the same page, Remedy states that they have no plans to release Alan Wake 2 in a disc-based version. However, hopefully in the future, companies like Limited Run Games will show interest in producing this format.

Alan Wake 2 will be released on October 27th, 2023 for the Xbox X|S series, PlayStation 5 and PC via the Epic Game Store.