a really good game with some absolutely transcendentally great moments (and some poor design choices, stiff writing/character performances and occasionally goes total cornball).

Overall the atmosphere is terrific. Such a great setting, very fun world building, a cool progression of powers and some fun excuses to get off the beaten path and explore. I wish there was more of that, the crates are fun to find because they're fun to find but the crafting system and upgrade tree is pretty poorly designed so finding stuff rarely makes you feel like you found anything actually helpful.

I think my biggest issue is that the Oldest House could feel more fun to traverse. It's big, and sort of interconnected, but never really gives the satisfaction you get in great Metroidvanias when you turn a corner or go down a hallway and realize you know where you are, where you gradually gain a deeper understanding of the geography of the space. There are too many fast travel points so you never have to learn how anything connects. This could've been fixed with more thoughtful design. More shortcuts, elevators, staircase, hallways zig zagging across the areas. Limit fast travel to maybe one control point per zone. Make me understand the space, make me figure out how to get back to an old area. More interesting traversal and better rewards would make the side quests a little more interesting, too.

Combat is usually pretty fun, has a decent difficulty curve. You are forced to evaluate a situation and figure out the best approach. Unfortunately in the end the best approach is usually "throw a ton of stuff at the bad guys with your psychic powers" and that gets a little repetitive.

There's a really solid foundation here, but this game is held back by so many fundamental issues that keep it from being anything more than okay. It can be really fun to throw shit around with telekinesis for a while, but the combat eventually becomes really stale. Enemies are damage sponges and eventually you won't even be using your gun, just hurling shit at endless waves of the same repeated mobs, only shooting when your energy is on cooldown. The art design here is phenomenal, and implements live action in genius ways, but nearly every area you explore looks identical, and the in game models look incredibly uncanny, it's honestly hilarious every time it cuts from a live action scene to their in game model that looks like them made out of clay. The story has some really interesting concepts, but I was mostly just interested in the facility, Dr. Darling and the stuff with Alan Wake. The main plot involving Jesse, her brother and the hiss feels incredibly half baked, and ends as soon as it feels like it's really picking up.
The game really wasn't that bad, but it really started wearing me down by the end with it's repetitive gameplay. I only played this because I was interested in continuing Alan Wake and heard there was stuff relating to the story in this game, and I can't really say it was worth it in that regard, but if you're interested I think you should check it out. Despite it's flaws, there's still a lot of fun to be had here, for a while at least.

I played this a few years ago on a base PS4 and struggled with it a bit. I could get a sense of the aesthetic they were going for, but the hardware was not able to sell it. None of the amazing raytracing, textures would take forever to load (and sometimes not load at all), and there was even some basic draw distance issues. The PS5 version is so much more effective, not just because it looks nicer, but because of how much those graphical extras contribute to the mood and atmosphere of this thing. I was so much more immersed this time, and got much more into the story and the combat as a result. I still find it a little frustrating that both Alan Wake and this game have such great storytelling, unique and inventive worlds, and rich palpable atmosphere, but gameplay that mostly consists of shooting guys who attack you with conventional weapons, but at least the combat in Control feels really good, and de-emphasizes gunplay in favor of some very satisfying telekinesis moves.

Queria jogar Alan Wake e li que seria interessante jogar Control pra entender melhor a história de Alan Wake, e como Control tava na ps plus extra (que eu assino) resolvi jogar.
O jogo começa lento e se sustenta na narrativa, depois a gameplay se sustenta sozinha e é perfeitamente temperada pela ambientação e narrativa.
Eu joguei com o ps5 focado na qualidade e não desempenho e com isso senti alguns pequenos engasgos que acredito serem meios absurdos, visto que o jogo foi lançado pra ps4, mas não é nada que incomode tanto.
Fora isso, o jogo dessa maneira é lindo, meio escuro demais em alguns ambientes, mas num geral eu gostei muito.
A gameplay é muito dinâmica e com um bom nivel de dificuldade, tendo alguns chefes e desafios opcionais bem complicados. Ela consegue se tornar bem diversa com os poderes que você vai aprendendo e com as diferentes formas da sua arma principal.
A exploração tem bem uma vibe metroidvania 3d, com áreas que só são acessíveis mais tarde, e o jogo faz você re-explorar essas áreas de maneiras orgânicas e divertidas.
Agora o que faz esse jogo ser incrível pra mim é o nível de criatividade do universo e narrativa. O nível de conteúdo pra contextualizar e ambientar o jogador, através de flashbacks, documentos, gravações é impressionante. Sinceramente é tanto conteúdo que eu devo ter pulado por volta de uns 20% por estar cansado naquela sessão de gameplay específica.

Esse jogo é um prato cheio pra quem gosta de narrativas instigantes e envolventes, e ainda se sustenta como um bom jogo para aqueles que só se importam com a gameplay e ação nos jogos.
Só não quis platinar pois tem muitas conquistas que são apenas pra render mais horas de gameplay, pouco criativas e muito menos divertidas.

Remedy games are so good man, for real. I loved Alan Wake so I figured I would dig this one as well. And so I did, finished this in 2 days while sick and what a trip it was. The lore, the universe and the story are all pretty good - mysterious weird trippy stuff.

The plot and characters were maybe just decent when compared with Alan Wake or even Bioshock and the likes. But, in a similar fashion to Alan Wake, the universe and lore are more interesting than the actual plot - though Alan Wake's is better.

Gameplay wise it gets kinda repetitive but it's got pretty fun and creative combat, with some sparse puzzles sprinkled in there.

The thing that makes the game what it is though is it's CHARM. The aesthetic, the narration, the live action videos are all super charming. The whole thing reaks of David Lynch, as Alan Wake did too. Although this one leans more towards Stephen King and X-Files too.

Overall really great game, even if it's a bit repetitive at times and doesn't have the strongest of characters or story.

I think I saw somewhere that all Remedy games are linked in the same universe too, which could make the lore in here even better.

One of the bigger disappointments I've played. As a premise, Control is awesome: Dynamic gameplay and an SCP style lore to it. However, it gets totally dull very fast. Its gameplay is repetitive and easily exploitable; with a story that fails to grip you along side totally vanilla characters.

If they ever do a sequel then I'm sure they can fix this. This first game though is not as fun as you would think and overall a letdown. Even the Alan Wake DLC: a game I really enjoyed, wasn't all that good. Great visuals and sound design though.

has its fun moments and overall a good game, just marred with the unnecessarily excessive, constant waves of enemies at almost every turn that simply feel like they're getting in the way of the storytelling. wouldn't have complained if at least the combat was more varied, but instead, seemingly, only the enemy quantities are turned up as the game progresses. wore me down enough for me to finish the last two-ish missions with the no-damage assist setting turned on.
also, the map UI is some unintuitive garbage for some reason. and some of the puzzles felt kinda lame.
the Ashtray Maze was really cool, though.

oyunu oynaması çok zevkli tüm yan görevleri zartı zurtu bitirdim 1 2 tane skill kaldı ağaçta açılmadık oyunun gameplayi telekenis ile fırlatma ucma cart curt beklemediğim kadar eğlendirdi ondan dolayı tüm görevleri yaptım oyundaki ama oyunun bence en büyük eksiği hikaye anlatımı neden böyle bir yol seçmişler anlamadım oyunu oynayıp bitirdim hikayeden bir bok anlamadım dedim proble mbende mi herkes böyleymis hikayeyi gizemle sunuyor anlayabilmek icin oyundaki notları falan okumak gerekıyor bunun yerıne daha anlasılır sekılde sunsalarmıs hıkayeyı mıs gıbı oyun olurmus

After playing Alan Wake 2, I remembered playing Control for free with PS+. I remember it was kinda neat, but this was like upwards of 3 years ago so i dont remember any of that. Eventually I just sorta dropped it and it skipped my mind. Until now i guess, and honestly? What a game.

Control is a start of the Remedy Cinematic Universe (positive) and tells a story about something going on at the SCP fou- i mean the Federal Bureau of Control. Right of the bat to get it out of the way, yeah it's more or less an unofficial SCP game. Difference is the FBC is less morally dubious (it still is but they dont feed prisoners into objects just to see what would happen). The story itself is pretty ok. Nothing amazing up until the end when a couple of big bombshells get revealed. What sells this game is the presentation, it's really damn cool to put it bluntly. It's a bit avant garde but not enough that you can't understand anything happening in it. The weird mist effect the Hiss soldiers have, the way the environment ends up falling apart as you fight in the big arenas the game has, it's small stuff that adds up to make the game feel way bigger then, in reality, it actually is.

The gameplay is where i was worried going in though. Remedy always has good stories and characters and such, but the gameplay has always been a mixed bag. In this game, it's honestly not bad but it's nothing mind blowing. It's a standard action shooty game, but you have some cool powers. Throwing objects, which does an OBSCENE amount of damage and breaks shields, is your main one, but you can also dash, make a sheild, just do a ton of fun stuff and it spices up what would normally be a very middling game. Especially late in the game. HOWEVER: at least on normal difficulty, its veeeery easy to cheese the game. Enemy AI isnt the best, and you can easily break the game with throwing objects. It's still fairly fun, but yeah it's...fine.

Honestly the biggest thing i have an issue with is the mods system. You get a billion different crafting elements and it's to craft weapons, which most of them I never ended up using more than once, and mods. Mods are just that, they modify your character and your weapons, but most of the mods are just kinda boring stat boosts. In fact, all of them are for personal mods. Weapon mods have some good ones though, like tightening the choke on Shatter (the shotgun) or other various effects like that, but generally the mods are uninteresting busy work and clutter. This is a pet peeve but i also just ended up using the starting pistol and the shotgun the entire game. Never really needed to switch them.

The side missions range from busy work to neat. The best ones are dealing with altered items, usually cause you get some sort of ability afterwards, and just cause it's fun to see what they come up with. The altered items/objects of power are always fun. It's my favorite type of SPCs too, just random things that do silly (or dangerous) stuff. You also get board countermeasures and protocols, which are just "kill enemies in [blank] area" missions. They're busy work, didn't intentionally do any of them.

Really, what sells this game for me is passion. This is clearly something that Remedy wanted to make, a story that Sam Lake wanted to tell, and something that the entire dev team put their heart into. The presentation, the story, the pretty dang neat gameplay, it all comes together to make a pretty good package. I haven't gotten to the dlc yet, but control is fantastic. Highly would recommend it if you haven't played it.

Сперва не мог поверить в то, что такое напишу. Control, наравне с Resident Evil 2 Remake, получила награду "Игра года" в моём личном топе. Если Вам, дорогой читатель, не хочется читать большой текст ниже, то скажу кратко: визуал — умопомрачительный, атмосфера — великолепная, физика — впечатляющая, ганфайт — лучший от Remedy со времён Max Payne 2, сюжет — интригующий, подача — что-то с чем-то. Если хотите узнать больше, то милости прошу.

Как принято, начну с краткого введения. Главная героиня по имени Джесси Фейден ввиду личных причин отправляется в таинственное Федеральное Бюро Контроля, находящееся в самом сердце Нью-Йорка. Это место и станет центром всех дальнейших событий игре. По ходу сюжета героиня будет сталкиваться с паранормальными вещами и получать разные способности с улучшениями, такие как телекинез, левитация, к примеру.

На моём геймерском опыте свыше двухсот пройденных игр — всё, что только можно было, я увидел, казалось бы. Реальность оказалась, на удивление, иной. Как я подчеркнул в чьём-то обзоре, Control представляет из себя квинтэссенцию безумия, мол, разработчики оторвались по полной, показывая множество странных и ненормальных вещей. И это, чёрт возьми, прекрасно!

Возьмём визуальную составляющую: доминирование строго красного, строго синего или строго жёлтого в определённых местах, наложение полупрозрачного изображения поверх другого (представьте, что во время игры открылось окно с каким-то видео, только это видео полупрозрачное и потому не отвлекает от геймплея, а, наоборот, идеально его дополняет). Подобных моментов немного, расставлены они в определённых местах, и как раз поэтому они воспринимаются на ура.

Кто-то может утверждать, что персонажей в игре мало и их личности плохо раскрываются. Что ж, они имеют право на такое мнение. Однако я впал в экстаз, поскольку моими любимыми колоритными персонажами стали уборщик Ахти и доктор Каспер Дарлинг, персонаж, которого вообще не встречаешь лично: мы наблюдаем его лишь в видеозаписях с проекторов. Уборщик и человек с экрана — лучшие второстепенные персонажи. Безумно, не так ли?

Что насчёт Джесси, так мне она показалась интересной персоной, которая вписывается в общий сеттинг. Странное вообще впечатление о ней сложилось. Просто вписывается, и всё. Но именно такая странность в мире Control — простое дело.

Сражения. Проблема Alan Wake и Quantum Break заключалась в том, что ближе к концу они начинали докучать своим геймплеем: убивай врагов, снова и снова. В Control у меня такое чувство почти пропало, однако я могу оправдать свою малейшую усталость от ведения боя тем, что решился пройти все побочные задания, речь о которых пойдёт ниже (спойлер — побочки шикарны, не из разряда "подай-принеси").

Игра Remedy. Чувствуется "почерк" обожаемых нами финнов: зрелищные перестрелки, Poets of The Fall в саундтреке, кинематографичность с использованием видео с живыми актёрами, сверхъестественное (этот пункт уже не отнесешь к дилогии Max Payne, зато зрелищные перестрелки лучше соотносятся с ним, так как Alan Wake и Quantum Break немного проигрывают в этом, как я написал выше).

Сайд-квесты. Они уникальные! В одном дают новую способность, которую никак иначе нельзя разблокировать, а в бою она будет полезна; в других будут схватки с созданными специально боссами (я насчитал пять, плюс один встретится еще раз), ещё одни оригинальны по содержанию и нестандартности ситуации (к примеру, в одном задании попросят поговорить с растениями).

Оптимизация. Явное слабое место игры, унаследованное от предыдущего проекта Remedy. Играл на fat-версии Xbox One. Во время тяжелых битв fps проседал до 20, а после выхода из меню паузы игра застывала на несколько секунд. Будь это любая другая игра, я бы даже не дал ей шанса. На моём PC дела обстоят лучше, только мыло и проседания в боях остались (тут количество кадров падает до 27-28, когда в обычное время стабильно держится 32 FPS). Но это оказалась Control, всю шедевральность которой я понял спонтанно. Именно так я и воспринял атмосферу игры, что помогло мне влюбиться в неё.

Подводя итог, хочу сказать, что Control — грандиозный геймерский опыт, который желаю пережить каждому игроку.

P.S. Отзыв был написан ещё в период между августом и сентябрём 2020-го. Сейчас вернулся, чтобы его подкорректировать и попытаться опубликовать повторно. На моём счету уже свыше пятисот пройденных игр, и я до сих пор считаю Control настоящим шедевром. Любителям "Секретных материалов", творчества Дэвида Линча настолько сверхординарная работа обязана прийтись по душе!