Alan Wake 2’s Seemingly Dire Sales Don’t Paint the Full Picture

Chatting with IGN, Circana analyst Mat Piscatella defined why Alan Wake 2 did not debut in the prime 20 of Circana’s gross sales charts this month. It is largely a problem of information reporting: Circana does not have information on each single sale for each single recreation. They will accumulate information from bodily retailers, and choose digital information from publishers and storefronts who select to produce it.

Consequently, whereas Circana’s information is extraordinarily helpful, in lots of circumstances, it is incomplete. The most effective examples of this are Nintendo, which doesn’t present digital gross sales to Circana in any respect, and Take-Two, which used to offer information however restricted its enter a couple of years in the past. That is why you by no means see GTA 5 in the Circana charts regardless of it promoting a strong 5 million copies per quarter worldwide.

In Alan Wake 2’s case, there was no bodily launch, and its writer Epic Video games doesn’t present digital gross sales information to Circana, so there’s simply no method for Circana to inform us how nicely it offered. Piscatella did affirm that Alan Wake 2 ranked 147th on Xbox Collection and one hundred and fifteenth on PlayStation 5 in MAUs in November, however that does not inform us an excessive amount of.

We will complement that with a bit extra information from Ampere Evaluation’ Piers Harding-Rolls, although, to get a clearer image. Ampere estimates that globally, simply on console, Alan Wake 2 offered 850,000 copies as of the finish of November.

Our international Alan Wake 2 gross sales estimate throughout console finish of Nov is ~850k

Assume there might be a good quantity of curiosity at a diminished value, after which there may be sub service inclusion down the line (I assume)

Value noting that AW Remastered acquired a good enhance in Oct/Nov as nicely pic.twitter.com/GtI1DFcomQ

— Piers Harding-Rolls (@PiersHR) December 13, 2023

It is a bit tough to inform given the limitations of each these information units, however in case you really feel like that appears a contact low for a serious AAA recreation that was widely-anticipated and is reviewing phenomenally, nicely…it’s, and it is not. Treatment’s final providing, Management, sold two million units in its first year, and that was with none presence on PlayStation. You can argue that Management is doing higher due to its bodily launch, however in that very same interval, Treatment reported that solely 10% of the recreation’s gross sales have been digital. So bodily wasn’t doing a ton of heavy lifting in the first place, and Alan Wake 2 skipping the costly technique of a bodily version completely might have saved Treatment more cash than it will’ve made.

So is Alan Wake 2 actually promoting poorly? It is…nonetheless onerous to say, even with these items of information. 850,000 copies on console, sans PC, is not dangerous. And in case you assume even just some hundred thousand PC gamers, gross sales could possibly be inside attain of Management’s one-year milestones. Nonetheless, Management was a brand new IP, the place Alan Wake is supposedly a beloved cult basic using on Management’s stellar coattails. It could make sense for Treatment to have greater hopes for its success. However as with Management, maybe word-of-mouth over the subsequent yr will preserve Alan Wake 2 in the zeitgeist longer than most video games and make it a gross sales success.

We requested Treatment for remark for this piece, however the studio has but to reply.

Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. Obtained a narrative tip? Ship it to rvalentine@ign.com.