News
The ‘Alan Wake’ Publishing Rights Have Reverted Back to Original Developer Remedy
Remedy, the Finnish developer behind the upcoming Control, has regained the rights to what is arguably its biggest game name, the supernatural horror franchise Alan Wake.
The developer, as reported in Global Newswire, has just received its royalties for previous games (totaling 2.5m Euros) and the publishing rights for Alan Wake, a series synonymous with Microsoft’s consoles, are now back in the hands of the independent Remedy, meaning there could be Alan Wake on multiple platforms in future.
Remedy previously held the IP rights for the franchise, but had claimed it wasn’t easy to get a planned Alan Wake 2 off the ground, with the publishing rights possibly a cause of that. It’s thought that any early development of Alan Wake 2 went on to build Remedy’s Xbox One title, Quantum Break.
So hopefully this means we’ll get more Alan Wake, and introduce the series to other platforms. When Alan Wake first debuted on the Xbox 360 in 2010, it’s episodic structure, complete with cliffhangers and all, gave video game horror an intriguing new slant. It was also perhaps the most Stephen King-like a game has ever been, even featuring a protagonist who is a writer. Given how in King is right now, maybe Wake could ride those coattails into fresh relevance.
In the grim darkness of the far future there is only war, but it was a cheerful illustrator from England who helped to define the terrifying war-torn imagery that inspired what we now know as Grimdark (a hybrid genre combining horror with sci-fi/fantasy).
Unfortunately for fans of Warhammer 40,000, Trench Crusade and countless other sources of Grimdark thrills, veteran artist John Blanche passed away this week after struggling with health issues for the past few years.
While the artist retired back in 2023, he leaves us with an enormous legacy of iconic artwork that continues to inspire gamers and storytellers around the world to this very day.
The news is especially gloomy as it was only last year that Daniel Lowman and Napoleon Dynamite himself Jon Heder released The Grim & the Dark: The Search for John Blanche, a documentary following Heder’s exploration of the Grimdark genre culminating in a heartwarming encounter with Blanche in his own home.
Below is one of my favorite pieces by Blanche, his highly influential depiction of Warhammer 40k’s God-Emperor of Mankind on his Golden Throne.
We send our deepest condolences to John Blanche’s family, friends, and fans.
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