| Ryuu96 said: The Alan Wake 2 example shows exactly what I meant earlier, every single game is slapped with the woke label so when one of them doesn't perform to expectations they can latch onto that one and use it to justify their rage-bait whilst ignoring every single other reason as to why a certain game unperformed and also ignoring all the games that do the same shit that are successful. I'm not sure by what metric Alan Wake 2 was hurt because of "woke" and is there any proof that actual fans of Alan Wake 2 are upset? 4.7/5 Stars on PlayStation Store from 33k reviews. 4.8/5 Stars on Epic Game Store (I can't see how many reviews). 8.5/10 on Metacritic user reviews after 3,029 reviews. 90/100 on OpenCritic user reviews (I can't see how many reviews). Also it reached 6th in Round 1 of Player's Voice in TGAs 2023 behind Baldur's Gate 3, Phantom Liberty, Tears of the Kingdom, Spider-Man 2 and Resident Evil 4. Why Alan Wake 2 has not yet recouped profits (but is on track to) is for multiple reasons and none of them have to do with "woke" for starters, lets not act like Alan Wake is a huge IP, Control is likely Remedy's most profitable title, Alan Wake released May 2010 on Xbox 360 and February 2012 on Windows, Remedy announced 2m sold as of March 2012 across Xbox 360 and Steam so it took just slightly under 2 years to sell 2m copies. By March 2015 the "franchise" (Alan Wake + American Nightmare Standalone Spinoff) sold over 4.5m units, with 3.2m of those units being Alan Wake 1. So it took just slightly under 5 years for Alan Wake 1 to sell 3.2m units across Xbox 360 and PC. There's a reason why it took 13 years to make a sequel, why Microsoft rejected a sequel multiple times and instead opted to try a new IP instead. Sam Lake himself said that Alan Wake 1 was not financially successful enough for a sequel back in 2013 (and it wasn't because woke), it was repeated multiple times that Alan Wake would never receive a sequel despite Remedy wanting to make one since it was not financially successful, it was never a huge title, instead a fairly humble sized IP. Also hard to grow a fanbase when it goes 13 years without a sequel. In comes Epic Games Publishing who are throwing the cash around and have Fortnite money to burn in desperate attempts to drag people away from Steam to Epic Game Store so they fund cult classics like Alan Wake 2 and try to garner good will, I doubt Epic had any ideas that Alan Wake 2 would be a huge success, their entire Epic Game Store enterprise has been designed to lose to try to have long-term gains. Thankfully for Remedy, it got them funding for their sequel they've always wanted to make and before anyone says about how they can live on unprofitable adventures, take a look at Epic Game's Publishing contracts, Lol. IIRC the way Epic's contract with Remedy works is that they funded absolutely everything for Alan Wake 2 (salaries, development costs, marketing costs, etc). So Remedy hasn't really "lost" anything but they haven't gained anything yet either because the Epic contract also stipulates that Remedy will only start seeing revenue once 100% of Epic's costs have been returned to them, so lets say it cost Epic $100m to make Alan Wake 2, even if Alan Wake 2 makes $99m, Remedy won't see a single penny until it exceeds the $100m because Epic funded the whole thing in its entirety, then once it exceeds that, Remedy is entitled to 50% of the revenue of proceeding sales. Alan Wake 2 is Remedy's "fastest selling game" as of February 2024 with 1.3m units (4 months after launch) and 1.8m units a year after launch, it took the first Alan Wake, almost 2 years to sell 2m units so Alan Wake 2 is roughly a year ahead of Alan Wake 1 in sales launch aligned. I think Alan Wake 2 was a success in critic and user reception, but it is an expensive AAA to a fairly modest sized IP, Epic has not yet recouped 100% of its costs which means Remedy has not yet received a single penny, this is not a surprise for the IP, but it is close to recouping those costs and it's doing so without Steam, the biggest PC store by far and we've seen repeatedly how reluctant Steam users are to use EGS. Sometimes, good titles aren't profitable immediately, sometimes they aren't profitable at all. |
Even though I am impressed by your knowledge on the subject, it doesnt really change my mind. There can be many reasons why Alan Wake 2 didnt sell well. The fact is that some people were put off by the game when it was labeled "woke". Go look on several comment sections for Alan Wake 2 videos on Youtube or X or whatever and you will see several of them. Now you might just shrug them off and call them mindless sheep influenced by grifters, but these are gamers saying they wont buy the game because of it.
I know several of you dont want to admit that woke is hurting video games, because that would maybe mean that you are wrong in your beliefs. I dont think that is the case, but I mean according to you, the anti-woke crowd is just loud and doesnt really affect game sales anyway. Yet you hate them so much. Yes anti-woke people hate woke stuff, but woke people hate anti-woke stuff. So neither one is better that the other. Its just that you have such low opinions of eachothers and you both think you are on the right side of history, that the hate for eachother becomes justified in your mind. "I mean so what if I call these people racist, bigots and sexist? They are on the evil side after all, right?"
Im not taking any high ground here either btw. I have a tendency to lose my cool as well when it comes to discussing stuff like this. Like several people on this site can attest to. I think "wokeness" is being pushed a bit too hard by certain companies. I dont think its as bad as many make it out to be, but there definitely is a problem that needs to be adressed imo. How do we do that? I dont know, but I guess we just need to find common ground. However difficult that may be. Because we cant seem to agree on much except for our love of video games.
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