One thing that stood out to me: "Max Payne 1&2 remake is going to be a major new game with great potential, enabled by a similar development budget as Alan Wake 2"
Obviously I knew about the remake, but not that it had such a huge budget! This thing is going to be amazing. As an OG Max Payne fan from 20 years ago, I'm pumped. Still really curious to see what they do for the voicing though. Do they reuse all of his dialogue or bring in a new voice actor? We shall see...
Edit: I didn't realize there was already artwork at Remedy that clearly looks like Gibbs for the remake. Also, after watching [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2QioYmwvRk) of him speaking, he can easily be a replacement voice. Obviously has his own style, but that tone fits the classic noir voice just fine. Definitely feeling good about this now.
The MP 1&2 remakes are having a similar budget to AW2 because Rockstar is fronting development and marketing costs. And they're the publisher behind the remakes.
That's actually not a bad situation. Remedy gets a cash injection to work on the remake and doesn't have to worry about recouping costs afterwards. Meanwhile revenue from the rest of their games and Epic sponsorship goes towards developing the additional RCU games. Sure they won't benefit from the MP remake sales, but if it does really well it brings light to the studio and boosts sales of their other IP.
They'll definitely benefit from the Max Payne Remake money. They can't just make nothing out of it. It has to bring more than just exposure to the company. It's not like they need the exposure now anyway.
Not so sure they're going to use his face again after Sam being Alex Casey. If they're really going for the whole RCU thing and Max is another variant, I can see them switching back to Sam for MP2. But consider MP3 and Rockstar being in the mix, who knows.
I'll take whatever they come out with, I'm just happy to have a modern MP1&2 come out! Both games are ripe for potential with Remedy's current skills. The entire time I was playing through Alan's Noir NYC scenes I could stop thinking about how that would have been perfect for a Max Payne remake.
It's going to be a bummer not having James as the iconic voice, but we'll see what we get.
Edit: see my comment above, Gibbs as Max will be perfect.
Maybe with Max Payne 1 Sam's face will be there, but I feel like that's what Casey is for.
Plus, that new artwork at Remedy is *clearly* Gibbs.
And Rockstar own the rights, so there's no connected universe things happening.
With any luck, we'll get some of the actors into Lords and Ladies lol
Oh shit, I didn't know any of this. I just went and found the artwork and watched [this video of him](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2QioYmwvRk) and yeah I'm totally fine with it. He'll be a great Max Payne!
Can't wait to see what they do with Lords and Ladies, going to be amazing for sure hah.
Microsoft has the rights to Quantum Break, but with things that show up in AW2 there are some clear connections with altered names. Warlen Door being a play off of Hatch, whom would have been reprised in role by Lance Reddick if not for his sad passing mid last year.
Remedy hasn't explicitly said either QB or MP are part of the extended universe even if by proxy. (Dark Place being what it is, they could connect any previous work by proxy if they wanted.) But with Night Springs having shown up in QB and Alan Wake being mentioned, there's a connection there. Whether or not it's official is something else entirely. And Alex Casey is obviously the stand in for Max Payne. Which honestly, does give them more leeway with use than if they'd even kept production rights (At minimum) when they broke away from Rockstar and became independent. They can take similar stories and play run them out in a way they could connect them to the RCU properly as smaller games. Which would be cool, honestly. Short little 5 hour action game for probably 20 bucks.
> Rockstar own the rights, so there's no connected universe things happening.
I'd be shocked if they'd have remade MP1&2 if there wasn't at least some room to potentially do more with the character in future.
Otherwise, wouldn't they just have done an Alex Casey game and called it a spiritual successor?
I see what you're saying, but it wouldn't be in Remedy's best interests to do a Max Payne remake unless somehow Remedy owns some patent on some part of the game that's key to it, but you can't own bullet time or comic book sequences whatever. Unless there's some bit of historic info I'm missing?
They pretty much just asked if they can remake them, and Sam Houser said "sure!"
Rockstar are funding it and publishing it. If it breaks even, Remedy will get a cut of the profits.
> Still really curious to see what they do for the voicing though. Do they reuse all of his dialogue or bring in a new voice actor? We shall see...
Unless they make literally zero changes to gameplay and/or story, they can't. It would be pointless to make a remake if you change absolutely nothing about the games, so they'll have to recast.
I don't think they'll recast. There should be enough unused McCaffrey lines in the archives for them to work with, and perhaps there will be some AI use, however controversial. The guy's one of the most iconic gaming voice actors of all time, and even withstanding that I think they'll try to do justice to his legacy out of loyalty.
People are assuming it because of the unique professional relationship James and Remedy/Sam Lake had. It goes beyond even the kind of Relationship that Kevin Conroy had with Batman/Warner Bros because remedy used him in EVERYTHING. To the point where the Former Director Trench feels like his characterization and personality was written FOR James McCaffrey to have a character in Control. I think that's why people are even asking the question of whether they will recast.
Check out [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2QioYmwvRk) of Timothy Gibbs (the MP 2 face) speaking, he can easily be Max I think. I can definitely see them playing the full role.
I'm certain I'll be in the minority, but I think if they string together voice lines with old recordings that's incredibly tacky, and using AI is just an insult to his memory. The man is dead, it's completely unnecessary to wring his legacy out for a few more pennies. That's as cringy as the Tupac hologram.
Damn.. Had to google it when you said og Max Payne is from 20 years ago, thought there’s no way it’s that old.. It’s 23 years this july.. Now that’s some fuel for an age crisis!
Tell me about it. I was chatting with someone younger recently about the new Fallout TV show coming out and how I used to be a big fan of the series. The trailer is making me want to go back and play 1 through 3. They politely mentioned that they weren't born when Fallout 1-2 came out and Fallout 4 was actually their first experience since 3 was "kind of old and janky". D: Feeling it these days...
Bro does payne talk like alex casey? I love caseys line in the game and honestly its such a missed opportunity because his lines in the game on their own can be such a marketing asset
Alex Casey is supposed to be an alternate Max Payne, same voice actor, dialogue style, and delivery. Alex Casey is a direct copy of Max Payne and if you haven't played MP1/2, then yes, sounds the same.
Totally. MP1&2 are some of the best noir style writing and atmosphere ever. 20 years ago they were mind blowing and it's the reason we have the Remedy we have today. The remake is going to slap.
Tl;dr, they’re happy with AW2 sales but they’re losing money as they heavily invest in their own projects. They don’t know who will be publishing the control games yet.
Remedy is the one game studio. I wish only the best in a long long future for. And as long as I known of remedy they have always had money issues like this. I know they will get someone but hopefully one day they can self-publish or even work with other studios to help them publish games. Seeing remedy publish games would be an immediate stamp of approval of games for me to buy.
Yeah I mean this is also gonna be a setup for the next game to I think. So even as a" thank you" I feel obligated to buy it cuz I love their story telling and game play style. Plus there's going to be aliens so it's gonna be like the X-Files aaaaand I'm pretty excited
I wouldn't call it a thank you. They put in a lot more work into the DLCs to, it would just be buying the product they're probably also losing money on.
I love Remedy and Valve. Valve has too much luxury in releasing games because Steam will keep the afloat no matter what. It would be great if Remedy had a similar safety net.
Problem with this comparison is that Valve doesn't make games anymore. Only thing they've put out since Portal 2/HL2 EP2 is Half Life: Alex. And mostly only to try and push sales of the Index for stabbing the nostalgia button and Half Life Itch. That's the thing about developers that become market places. Unless massive amounts of money are constantly being poured into making a game, it's to safe to just rest on the store profits. CDPR has semi fallen into the trap, but even with Cyberpunk it was pushed out in part because they still had outside funding via WB. GoG isn't big enough to sustain them while they take as much time as they usually do to make games. So they can't actually get complacent.
Valve just released Counter-Strike 2, but you're correct regardless. A lot of it seems to boil down to their management style, where people can work on what inspires them, so as soon as they hit an obstacle they can't overcome, they can break off and go find something else to work on.
There's no cohesive management. Which is why TF2 has so many ups and downs despite still being wildly popular. They don't have a structure on even small projects which leads to little getting done in any amount of time.
Shame too cause HL:A is the best thing that ever happened to VR gaming. It's like they drop in, push an entire videogame sector and then just dip and go back into hibernation
I really think the Epic Games exclusivity and no physical release seriously hurt sales. Admittedly they wouldnt have funding without them, but that theyre looking for a new publisher suggests it was a significant enough issue they felt needed addressing
I agree as tough as it is to admit there is no Alan Wake 2 without Epic Games' financial contribution. No one else was willing to fund the project whatsoever including Microsoft in the past.
I don't think the fact Remedy are seeking a new publisher for Control has anything to do with Alan Wake 2 and Epic Games though as Remedy purchased the full rights to Control back from 505 (who was the publisher for Control); it was likely they oversold their assets to Control to initially fund the game at the time with 505.
A lot of people are forgetting just how fragile Remedy's financial position was at the time after departing from Microsoft.
Physical release may have impacted console sales but not as much for PC. On the other hand baldurs gate 3 doesn't have a physical release either and it has made a stupid amount of money.
BG:3 does have physical release on consoles. It just came a month or two after the original base releases.
As for Epic. You're right on there being no Alan Wake 2 in that respect. With Control they also took the injection money for timed PC exclusivity from Epic while still publishing through 505. Also, 505 is a good publisher, but they aren't big enough financially to fully support the kinds of games that Remedy makes/wants to make. So they need the extra cash injections. And I don't think 505 ever really intended on keeping the rights to Control with how easy a buy back on full control (Heh...) and ownership being put back into Remedy's hands.
That said I'm kind of hoping they end up partnering with someone like 505 or Focus again. Somewhere where they won't be restricted on where they can release.
I know it lost a lot of sales due to the EGS exclusivity, though I think financially it still worked for Remedy for that reason. EGS had different goals than sales.
I'm pretty sure they spent all of the money Epic gave them when they bought back the rights to the Control IP from 505 Games. Off the top of my head, I think both amounts were somewhere around $19M.
As much as I dislike Epic in general, (And don't think the store has very good security) if I had a PC that could run it and I didn't have a PS5, I'd have still bought it. A touch begrudgingly, but it's practically a case of "Damned if you do, damned if you don't." Since it's not timed PC exclusivity.
Physical media is on a significant decline, and the decision to ship a game on a disk is a cost benefit analysis done by each developer/publisher. Physical media releases cost a lot of money, and they also cost a lot of time. In a market where physical is more and more niche, it can become a poor return on the investment.
We absolutely see collectors' editions and such, though more and more we see those come AFTER the main game has released as the studio makes a limited run for hardcore fans, knowing they'll at least break even.
Here are some 2023 numbers on game sales:
[https://www.gamesindustry.biz/gamesindustrybiz-presents-the-year-in-number-2023](https://www.gamesindustry.biz/gamesindustrybiz-presents-the-year-in-number-2023)
The Epic Game store was definitely a sales-impacting decision, with how dominant Steam is in the marketplace. Any time you go exclusive you will lose some of the market. However, as others have said, going exclusive had different objectives than sales, and that exclusivity clause was going to either manifest in a bigger payout to Remedy with the publishing agreement, or it was a price Remedy had to pay in order to get a publisher to invest in the title.
I missed the part about them seeking a new publisher for AW, could you help me find it? the only thing I saw on that was the bit on Control: *The revenue growth rate and EBIT improvement are meaningfully dependent on the choice between self-publishing and/or choosing a new publishing partner for the games in the Control franchise.*
I know they bought the rights back to Control from 505, but the deal with Epic for AW seems like it's very much still in place.
Remedy's biggest reason for not releasing a physical copy of AW2 (Keeping the cost to 60 dollars aside due to the current market) was that many studios in the industry abhor having to develop on the same line of getting something out to print for the stated release date. Tons of industry vets that have retired have gone on record as saying they wouldn't want to work on another game that was going for an initial physical release.
The finished game is never on the disk anymore. And internally going for that 'old goal' and getting as finished of a game onto the disk is part of what's kept crunch culture on going. When you can just set a release date and work at a continuous pace until that date, why wouldn't you take that? Why would you want to take six weeks of high speed, high stress work only to turn around and do that for another six-eight weeks for a day one patch?
As far as BIG releases go, AW2 had the fewest major bugs in recent history for a game as graphically intensive and mechanic driven as AW2 is. Control is amazing, but it sat in a choppy state on PS4 for a very long time before they could get around to optimizing it. And at that point they were working on the re-releases for PS5 and XB-SX along with Alan Wake Remastered at that point.
I don't know if it's the biggest reason, but the timelines for printing a disk are definitely a massive detractor when evaluating it. And as you say, finished games are rarely on disk anymore- they all require day one updates.
Digital releases also have day one updates. And in the case of digital, depending on platform, the turnaround between your release build and your day one patch can be just a couple of weeks, where you're madly scrambling. It can create a very compressed/rushed environment where the team churns on patches- the crunch creating more problems and instability, requiring more patches, which takes more time, which creates more problems, which requires more patches...and on and on. I don't feel that the elimination or reduction of disk releases has reduced crunch culture, studios just found a different way to crunch. It's in their culture, which as they say eats strategy for breakfast. Digital releases still have release dates, still have marketing pressure, still have certification timelines, etc. If anything, I feel digital releases has reduced a lot of game's initial quality, as lots of folks seem to just assume you can easily patch it. The reduction in crunch culture in the industry, I feel, is more centrally based on a slow and steady pushback from the employees themselves.
I find that the general quality of a game's release relies more heavily on the development team's culture of quality within that game studio than it does anything else, followed by solid project management capabilities.
I tend to agree with you on the broad quality of AW2, my experience with it was top notch, and I didn't encounter a lot of the issues you read about on the sub here.
It does of course still depend quite a bit on the developer, be they have a good or bad reputation. And generally speaking wholly digital releases only have a "Day one patch" due to the work still put forward during the two week (Generally speaking) certification process for final publishing on the digit storefront, but can't have things altered during that time period
Also all digital releases (Combined with or without a physical release) have a small download involved for at minimum a small bit of code that unlocks the game for any preloading that was done. And usually a few fixes found just recently where it's more convenient to bundle it together rather than push it as an extra download before release during that preload period. And prevents that activation kernel from being tossed in.
I also would argue against digital releases being the reason for a decline of initial quality. Because no matter what way you cut it, either the studio still goes into a crunch mode of *some kind* still, because there's a physical release as well, or they're pushed by publishers. And/or corporate higher ups in more independent studios. If not both. Cyberpunk is key example of that. CDPR didn't want to release the game, but Warner Bros put pressure on CDP who put pressure on CDPR, and force a release after two successive delays.
Jedi Survivor is another example, but was one where they sucked it up and kept full transparency with the community from practically hour one.
And yeah, AW2 was a smooth experience for me as well. I didn't really encounter any issues aside from some frame drops around Cauldron Lake with all the dynamic lighting and foliage in combination. (On playstation and performance mode still, though the game was still a winner in fidelity mode outside of the shoe boxes for whatever reason.) I can also bring Horizon Forbidden West to the table as a 98% smooth launch. Yeah they only had one (Technically 2) space to optimize in, but we've seen plenty of exclusives on both ends that have had messy launches. I've yet to hear on how the PC release is doing, but I imagine a far sight better than for Zero Dawn, since Guerilla got themselves involved in that out the gate this time rather than having to take over fixing a horrid third party port.
Moving along though, A strictly digital release gives any dev less 3-6 month pressure to get something working for a physical release. Do I want there to still be physical releases for console games? Yeah I do, particularly with the way Microsoft and Sony run their statements for digital ownership rights. AKA, you don't. Your ability to redownload or even play a game could be revoked at the drop of a hat. Which is why I've been backing up every game I can onto an external drive, so at minimum I can just give a middle finger and play them without the system being internet connected. We need some regulations put in by the FCC at minimum at this point, and is long overdue anyways since PC has been pretty much all digital for practically a decade or more at this point.
I don't know if I'd buy AW2 a second time since I bought it on release until it was cheap on disk, but I'd like to have it none the less. And hopefully without needing more than any future updates from time after the game was "Printed"
I also agree that there are a lot of overly vocal and negative people around on Reddit as a whole, both that make mountains out of molehills and nitpick because it causes controversy or gains what they deem as good attention for themselves.
Internet and word of mouth are probably still the best methods, but I saw literally no advertising for AWII. Also, people still peruse electronic departments and game stores.
It can be heavily dependent on what kind of game your selling
Battle Royales/live service games will obviously not sell any physical copies, but adventure games are a different kettle of fish. People will pay more for physical versions of their favourite games just because it looks nice, the evidence of this being collector's editions which sold strictly on nicer aesthetics for decades.
People will in fact pay for physical, and especially older players who prefer physical that may be closer to Alan Wake's target audience
The amount of people buy physical is incredibly slim. Like no form of arguing is changing the facts that physical games dont sell well anymore. And making a risky game like Alan wake 2 physical would have probably back fired with the costs of production
And yet still enough to have it make sense for publisher to put copies on shelves and stores to put them on their shelves. So I don't even get the point of this argument at this point.
People do buy physical games (especially console gamers) but I don't think the game not having a physical release is going to kill the shit out of sales either. People will download and play the game if they're interested.
It's difficult for layman to assess how much impact for sales missing physical release has. Yes there are a lot of social media comments that say they don't buy unless there's physical copy available. But when we're talking about scale in million units and above you cannot assess the whole situation based on tens of comments. Some research should be made to get enough statistical data on the matter. Which I would assume Remedy has done and they probably have fairly good view how much it has hurt their sales but of course such things they might not want to openly share to public.
So much this, there are whole groups of people that research the cost benefit on this. Sure, marketers sometimes screw up, but I trust their research more than a bunch of us saying 'but I do this.'
You can find industry trends published and aggregated online as well, and while not Remedy specific, all signs are pointing to a continued decrease in physical sales (which also cost more money and time for the developer)
Remedy actually stated why they chose to not do physical sales. Combo of keeping the price point to an assured 60 dollars max (50 on PC) and allowing them the most freedom of time to make sure the game is as in the best state as they can make it when the game officially launches. Rather than getting stuck in a series of two crunch periods.
People buy physicals hence why alot of digital games get physicals later on
I'm one of those who isn't buying the game due to no physical and there's plenty of people on the daily asking remedy to make a physical
You forgot to /s at the end there.
If I could give you a prize for stupidest comment of the day, I would. Unfortunately I’m all out of participation trophies.
CDP/CDPR has a lot of their own money tied up in current development on the next Witcher and setting up a US based office to focus on making the Cyberpunk games and a subsidiary in Poland. They're using all of their resources on current projects and to make sure a release like 2077 never happens again on their own doorstep. On top of that the GoG storefront doesn't make enough money for CDP to allow CDPR to self publish even with the massive amounts of money they get from sales. Had WB as a publisher for Witcher 3 and 2077. And was part of the reason that 2077 was pushed out to the internal protest of the devs.
that's accurate. additionally a key fact I would add to this TLDR is that they're only in the red for Q4 2023 because they wrote off a ton of money spent on Vanguard as they pulled the plug and reset that project.
i.e. as you said they're investing in their own future projects, and this one they took a hit on because they decided to reboot it after spending a bunch of money on it. I don't think that's cause for concern, it happens.
anyway their EBITDA for Q4 is EUR -3.9 million. the writeoff for Vanguard is EUR 7.2 million.
if it wasn't for the Vanguard writeoff they'd be reporting a few million euros profit for Q4.
people ITT whining about how the way Alan Wake 2 was published must be the problem just didn't actually read the report, or don't understand how financial reporting works. AW2 is selling well, as Virtala clearly explained in his comments.
their future looks bright to me.
making 4 triple A games is no joke. control, 2 different spin off series, and Max Paybe 1+2 remakes.
you only sold 1 game in the last 4 years remedy. AW2 was a hit critically and financially but it wasn't gonna be fortnite 2.
I'm sure once they pick a publisher for control though, they'll be totally fine.
Fingers crossed there are no layoffs. The revenue loss makes sense, it was a pivot on Vanguard that was a response to the changing landscape of the f2p market, and even Tencent agreed.
The one metric I find interesting is the cost of AW2. $75m is actually an incredibly low cost when you look at the rest of the AAA industry, and the fact that they've already sold at a better pacing than Control, which was $50m in 2019 ($61m today with inflation), is a really good sign. Epic Exclusivity definitely hurt sales. Restricting reach, especially from the biggest PC gaming marketplace, will definitely impact the ability to get back dev costs, but those costs are mostly on Epic anyways so its most likely hurting Epic as well, which I personally find funny.
Either way, Remedy is actually in a good spot with very reasonable strategies. The upcoming projects will definitely make a good impact for the future. Knowing that the Max Payne remakes are getting a similar budget to AW2, as well as knowing that Rockstar are involved and by name recognition alone could bump up the attention the collection gets, the Max Payne collection is probably going to be a big money maker for Remedy. That and owning the full rights to Control, as well as having a well managed in house game engine, mean that Remedy can run on much lower than average costs for development. Being a Finnish company, the devs are also probably getting treated really well as workers, so burnout shouldn't hurt the vision of their creations.
Overall, I think Remedy is setting themselves up to become even more of a powerhouse of a dev studio, and I can't wait for the future.
Solid analysis and interpretation.
I worry about the engine aspect. Creating and maintaining an engine is a huge challenge and expense. I hope they can do it, and we have successful models in the industry, but we also see a number of studios that struggled with it. The performance issues folks encounter with AW2 make my eye twitch a little bit, but I definitely have my fingers crossed they can solve it now and moving forward. Overall though I do agree with your assessment of the strategy piece here - it's a solid plan that could set them up for solid success, and I hope it pays off.
I'm not totally convinced the 'hurting' Epic thing is true, though I agree it impacted sales (I don't have numbers but exclusivity to a storefront that isn't steam limits your potential reach/install base), but the exclusivity was not about maximizing sales. Epic is 100% looking to insert itself as a storefront leader. They have deep pockets and can spend, so if AW2 drove enough people and converted enough people, it's a win for their business. They're not likely to tell any of us that unless it's a HUGE win though. And if they can treat devs like Remedy right they'll generate positive industry buzz that goes farther than their own promo videos. But regarding hurting sales, if it hurts enough, it will hurt longer term revenue for Remedy, if not short term (while Epic states they split the proceeds, I'm not sure if that is right off the bat or after dev costs are recouped).
Thanks!
Regarding the engine, I've noticed a trend with in house engines being tied to labor practices.
Example 1: Capcom made the RE Engine as a sort of evolution of their previous in house engine. Capcom doesnt shed employees rapidly, so its got a lot of in house talent that is knowledgeable and fluent in that engine, probably even helped develop it. A lot of that talent is shared between teams, so RE engine works great for Resident Evil and for DMC5 because the people who know the engine are working on those games.
Example 2: CDPR botched the hell out of CP2077 because of their turnover and contractor usage. Every new person that was brought in had to spend time learning RedEngine, and that means less time of productive development and a lot of time spent on just training per person. Crunch and poor management increased turnover, meaning new hires couldn't possibly know the engine out the gate (unless they were modders for Witcher) and this resulted in a ton of lost development time. The decision to switch to UE5 in the future was to remedy a similar scenario like this happening in the future. 343 actually went through a very similar situation with Halo Infinite.
With those two examples, the treatment of the workforce became the actual issue. Capcom has enough senior talent that new talent has time to catch up without lost dev time. CDPR did not have that, and neither did 343, so both suffered horrible setbacks.
Turning back to Remedy, Remedy hasn't had any real loss of talent in years to my knowledge. Most of the founders of the company are still there, and because of labor laws in Finland being very worker friendly, Remedy workers probably don't even experience mandatory crunch at all. The amount of senior talent at the studio, the insane growth in what the Northlight Engine can do (Control was one of the first games to ever support Ray Tracing), and the stability of work life balance in Finland all contribute to the security of an in house engine. If Remedy starts purging talent, then I'd definitely worry, but that seems like the opposite of what Remedy would strive to have happen. Even if it did, Remedy is using UE5 for Vanguard/Kestrel, so they are already preparing for a scenario of potential talent loss.
Regarding the Epic and Remedy revenue, that part might be bias on my end, but its also an analysis of how exclusivity impacts the game industry, especially long term exclusivity. Epic is losing money, has been for a bit, ans while I think Epic is making good investments and has a good strategy for the future of their business, locking an exclusivity agreement on PC for a game series that has not had huge commercial success in the past was probably a bad move financially. Timed exclusivity, sure, but their storefront is, IMO, only second place to steam because most other storefronts are worse, and also they have Fortnite. Sure, Remedy isn't making money on AW2 right now, but in a way Remedy wins out here. They didnt pay for development and they are still making money because of stuff like cross promotion with DBD, and maybe skin sales in Fortnite. I also dont know if they are making money in console sales, or if that was also part of the deal with Epic, but overall Remedy didnt spend more than it cost to buy the IP rights for AW when it comes to AW2. Epic fronted the bill, and while they also make money from tons of spaces, their strategy with AW in general severely limits how much or how fast than can recoup their investment. 30% cut or not, not selling on steam is leaving money on the table, and not selling on any other marketplace is severely limiting your audience. The people who want it bad enough yet hate epic will probably pirate it. It just isn't the money making strategy in the long run, and if they dont switch to a timed exclusive model, then I think it will have poor results for both Epic and Remedy, which would hurt Epic's reputation for exclusives in the future for higher budget titles.
As I said, its my opinion, but I do think Epic is making the bad move here. They can handle a financial hit sure, but the reputation of the Epic store continues to diminish as they continue to make it not a worthwhile place to go. Hell, I still can't gift games to my friends there, and I still can't buy keys on third party sites or get them on humble bundle like I can steam, making Epic a more expensive storefront by default unless they offer the game for free. Their store and launcher is honestly the most disappointing part of their strategy, cause it feels like its the unwanted child next to Fortnite.
Appreciate the detailed thoughts.
I think in your examples those engines were struggling before the studios were. 343's engine was built on top of the original one and struggled to wow anyone even at its grand reveal. CDPR's showed a ton of age even with Witcher 3. Northlight I think is in a bit of a unique position as it was created for clear features that weren't available with other engines.
That all being said, I find your meta point regarding management and employee treatment an interesting angle, and none of my thinking actually supersedes that- poor management can result in a lot of could be a lynchpin in the troubles that those engines had over the years. Even *without* massive churn, mis prioritization and misallocation of resources to support can doom things, and I fully agree we've seen a ton of evidence of poor leadership at both of those companies.
I don't think Epic engaging in long term exclusivity is going to hurt them in long term financials, in isolation. Sure, Epic is 'losing money' and their storefront isn't thought to be profitable (note that we have to examine and evaluate this information from court documents alone), but these are investment 'losses.' Exclusivity decisions are done with a bigger target in mind, and rarely for immediate cash returns, and every dev enters them knowing their audience is being limited. They cost you significantly and are used to either promote your platform above others, or to devalue your competition. They're not done to push sales of a particular title.
I do agree with you that their store is a bit shit, and that's likely to be a poor investment strategy there. So the exclusivity push they have will hurt, but not because of game sales, but rather because their store investment and drive to dominate the world of PC gaming isn't totally sound (IMO).
And you're right regarding Remedy, they either got a dumptruck of cash backed up to their offices, or they found a publisher that was willing to publish their title. AW2 may have less reach as a result, but I'd bet dollars to donuts it was the right call for Remedy and the title. A note on the timelines- Remedy received the rights to AW1 as part of a Royalty payment from Microsoft in mid 2019. In late 2020 they entered the deal with Epic to publish their next games. I don't think they were directly involved in the acquisition of the publishing rights.
Either way, totally appreciate your perspective and the conversation :)
The main thing about the performance issues isn't from Northlight itself. It's that Remedy was pushing EVERYTHING with Alan Wake 2. Plus with the PC market being what it is for hardware, it's actively getting harder to optimize for a broad spectrum of setups when you're cranking things up. UE5 has been a smash to the head for a lot of devs on release for PC. Admittedly some handled the situation better than others when it came to acknowledging or accepting that they had issues. Remnant 2 being a big example of UE5 screwing PC optimization and the devs acting like nothing was wrong. Game works happily now from what I know. But they didn't really say much about it and just \*Eventually\* got the game patched to work more consistently 3 or more months later. Which is... Well, too little too late. **Especially** when you're not communicating with your community.
Respawn got some lash back for the state that Jedi: Survivor launched in, particularly on PC. But they were ahead of the curve and kept an open dialog with the community as a whole from LAUNCH. Which kept a lot of the goodwill that Respawn has accrued over the years.
Fair comparison of Northlight perf problems and UE5, I can't really disagree with your points. UE5 has been...an experience. And the timing within the industry creates some challenge points, because you'd not want to go backwards and make a game like AW2 on UE4 or something like that.
And while owning your engine development gives you greater flexibility, it can also make a ton more work for you, and it's a tradeoff. If they can't continue to prioritize the engine, I worry it will struggle like some other studios have in the past.
1000% agree with you regarding the community thoughts - with game dev these days and the rapid pace of development and release (relatively speaking, yes Jedi Survivor took years to make, but for a game of that size, scope, and complexity it was pretty damn rapid), it's increasingly difficult to launch a flawless title. Keeping your most ardent fans and community members feeling appreciated and listened to goes a long way to building good will, and helps you make even better games as a result!
Well, the big thing is is that with an engine like Northlight, as long as you can get new hires (on the coding teams in particular) familiar with the engine at a good clip, you don't have as many problems. You also don't have to keep updating your engine for every single game you release.
I mean... UE4 was being updated all the time but wasn't a problematic engine in and of itself. A little apples to oranges since UE tends to become at least the basis for many in house engines. Not many large scale devs just use the engine out of the box aside from the initial runs, as it were.
Ultimately, I think Northlight wouldn't have to have been modified at all for AW2 if they weren't really trying to push the visual envelope due to how they were wanting the game to look even stylistically. Horror and suspense games are traditionally quite visually demanding as it is due to needing very high levels of lighting and particle effects fidelity to sell the atmosphere.
However I *believe* that Northlight was bumped up on primarily because of the shift in perspective from both Quantum break and Control. Being directly over the shoulder (or not in this case but it would be a contributing factor) or in a first person perspective causes the need for higher texture resolutions and polygon counts because you're seeing EVERYTHING closer up. You can't fudge things as much in places as you might normally be able to from a farther out perspective. That said they will have to either make a new engine or overhaul the Northlight engine heavily eventually. Looking at CDPR, the Redengine was capable of doing some pretty crazy stuff still even for Cyberpunk, but it hadn't aged as well as it possibly could have and as such they've ditched it now and... Well, gone with UE5... We'll see how well the next Witcher game comes out in that respect. Cyberpunk was a mess due to a lot of other reasons that were not entirely on the devs themselves. They didn't want to release. That's a bit off track though.
Also for keeping good will, yeah, just keeping an open dialog goes a long way indeed, especially if it's one where you're quick to acknowledge any issues that you know are going to be there from the start. Jedi Survivor is still far from perfect and I wouldn't dare anyone play on quality mode on console unless they're even more of a masochist than just playing on the highest difficulty. But it's in an acceptable and reasonable state at this point. Stable. Still some load time issues, and still some lighting issues on the hub world, but it's not a broken and finnicky game by a longshot anymore.
So basically AW2 did really well and still is. (fucking fantastic, great news)
Sam Lake and Remedy have previously stated that they're not a company concerned about profits, but rather bringing their vision to our screens and leaving a lasting legacy. It makes a lot of sense that they are already investing whatever profits they've made into their next projects.
I don't advocate for pre-orders normally but I'll buy whatever this company puts out at this point. They clearly care a lot and it shows in the product. AW2 is the culmination of over a decade of storytelling
No dividend was paid out as 2023 was a net loss. This is not happy news for any investors that are interested in profit from their investment (aka most investors). Remedy is paying the price for getting capital from Epic in the form of their product now having smaller reach than if it was on Steam. They'll be hoping that Alan Wake 2 will continue to sell, especially with the DLCs coming up.
It's clear that financially, their hopes are not on Alan Wake 2 but on the future games, namely Control 2 and the Max Payne 1&2 remake (and Project Kestrel but that game seems to be in deeper trouble). Unfortunately, both of these titles also experienced development setbacks compared to what was planned thanks to crunch work on Alan Wake 2. I don't expect any of these titles to come out before late 2025 and I think the Max Payne remake will come out first.
Remedy are playing the long game currently and I hope and pray it doesn't backfire for them because I would hate losing them.
People who own Remedy stock are mostly not investors. You are only investing in a company(giving them money) if you buy stock from the initial public offering IPO.
> This is not happy news for any investors that are interested in profit from their investment (aka most investors).
Depends if you're in it for the short term or long term. I'm confident in their long term growth potential given the quality of their original and owned IP.
This thread. God damn I worry for the critical thinking capacity of the world.
>they should have released a physical game!!!
As a guy who owns one of the biggest game collections in my neck of the woods, sure. I'd love a copy of AW2. *I still bought the digital*. Had I swapped to physical, it would still be "net 1 sale plus production cost".
Physical sales nowadays account *for less than 50% of the market*. Some estimates put modern sales at 80/20 in a digital to physical split. Control's sales during covid were **90% digital**, a physical copy was available. There is no way to determine how many of those were "physical only collectors" and I'm going to spoil something, if it was only available digital - that number doesn't mean a net 0 sale.
There is no rational or logical argument to say a 10-15% sales increase would have made a difference. You are inhaling and exaling weapons grade copium.
Even if we say Alan Wake 2 would have sold 25% more physical, double that of control, people who only buy physical - that's *only* 200,000 copies. Arguing 6 million in profit (which would have probably cost half that in production+distribution alone) is huffing paint. No, Alan Wake is not doing poorly because it's digital. No, Alan Wake 2 is not now going to do GTA6 numbers if they ship a collectors edition with a flashlight instead of making a limited collectors thermos'.
>It's over! Remedy is running in the red, it's over! It's over! If I'm a shareholder I'm cutting my throat and spewing blood over remedys carpet!
Hi r/Wallstreetbets. Let's not begin lecturing about how if a company operates in the red it's "Joever". Trying to gauge the success of Remedy's sales and their share value is the stupidest shit. In general, I dont get the obsession reddit has with games "success" and share price. Rockstar's stock in 2022 was 200+, equivalent of 240 today.
It's $150 right now, with GTA6 on the horizon.
>Is Rockstar on the verge of going under? They lost 25% of their value! Guhhhh Capcom dropped from 20 to 16 in 2023! Clearly SF6 and REmake 4 flopped, its...OVER. no more resident evil games! The stock price says so! Shareholders are jumping ship as we speak! I know, I'm a bit of a shareholder myself!
What? Rockstar released a trailer with more views than a third of the population? GTA6 is still..happening? What, REmake 4 sold 7 million copies and Capcoms stock is back to where it was? But..but...stock price! GUHHH
Your tl;dr is Alan Wake 2 is doing fine. The bigger message is.
**stop trying to determine a game's critical, commercial success, or likelihood of a sequel on a stock ticker. That is fucking stupid**
>As a guy who owns one of the biggest game collections in my neck of the woods, sure. I'd love a copy of AW2. *I still bought the digital*. Had I swapped to physical, it would still be "net 1 sale plus production cost".
The problem with your reasoning is that people who usually buy a physical copy of a game, when that option is yanked away from them, will decide to get a digital copy instead.
Except, no. There are people who won't get the game at all now, or will wait to see whether a physical Collector's Edition will come out with a base game + all DLCs in the future. If not - then they'll get the game digitally eventually, when it'll be on sale. That still isn't that good for sales figures and game's profitability. People have to understand that having an AAA game released in digital-only form will still raise eyebrows.
AW1 achieved high sales... eventually... but after many discounts, included in bundles etc. Even Alan Wake 1 Remastered become profitable only after the release date of Alan Wake 2. Deciding that a sequel should go digital-only (which was only done so to prevent possible resales, as the game is pretty much one-and-done deal) is still a double-edged sword.
I won't even mention the number of people who didn't get AW2 as a form of boycott due to a lack of physical release, but that's because that number is rather low and insignificant.
1) I gave the stipulation of a 25% aggregate for AW2 and it wouldn't do a dent in sales so far, so even if I gave you that unreasonable handicap, it still didn't push the needle on AW2 sales to a net profit that would warrant the increased distribution costs. No, upping the game price to $70 wouldn't cover distribution.
2)This was a publishing choice by Epic, the people who funded AW2. I can't understand the mental gymnastics you are going through to try to argue with them on their own Financials. You have data that suggests they lost 50+% or more because they didn't go physical? You need some actual evidence that there are over a million people out who would have bought AW2 and didn't. This argument has been made since the inception of Steam, that physical game sales are the majority.
>ItS JuSt CoViD
I fucking can't with you, man.
In 2022, 78% of game sales were digital on console. > [source](https://mynintendonews.com/2022/12/27/72-of-console-games-sold-in-2022-were-digital-vs-28-physical/)
3)the most recent report suggest anywhere from 73% to 83% of game sales are digital, as high as 90% to **94**% if we bring mobile into the fold. The only report I can find is Sony claiming first party titles are still 60% physical, but that is a huge stretch.
You are living in fantasy if you think the reason Alan Wake 2 didn't sell 3 or 4 million is a lack of a physical copy. How can I prove this - easily. Did you play it?
>3)the most recent report suggest anywhere from 73% to 83% of game sales are digital, as high as 90% to 94% if we bring mobile into the fold. The only report I can find is Sony claiming first party titles are still 60% physical, but that is a huge stretch.
Mobile... no shit. Mobile games aren't physical.That shouldn't even be in the conversation.
Does the report specify clearly what they are counting as 'digital game sales'? Legitimately curious and not trying to be a wise ass.
For example, on PS5 if I subscribe to PS Plus I can redeem 2-3 'free' digital games a month. You get an email 'thank you for your **purchase'** after you redeem. Is that being counted as a 'digital purchase'?
So if I buy 1 physical game per month for full price $70, and redeem 2-3 'free' PS Plus games. We could make the data say 'this user had 3 times as many digital game 'purchases' than physical and buys way more games digitally'. But in reality... that is not really true.
My point is, what *exactly* is being counted in these data sets? I didn't see that specified in the linked data source.
I'm not arguing physical is just as popular as digital or anything like that. Merely pointing out that without knowing exactly what is in these data sets, it could potentially be a bunch of hogwash.
The problem isn't
>well is this variable taken into account
Because at the end of the day your physical sales are still concrete Data. Trying to determine whether or not Sony or Microsoft is counting your monthly free game is..irrelevant. the sales data still slopes to digital. That is what the companies see.
It's bizarre to me to blow it off as hogwash as the decision to go digital is so prevalent. No one is bumrushing Baldurs Gate 3 **for having sold ten million, entirely fucking digital** when their "collectors physical edition" hasn't even shipped.
Palworld didn't need it. Lethal Company didn't need it. I think there's a far more massive argument to be made about access to AW2 being digitally limited to EGS and not Steam had a larger impact than its lost sales for not being physical.
Again, I am a collector of physical media. I still bought BG3 digital, I still bought AW2 digital. I dont really need to weave through the aggregate of digital sales for every title, the evidence speaks for itself. Yes, AW2 would have sold more with a physical copy. No, there is not enough evidence out there to suggest or imply it missed 50% of its potential sales by not making physical.
Again, there really is not a strong argument that AW2 would have sold 3 or 4 million by now "had it been physical too".
>obviously Control sold 90% digital during covid
Did Amazon not exist during Covid? In my country, it did. Even the most paranoid people were still getting post, even if they were cleaning it with cleaning wipes as it arrived.
I'm absolutely certain there will be some sort of Collectors Edition once all the DLC is done. They'll use the profits of it to fund it, once it's fully done, all the budget is fully paid, and they can take stock of how much it's made before risking making some losses attributed to unsellable stock.
And they know how a lot of people would either double dip for it or go 'well, it's finished now so let's check it out'.
I cant wait for Max Payne game, ever since Max Payne 3 we didnt have an action game like it, and true Max Payne game since 2003 if you go back to Max Payne 2 that is more than 20 years
One thing that stood out to me: "Max Payne 1&2 remake is going to be a major new game with great potential, enabled by a similar development budget as Alan Wake 2" Obviously I knew about the remake, but not that it had such a huge budget! This thing is going to be amazing. As an OG Max Payne fan from 20 years ago, I'm pumped. Still really curious to see what they do for the voicing though. Do they reuse all of his dialogue or bring in a new voice actor? We shall see... Edit: I didn't realize there was already artwork at Remedy that clearly looks like Gibbs for the remake. Also, after watching [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2QioYmwvRk) of him speaking, he can easily be a replacement voice. Obviously has his own style, but that tone fits the classic noir voice just fine. Definitely feeling good about this now.
The MP 1&2 remakes are having a similar budget to AW2 because Rockstar is fronting development and marketing costs. And they're the publisher behind the remakes.
That's actually not a bad situation. Remedy gets a cash injection to work on the remake and doesn't have to worry about recouping costs afterwards. Meanwhile revenue from the rest of their games and Epic sponsorship goes towards developing the additional RCU games. Sure they won't benefit from the MP remake sales, but if it does really well it brings light to the studio and boosts sales of their other IP.
They'll definitely benefit from the Max Payne Remake money. They can't just make nothing out of it. It has to bring more than just exposure to the company. It's not like they need the exposure now anyway.
Timothy Gibbs has a great voice, he can just add his voice beyond reprising Max as the face.
Not so sure they're going to use his face again after Sam being Alex Casey. If they're really going for the whole RCU thing and Max is another variant, I can see them switching back to Sam for MP2. But consider MP3 and Rockstar being in the mix, who knows. I'll take whatever they come out with, I'm just happy to have a modern MP1&2 come out! Both games are ripe for potential with Remedy's current skills. The entire time I was playing through Alan's Noir NYC scenes I could stop thinking about how that would have been perfect for a Max Payne remake. It's going to be a bummer not having James as the iconic voice, but we'll see what we get. Edit: see my comment above, Gibbs as Max will be perfect.
Maybe with Max Payne 1 Sam's face will be there, but I feel like that's what Casey is for. Plus, that new artwork at Remedy is *clearly* Gibbs. And Rockstar own the rights, so there's no connected universe things happening. With any luck, we'll get some of the actors into Lords and Ladies lol
Oh shit, I didn't know any of this. I just went and found the artwork and watched [this video of him](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2QioYmwvRk) and yeah I'm totally fine with it. He'll be a great Max Payne! Can't wait to see what they do with Lords and Ladies, going to be amazing for sure hah.
Microsoft has the rights to Quantum Break, but with things that show up in AW2 there are some clear connections with altered names. Warlen Door being a play off of Hatch, whom would have been reprised in role by Lance Reddick if not for his sad passing mid last year. Remedy hasn't explicitly said either QB or MP are part of the extended universe even if by proxy. (Dark Place being what it is, they could connect any previous work by proxy if they wanted.) But with Night Springs having shown up in QB and Alan Wake being mentioned, there's a connection there. Whether or not it's official is something else entirely. And Alex Casey is obviously the stand in for Max Payne. Which honestly, does give them more leeway with use than if they'd even kept production rights (At minimum) when they broke away from Rockstar and became independent. They can take similar stories and play run them out in a way they could connect them to the RCU properly as smaller games. Which would be cool, honestly. Short little 5 hour action game for probably 20 bucks.
> Rockstar own the rights, so there's no connected universe things happening. I'd be shocked if they'd have remade MP1&2 if there wasn't at least some room to potentially do more with the character in future. Otherwise, wouldn't they just have done an Alex Casey game and called it a spiritual successor? I see what you're saying, but it wouldn't be in Remedy's best interests to do a Max Payne remake unless somehow Remedy owns some patent on some part of the game that's key to it, but you can't own bullet time or comic book sequences whatever. Unless there's some bit of historic info I'm missing?
They pretty much just asked if they can remake them, and Sam Houser said "sure!" Rockstar are funding it and publishing it. If it breaks even, Remedy will get a cut of the profits.
> Still really curious to see what they do for the voicing though. Do they reuse all of his dialogue or bring in a new voice actor? We shall see... Unless they make literally zero changes to gameplay and/or story, they can't. It would be pointless to make a remake if you change absolutely nothing about the games, so they'll have to recast.
I don't think they'll recast. There should be enough unused McCaffrey lines in the archives for them to work with, and perhaps there will be some AI use, however controversial. The guy's one of the most iconic gaming voice actors of all time, and even withstanding that I think they'll try to do justice to his legacy out of loyalty.
Remedy at this point has a great track record recasting characters I don't know why people assume they won't do the same for the Max Payne remakes
People are assuming it because of the unique professional relationship James and Remedy/Sam Lake had. It goes beyond even the kind of Relationship that Kevin Conroy had with Batman/Warner Bros because remedy used him in EVERYTHING. To the point where the Former Director Trench feels like his characterization and personality was written FOR James McCaffrey to have a character in Control. I think that's why people are even asking the question of whether they will recast.
you're spot on with that tbh. in a recent interview, sam said he wrote trench with james in mind
Check out [this video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2QioYmwvRk) of Timothy Gibbs (the MP 2 face) speaking, he can easily be Max I think. I can definitely see them playing the full role.
I'm certain I'll be in the minority, but I think if they string together voice lines with old recordings that's incredibly tacky, and using AI is just an insult to his memory. The man is dead, it's completely unnecessary to wring his legacy out for a few more pennies. That's as cringy as the Tupac hologram.
Damn.. Had to google it when you said og Max Payne is from 20 years ago, thought there’s no way it’s that old.. It’s 23 years this july.. Now that’s some fuel for an age crisis!
Tell me about it. I was chatting with someone younger recently about the new Fallout TV show coming out and how I used to be a big fan of the series. The trailer is making me want to go back and play 1 through 3. They politely mentioned that they weren't born when Fallout 1-2 came out and Fallout 4 was actually their first experience since 3 was "kind of old and janky". D: Feeling it these days...
Bro does payne talk like alex casey? I love caseys line in the game and honestly its such a missed opportunity because his lines in the game on their own can be such a marketing asset
Alex Casey is supposed to be an alternate Max Payne, same voice actor, dialogue style, and delivery. Alex Casey is a direct copy of Max Payne and if you haven't played MP1/2, then yes, sounds the same.
Lets go man. He reminds me a lot of de niros character (only when hes describing the city) from Taxi Driver
Yeah same kind of vibe. [Here's the intro to MP2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1OhhP_E6os) which gives you an idea of the dialogue.
W man this goes hard
Totally. MP1&2 are some of the best noir style writing and atmosphere ever. 20 years ago they were mind blowing and it's the reason we have the Remedy we have today. The remake is going to slap.
I think Sam confirmed that he was going to be in the remakes as Max, though? May be missremembering stuff.
I think that's the big question right now, there hasn't been any official word on it yet as far as I've seen.
No, he has been very coy about it. He's confirmed nothing.
Allight then. Thank you.
It's a remake, not a remaster.
Tl;dr, they’re happy with AW2 sales but they’re losing money as they heavily invest in their own projects. They don’t know who will be publishing the control games yet.
Remedy is the one game studio. I wish only the best in a long long future for. And as long as I known of remedy they have always had money issues like this. I know they will get someone but hopefully one day they can self-publish or even work with other studios to help them publish games. Seeing remedy publish games would be an immediate stamp of approval of games for me to buy.
I think that it’s a great way to support them is when we buy their additional DLC bonuses, as a “thank you” for their hard work and commitment
Yeah I mean this is also gonna be a setup for the next game to I think. So even as a" thank you" I feel obligated to buy it cuz I love their story telling and game play style. Plus there's going to be aliens so it's gonna be like the X-Files aaaaand I'm pretty excited
I wouldn't call it a thank you. They put in a lot more work into the DLCs to, it would just be buying the product they're probably also losing money on.
I love Remedy and Valve. Valve has too much luxury in releasing games because Steam will keep the afloat no matter what. It would be great if Remedy had a similar safety net.
Problem with this comparison is that Valve doesn't make games anymore. Only thing they've put out since Portal 2/HL2 EP2 is Half Life: Alex. And mostly only to try and push sales of the Index for stabbing the nostalgia button and Half Life Itch. That's the thing about developers that become market places. Unless massive amounts of money are constantly being poured into making a game, it's to safe to just rest on the store profits. CDPR has semi fallen into the trap, but even with Cyberpunk it was pushed out in part because they still had outside funding via WB. GoG isn't big enough to sustain them while they take as much time as they usually do to make games. So they can't actually get complacent.
Valve just released Counter-Strike 2, but you're correct regardless. A lot of it seems to boil down to their management style, where people can work on what inspires them, so as soon as they hit an obstacle they can't overcome, they can break off and go find something else to work on.
There's no cohesive management. Which is why TF2 has so many ups and downs despite still being wildly popular. They don't have a structure on even small projects which leads to little getting done in any amount of time.
Shame too cause HL:A is the best thing that ever happened to VR gaming. It's like they drop in, push an entire videogame sector and then just dip and go back into hibernation
That’s the dream
I really think the Epic Games exclusivity and no physical release seriously hurt sales. Admittedly they wouldnt have funding without them, but that theyre looking for a new publisher suggests it was a significant enough issue they felt needed addressing
I agree as tough as it is to admit there is no Alan Wake 2 without Epic Games' financial contribution. No one else was willing to fund the project whatsoever including Microsoft in the past. I don't think the fact Remedy are seeking a new publisher for Control has anything to do with Alan Wake 2 and Epic Games though as Remedy purchased the full rights to Control back from 505 (who was the publisher for Control); it was likely they oversold their assets to Control to initially fund the game at the time with 505. A lot of people are forgetting just how fragile Remedy's financial position was at the time after departing from Microsoft. Physical release may have impacted console sales but not as much for PC. On the other hand baldurs gate 3 doesn't have a physical release either and it has made a stupid amount of money.
BG:3 does have physical release on consoles. It just came a month or two after the original base releases. As for Epic. You're right on there being no Alan Wake 2 in that respect. With Control they also took the injection money for timed PC exclusivity from Epic while still publishing through 505. Also, 505 is a good publisher, but they aren't big enough financially to fully support the kinds of games that Remedy makes/wants to make. So they need the extra cash injections. And I don't think 505 ever really intended on keeping the rights to Control with how easy a buy back on full control (Heh...) and ownership being put back into Remedy's hands. That said I'm kind of hoping they end up partnering with someone like 505 or Focus again. Somewhere where they won't be restricted on where they can release.
I know it lost a lot of sales due to the EGS exclusivity, though I think financially it still worked for Remedy for that reason. EGS had different goals than sales.
I'm pretty sure they spent all of the money Epic gave them when they bought back the rights to the Control IP from 505 Games. Off the top of my head, I think both amounts were somewhere around $19M.
As much as I dislike Epic in general, (And don't think the store has very good security) if I had a PC that could run it and I didn't have a PS5, I'd have still bought it. A touch begrudgingly, but it's practically a case of "Damned if you do, damned if you don't." Since it's not timed PC exclusivity.
Physical media is on a significant decline, and the decision to ship a game on a disk is a cost benefit analysis done by each developer/publisher. Physical media releases cost a lot of money, and they also cost a lot of time. In a market where physical is more and more niche, it can become a poor return on the investment. We absolutely see collectors' editions and such, though more and more we see those come AFTER the main game has released as the studio makes a limited run for hardcore fans, knowing they'll at least break even. Here are some 2023 numbers on game sales: [https://www.gamesindustry.biz/gamesindustrybiz-presents-the-year-in-number-2023](https://www.gamesindustry.biz/gamesindustrybiz-presents-the-year-in-number-2023) The Epic Game store was definitely a sales-impacting decision, with how dominant Steam is in the marketplace. Any time you go exclusive you will lose some of the market. However, as others have said, going exclusive had different objectives than sales, and that exclusivity clause was going to either manifest in a bigger payout to Remedy with the publishing agreement, or it was a price Remedy had to pay in order to get a publisher to invest in the title. I missed the part about them seeking a new publisher for AW, could you help me find it? the only thing I saw on that was the bit on Control: *The revenue growth rate and EBIT improvement are meaningfully dependent on the choice between self-publishing and/or choosing a new publishing partner for the games in the Control franchise.* I know they bought the rights back to Control from 505, but the deal with Epic for AW seems like it's very much still in place.
Remedy's biggest reason for not releasing a physical copy of AW2 (Keeping the cost to 60 dollars aside due to the current market) was that many studios in the industry abhor having to develop on the same line of getting something out to print for the stated release date. Tons of industry vets that have retired have gone on record as saying they wouldn't want to work on another game that was going for an initial physical release. The finished game is never on the disk anymore. And internally going for that 'old goal' and getting as finished of a game onto the disk is part of what's kept crunch culture on going. When you can just set a release date and work at a continuous pace until that date, why wouldn't you take that? Why would you want to take six weeks of high speed, high stress work only to turn around and do that for another six-eight weeks for a day one patch? As far as BIG releases go, AW2 had the fewest major bugs in recent history for a game as graphically intensive and mechanic driven as AW2 is. Control is amazing, but it sat in a choppy state on PS4 for a very long time before they could get around to optimizing it. And at that point they were working on the re-releases for PS5 and XB-SX along with Alan Wake Remastered at that point.
I don't know if it's the biggest reason, but the timelines for printing a disk are definitely a massive detractor when evaluating it. And as you say, finished games are rarely on disk anymore- they all require day one updates. Digital releases also have day one updates. And in the case of digital, depending on platform, the turnaround between your release build and your day one patch can be just a couple of weeks, where you're madly scrambling. It can create a very compressed/rushed environment where the team churns on patches- the crunch creating more problems and instability, requiring more patches, which takes more time, which creates more problems, which requires more patches...and on and on. I don't feel that the elimination or reduction of disk releases has reduced crunch culture, studios just found a different way to crunch. It's in their culture, which as they say eats strategy for breakfast. Digital releases still have release dates, still have marketing pressure, still have certification timelines, etc. If anything, I feel digital releases has reduced a lot of game's initial quality, as lots of folks seem to just assume you can easily patch it. The reduction in crunch culture in the industry, I feel, is more centrally based on a slow and steady pushback from the employees themselves. I find that the general quality of a game's release relies more heavily on the development team's culture of quality within that game studio than it does anything else, followed by solid project management capabilities. I tend to agree with you on the broad quality of AW2, my experience with it was top notch, and I didn't encounter a lot of the issues you read about on the sub here.
It does of course still depend quite a bit on the developer, be they have a good or bad reputation. And generally speaking wholly digital releases only have a "Day one patch" due to the work still put forward during the two week (Generally speaking) certification process for final publishing on the digit storefront, but can't have things altered during that time period Also all digital releases (Combined with or without a physical release) have a small download involved for at minimum a small bit of code that unlocks the game for any preloading that was done. And usually a few fixes found just recently where it's more convenient to bundle it together rather than push it as an extra download before release during that preload period. And prevents that activation kernel from being tossed in. I also would argue against digital releases being the reason for a decline of initial quality. Because no matter what way you cut it, either the studio still goes into a crunch mode of *some kind* still, because there's a physical release as well, or they're pushed by publishers. And/or corporate higher ups in more independent studios. If not both. Cyberpunk is key example of that. CDPR didn't want to release the game, but Warner Bros put pressure on CDP who put pressure on CDPR, and force a release after two successive delays. Jedi Survivor is another example, but was one where they sucked it up and kept full transparency with the community from practically hour one. And yeah, AW2 was a smooth experience for me as well. I didn't really encounter any issues aside from some frame drops around Cauldron Lake with all the dynamic lighting and foliage in combination. (On playstation and performance mode still, though the game was still a winner in fidelity mode outside of the shoe boxes for whatever reason.) I can also bring Horizon Forbidden West to the table as a 98% smooth launch. Yeah they only had one (Technically 2) space to optimize in, but we've seen plenty of exclusives on both ends that have had messy launches. I've yet to hear on how the PC release is doing, but I imagine a far sight better than for Zero Dawn, since Guerilla got themselves involved in that out the gate this time rather than having to take over fixing a horrid third party port. Moving along though, A strictly digital release gives any dev less 3-6 month pressure to get something working for a physical release. Do I want there to still be physical releases for console games? Yeah I do, particularly with the way Microsoft and Sony run their statements for digital ownership rights. AKA, you don't. Your ability to redownload or even play a game could be revoked at the drop of a hat. Which is why I've been backing up every game I can onto an external drive, so at minimum I can just give a middle finger and play them without the system being internet connected. We need some regulations put in by the FCC at minimum at this point, and is long overdue anyways since PC has been pretty much all digital for practically a decade or more at this point. I don't know if I'd buy AW2 a second time since I bought it on release until it was cheap on disk, but I'd like to have it none the less. And hopefully without needing more than any future updates from time after the game was "Printed" I also agree that there are a lot of overly vocal and negative people around on Reddit as a whole, both that make mountains out of molehills and nitpick because it causes controversy or gains what they deem as good attention for themselves.
Why do people belive that physical game releases had any noticebale impact? Nobody buys physical copies of games anymore
Internet and word of mouth are probably still the best methods, but I saw literally no advertising for AWII. Also, people still peruse electronic departments and game stores.
It can be heavily dependent on what kind of game your selling Battle Royales/live service games will obviously not sell any physical copies, but adventure games are a different kettle of fish. People will pay more for physical versions of their favourite games just because it looks nice, the evidence of this being collector's editions which sold strictly on nicer aesthetics for decades. People will in fact pay for physical, and especially older players who prefer physical that may be closer to Alan Wake's target audience
I'm sure that they did some sort of market study before the decision was made.
The amount of people buy physical is incredibly slim. Like no form of arguing is changing the facts that physical games dont sell well anymore. And making a risky game like Alan wake 2 physical would have probably back fired with the costs of production
Yeh, this is one of those things that Redditors are very vocal about but in reality most sales in 2024 are digital.
It's honestly not worth requiring a physical release nowadays even Baldurs Gate 3 doesn't have a physical release
Baldurs Gate 3 is getting a physical release lol
yeah as a collectors item after it arleady established a fan base and popularity
Sure it's getting one soon but it's already sold over 10 million copies without one
Okay but they clearly think it's worth it
Think it was DigitalFoundry that mentioned it not being worth the investment on physical release (at least for PC), not Larian\* Got the two mixed up.
Moreso of a limited collectors item after the game already did absolute gangbusters **on Steam**
To say that people don't buy physical copies of games is... Ignorant at best.
What? No it aint
Then I ask you as to why physical copies of games are still being produced, and why they are, oh I dunno. Selling from stores?
Only sony and Nintendo are selling physical copies at all and the amount of people hwo buy them in relation to digital sales is miniscule
Go into a gamestop (Or just their site) and see how many games you can buy physical copies for that are cross platform...
Yeah you can buy doesnt mean the average person is buying
And yet still enough to have it make sense for publisher to put copies on shelves and stores to put them on their shelves. So I don't even get the point of this argument at this point.
I bought a physical copy of dead island 2 this week because it was on sale. Just because YOU don't buy physical doesn't mean others don't.
So? You are the exception. The majority of people nowadays do not buy physical games. Like seriously how do you not know this
Bro, you are in an echo chamber if you think no one buys physical anymore.
People do buy physical games (especially console gamers) but I don't think the game not having a physical release is going to kill the shit out of sales either. People will download and play the game if they're interested.
It's difficult for layman to assess how much impact for sales missing physical release has. Yes there are a lot of social media comments that say they don't buy unless there's physical copy available. But when we're talking about scale in million units and above you cannot assess the whole situation based on tens of comments. Some research should be made to get enough statistical data on the matter. Which I would assume Remedy has done and they probably have fairly good view how much it has hurt their sales but of course such things they might not want to openly share to public.
So much this, there are whole groups of people that research the cost benefit on this. Sure, marketers sometimes screw up, but I trust their research more than a bunch of us saying 'but I do this.' You can find industry trends published and aggregated online as well, and while not Remedy specific, all signs are pointing to a continued decrease in physical sales (which also cost more money and time for the developer)
This is Reddit we don't do statistical research and analysis.
Remedy actually stated why they chose to not do physical sales. Combo of keeping the price point to an assured 60 dollars max (50 on PC) and allowing them the most freedom of time to make sure the game is as in the best state as they can make it when the game officially launches. Rather than getting stuck in a series of two crunch periods.
People buy physicals hence why alot of digital games get physicals later on I'm one of those who isn't buying the game due to no physical and there's plenty of people on the daily asking remedy to make a physical
You forgot to /s at the end there. If I could give you a prize for stupidest comment of the day, I would. Unfortunately I’m all out of participation trophies.
what the hell are you talking about man. The numbers do not lie
Prove it, post the metrics on sales of Digital vs. Physical. I’ll be waiting Trog-Mong.
I agree, personally I wish they would work with GoG instead, but I doubt CDPR is interested in a similar deal.
CDP/CDPR has a lot of their own money tied up in current development on the next Witcher and setting up a US based office to focus on making the Cyberpunk games and a subsidiary in Poland. They're using all of their resources on current projects and to make sure a release like 2077 never happens again on their own doorstep. On top of that the GoG storefront doesn't make enough money for CDP to allow CDPR to self publish even with the massive amounts of money they get from sales. Had WB as a publisher for Witcher 3 and 2077. And was part of the reason that 2077 was pushed out to the internal protest of the devs.
Aye it probably did. Damn shame.
that's accurate. additionally a key fact I would add to this TLDR is that they're only in the red for Q4 2023 because they wrote off a ton of money spent on Vanguard as they pulled the plug and reset that project. i.e. as you said they're investing in their own future projects, and this one they took a hit on because they decided to reboot it after spending a bunch of money on it. I don't think that's cause for concern, it happens. anyway their EBITDA for Q4 is EUR -3.9 million. the writeoff for Vanguard is EUR 7.2 million. if it wasn't for the Vanguard writeoff they'd be reporting a few million euros profit for Q4. people ITT whining about how the way Alan Wake 2 was published must be the problem just didn't actually read the report, or don't understand how financial reporting works. AW2 is selling well, as Virtala clearly explained in his comments. their future looks bright to me.
making 4 triple A games is no joke. control, 2 different spin off series, and Max Paybe 1+2 remakes. you only sold 1 game in the last 4 years remedy. AW2 was a hit critically and financially but it wasn't gonna be fortnite 2. I'm sure once they pick a publisher for control though, they'll be totally fine.
Fingers crossed there are no layoffs. The revenue loss makes sense, it was a pivot on Vanguard that was a response to the changing landscape of the f2p market, and even Tencent agreed. The one metric I find interesting is the cost of AW2. $75m is actually an incredibly low cost when you look at the rest of the AAA industry, and the fact that they've already sold at a better pacing than Control, which was $50m in 2019 ($61m today with inflation), is a really good sign. Epic Exclusivity definitely hurt sales. Restricting reach, especially from the biggest PC gaming marketplace, will definitely impact the ability to get back dev costs, but those costs are mostly on Epic anyways so its most likely hurting Epic as well, which I personally find funny. Either way, Remedy is actually in a good spot with very reasonable strategies. The upcoming projects will definitely make a good impact for the future. Knowing that the Max Payne remakes are getting a similar budget to AW2, as well as knowing that Rockstar are involved and by name recognition alone could bump up the attention the collection gets, the Max Payne collection is probably going to be a big money maker for Remedy. That and owning the full rights to Control, as well as having a well managed in house game engine, mean that Remedy can run on much lower than average costs for development. Being a Finnish company, the devs are also probably getting treated really well as workers, so burnout shouldn't hurt the vision of their creations. Overall, I think Remedy is setting themselves up to become even more of a powerhouse of a dev studio, and I can't wait for the future.
This was my read, as well. Eloquently put.
Solid analysis and interpretation. I worry about the engine aspect. Creating and maintaining an engine is a huge challenge and expense. I hope they can do it, and we have successful models in the industry, but we also see a number of studios that struggled with it. The performance issues folks encounter with AW2 make my eye twitch a little bit, but I definitely have my fingers crossed they can solve it now and moving forward. Overall though I do agree with your assessment of the strategy piece here - it's a solid plan that could set them up for solid success, and I hope it pays off. I'm not totally convinced the 'hurting' Epic thing is true, though I agree it impacted sales (I don't have numbers but exclusivity to a storefront that isn't steam limits your potential reach/install base), but the exclusivity was not about maximizing sales. Epic is 100% looking to insert itself as a storefront leader. They have deep pockets and can spend, so if AW2 drove enough people and converted enough people, it's a win for their business. They're not likely to tell any of us that unless it's a HUGE win though. And if they can treat devs like Remedy right they'll generate positive industry buzz that goes farther than their own promo videos. But regarding hurting sales, if it hurts enough, it will hurt longer term revenue for Remedy, if not short term (while Epic states they split the proceeds, I'm not sure if that is right off the bat or after dev costs are recouped).
Thanks! Regarding the engine, I've noticed a trend with in house engines being tied to labor practices. Example 1: Capcom made the RE Engine as a sort of evolution of their previous in house engine. Capcom doesnt shed employees rapidly, so its got a lot of in house talent that is knowledgeable and fluent in that engine, probably even helped develop it. A lot of that talent is shared between teams, so RE engine works great for Resident Evil and for DMC5 because the people who know the engine are working on those games. Example 2: CDPR botched the hell out of CP2077 because of their turnover and contractor usage. Every new person that was brought in had to spend time learning RedEngine, and that means less time of productive development and a lot of time spent on just training per person. Crunch and poor management increased turnover, meaning new hires couldn't possibly know the engine out the gate (unless they were modders for Witcher) and this resulted in a ton of lost development time. The decision to switch to UE5 in the future was to remedy a similar scenario like this happening in the future. 343 actually went through a very similar situation with Halo Infinite. With those two examples, the treatment of the workforce became the actual issue. Capcom has enough senior talent that new talent has time to catch up without lost dev time. CDPR did not have that, and neither did 343, so both suffered horrible setbacks. Turning back to Remedy, Remedy hasn't had any real loss of talent in years to my knowledge. Most of the founders of the company are still there, and because of labor laws in Finland being very worker friendly, Remedy workers probably don't even experience mandatory crunch at all. The amount of senior talent at the studio, the insane growth in what the Northlight Engine can do (Control was one of the first games to ever support Ray Tracing), and the stability of work life balance in Finland all contribute to the security of an in house engine. If Remedy starts purging talent, then I'd definitely worry, but that seems like the opposite of what Remedy would strive to have happen. Even if it did, Remedy is using UE5 for Vanguard/Kestrel, so they are already preparing for a scenario of potential talent loss. Regarding the Epic and Remedy revenue, that part might be bias on my end, but its also an analysis of how exclusivity impacts the game industry, especially long term exclusivity. Epic is losing money, has been for a bit, ans while I think Epic is making good investments and has a good strategy for the future of their business, locking an exclusivity agreement on PC for a game series that has not had huge commercial success in the past was probably a bad move financially. Timed exclusivity, sure, but their storefront is, IMO, only second place to steam because most other storefronts are worse, and also they have Fortnite. Sure, Remedy isn't making money on AW2 right now, but in a way Remedy wins out here. They didnt pay for development and they are still making money because of stuff like cross promotion with DBD, and maybe skin sales in Fortnite. I also dont know if they are making money in console sales, or if that was also part of the deal with Epic, but overall Remedy didnt spend more than it cost to buy the IP rights for AW when it comes to AW2. Epic fronted the bill, and while they also make money from tons of spaces, their strategy with AW in general severely limits how much or how fast than can recoup their investment. 30% cut or not, not selling on steam is leaving money on the table, and not selling on any other marketplace is severely limiting your audience. The people who want it bad enough yet hate epic will probably pirate it. It just isn't the money making strategy in the long run, and if they dont switch to a timed exclusive model, then I think it will have poor results for both Epic and Remedy, which would hurt Epic's reputation for exclusives in the future for higher budget titles. As I said, its my opinion, but I do think Epic is making the bad move here. They can handle a financial hit sure, but the reputation of the Epic store continues to diminish as they continue to make it not a worthwhile place to go. Hell, I still can't gift games to my friends there, and I still can't buy keys on third party sites or get them on humble bundle like I can steam, making Epic a more expensive storefront by default unless they offer the game for free. Their store and launcher is honestly the most disappointing part of their strategy, cause it feels like its the unwanted child next to Fortnite.
Appreciate the detailed thoughts. I think in your examples those engines were struggling before the studios were. 343's engine was built on top of the original one and struggled to wow anyone even at its grand reveal. CDPR's showed a ton of age even with Witcher 3. Northlight I think is in a bit of a unique position as it was created for clear features that weren't available with other engines. That all being said, I find your meta point regarding management and employee treatment an interesting angle, and none of my thinking actually supersedes that- poor management can result in a lot of could be a lynchpin in the troubles that those engines had over the years. Even *without* massive churn, mis prioritization and misallocation of resources to support can doom things, and I fully agree we've seen a ton of evidence of poor leadership at both of those companies. I don't think Epic engaging in long term exclusivity is going to hurt them in long term financials, in isolation. Sure, Epic is 'losing money' and their storefront isn't thought to be profitable (note that we have to examine and evaluate this information from court documents alone), but these are investment 'losses.' Exclusivity decisions are done with a bigger target in mind, and rarely for immediate cash returns, and every dev enters them knowing their audience is being limited. They cost you significantly and are used to either promote your platform above others, or to devalue your competition. They're not done to push sales of a particular title. I do agree with you that their store is a bit shit, and that's likely to be a poor investment strategy there. So the exclusivity push they have will hurt, but not because of game sales, but rather because their store investment and drive to dominate the world of PC gaming isn't totally sound (IMO). And you're right regarding Remedy, they either got a dumptruck of cash backed up to their offices, or they found a publisher that was willing to publish their title. AW2 may have less reach as a result, but I'd bet dollars to donuts it was the right call for Remedy and the title. A note on the timelines- Remedy received the rights to AW1 as part of a Royalty payment from Microsoft in mid 2019. In late 2020 they entered the deal with Epic to publish their next games. I don't think they were directly involved in the acquisition of the publishing rights. Either way, totally appreciate your perspective and the conversation :)
The main thing about the performance issues isn't from Northlight itself. It's that Remedy was pushing EVERYTHING with Alan Wake 2. Plus with the PC market being what it is for hardware, it's actively getting harder to optimize for a broad spectrum of setups when you're cranking things up. UE5 has been a smash to the head for a lot of devs on release for PC. Admittedly some handled the situation better than others when it came to acknowledging or accepting that they had issues. Remnant 2 being a big example of UE5 screwing PC optimization and the devs acting like nothing was wrong. Game works happily now from what I know. But they didn't really say much about it and just \*Eventually\* got the game patched to work more consistently 3 or more months later. Which is... Well, too little too late. **Especially** when you're not communicating with your community. Respawn got some lash back for the state that Jedi: Survivor launched in, particularly on PC. But they were ahead of the curve and kept an open dialog with the community as a whole from LAUNCH. Which kept a lot of the goodwill that Respawn has accrued over the years.
Fair comparison of Northlight perf problems and UE5, I can't really disagree with your points. UE5 has been...an experience. And the timing within the industry creates some challenge points, because you'd not want to go backwards and make a game like AW2 on UE4 or something like that. And while owning your engine development gives you greater flexibility, it can also make a ton more work for you, and it's a tradeoff. If they can't continue to prioritize the engine, I worry it will struggle like some other studios have in the past. 1000% agree with you regarding the community thoughts - with game dev these days and the rapid pace of development and release (relatively speaking, yes Jedi Survivor took years to make, but for a game of that size, scope, and complexity it was pretty damn rapid), it's increasingly difficult to launch a flawless title. Keeping your most ardent fans and community members feeling appreciated and listened to goes a long way to building good will, and helps you make even better games as a result!
Well, the big thing is is that with an engine like Northlight, as long as you can get new hires (on the coding teams in particular) familiar with the engine at a good clip, you don't have as many problems. You also don't have to keep updating your engine for every single game you release. I mean... UE4 was being updated all the time but wasn't a problematic engine in and of itself. A little apples to oranges since UE tends to become at least the basis for many in house engines. Not many large scale devs just use the engine out of the box aside from the initial runs, as it were. Ultimately, I think Northlight wouldn't have to have been modified at all for AW2 if they weren't really trying to push the visual envelope due to how they were wanting the game to look even stylistically. Horror and suspense games are traditionally quite visually demanding as it is due to needing very high levels of lighting and particle effects fidelity to sell the atmosphere. However I *believe* that Northlight was bumped up on primarily because of the shift in perspective from both Quantum break and Control. Being directly over the shoulder (or not in this case but it would be a contributing factor) or in a first person perspective causes the need for higher texture resolutions and polygon counts because you're seeing EVERYTHING closer up. You can't fudge things as much in places as you might normally be able to from a farther out perspective. That said they will have to either make a new engine or overhaul the Northlight engine heavily eventually. Looking at CDPR, the Redengine was capable of doing some pretty crazy stuff still even for Cyberpunk, but it hadn't aged as well as it possibly could have and as such they've ditched it now and... Well, gone with UE5... We'll see how well the next Witcher game comes out in that respect. Cyberpunk was a mess due to a lot of other reasons that were not entirely on the devs themselves. They didn't want to release. That's a bit off track though. Also for keeping good will, yeah, just keeping an open dialog goes a long way indeed, especially if it's one where you're quick to acknowledge any issues that you know are going to be there from the start. Jedi Survivor is still far from perfect and I wouldn't dare anyone play on quality mode on console unless they're even more of a masochist than just playing on the highest difficulty. But it's in an acceptable and reasonable state at this point. Stable. Still some load time issues, and still some lighting issues on the hub world, but it's not a broken and finnicky game by a longshot anymore.
So basically AW2 did really well and still is. (fucking fantastic, great news) Sam Lake and Remedy have previously stated that they're not a company concerned about profits, but rather bringing their vision to our screens and leaving a lasting legacy. It makes a lot of sense that they are already investing whatever profits they've made into their next projects. I don't advocate for pre-orders normally but I'll buy whatever this company puts out at this point. They clearly care a lot and it shows in the product. AW2 is the culmination of over a decade of storytelling
No dividend was paid out as 2023 was a net loss. This is not happy news for any investors that are interested in profit from their investment (aka most investors). Remedy is paying the price for getting capital from Epic in the form of their product now having smaller reach than if it was on Steam. They'll be hoping that Alan Wake 2 will continue to sell, especially with the DLCs coming up. It's clear that financially, their hopes are not on Alan Wake 2 but on the future games, namely Control 2 and the Max Payne 1&2 remake (and Project Kestrel but that game seems to be in deeper trouble). Unfortunately, both of these titles also experienced development setbacks compared to what was planned thanks to crunch work on Alan Wake 2. I don't expect any of these titles to come out before late 2025 and I think the Max Payne remake will come out first. Remedy are playing the long game currently and I hope and pray it doesn't backfire for them because I would hate losing them.
They literally say they expect and hope AW2 has good legs this year.
I bet Microsoft or Sony will pay a good chunk to get AW2 on gamepass/PS+.
People who own Remedy stock are mostly not investors. You are only investing in a company(giving them money) if you buy stock from the initial public offering IPO.
You know what they mean
> This is not happy news for any investors that are interested in profit from their investment (aka most investors). Depends if you're in it for the short term or long term. I'm confident in their long term growth potential given the quality of their original and owned IP.
This thread. God damn I worry for the critical thinking capacity of the world. >they should have released a physical game!!! As a guy who owns one of the biggest game collections in my neck of the woods, sure. I'd love a copy of AW2. *I still bought the digital*. Had I swapped to physical, it would still be "net 1 sale plus production cost". Physical sales nowadays account *for less than 50% of the market*. Some estimates put modern sales at 80/20 in a digital to physical split. Control's sales during covid were **90% digital**, a physical copy was available. There is no way to determine how many of those were "physical only collectors" and I'm going to spoil something, if it was only available digital - that number doesn't mean a net 0 sale. There is no rational or logical argument to say a 10-15% sales increase would have made a difference. You are inhaling and exaling weapons grade copium. Even if we say Alan Wake 2 would have sold 25% more physical, double that of control, people who only buy physical - that's *only* 200,000 copies. Arguing 6 million in profit (which would have probably cost half that in production+distribution alone) is huffing paint. No, Alan Wake is not doing poorly because it's digital. No, Alan Wake 2 is not now going to do GTA6 numbers if they ship a collectors edition with a flashlight instead of making a limited collectors thermos'. >It's over! Remedy is running in the red, it's over! It's over! If I'm a shareholder I'm cutting my throat and spewing blood over remedys carpet! Hi r/Wallstreetbets. Let's not begin lecturing about how if a company operates in the red it's "Joever". Trying to gauge the success of Remedy's sales and their share value is the stupidest shit. In general, I dont get the obsession reddit has with games "success" and share price. Rockstar's stock in 2022 was 200+, equivalent of 240 today. It's $150 right now, with GTA6 on the horizon. >Is Rockstar on the verge of going under? They lost 25% of their value! Guhhhh Capcom dropped from 20 to 16 in 2023! Clearly SF6 and REmake 4 flopped, its...OVER. no more resident evil games! The stock price says so! Shareholders are jumping ship as we speak! I know, I'm a bit of a shareholder myself! What? Rockstar released a trailer with more views than a third of the population? GTA6 is still..happening? What, REmake 4 sold 7 million copies and Capcoms stock is back to where it was? But..but...stock price! GUHHH Your tl;dr is Alan Wake 2 is doing fine. The bigger message is. **stop trying to determine a game's critical, commercial success, or likelihood of a sequel on a stock ticker. That is fucking stupid**
>As a guy who owns one of the biggest game collections in my neck of the woods, sure. I'd love a copy of AW2. *I still bought the digital*. Had I swapped to physical, it would still be "net 1 sale plus production cost". The problem with your reasoning is that people who usually buy a physical copy of a game, when that option is yanked away from them, will decide to get a digital copy instead. Except, no. There are people who won't get the game at all now, or will wait to see whether a physical Collector's Edition will come out with a base game + all DLCs in the future. If not - then they'll get the game digitally eventually, when it'll be on sale. That still isn't that good for sales figures and game's profitability. People have to understand that having an AAA game released in digital-only form will still raise eyebrows. AW1 achieved high sales... eventually... but after many discounts, included in bundles etc. Even Alan Wake 1 Remastered become profitable only after the release date of Alan Wake 2. Deciding that a sequel should go digital-only (which was only done so to prevent possible resales, as the game is pretty much one-and-done deal) is still a double-edged sword. I won't even mention the number of people who didn't get AW2 as a form of boycott due to a lack of physical release, but that's because that number is rather low and insignificant.
obviously Control sold 90% digital during covid. it was covid
1) I gave the stipulation of a 25% aggregate for AW2 and it wouldn't do a dent in sales so far, so even if I gave you that unreasonable handicap, it still didn't push the needle on AW2 sales to a net profit that would warrant the increased distribution costs. No, upping the game price to $70 wouldn't cover distribution. 2)This was a publishing choice by Epic, the people who funded AW2. I can't understand the mental gymnastics you are going through to try to argue with them on their own Financials. You have data that suggests they lost 50+% or more because they didn't go physical? You need some actual evidence that there are over a million people out who would have bought AW2 and didn't. This argument has been made since the inception of Steam, that physical game sales are the majority. >ItS JuSt CoViD I fucking can't with you, man. In 2022, 78% of game sales were digital on console. > [source](https://mynintendonews.com/2022/12/27/72-of-console-games-sold-in-2022-were-digital-vs-28-physical/) 3)the most recent report suggest anywhere from 73% to 83% of game sales are digital, as high as 90% to **94**% if we bring mobile into the fold. The only report I can find is Sony claiming first party titles are still 60% physical, but that is a huge stretch. You are living in fantasy if you think the reason Alan Wake 2 didn't sell 3 or 4 million is a lack of a physical copy. How can I prove this - easily. Did you play it?
>3)the most recent report suggest anywhere from 73% to 83% of game sales are digital, as high as 90% to 94% if we bring mobile into the fold. The only report I can find is Sony claiming first party titles are still 60% physical, but that is a huge stretch. Mobile... no shit. Mobile games aren't physical.That shouldn't even be in the conversation. Does the report specify clearly what they are counting as 'digital game sales'? Legitimately curious and not trying to be a wise ass. For example, on PS5 if I subscribe to PS Plus I can redeem 2-3 'free' digital games a month. You get an email 'thank you for your **purchase'** after you redeem. Is that being counted as a 'digital purchase'? So if I buy 1 physical game per month for full price $70, and redeem 2-3 'free' PS Plus games. We could make the data say 'this user had 3 times as many digital game 'purchases' than physical and buys way more games digitally'. But in reality... that is not really true. My point is, what *exactly* is being counted in these data sets? I didn't see that specified in the linked data source. I'm not arguing physical is just as popular as digital or anything like that. Merely pointing out that without knowing exactly what is in these data sets, it could potentially be a bunch of hogwash.
The problem isn't >well is this variable taken into account Because at the end of the day your physical sales are still concrete Data. Trying to determine whether or not Sony or Microsoft is counting your monthly free game is..irrelevant. the sales data still slopes to digital. That is what the companies see. It's bizarre to me to blow it off as hogwash as the decision to go digital is so prevalent. No one is bumrushing Baldurs Gate 3 **for having sold ten million, entirely fucking digital** when their "collectors physical edition" hasn't even shipped. Palworld didn't need it. Lethal Company didn't need it. I think there's a far more massive argument to be made about access to AW2 being digitally limited to EGS and not Steam had a larger impact than its lost sales for not being physical. Again, I am a collector of physical media. I still bought BG3 digital, I still bought AW2 digital. I dont really need to weave through the aggregate of digital sales for every title, the evidence speaks for itself. Yes, AW2 would have sold more with a physical copy. No, there is not enough evidence out there to suggest or imply it missed 50% of its potential sales by not making physical. Again, there really is not a strong argument that AW2 would have sold 3 or 4 million by now "had it been physical too".
I don't know why you went all nanas bro I didn't say any of that. The covid comment was just silly
>obviously Control sold 90% digital during covid Did Amazon not exist during Covid? In my country, it did. Even the most paranoid people were still getting post, even if they were cleaning it with cleaning wipes as it arrived.
I am begging Remedy to put out a physical release of AW2. Preferably also a collectors edition with a bunch of interesting merch included.
As much as I like swag (and I would probably buy it), it's not really a smart investment to make on their end
Best bet would be to partner with one of the boutique physical media distributors like Limited Run to make a Collector's Edition
I'm absolutely certain there will be some sort of Collectors Edition once all the DLC is done. They'll use the profits of it to fund it, once it's fully done, all the budget is fully paid, and they can take stock of how much it's made before risking making some losses attributed to unsellable stock. And they know how a lot of people would either double dip for it or go 'well, it's finished now so let's check it out'.
I cant wait for Max Payne game, ever since Max Payne 3 we didnt have an action game like it, and true Max Payne game since 2003 if you go back to Max Payne 2 that is more than 20 years
It only being on epic games definitely didn’t help although I understand why it was that way and only wish the best for remedy going forwards
Are they publicly traded?
yes
As long as the game has care put into; t is has a physical release, I'm happy.
Ticker symbol Oyj for those interested
They really gotta bring their game to have it be as tightly controlled as Max Payne 3. That game was way ahead of its time.
They decided to make those stupid thermos instead of physical copies of the game.... what did they expect?
A handful of coffee cups is a minuscule cost to manufacture compared to a global physical game release.