For those who are new to channel, I've covered Alan Wake (😄) and Quantum Break (💩) as well. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-mK7gV2rL7cs.html
New subscriber here! Absolute phenomenal critique of my favorite video game! I never really saw any content regarding Control following it's release, but holy wow this video is a breath of fresh air! My deepest thanks for a satisfying study :) Edit: Hearing your excitement over the Synchronicity section made me reinstall the game lol Also, I love that you emphasized the mechanics in the AWE expansion! The way Remedy combined their games' styles, requiring aspects of both to ultimately defeat Hartman who himself is corrupted by the entities within both games. It's wonderful. For a second it felt like the mechanics were contextualizing the story. It was a Weird experience lol
I feel like you were just nitpicking at things on this one, not gonna lie... Her reaction for instance: ever consider that she doesnt react very strongly because of her past? Because she has already had experience with paranatural phenomena from childhood with her brother? Or maybe it may have something to do with the fact that this game exists within the same shared universe of Alan Wake, and the events in this game (including Jessies past, and the Hiss) may be affected by his reality altering abilities. Then there is the possible complexity of her character development over the years of her life before the game. Maybe shes just more open minded and mentally/emotionally stronger than most, as well? What if shes just more intelligent and can observe and accept unusual things better? Id be surprised at paranormal happenings if they turned out to be real, but I wouldnt be shitting bricks, because that wouldnt be outside the range of my ''what if's'', no matter how imaginative. Plus, as you have mentioned about the ''2/3'rds'' of the gameplay, by then, she has already went through numerous experiences within the building, so the lack of reaction is even less surprising. Now, as for the characters goals/motivations? Well, she doesnt have to be a complete projection of the players ego. I have said this to someone else, but she is her own character with her own backstory and potential motivations. Shes not some researcher, or any operative within the bureau already stationed there - she has been shoved into that whole mess in one way or another, whether years in the past, or more recently in the game, so she doesnt have to care as much about the same questions as you. Shes not a silent protagonist for anyone to imprint on, she has her own kind, slightly stoic, introspective personality. Besides, if she knows her brother is in the facility, doesnt it make far more sense for her to care about that far more than some incomprehensible babble of words? Its her f**g brother. Then there is the ''design''.... Despite her paranormal past, and up until her arrival at the ''house'', she is just an every-day person, like you or me. She does not have to have any ''wild'' style or personality. A leather jacket and jeans is plenty. Its if like a reflection of her strong mindedness and seriousness. In fact, like i mentioned, her personality could be a combination of her more analytical/comprehensive mind, more open mind, her previous paranormal encounters, and the general seriousness/mental hardiness of someone who has 'gone through shit'. Thats what I think, anyway. The enemy variety can be explained by the fact that the hiss may be affecting everyone in similar ways unless it decides otherwise or there are some modifying factors involved.The guns may have had more variety, but it wouldnt be surprising that a good number of the personnel would have guns, and guns of similar/same models. The ''barely looking inhuman'' part may have been, again, the hiss's chooice to allow the puppets to retain their existing combat ability and potentially knowledge/intelligence (in case of severe brain morphs). Anything more than that is too much writing, so I'll stop. Its a very good game all in all. Havent played the DLC's yet.
i actually like how Jessie reacted referencing having looked at Wired stuff and owww it's Wired but you know what i have already seen my share of Wired and I liked it so more Wired stuff is cool (plus I also like her apathetic tone) i guess it might actually be because she actually makes setting even more wired supernatural by reacting in such a wired and airy tone
Another thing with the janitor at the start that some players miss is he makes a comment in response to something the protagonist thought to herself in her head
AND the janitor wasn't wearing on of those frequency things. So he should be possessed too. But he isn't. So he is either being protected by an object of power or he is a manifestation of the house itself. Maybe a ghost? Either way something supernatural is going on there. Maybe he even is a physical manifestation of an object of power
I do see how her reactions could seem weird, but personally when I heard "This is exactly where I needed to be" I have never related to anything more, which made me identify with Jesse until the very end, and just in general I always related to her reactions
When i played Control for the first time, i walked away with a VERY different understanding of Hedron and the Hiss relation ship! I thought, they were both Sentient songs (resonances) and that on the world of the Slide Hedron was a warden, trapping the Hiss on the slide. That they both drew power by creatures "Singing" with them (increasing there resonance) and that why Jesse was immune to the hiss, was because she was already "singing" Hedrons song The difference between them was that Hedron is either incapable, or unwilling, to force others to sing. Jesse was an exception, because she need its help fighting the not mother. A favor Jesse would later repay, when she is tasked by Polaris to save Hedron in turn, because the bureau in its need to stick its nose where it didn't belong, removed Hedron from the slide, seeking to understand it. Which unwittingly allowed the Hiss to consume the slide (I think they describe there being fields and trees there in the reports, but when trench activates it, its just red space) Which was what the Hedron Amps were for, allowing Hedron to sing over the Hiss, and drive it back. In the end, i had assumed Hedron was the more powerful entity, but its refusal to fight dirty against the hiss got it destroyed, leaving only Jesse, and quite possibly Darling, as the only Hedron "infested" singers, and since Darling vanished, that leaves it up to Jesse to re-contain the Hiss! Just wanted to put my thoughts out there, and since i'm leaving a comment anyway, Love your videos!
I know I'm like 8 months late on this comment and I'm still not going to watch this critique yet because I have not finished the DLC but I am beyond hype for Alan Wake 2. In a strange way it's like remedy is the only way we get new X-Files episodes I think that's what fascinates me about the studio
I actually felt very much in tune with Jesse. We both had the exact same approach to the world - first about half an hour, we were both weirded out, but in the most enjoyable way ever, then we both accepted the weirdness because... after all... that's why we came into The Oldest House, and the rest of it flowed from that. Her quips were also totally my kind, often bad on purpose because that's how I amuse myself by them - by how bad/deadpan they are, especially in the circumstances. To me, she would be extremely annoying if she kept being fascinated and surprised, that's what would create the rift between me and her.
I loved Control because it is not a story about what happened to a bunch of kids in a "Stranger Things"esque story. It is about what happens to these kids when they have become adults. Jesse and Faden and their friends have been through an extremely traumatic experience as children, I mean they had to kill one of their friends when he turned into a werewolf type thing from this grotesque entity called "Not-mother" which has a very strong childish name associated with it as well. The reason she isn't fazed much about what is happening in the oldest house because she has experience similar or even more traumatic and "weird" experiences in the past, those experiences have been put into question due to the FBC silent influence on her life but being in the FBC confirmed all her experiences that she knew to be real. She lived her whole life believing in those things because it happened to her before to a more extreme level and as an impressionable child. While I do agree that her interaction with Dylan was unnecessarily devoid of emotion, I am of two minds on this: The first being that she lived her whole life after the incident in "Ordinary" devoid of a lot of agency, Polaris has always been her guide and instructor, she comes to the FBC because Polaris wished it, she is swept away by the Board, multiple people are telling her what to do so she just goes with the flow of what she knows her whole life, so when she finds Dylan we see Polaris flash again taking away her agency, and even like most of the game she displays that emotion inwards towards the only entity that ever listened to her and believed her which is Polaris so she never really did develop a conventional capacity to display emotion outwards . My Second opinion on this is that the developers wanted a blank character for you to fit into, which I sort of disagree with because Jesse's backstory is too complex to allow that. I think from a psychological point of view, Jesse's lack of outward emotion expression is completely normal for a person who is in her circumstances, especially considering that she had to lie and cheat her way out of mental-health asylums and constant programmed brainwashing by the FBC disguised as psychological therapy. She is very animated and talkative when conversing internally with Polaris displaying tonal shifts and pitch adjustment in a manner she doesn't do when talking to people, it's the only way she has learned to survive.
I think the one thing I don't like about this is that it is the second time remedy has portrayed the mental health profession as sinister and evil. Otherwise, it's a fantastic set of observations on the character that do actually save a lot of the game for me.
@MIS_behave they're really not. There's a lot of internal struggles in the field still but the field is finally evolving from old conjecture and unproven ideas into an actual science in light of the replicability crisis. And MOST people getting into it still do so to help people rather than to be weird hypercontrolling supervillains.
@@IAMFANTROLL I don’t think the mental health professionals depicted in Control were made to look sinister or evil. They had no way to know that Jesse had actually experienced a paranormal event. To any reasonable outward observer she was a traumatised child who had lost her entire family to an industrial accident. Of course she would be seen as delusional; it’s by far the simplest explanation (and in the real world this is what happens - therapists would go mad if they believed the delusions of their patients).
As you mentioned at the start, Control was my personal GOTY for 2019, I have become obsessed with the game/universe/etc since release. I agree with most of what you're saying in this video. It's an almost perfect game, except for those few flaws. I have a minor correction for you though, in that Alan didn't create the Hiss. It's mildly mentioned in game, and then fully confirmed in the art book, that Alan cannot create things with his power...he can only manipulate events, guide the story, etc. So the Hiss, FBC, Jesse, etc always existed, Alan just pushed the "narrative" of reality to make it so Jesse could come and save him with the full might of the FBC.
I agree that Alan may not have created the hiss, but I can't help but mention how he DID shape it. He wrote the chant that we heard from the Hiss-possessed people all throughout the game. And he wrote a pretty bad script for a Night Springs episode that was probably what caused Trench and Darling to open up the slidescape to let the Hiss into the Oldest House. I fully can't get over how Alan has seemingly caused and manipulated the events of Control, just to enable his own escape from The Dark Place.
@@3ndlessL00p exactly that. I like that it furthers how Alan isn't a *good* person, he's a very flawed (mildly abusive alcoholic with anger issues) human that happens to have been dragged into an AWE, and is now willing to manipulate events to get back home. I believe we'll see an even darker version of Alan in his 2nd game, probably requiring Alice to bring him back to humanity if he doesn't die.
In my oppinion Jessie reacts exactly right. Not only has she experience with that kind of stuff since childhood and an entity in her head, it was also how i reacted. If the action is high you need to underperform. That is right in movies and in games. Also think her look is perfect ^^ Living is rough. You wear jeans, leather jacket and do not care about your hair. Been there. Done that. And Langston is my favorite next to Darling ;) Enjoyed the video :)
@@SantosAl is it possible that jesse was instead altered in term of her identity that Alan gave her a different reality that is by having Dylan as her brother as we never got any further details of their childhood nor remarks other than Ordinary AWE. Could it be that Alan "made" the Hiss to create a hero to save him from the darkness and the by-product are both the Hiss and Dylan or just on of those? It's interesting to think about, i'm even planning on playing Alan Wake
@@akmalrusydi2730 If you haven't played Alan Wake I definitely recommend it it is such a great game. It has been many years since I played AW, but from I can remember he can't really "create" anything, only affect what is already there. I think I remember him also mentioning that even with the things that he can affect they have to fit with what he has already written thematically. I guess I should play the game again, I seem to have forgotten a couple of things.
Elevated Hiss dodge the initial projectile thrown at them, and the 2nd one always hits. There is a cooldown that resets this, so if you don't launch two in quick succession, they'll appear to dodge randomly.
Old comment, but I'm glad someone said it. Granted, that doesn't make the rest of Monty's observations invalid -- Launch is still overpowered and Elevated Hiss are tedious. I'd argue the fact they ALWAYS dodge the first and get hit by the second makes their behavior a little artificial and boring. It just makes fighting them basically take twice as long and twice as much energy. But it ain't random, that's for sure.
Can't believe I sat through a two hours analysis of Control. Very impressive. I personally didn't mind Jessie's attitude. Seemed to me like the acting in some Lynch movies, where the characters are strangely removed from the things happening around them and therefore fitting into the overall weird tone. Looking at the inspiration they took from the SCP Foundation and the best entries on that side, I think they could definitely had dialed up the weirdness a little further. Nonetheless it was an impressive example of world building in a game.
Thanks for your patience with this one. The current plan is for a The First Ten Minutes video to come out in a couple weeks, and an "I Explained Metal Gear Solid to My Friend Who Hasn't Played The Games" - similar style and format to the Resident Evil lore video.
This is going to be a habit of mine, but I'll once again compliment how astonishing your avatar design is. Beyond that, I'm excited to see the metal gear video - I hadn't even played the RE games and I found it one of my favourite videos of the year.
@@mrfreddorenton thanks so much! Would you believe the avatar stuff is just a bit of messing around on Canva? I'm always chuffed they turn out cooler than I think but in the future I might ask a proper artist to help for complex designs. The lore video was a spur-of-the-moment idea with the Resi one and we had so much fun doing it I figured we'd do a few more.
The hitting pattern o flying enemies isn't random, you have to instantly throw the object so it doesn't have time to react and you break their shield, but the trick is to throw it before the object goes hovering to Jesse
Jeeeezus. That PS4 only Astral Dive outfit is just: ASS THE VIDEO GAME, huh? Loved this video essay man, Control is one of my favourite games and you touched on pretty much every plus and minus I had about the title.
Yeah, I felt so uncomfortable looking at her hindside in this outfit that I never used it. It's still scummy that the Ultimate Edition doesn't include it, even on PS5. My favorites are the Asynchronous Suit and Urban Response Outfit.
I really enjoyed the SCP description interludes/prologues. For something I didn't know anything about until maybe last year it has a lot of really cool unique (weird) fiction. I hope a sequel really delves deeper into some SCP fiction. I played Control late last year and it is my first and to date only Remedy game I've played. I enjoyed it a lot, makes me interested in trying out Alan Wake.
Wait. Did you think the board gave Ahti the tape? Its an Old gods song about Jesse's life. They saw her future and wrote the song. Then they gave it to Ahti in his sauna in Watery Washington
I really liked Jesse’s deadpan delivery. Her entire life she was antisocial and off. Her arrival at the FBC is natural for her, as if she was always a fish out of water until arriving at her true calling. she fits in perfectly with the FBC due to her weirdness.
Jesse is a freak. She's not us, the player. She's seen some crazy shit starting from a young age and Polaris has guided her through it all, possibly being the only true friend she's ever had, so she's not an "everywoman" and no she doesn't need to be more freaked out. She's a freak, a weirdo, and part of her may have accepted that she's basically a video game character. We're not playing as Jesse, we're playing as Polaris.
If you wanted your service weapon to deal damage you should have used the peirce, that thing huts like a truck and instantly destroys shealds. Great video man, I absolutely adore control but you make some very good points especially when it fomes to the mods and loot system. Really just a waist of time to interact with it
I'd also argue that the level 5/6 mods are incredible. 125% charge velocity increase + 500% projectile speed increase + a 125% blast radius boost is a thing of beauty
Excellent video as per usual. A true sign of a great video critique is when I don’t always agree with an opinion expressed but still value and respect the views because they are explained very well. One small critique I would make is the transitions between your points by using the SCP snippets. I have a large attention span but I did find myself scrolling ahead during these breaks. That being said, this is likely a “me problem” since I go to sleep sometimes listening to compilations of SCP stories so they don’t hold my interest having heard most of them already :) Definitely gonna start using GOOT. Perfect description!
The Jesse dislike hurts my heart. I love her and feel like her quick acceptance of everything mimics everyone else’s quick acceptance of her as director in a notable way. She constantly makes mention of her “liking” this and “glad” shes here. There’s something about this place that feels good to her and like home. It feels important lore wise that she is so un-taken aback. I think Polaris has subconsciously prepped her to see the Oldest House as the place she belongs
Addendum: I haven't played this yet so maybe I'm ruining it for myself, but I'm about half an hour in. "The Oldest House" absolutely has to take some inspiration from "House of Leaves" which is one of the most unnerving and outlandish novels I've read.
I definitely disagree with your take on Jesse and wouldn't have her any other way. Jesse's reactions to everything always made complete sense to me given her history not only with polaris but what happened to her home town when she was young. She grew up with paranormal beings from another realm, alternate dimensions, powerful artifacts, and even body horror all as things that were "normal" for her during her formative childhood years. By comparison the real world has always considered her crazy and denied her reality. She states it several times throughout the story that the FBC isnt really weird to her, its not only normal, its calming and solidifies her past and who she is as a person. It would have been so much easy to have her be shocked by all the weirdness or reacting gung ho to all of the action like so many other characters in these stories, but who she actually is and how she reacts to the world around her is so much more unique and what makes her the most qualified person to be the director of the FBC. In her own words, she's finally exactly where she should be. Jesse IS "Control", not wonder or fascination like Darling or Emily, or fear like the previous director, but someone who is fully naturally in control in the super natural.
For whatever reason, I bounced off Control really fast the first time I played it. Pretty sure that was 100% on my end though, just wasn't in the right mood or something. When I came back to it a few months later, it became one of my favorite games this side of the new millennium.
How the term speculative fiction is applied, most of the time, is as a generalization that includes multiple already existing genres to say that they’re all related, mostly Sci-fi fantasy and horror, so anything in any of those genres is also spec fic
The Foundation DLC trailer introduced me to Not Waving, the.. odd industrial-ish electronica band. It definetly fits the weird exploration of something that supposed to feel normal but is not- very fitting, and would also fit stuff like theoretical perfect "Backrooms" exploration game I would envision (something closer to Stalker than the myriads of themed escape rooms with vague alusions of "butthurt because we weren't fit for SCP WIKI" that current "Backrooms" games are) Also, Shape and Fracture would fit the theme of Jessie getting control of the Oldest House over from The Board- now letting her shape and move the place around, not disimilarly to Hiss corruption, but under player control
1:24:46 "... We learn in the AWE DLC that Alan Wake probably created the Hiss ..." I don't think this is true - I think Alan Wake gave the Hiss voice, made it louder and arguably stronger, to coincide with Jesse's arrival. Jesse would still have arrived, would still have become the Janitor's Assistant, and would have eventually gotten the Service Weapon.
Don't know if it gets mentioned yet, but I kind of had a big moment when the game kind of hinted at its lower parts of the Oldest House that it is actually the world tree, Yggdrasil. Because a sort of deal is that an alternate name for for the tree is "Odin's Horse", so it is sort of like the earliest people misheard this when the Board explained it. And this connects things like Ahti being a god.
Adding to your talk about naming things, if i remember correctly naming things also makes us feel a sense of control, hence why i think we started naming astroids and meteors, its these things that goes hundred of kilometres per hour, totally out of control, but now we have given it a name and can begin to predict its course, so in a sense we gain control over it even if just arbitrary. Btw great critiques just subbed!
@@MontyZander the audio logs and spliced footage were really nice touches too - felt like some really high production values. Hope you're proud of this one :)
I swear I've said the same thing as the opening of this video, verbatim, about the needless creation of new sub-genres. Unsurprisingly, the people most often pushing that sort of thing are the people who most benefit from it. Why be just another science fiction writer when you can declare yourself the King of the New Weird? Subscribed.
wasn't the "Too pink" line clearly sarcasm. She is in fact just as confused and amazed as we are, but she keeps her cool and acts indifferent to stay in character. It's fitting I'd rather she not go "wow" "that's crazy" "did you just see that" every chance she gets
This video really won me over! I love Control, but there are easy ways to misinterpret it, or interpret it too shallowly, which I think you avoided really well :) Subbed!
The Tomb Raider reboot is an action game and directly disputes the idea that action games aren’t a place for shock and recovery of a character killing someone for the first time.
I love this game so much, it’s like if I asked a super computer to make a game just for me that is equal parts resident evil, max Payne, and half life.
eh i get why jesse is dressed the way she is. she's essentially been living her life on the run since she was a kid, maybe not totally literally but definitely in her mind. a person trying to be at least a little discreet isn't gonna have flashy hair and clothes
commenting to help with algorithm but i have been binging your videos for the last few weeks. i had been replaying bioshock 1 and 2 for fun and i guess me googling audio daries guides made your videos on them pop up in my recommendeds. i loved them, the way you structure the videos is fantastic, i love how you flow well across the mechanics and points of discussion in and out of your recap of the narrative. i agree with pretty much everything you say in that you are putting to words feelings i've had but haven't bothered picking through (i also ignore the joker blood thing in AK and substitute it with a fear gas internal metaphor [i happened to replay the arkham games after bioshock and watched your video on each game after i played the respective one]). choosing to comment now because i love alan wake. wanted to watch this one first cause im saving your alan wake one for another day. and you nailed my feelings towards this game. when i originally played it on release i found that the drawbacks you mention weighed the game down significantly for me, and then the fact that it just didn't work properly on a baseline xbox one (the game freezes for many seconds and sometimes crashes when you bring up the map, etc) meant i left Control with a bad taste in my mouth despite wanting to enjoy it. Yet, when the Foundation DLC came out I still played it and found I loved it so much more than the base game itself (i think cause i'd fully upgraded my weapons so i didnt spend a single moment pausing to look at the GOOT menu, truly). Then the AWE DLC made me lose my mind at the promise of an Alan Wake sequel. I 100%ed Control again in the week before AW2 released and realised that I love the game! Going in (on a stronger console) with the knowledge of its flaws meant I could focus on what it did well rather than be caught by the nasty surprise of eight generation mediocrity moments. You've articulated this so well and I really appreciate it.
Just finished the game. This is a great video. I had a couple of problems with some elements of comabt like melee not boing punchy enough and just feeling of emptiness but my lord the vibes are pretty great and left me wanting more of the twilight zone/scp elements of the games. looking forward to Alan wake 2
The Sharpened are a shameless homage to the axe murderer enemies in Alan Wake. They have 2 swipe jump attacks, and will throw their weapon if you're at a distance for too long. I pointed at my screen like "IVE SEEN YOU BEFORE!"
Control was my first remedy game.. got it on PS plus as I didn't thin I'd love it much.. in short I loved it and have played it quite a few times now, bough the art book and bought the Alan Wake remaster which i will get around to playing when i get a spare moment.. I very much hope for a Control 2
Control is a good blend of sci-fi and fantasy many aspects of the game cant be described as wholy science fiction, there is even a note in a hidden area that say how the things in control or more fanstsy arcane and mystical than science and that director trench and darling are trying to labels everything as science and silencing anyone to say they could be supernatural and mystical.
I bought this game AS SOON AS IT WAS AVAILABLE!!!!!!! I loved it so much. I remember seeing the marketing, and going 'yes, this is the one'. I put it in the night I got it, and it was like midnight because I'd had to work late, and I had my earphones in, and as soon as I walked through the door to the first area where you encounter the Hiss, I turned it off because I got scared, lol. But I booted it back up the nest day because I was still excited and finally had the courage to look around the corner, and found that it wasn't all that scary. So I kept playing for another few minutes and...encountered the first few guards, who, for a person who doesn't play a lot of FPS type games, were a real struggle to defeat. So I turned it off again. Even after the rocky start, I was so intrigued by the game that I pushed through, and gradually got better at shooting people, and found myself thoroughly enjoying it. The Ashtray Maze was the best part of the game for me, and I'm so upset that you can only do it once per playthrough. (I kinda get it from an 'I want to get to the other side' standpoint, but the option to replay it would have been spammed on my playthrough) I loved Jessie as a character. I really empathised with her, and understood that she wasn't really phased by a lot of these things because of her previous experience. It was also really grounding that, when I was like ???????, she was like 'I got this'. There were a few points in the game where I found the difficulty spike really daunting, and had to redo some battles over and over again, a few instances where I just did something, but couldn't for the life of me recreate it because I had no idea why it worked, and a few instances of running around in circles either because I was lost or because I had no idea what I was doing, but the overall takeaway for me was positive. I still haven't been able to finish the game, and I probably won't, because it's way too hard, and I'm still scared by the Hiss, honestly. I think it really speaks to how good the game's mysteries are, that I was scared enough to want it to be over, but I pushed through because I was curious. (Yes, I know I'm a scaredy cat, but I hate playing scary games so much, lol) I'm really enjoying your reviews, and even though I didn't really agree with some of your views in this one, I'm glad you talked about it. Loving the little bit of sass, too.
New here but really a big fan of your structure and analysis. You’ve got a great talent for condensing your thoughts into specific relevant moments of insight!
@@MontyZander you got it! I’m new to long form stuff on RU-vid and it’s clear you’ve got a real honed process, it makes the few videos I’ve seen of yours so far feel consistent and gets me a feel for your takes even when I may disagree. Might see me comment on other stuff lol Be safe dude!
Ease up on the "sub-genre" hate there. It's human nature to name and categorize things, and it's helpful for people with specific interests to have a name for things they enjoy and want to find more of.
So... do you think it was just coincidence that Casper Darling and Alan Wake are voiced by the same guy? I couldn't shake the feeling that had some relevance.
Have this distinct feeling you don't know what a 'Gatcha' game is or why it's called that, randomized loot is not Gatcha, Gatcha comes from Gatchapon, which are little spheres you buy from vending machines that contain 'stuff', stuff that you do not know what you have bought till you open it, but are for the most part not components to make something. Gatcha as a game is really just another name for Loot Boxes only in the Asian sense, and they are most frequently also mobile games, the heavy focus on 'pulls' where you randomly open a loot box and monetization characterize a Gatcha game. Control is not a Gatcha game, you do not have to invest money (or time restricted by f2p mechanics) in the game to get pulls to try to get loot (which are usually very simple to understand if maybe useless to you). It's just a normal shitty crafting system like any other game, ala Assassin's Creed or something of that nature, even though it didn't bother her, she can see where you get this idea, but mischaracterizing it as Gatcha is just... really really off base.
My experience was basically what you said in the introduction. Great world building, but the game mechanics were so lame, I actually stopped playing and never played again when I tried out some jukebox missions. I loved the oldest house and that normal things can get supernatural just by us believing in it. I loved exploring the departments, reading whiteboard scribbles and just soaking it all in. The gameplay is okay for the most part - visually cool, but forgettable really. I want to get back to this game, but the jukebox missions really shattered my enjoyment of the game. I know they are optional, but they showed me an ugly part that I cannot unsee :(
speculative fiction though is not a sub-genre, but instead is a blanket term for "things with made up stuff" or "what if". It includes fantasy, scifi, horror, literally any other thing that 'literary' writing people don't like.
I agree that the "Goot" is a problem, it is not explained but the sectors where materials can be farmed are in the description of the materials, the player needs to put 2 and 42 together. I kind of like this but they should've shown all available materials even if you currently don't have one, so you know where to look for them; like they did with the ability tree. I think what they were going for is: you check the crafting menu, notice there is something new, check what materials you need and visit the sectors. The main quests are ordered in a way that you should find enough materials to not have to farm much unless you want to max out a weapon for which you need to defeat bosses, which is also never explained.
The Goot system is the worst. You have to periodically stop and delete the ones you don't want just in case you find something you actually want. Those pickups end up being about 99% useless, especially later in the game when all you want is level 5 or 6. But despite your valid and well thought-out criticisms, this is one of the best games I've ever played. I've been playing through again in the past couple weeks and am still really enjoying it.
I'm not all the way through the video but am quite enjoying it. I actually disagree with the author's thoughts on Jesse, at least her attitude towards events. She's spent most of her life with this spirit being only she knows about talking to her and trying to find the weird after the events she went through with her brother. She knows it's there. She's been obsessing about it. So she's not freaked out like a lot of us would be. She just has confirmation she's not crazy and now it's time for the other thing she's obsessed over for years. Finding her brother.
Could you imagine if Marvel were to hire Remedy to make a Dr. Strange game that took place inside the Sanctum Sanctorum the way they made the Oldest House? ufff.
Regarding health pick-ups not having a lore explanation: I think I remember a board message that refers to them, talking about subtraction-addition. Which sounds like something conceptual, 'subtracting' health from enemies, then 'adding' it to oneself. ___ It's really weird to me that you call the Former the Founder. Initial misreading that lead to further misreading/mishearing down the line? ___ I'm not sure that the friends Ahti says sent the cassette player are the board, because I vaguely remember another scene where he said something about 'taking the board behind the shed with an axe', or some such. So they are below/besides him? Could be wrong though.
Funny you said this but the first time I got to maintenance I gave up on the game lol. I only went back after playing Alan Wake and while I've completed the main campaign I didn't finish the DLCs - found it really hard to get into and after rolling credits it just didn't land with me... your right Jesse's carefree attitude to the weird shit going on bugged me but not because I expected her to react to the "strangeness" but because I thought I was missing something that she understood - something that may have been explained elsewhere in a book or another form of external media. Like I was "not in the know" and she seemed to understand everything. Gameplay or no the biggest disconnect is feeling on the outside of the games plot.
Alan Wake was the exact opposite as I stumbled upon yet another page of his manuscript reading the future I empathised with him in those moments because I was being told the narrative to come as he was and his confusion was mine. I really felt "in the know" for that game and the fact Alan was as confused as me felt much more personal. Just my two cents :)
Good critique. I disagree with some things, but only a few overall. Except for your view of the end of the game, which I wholly disagree with. If 'Gaming University' has an explantion for what happened that makes sense to you and fits within the narrative of the game, I see that as evidence enough that you got the ending wrong. The ending wasn't botched, because the story isn't really over. The game ended in the way that made the most sense for that portion of the story, and all of the information we needed to understand it had been given throughout the game. Jesse was never there to rescue her brother. Not really. We know this by her strange and understated reactions throughout the games, and that Polaris had manipulated her from the start to bring her to the FBC. She was brought there, not for her brother, but to replace him as the next Director. And she most likely always knew she was meant for something like that. Jesse says so within the first minute, asking Polaris why she was 'brought' there. And Ahti says as much with his first words. She's there about the job. Janitor's assistant. And in that place, the Janitor's assistant would be the Director, wouldn't it. And then he points and says, that way to the interview. Her success at dealing with the Hiss, and choosing the FBC over her brother, was her interview process. One her brother might have failed. She was never there for him. He was just a macguffin, a treat to lure her into her destined role as the next Director. Assistant to Ahti the Janitor. There was no big boss battle at the end of that interview, because there was no big boss. To me, that would have felt contrived. I found it the better end to have Jesse finally accept her mantle atop the FBC, not in spite of the lack of answers about where Darling went and who Ahti is, but because of them. If it was all resolved, her brother cured, Darling found, the big baddy defeated, then why would she stay. She was always going to stay, after all. I believe the ending to this game perfectly portrays what the reality of Jesse's situation would look like. It didn't end after anything but the moment she realized her place in her own story. She's the Director now. And if it had ended any other way, I think it would be lesser for it. But it's a good video. Thanks for making it. Control is a truly exceptional game, and I hope to see the story continue at some point. But only if they have something to say with it, not because it'll make all the money.
My thoughts on Control was that it was a great 'weird' (if not light horror) shooter. Glad we got to enjoy such a once-in-a-generation gaming experience - it gave me major FEAR vibes in many ways. That said, there are major differences between the two, but the similarities outweigh those differences by my reckoning, with the exception of Control substituting cosmic horror for ghosts and the paranormal, and combat (and by extension, AI and arena design). Could've used some more varied combat in Control, but it is what it is. Besides a step back in combat vs FEAR, which honestly wouldn't have likely fit with Control's gamefeel, some careful consideration informs why things had to be this way. I'm totally satisfied with both games at the end of the day.
I actually found this channel via your video on Alan Wake, having never played the game and wanting some context for Control's AWE DLC and now that I'm (mostly) done with Control it's fun to hear your thoughts on that game too! Regarding the Goot I didn't even take conscious note of how meh it's implementation is until a friend I was streaming the game for talked about how much she hates inventory management in a lot of games. In Control it's not a big part of the game but the sheer amount of shitty upgrades you keep getting and the limited number of inventory slots just means you have to pop into the menu every 2 or 3 fights to get rid of the garbage. IMO it got a bit better with the loot from the Foundation (Heal on Launch hit and Ammo regen on Evade being my favourites) but while the upgrades got a bit more creative a lot of them just aren't as useful as the boring base game stuff - Why would I ever pick energy regen when getting hit by an explosive over just having faster energy regen in the first place for example? I think if these upgrades were less ubiquitous but more impactful it would go a long way to make the system more interesting. Perhaps weapon upgrades that change the way they work slightly (f. ex. Charge having up to six smaller projectiles with more spread), or more "conditional" benefits like the heal on launch or ammo on evade I mentioned. I'm also unsure how much I like the way Dylan has been "raised" within the FBC. A story like his makes a lot of sense in the SCP universe, where the Foundation is shown to be amoral and uncaring at every turn, literally (and figuratively) feeding condemned criminals and other unwilling subjects to SCPs for research. But the FBC never shows this systemic level of amorality; all personnel are willing and well-trained and the Prime Candidate program being so far outside of the Bureau's normal means of operation that it was even internally investigated due to it's possible ethical problems. And yet no one figured that keeping a traumatised young boy/teenager locked up in a cell and treating him like any other OoP was a bad idea that would lead to resentment? Trench himself was a father and Darling didn't seem like he was emotionally stunted to the point of not understanding that Dylan needed emotional care too.
control isn't new. it isn't weird. it is literally copy and pasted SCP articles. it looks great. it stays true to the original authors' articles from the wiki. it is what it is.
I got control for free from my playstation+ subscription, but I didn't really enjoy the gameplay. a great disappointment to me, because it had interested me since I first saw it. I really enjoyed this review though, it let me appreciate a game I couldn't appreciate before. I won't play it, but now that disappointment isn't quite the same. Also, I know I have no buiseness asking, but a review of infamous: second son would be really great I think. I don't know why this video made me want a review of that game, but it is one of my all time favourites. Anyway, have a nice day
To be fair, you're not dealing with the furnace. You're dealing with the barrells. Also, control is the first game I've ever wished it wouldn't end. When I finally ran out of sidequests, I actually felt bad. And when you start seeing the crossovers, they're so good my brain hurt. The fact that the main... bad guy? in one of the DLCs is presented in a sidequest in the main game. Just... Everything about it. Heck. I went into this game expecting a tech demo for RTX. Got it for free in the Epic Store because I didn't care enough to buy it. By the time I beat it there, I head to Steam, buy the Ultimate Edition and beat it again, this time with both DLCs. There may be the ocassional hindrance, but there is soooooo much good here the proportion is ridiculous. Closest thing to a perfect game to me since Hollow Knight.
You know, I really should play The Foundation, but idk by the time I was finishing up Control, I guess I was sorta done with it. I liked the game and the atmosphere and the Oldest House itself, but the gameplay and especially the slog of item management I think was getting to me by that point. I only played the Alan Wake DLC because, it's fucking Alan Wake! But then that disapointed me because it wasn't much Alan Wake to be found tbh. I had even played American Nightmare again in preparation for Control's DLC yet really nothing from that was included in the Alan Wake DLC. Control was a good game, and probably the most gorgeous game I've ever played (I don't play many "modern" triple A games, despite having a computer that can handle them, so when I booted up Control and didn't have to turn down any of the settings, I was floored by its visuals. Especially black rock quarry OMG) but yea, I think Alan Wake still holds a special place in my heart. I loved it from the start despite playing on a crappy PC that could barely run it at like 15 fps, to my newest computer which handled it flawlessly. Control wasn't able to top that, but hopefully Remedy is able to do even better in Alan Wake 2! But yea, with the Foundation DLC, it's interesting you brought up and even see in the video, cave paintings. Idk what the lore is behind those, but it implies that openings to the Oldest House may have existed for a long time throughout humanity's history, maybe openings all around the world popping in and out of existence, and at one point it opened into the caves at the bottom of the Oldest House, and was revered by the peoples who found it. Maybe the Oldest House's openings haven't even opened up all on our Earth, maybe it's opened into different dimensions each and every time. It's just that recently, its opened into our Earth, in NY, in the form of the Oldest House building itself. Or maybe I'm completely on the wrong track here LOL
On some level, it's feels weird as fin to watch these Remedy games, that I have not played. Heard good things about them all, but still haven't checked them for some unknown reason. Oh and have a sub already!
I finally could get Control work in my computer, and yeah, is very weird, the weirdest game that Remedy ever release, and Jesse is not that bad, at least in the dub, the actress in the Spanish dub actually try to give some sense of emotion and agency behind her actions, but it seems that the combat continue to be as brutal as the other Remedy games.
Jesse CAN run. That alone is making this game good =P A recording of Ahti, became an Altered Item. We can find both the document where it states that Ahti is designated as Entity A-OO1, and the item itself (that TV) that doesn't need cleansing but rather containment. In the Foundation DLC. I did Wake first, then finished the game, then did Foundation (ofc) but... Zane looks like Alan, while Alan looks like Mr. Scratch. And Zane does NOT have his voice, which is probably because of Trench. So it's a triple mind[redacted]. I hope we can deal with Astral Spikes in the next game. Those [redacted] never killed me, stopped scaring me after my first encounter, but I hope to clear them out. If you keep talking to Dylan, he will say something that can be taken as a reference to Max Payne. It's a fourth wall break in a way.
Control was such a huge letdown for me. I was very interested in the premise of shooting my way through a facility inspired by the SCP Foundation, but the gameplay was so bland and boring that it ended up feeling like a slog. I enjoyed some of the creepy horror elements, but it was hard to get too engrossed in that stuff with the thought of returning to the tedious and boring combat lurking in the back of my mind.
The ending was just like Devil May cry, same unfinished mess. The last part should have a representation of the Hiss, maybe in the end have her brother to become the antagonist. I thought he was a Trojan Horse. That he would like be like kidnapping Emily Pope or something. Even the guards make comments how dangerous is to have Dylan just there with no safe guards. The ending could have a twist Dylan plays being Good and then turns on Jesse on favor of the Hiss. Show more about his hatred toward the FBC and the whole thing. Raise the stakes, maybe say the slide proyector will open a portal outside of the Oldest House and now things will turn bad. But nope. So much wasted potential. Or Darling, make it he turn evil or something.🤷♂️
The only real bad thing about Control is "goot". Lame weapon and personal mods are boring and grate to utilize. As well as build new ones... I do not understand how this slipped into this game as it's so nicely detailed otherwise.
This was a very good review, but I would like to respond to your point at the beginning, where you express your distaste for seemingly unnecessary subgenres. Essentially, I think that the reason creatives like to "invent" new subgenres is close to the reason you jokingly invented "goot" - it gets a certain point across and evokes a certain image. There's a difference between sister genres like steampunk and atompunk, and large terms like magical realism cover a ton of ground, leaving a lot of room for more specific ideas that people might be intentionally searching for. I won't pretend that I perfectly understand slipstream fiction, but it seems to be targeting a certain niche or nuance as a reaction to whatever fiction was going on in its time. I think the bigger question could be, "when is a niche subgenre unnecessary"? There's a genre called gaslamp fantasy which is all about Victorian Era historical fantasy. That genre falls under both fantasy and historical fiction. But it targets a very specific niche, similar to steampunk or atompunk (Fallout series). I doubt most people have gone out of their way to search for "gaslamp fantasy", but there certainly is a market for it, and there are authors who like to target it, so I'd argue it earns its place. The narrative director of Control was likely trying to achieve something similar by attempting to coin that genre she named, even if it sounds silly. It's a fusion of sci-fi, modern conspiracy, horror, and perhaps magical realism. Frankly, I'd say she's on to something, but not because of Control. Rather, because the thing it's based on - the SCP internet lore - has founded a wave of other fiction, games, movies, music, and so on. Moreover, there are many more IPs that don't use the SCP name but are still strongly inspired by it, like Control and Lobotomy Corporation, which share that common bond, tied together by anomalies, government facilities, and hidden conspiracies. If anything, I'd argue that "SCP" is it's own subgenre at this point, and that would be the niche subgenre Control falls into. If SCP was perhaps more widely considered a genre of its own, and she had simply named that instead of making up her own term, I don't think there would've been a problem at all. The problem wasn't that she was inventing a new subgenre, but that she was treating it like something new instead of a long-established fiction trend. In the same way that Rogue inspired so many games that "roguelike" became it's own game genre, I'd say the same can be said of SCP lore. Lastly, as a minor correction, you mentioned speculative fiction next to slipstream. Speculative fiction basically means any fiction that isn't realistic fiction - in other words, it's the other side of the coin. It's an umbrella term that fantasy, sci-fi, and all of their subgenres fall under. So rather than another niche subgenre, it's actually a very general and loose term.
Told you I'd be here! The biggest thing I agree with is how off-putting Jesse can be at times with her nonchalant reactions. I guess everyone working in the Oldest House is kind of insane, and her reactions, in a way, show how she's crazier than all of them. Rightfully so as Director I might add. She doesn't care, she just telekinesises everything. I always feel so let down if I watch a let's play of Control and people are hammering away with the gun. Like come ON. You're in this huge, incredibly interesting world and instead of diving in and investing in it you go pew pew like every other shooter around. (I suck at shooters) Also, I'm gonna be playing Alan Wake before diving into your critique. Just bought it!
@@MontyZander So I just finished Alan Wake, and that was one hell of a story. The world, the aesthetic, the rythmn it dances to. It's all so tight and dark and crisp and intriguing I just want more, and you BET I'm immediately buying Alan Wake 2. I only have some gripes with the gameplay and how there are some holes in it and, at least for me, it leaves a desire for something more refined. Maybe it's just outdated, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. I might jump back in for Nightmare mode one day, but I suck at shooters and being strategic lol. I'll be jumping into your critique if it ASAP!
My only complaints with Control were, yes, the messy upgrade system (though some of the weapons are INSANE when upgraded) and a few wonky boss fights. Cannot wait for Control 2.
