This game was a blast to play through but it was far too short, preventing many of its great qualities from really shining. Control is a graphically beautiful game, which boasts a solid physics engine and destructible environments. It also does a lot of world-building through scattered classified documents that you can read, recordings that utilize 1980's-era video technology, and dialogue with a few important characters. All of these collectibles set the groundwork for a really mysterious and interesting story, though it sort of falls flat. As far as optimization and playability are concerned, I was able to run this game pretty well on high settings with ray tracing on, though there were many occasions where the game would crash abruptly. Combat was very fun, with a variety of special abilities, forms for the Service Weapon, and objects in the environment at your disposal. As you progress through the game and collect resources, the Service Weapon will become more versatile, capable of transforming into many different weapon types. Special abilities are unlocked by "cleansing" so-called "objects of power (OoPs)" found throughout the story or through side-missions, and these abilities will aid you in fighting certain enemy types or in traversing through the environment. The enemies you fight are personnel of the Federal Bureau of Control who are "Hiss-corrupted," with some possessing powers similar to those you are able to unlock. Each enemy type requires some strategic use of your arsenal. The building the game takes place in, "The Oldest House," is home to many different sectors with notable set pieces that were very fun to explore and fight enemies within. The architecture is very abstract and provides a lot of verticality to spice up enemy encounters. This game has two expansions available: AWE and The Foundation, both of which contribute to the lore and add some fun and distinct elements. AWE serves as a crossover between the new Control IP and the Alan Wake franchise, also by Remedy. I cannot really comment on the quality of this crossover as I still have not played the Alan Wake franchise as of the writing of this review, but from the perspective of Control, the new elements meshed well with the already established gameplay. In contrast, The Foundation is purely focused on a new threat taking place in The Oldest House after the events of the main campaign. This expansion provides more new abilities for you to use, though they are isolated, and unable to be used outside of the new sector that the expansion takes place in. In conclusion, this game was a very fun experience that gave me a lot to play around with. There were many unforgettable moments during this game that left me anticipating the sequel that is apparently in the works.

Pretty cool game! Very X-files and Twin Peaks. The atmosphere and design is top-tier and the mind-bending items, power-ups and locations are awesome.

The combat is very cool at first but gets stale and easy as the game progresses. The story was super intriguing but lost me later on also. Ultimately the game doesn’t live up to the brilliant concepts it shows you at the beginning.

Ran quite badly on the base PS4.

Bought this after loving Alan Wake. I am personally kinda cautious about media in which the main character can be seen as psychotic, but is actually in the right about how the world operates. Control takes the concept of the ordinary being extraordinary in such a wacky, charming way that I felt comfortable with its story.

It adds to Alan Wake's concepts and expands upon them, it feels like a 5th of the game was spent reading files, which was a lot of fun for most of the game. Unfortunately I found the side missions to not add much, (at least the ones I played, some bugged out), and to just bloat the game. Control focused so much into detailing how the world works that I found myself waiting for more character interactions or development, it was lacking in this at the end.

The combat was a mixed bag, I could not find a consistent way to not be killed in seconds playing on normal difficulty. I mean, it wasn't a hard game, it just felt like jank maybe, sometimes running around would work, other times I would just immediately die by doing that, dunno, it was also kinda repetitive, in general I felt the game would have been better if it were linear and shorter.

The environments were cool at first, but they all felt kinda samey at the end. The game also commits the sin of having a substantial amount of audio logs and you not being able to continue playing while listening to them, so you just have to stand in place or pause the game to listen it on the menu.

The writing was so weird, it felt like Alan Wake, but I think Alan Wake was trashy on purpose, so I was on the joke with the writer, but now I don't think that was the case? This game tries to kinda use the same writing but in a kinda more serious tone, and it rarely worked for me. Jesse dialogue was good when she was joking I guess, it felt bland in other cases, I guess the game was trying to do too much and fell into being a little bit derivative with a lot of bloat.

+ Satisfying action gameplay. Combat generally feels really good to play around with. Props especially to the psychic powers that you gradually obtain throughout... probably the best implementation in this genre of both telekinesis and a later-game power.
+ Destructible environments and (especially combat) particles look great
+ Some pretty fun lore and worldbuilding, alongside plenty of collectibles and secrets

- Combat, while generally fun, tends to drag a little bit. Lots of "oh, there's still more?" waves of enemies that don't provide additional challenge or intrigue
- Some questionable design choices with combat alerts and lighting sometimes led to damage/deaths feeling a little cheap (I died more from falling into pits I didn't see than literally fighting enemies). Felt like the game couldn't decide whether to lean more towards action or horror at times
- Characters are mostly dull and uninteresting
- A couple weird design choices here and there. Most prominent one that comes to mind is that gear is randomly generated and unlocked through grindable random resource gathering? I never felt weak in my own playthrough, but weird decision to make it that way in the first place.

Control is usually slept on in comparison to other Remedy titles but personally, I'd say this is one their best.

Despite being a story heavy game, the gameplay loop is very fun and addictive. It's almost like a spectacle fighter in respect to the level of destruction you can cause with your powers. It can get repetitive but when that happens it's already over, so I didn't have an issue with that.

The story could be described as a lynchian X-Files with some amazing writing and mythology that reminisce of articles from the SCP Foundation. The bulk of the storytelling, though, is mostly done through documents and audio/video files that you collect. If you aren't willing to seek those out for yourself, it will probably feel very underwhelming and hard to follow.

That said, If you are willing to read and puzzle out the cryptic lore the game kinda hides from you, you'll get one of the best sci-fi stories in gaming. Exploring themes of extra dimensions, consciousness, universal entropy and tackling the theories and philosophies of Carl Jung about archetypes, synchronicity, collective unconsciousness and how subject reality can affect the material world. It's all great stuff that tickles my brain and it's all presented through a very entertaining mystery plot.

(This review was first written on Steam -- 16 February, 2022.)

Remedy's games never cease to bring me enjoyment and amaze me. Their games have unbelievingly captivating stories, characters and so much love and charm that I find it almost impossible not to fall into the worlds they create. Control was not only no different but also reached a new high with its story, world and combat. However, some systems in the game bog it down and interrupt and dampen my enjoyment.

In Control, you play Jesse Fayden, a young woman who arrives at a building owned by "The Federal Bureau of Control", a government agency that studies transdimensional and paranormal entities and is under the control of a director who is chosen by an entity called The Board. This is what Control's world is built on and exploring "The Oldest House" and finding out what the Bureau does and contains is what makes it so interesting. The closest comparison to the Bureau is the SCP foundation although Control separates itself in its presentation and its entities. Talking about the presentation Contol's Oldest House is a beautiful brutalist masterpiece with each floor switching styles like research having a mix of nature with trees and plans and maintenance having a more industrial look. These locations are jaw-dropping and the inclusion of the photo mode allows you to truly capture the concrete beauty of the building.

Controls combat is great as well with you unlocking different abilities throughout the game to the point by the end you're pretty much a superhero in a suit gliding around arenas and chucking various items at enemies using telekinesis, the game allows you to have quite a varied arsenal which is cool except it once it comes to fighting the best strategy is always throwing items at enemies and sticking with the two weapons you like. This allows for little experimentation and although the combat is fun doing the same thing over and over with little retaliation leaves the game feeling easy at times. What doesn't help is the enemy AI which is unbelievably simple with most enemies charging at you head-on or shooting you with little strategy. As well as this the upgrade system is a boring mess of minor stat bonuses in a cluttered inventory, with these upgrades being handed out as regularly as they are it means you'll end up taking time reading through boring and insignificant upgrades, an activity which really interrupts from the flow of the game and makes what should be interesting, daunting and frustrating. However, to say I didn't enjoy the combat would be wrong. Control allows for a complete power fantasy as you lift up forklifts and crush enemies. As well as this the varied roster of enemies makes the combat engaging and interesting with you having to keep in mind of enemy's ability and who to take out first to make the job easier. One feature in the game is alerts which act as small events where you need to travel to a sector and complete one of three challenges to protecting rangers to defeating higher health enemies while waves of enemies defend them. This isn't a feature that I'm opposed to in fact I believe that if implemented correctly they can add to the game, the problem is it isn't done correctly with them coming up during story missions and interrupting what you are currently doing. As well as this the mediocre rewards and repetitiveness of the missions make it so there's no incentive to do them and after a while you ignore them.

Overall I loved Control and although I did heavily criticise its systems, Its characters, world and gameplay altogether make for a great experience with Remedy's unbelievable world-building and charm added in like TV shows, quirky and breathtaking level design and some great writing and characters, I can confidently say I'd do anything to experience this game again for the first time.