I really liked Remedy Entertainment’s Alan Wake. Quantum Break wasn’t well received so I threw it onto the “maybe-play-it-one-day” pile and completely forgot about it until Control was announced. Control was immediately appealing, but I incorrectly believed Control looked like a redo of Quantum Break in some respects. After playing Control, I realized I was just seeing the through line of their work; they make third person shooters that transform players into bad asses.
Remedy action needs to feel hectic — it’s in their DNA — and they layered that increasingly hectic action into Control masterfully. I never felt overwhelmed and just when I thought they were done, they added another variable. The weapons themselves cover the standard video game shooter gamut: pistol, shotgun, rocket launcher, and the like. They were nothing to write home about and assumed a basic pistol shape known as the Service Weapon. In lore, this shape shifting weapon apparently took many forms in the past including Excalibur.
The marriage between of lore and function permeated throughout Control. The game cold drops Jesse Faden at the precipice of completing her life long quest to find her brother. She found herself in the Federal Bureau of Control’s headquarters known as the Oldest House. What was the FBC? Why is this place empty? Why is the Director dead? Through dialog, reports, and recordings, the universe of Control began to take shape. Nearly every single thing had an in-universe explanation; it wasn’t always the most plausible explanation, but it was fun! I loved the idea of a federal agency trying to explain the supernatural. It reminded me of The Witcher and how Witchers were treating magic, ghosts, and monsters with a degree of logic and seriousness that often wanders into the absurd.
I found the open and Metroidvania-like structure of Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order underutilized. The rewards for exploration were so trivial. Exploring the Oldest House yielded morsels of lore, materials for crafting upgrades, and the occasional side quest. It wasn’t for naught. Exploring a shape shifting office building may not be the most awe inspired thing I ever done in a game, but it was genuinely fascinating to push forward and see what Remedy tucked away.
Control may be one of the better super hero or Star Wars titles I’ve played. Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order may have gotten Lightsabers to a good spot, but the sensation of grabbing an object from the environment and hurling it towards an enemy was second to none in Control. It was incredible to see how the juggled gunplay, “force powers”, and movement into this elegant dance. Even though I saw Jessie flying in promotional art or trailers, it didn’t occur to me that they would include it as a component to combat. It didn’t take long before I was throwing chairs and computer screens, picking off pesky snipers with my pistol, before leaping into the air to launch rockets at clumps of enemy fodder.
The Ultimate Edition comes with a PlayStation 5 upgrade that includes a performance mode. There’s a quality mode as well for some 4K resolution nonsense and/or ray tracing, but I didn’t even bother digging into any of that. The game played great at 1440p60 and I recommend it as the way to play. While it may have played well and looked quite striking from a distance, I found the up-close character models very grimy looking. It’s not a full blown next-generation game and I hear the PC version looks a notch or two better, but poor Arish looked like a ghoul in some of those dialog sequences.
True to form for Remedy, the live action cutscenes and in-universe shows were top notch. I’m a big fan of Dr. Casper Darling’s corporate videos. I could watch him enthusiastically explain his discoveries all day. The Threshold Kids puppet show was unsettling a bit, but the reason for its existence made a lot of sense. Kids need to know about the dangers of the The Oldest House!
I wanted more of Control, but I don’t think the expansions were the right way to approach that conundrum. The main game felt concise and varied with sidequests brushing up with the limits of repetition. The Foundation and AWE expansions? They went a bit too far with stretching out the gameplay content. The 1:1 mix of story content and gameplay felt like it was stretched 1:3. Chase this monster again, retread these areas again, fight in this combat arena again. I wonder if I would have felt this way if I played these expansions on the original release schedule because despite their seamless integration with the main game, these expansions felt off.
Control was a fun filled adventure filled with top quality action and an engaging universe that I relished. This very well might be my favorite Remedy Entertainment game ever. It does everything that studio was known for extremely well and I cannot wait to see how they expand upon their ideas. How much of Control do they bring into Alan Wake 2? Can they ever pull off a sequel to Control? Much of what makes it the game it is, is the self contained nature of The Oldest House. The veil of mystery is essentially gone now, so just bringing more Control isn’t going to cut it. I don’t know what the answer is, but I’m back on board with whatever they do next.
Verdict:
I loved it