I need to get Control of myself.
Joel Collins (ireakhavok) June 17th, 2021
Mid-game Impressions
Control is a mind bending, supernatural, thriller of a game. Immediately, from the cinematic start at the beginning of the game, I knew that it would play more like a movie, than something like a sandbox RPG. It is a single player third-person shooter set in the department of control, a CIA lookalike. The high end office interior provides a picturesque scenery that not only catches the eye from time to time, thanks to gobs and gobs of ray tracing, but also indirectly emphasizes on the use of the close quarters environment to steer boss battles, hide treasures, and serve as barriers for the deceptively linear storyline.
The best part of this game is its story. The strong point here is it’s ability to immerse you into the story without leaving you with a feeling of dis-belief. Many times sci-fi can be dry, unoriginal, and not interesting, but control side-steps your reality and places you into a world where you must recover powerful artifacts. These artifacts progress the abilities of Jesse, the main character, and the story, deeper and deeper, into a trippy dream-like experience that leaves you wanting to explore more. Exploring every nook and cranny of these different departments can seem unimportant at first, but as you begin to collect powerups that augment your abilities, you realize that explorations is definitely rewarded. While you sift through the desks, chairs, and other office memorabilia of the people who once populated this building, you’ll uncover small back stories that only add to the ambiance, making you miss the people who once were.
The second best part of this game would have to be the ambiance and suspense. As I play I am constantly looking back to where I had just been, just to see what it looks like from a different perspective. This game is stunning, and the level design is extremely intriguing. Much of the architecture of the larger rooms are so unique, that it feels as if there were several real-life architects designing levels. Despite the diversity, the game still has an overall ambiance that melds the game into what I feel is a great merger of concept art and execution.
The sound in this game is great. It didn’t leave me with an impression that made me think further on the subject, but it also didn’t distract me. When sound designers and dialogue get lazy, like in oblivion when the same character says the same line over and over again while we’re in their shop, we are brought out of the immersion, and remember that we are just in a game. Gladly, this didn’t happen. I feel that the sound not only, passes, but doesn’t become center stage, either, allowing for the true star, the visuals, to be further emphasized. From time to time, you’ll hear some sounds from deeper within the departments, that again, only add to the ambiance.
There are many enemies to defeat, and they do respawn somewhat, if you die, but the lack of NPC’s doesn’t really bother me as you are meant to feel lonely in this eerie blood covered dream. This is a solo-player game, and feel that any kind of multiplayer or co-op gameplay would detract from the experience. Periodically, you will encounter bosses which test your ability to adapt to each situation, and being that this game is exceedingly supernatural, only your imagination can hinder each encounter. From flying specters, to giant plants, your ability to adapt quickly is exceedingly important during boss battles, and was a welcome challenge and made the gameplay more flexible, and the game, overall, more dynamic.
The gameplay was great, but from time to time, being primarily a first-person-shooter fan, I was left wishing that I didn’t have to switch the camera from shoulder to shoulder to be able to see if I was shooting around objects. It detracted from the gameplay, but feel that for people who play more 3rd person shooters this wouldn’t feel as clunky as it did for me.
The Gui I have yet to fully master, and although this is extremely important in some games, when don’t have to be in menus, much, it may take longer to get used to. I feel that although this could have been designed differently, it doesn’t distract from the game overall.
I have yet to beat the game, but am looking forward to picking up the game, again, to progress further into the halls of Control, find new artifacts, and ultimately find out what happens in such a thrilling title.