Should we have stayed in the Oldest House?

Explore a warped Manhattan on the brink of paranatural annihilation in this thrilling action-adventure RPG. Unleash the extraordinary powers of Dylan Faden as he fights for his humanity and our survival against a reality-bending cosmic threat.

I’m a big Remedy-verse fan, I’ve been hooked since the original Alan Wake. Control took things in a direction I wasn’t expecting, but it remains one of my favourite games and Alan Wake II raised the stakes even higher, turning into a more survival horror than I was expecting and while FCB Firebreak didn’t hit the mark, Control Resonant proves yet again that Remedy isn’t afraid to take risks.

Resonant places you as Jesse Faden’s brother, Dylan. Jesse is MIA and Dylan handles very differently to his sister in that he doesn’t use the Service Weapon but instead a melee weapon called Aberrant. Simply put, the game has shifted from a Metroidvania-style shooter to an open-world game with melee combat. It’s a big risk as the Oldest House did have its charm of being self-contained, even if you could venture to different plains of existence, while Manhattan is a different ball game altogether.

There are plenty of hidden puzzles, nooks and crannies that you can only reach with certain abilities. So, it does retain part of that Metroidvania DNA, but it’s not as concentrated as it was in the Oldest House. Manhattan is divided into different areas, and you can eventually fast-travel around them once you find the fast-travel doors and unlock them. The bad news is that you have to manually go to a fast-travel door to actually fast-travel each time instead of using the map and simply teleport to the location you wish.

Combat itself is a bit hit and miss, you can’t block or parry attacks…you can only dodge out of the way. There is an Assist mode which essentially can act as a God Mode which makes combat a breeze, but it does take away all challenge there as a result. It is good to use if you just want to play for the story though and it also doesn’t affect trophies, so getting the Platinum is fairly straightforward in that regard.

The main story took me around 20-25 hours to complete, while the side quests and mopping up everything for the Platinum took another 10-15 so we’re looking at around the 40+ hour mark to do everything. It’s not the longest open-world game out there, but the abilities Dylan gets to use in Manhattan definitely makes it interesting. He can eventually walk up the warped walls, essentially flipping gravity on its head along with the floating and dashing that we were used to with Jesse.

The visuals are outstanding and runs at a solid framerate throughout. Characters are nicely animated and detailed, while the overall game looks stunning. Voice-acting is brilliant as in most of Remedy’s games as is the incredible soundtrack that is used well throughout the game.

The Verdict

Control Resonant won’t be everyone’s cup of tea. It changes protagonist which is always a risk for a sequel…take a look at Metal Gear Solid 2 for that. It changes the confines from the Oldest House to Manhattan, and some might say it loses what made it special in the first place. But I disagree, it does well to expand on what made it stand out with its Objects of Interest, its story, the characters and while the combat isn’t the most interesting, it’s almost optional with the assist mode. Don’t let this slip under your radar, Remedy isn’t afraid to take risks, and this is the best example of that.

Score: 8.5

Disclosure: Code was provided by Remedy Entertainment