Romain FRICAUD

Honestly, it pains me to write this down. I love Remedy and the games they have made over the last two decades now. I was part of the minority that actually enjoyed Quantum Break. Unfortunately, Control will be seating at the end of the podium for me. One thing to clear out, the game is beautiful, the light, the physics, the paranoia of wandering in the hallway of a forever changing environnement that really put you into a David Lynch nightmare. The big let down for me, the story... I have put 20+ hours in the game and I still do not CARE about what is happening or why do I do what I do. Which is one of the main reason a solo narrative game should be pushing “why should I care”. The characters are flat most of the time dull, completely oblivious about the events surrounding them, most of the time you feel like having a casual conversation with Suzan at the coffee machine behind your cubicle on a Monday morning. The only character that has a minimum of substance would be the janitor (played by Sam Lake I believe), who is colorful and mysterious enough for me to appreciate my encounter with him. But the rest is really dull and boring. And it pains me because I know how good of a storyteller and worldbuilder Remedy can be. The gameplay is most of the time very satisfying. But the checkpoint system coming straight from the PS2 era is a grind I’m not willing to waste time on. You die, you go back wayyy back where you started, find the room again, run, fight again and die again to then repeat. The game doesn’t have a difficulty mode, so most of the time some levels can really, really be grinding. So dying and trying again will be a hell of a routine in this game. To note that the gun you’ll be using doesn’t have much “punch” to it. It doesn’t feel like a special weapon, the shooting moment aren’t that fun or dynamic, what save the fighting moment are the actual powers that you have and will enhance thorough the game. Now, I understand the critical response the game had, and I truly support the people who love it. I truly believe that my gamer expectation where not satisfied. Won’t be in my top games of 2019, and won’t probably give it another try.