Quantum Break Will Help Make Alan Wake 2 Better
By Evan Hopkins 26 January 2016
Remedy Entertainment’s creative director Sam Lake reveals that the development team’s work on Quantum Break will ensure that Alan Wake 2 is much better.
Few games qualify for a label like “hidden gem,” but Alan Wake is quickly gaining credence as one of the Xbox 360’s overlooked diamonds in the rough. Remedy Entertainment’s TV-aping game chronicling a Stephen King-esque writer getting embroiled in his own story captivated those who played it, leading to a dedicated following of fans clamoring for a sequel to what many deemed one of the best horror games of all time. While a spin-off was released, Alan Wake 2 seemed up in the air. But according to Remedy Entertainment creative director Sam Lake, it was actually Alan Wake 2 that lead to the studio creating the upcoming Xbox One-exclusive futuristic shooter Quantum Break.
While Lake has previously spoken about the fate of Alan Wake 2, the director revealed at a lecture conducted at the Cite des Sciences et de L’Industrie in Paris that Alan Wake 2 served as a sort of catalyst for Quantum Break. According to the director, Quantum Break came about after work began on Alan Wake 2 immediately after finishing the original Alan Wake, with Lake recalling:
“We were looking into it. We were doing prototypes. We were doing demos and experimenting on that, and it was really through [those] discussions, that eventually with Microsoft, that we had partnered with for Alan Wake, led into the idea of Quantum Break.”
While Lake recalls that the team at Remedy was enthusiastic about Alan Wake 2, he credits the shift from an Alan Wake sequel to a new IP as a result of “extra carefulness” in ensuring that Alan Wake 2 lived up to the companies high expectations, stating:
“Alan Wake, in some ways, for Remedy is really valuable. It’s our own IP. We own Alan Wake. So maybe there’s also a bit of extra carefulness in making sure that all the elements are right for the success of a sequel.”
The idea that Alan Wake 2 was sidelined by Quantum Break is sure to upset the series’ devoted fans, but Lake assures fans that the development team’s time working on another game will help make Alan Wake 2 better.
“I think it has been, in a way, fortunate, because, you know, we have been iterating the idea of what an Alan Wake sequel could be, and along the way there has been much better ideas that what the concept coming out of Alan Wake was for the sequel.”
While the fate of Alan Wake 2 remains up in the air, Lake and Remedy continue to focus their efforts on Quantum Break, with a tie-in TV show and a potential PC port planned for the big budget shooter. With Quantum Break inching closer to release, fans live in hope that Remedy’s promise to return to Alan Wake “when the time is right” ends up being sooner rather than later.
Quantum Break releases April 5, 2016 for Xbox One.
Source: DualShockers
