The upcoming Alan Wake Remastered will not feature the original game's product placements from companies like Verizon or Energizer, due to expired brand deals. This may be rather surprising to some, as the original Alan Wake featured a heavy amount of real-life brands, some of which were actually integral to the gameplay.
Following several leaks, Alan Wake Remastered was confirmed for a fall release earlier this week. The new remaster will largely resemble the original game as fans know it with enhanced visuals, 4K resolution, all DLC, and an audio commentary track from director Sam Lake. It's believed that Remedy is developing a sequel to Alan Wake after finally acquiring the IP from Microsoft in 2019. Although the developer seems to be just adding some polish to the game, some things from the original will be missing.
A PR rep for Alan Wake Remastered confirmed to Screen Rant that the upcoming game will not bring back any of the brands seen in the old game. All of the brand deals with Verizon, Energizer, Ford, Lincoln, and other brands have expired and will instead be replaced with generic in-universe branding, but songs and TV shows from the original game will make a return. With an Alan Wake sequel reportedly in production, it's unclear if Remedy will make any effort to bring back or add new product placements.
Footage of an old pitch for Alan Wake 2 on Polygon showcased some brands like Subway, but it's possible this was just for internal usage and was never intended to be in the actual game. The product placement, although not necessary, certainly helped ground the supernatural happenings in some sort of reality. Players could pick up packs of Energizer batteries to help fight off enemies and there were billboards/TV ads for things like Verizon all over the place, which made it feel like part of the real world rather than a made-up universe.
It was a bit on the nose at times, but it was an interesting experiment. Since Alan Wake is coming to PlayStation for the first time, it's probably fair to assume that Microsoft's branding will also be missing from Alan Wake Remastered. Things like an Xbox 360 could be found in the original game since Microsoft published the title, but it seems unlikely that will be included this time around since that's not only a dated console, but also from another expired deal.
Alan Wake Remastered will release this fall for Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, PS5, and PC.
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