Alan Wake 2 Alan Scared
Image via Remedy Entertainment.

Alan Wake 2 Will Not Have A Physical Release To Keep Costs Down

The shift begins.

Alan Wake 2, the sequel to Alan Wake, will be released digitally only. This information comes directly from the official Alan Wake 2 FAQ on the game’s website.

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Alan Wake 2 is releasing on October 17, 2023, but the team did not want to have to ship a game on a disc that would require an additional download.

Alan Wake 2 Will Not Have A Physical Release To Keep Costs Down

In the day and age of major day-one passes, download codes in physical boxes, and a massive shift to digital collections, it makes sense that Alan Wake 2 would switch to digital-only to reduce costs for the consumer.

Below you’ll find the information from the FAQ page.

“There are many reasons for this. For one, a large number of have shifted to digital only. You can buy a Sony PlayStation 5 without a disc drive and Microsoft’s Xbox Series S is a digital only console. It is not uncommon to release modern games as digital-only.

Secondly, not releasing a disc helps keep the price of the game at $59.99 / €59.99 and the PC version at $49.99 / €49.99.

Finally, we did not want to ship a disc product and have it require a download for the game — we do not think this would make for a great experience either.”

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The FAQ mentions there are no current plans to ship a physical version of Alan Wake 2, so if you’re a collector, you’re out of luck for now.

Alan Wake 2 will release on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC. The game is $49.99 on PC and $59.99 on consoles for the standard edition.

Time to hop into Alan Wake and the AWE expansion for Control to get caught up on the franchise before Alan Wake 2 releases this October.


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About the Author

Jesse Vitelli

Jesse loves most games, but he really loves games that he can play together with friends and family. This usually means late nights in Destiny 2 or FFXIV. You can also find him thinking about his ever-expanding backlog of games he won't play and being constantly dehydrated. Do not contact him.