Alan Wake 2 players lash out at devs after confirming it will be digital-only release

Alan Wake 2 fans are lashing out at Remedy Entertainment and Epic Games for the sequel’s digital-only release, with no plans at the time of writing for a physical edition to release anytime soon. 

During the Playstation Showcase, it was announced that the highly anticipated sequel, Alan Wake 2, would be released on October 17. This news was confirmed after being teased by Alan Wake’s voice actor. 

However, an aspect about the game’s release which was not mentioned during its reveal in the showcase was that it would not have any physical release, rather opting for a digital-only release. 

In a FAQ published on the Alan Wake website, they explicitly state that “there are currently no plans to release Alan Wake 2 on disc.” With its release on PC on the Epic Store, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S

However, the game’s devs have multiple reasons for it. For one, they note that the PS5 and Xbox Series S both operate as digital-only consoles.

Additionally, they state that even if they do ship a disc, it would require additional downloads for the game due to its size, which they feel would lead to a poor user experience. 

Lastly, they mention that doing a digital-only release would keep the game at $59.99 for consoles, and $49.99 for the PC versions. Mentioning that the price would increase with physical editions. 

Despite the reasoning, fans were still not happy with the lack of a physical release. “No physical, I’m not buying it” said a twitter user. “How are indie developer still able to drop their games on physical copies all the time yet a huge publisher won’t?”

“Yeah, I’m not getting this if it’s not on disk” another said. With many others seemingly deciding to not buy the game because it is being released exclusively on the Epic Store on PC. 

Despite the calling out by fans, Remedy and their publisher, Epic, is still going ahead with the digital only release, with no physical editions in sight.