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Control Review
Inside the Maw of Infinite Madness .
Read Time 14 minutes
“ ... A head-spinning descent in a pit of endless paranoia and psychic mayhem ... ”
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If the walls could talk, the ones inside the Federal Bureau of Control would sing like a macabre chant of countless voices. Welcome to the Oldest House, a featureless skyscraper from the outside that masquerades as a government office in its interior. Far from an ordinary place, this weird monolith defies the laws of physics as much as it does your expectations, with walls that fold like origami and doors that lead to alternate dimensions—a constantly shifting labyrinth of corridors filled with impossible architecture that feels alive, watching, and profoundly hostile.
This is just the tip of the strange iceberg that is Control, a game where staplers might be eldritch parasites and janitors may or may not be omniscient demigods in disguise. It's a setup that kicks subtlety out the window with a narrative that hooks you with its surrealism but keeps you invested by drip-feeding mysteries at just the right cadence. In that vein, much of the game unfolds in halls and offices, fusing liminal design with metaphysical horror until even fax machines start to look ominous. And if not for the murmuring bodies of office workers suspended mid-air, you'd almost think that working for the Bureau is just like any other soul-sucking corporate job.
The premise is deceptively simple at first: you embody Jesse Faden, a woman searching for her missing brother, who stumbles upon the Bureau—a secret agency tasked with investigating and containing paranormal phenomena—just as all hell breaks loose. Shortly after her arrival, she unexpectedly inherits the role of Director, a title bestowed by a sentient service weapon—a morphing firearm bound to the will of whoever claims it. However, bundled with it comes the responsibility of dealing with the outbreak of the Hiss, an otherworldly force capable of corrupting people, objects, and even reality itself, turning everything it touches into an extension of its will.
To stand a chance, Jesse will rely on psychic powers we can obtain by cleansing seemingly mundane items imbued with paranatural energy, often resembling everyday stuff like fridges, clocks, or even rubber ducks. There's also Polaris, a mysterious presence connected to Jesse's subconscious, acting as both a guiding star and a shield against the Hiss' incessant attempts to fracture her mind. That's to say, Jesse is far from a weakling, being able to hurl slabs of concrete towards enemies with dangerous speed and put up a fight even when faced with truly incomprehensible beings.
In terms of visuals, I can say firsthand that Control is a masterclass when it comes to graphical fidelity, blending photorealism with an attention to detail that left me awe-struck from start to finish. I'm talking about aesthetics that make the game look relatively next-gen several years after its original release, thanks in no small part to its cinematic lighting and some of the sleekest reflections I've ever seen, not even touching on the absurd raytracing support. And did I mention destructible environments? Seeing glass shatter into shards, ceramic explode on impact, and how entire areas can fall apart in a flash is utterly unbelievable and buttery-smooth too, assuming your graphics card can handle the load of so many particles floating around.
It's hard not to admire how Control wears its weirdness like a badge of honor. The game doesn't water itself down, doesn't explain more than it has to, and treats its mysteries with reverence, trusting players to piece together the strange puzzle without spoon-feeding anything. What begins as a simple question, "What happened to my brother?" quickly escalates into a cosmic tug-of-war where the stakes balloon from personal to existential, setting the stage for a narrative that will pull you deeper into a world where reality itself is negotiable.
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The Leads Needed Lie Deeper Inside: Answers Don't Come Easy .
You know you're in deep trouble when your new job, which you never signed up for, hands you a gun, supposedly for self-defense. The game's opening hours are unusual, mainly in the sense that your arrival at the Bureau is marked by nothing except for echoing silence, an empty receptionist's desk, and a deep feeling of unease. You glance at the squeaky clean floors, cold and sterile walls, and think to yourself: "What the heck is going on? Where even is everybody?" The answer is, of course, hiding inside a safe room!
Afterward, and without any sort of ceremony, you're tossed to the wolves, expected to make sense of a place that quite literally just swallowed you whole in its spiral of madness, and from there, you kind of just go with the flow. However, trying to fit the bill isn't easy work, especially after seeing how the previous director offed himself, for reasons initially unknown. And if you assume there's a team of agents and analysts somewhere ready to back you up... nope, there really isn't. After all, you're the only one capable of resisting the Hiss without wearing a clunky anti-possession device strapped to your chest, so at least it kind of makes sense.
All that being said, the early stretch of the game is as intriguing as it's confusing. In terms of exploration, it's worth noting that navigation can sometimes become a test of patience, given that the in-game map is, quite frankly, kind of a complete mess. It's a flat overlay that struggles to represent the building's vertical layout, so your best bet for getting around is the signs you find, which point you in the right direction, more often than not. That is to say, whether you like it or not, you'll get lost a lot.
Meanwhile, the storytelling is elusive yet deliberate, and the further you press in, the more the Oldest House reveals how trippy it can really be, letting fragments of lore trickle in through cryptic memos, absurd field reports about cursed objects, and eerie flashbacks that leave you with more questions than answers. I'll admit that, sometimes, the sheer density of lore borders on overwhelming, but it's packaged so organically into the environment that it never feels too much like a chore.
From the mundane to the outright surreal, there's never a dull moment in this shifting maze of weirdness, where even the walls seem like they're secretly conspiring against you.
On that note, missions aren't throwaway errands—they're proper narrative arcs that flesh out both the Bureau's twisted ecosystem and Jesse's place within it, opening the floodgates to some of the game's most bizarre, memorable encounters. One minute, you're wrestling with your own reflection in a mirrored world, and the next, you're traversing a mold-infested lab, searching for samples that could help eradicate it. Still, while main story missions are nicely scripted, there's occasional pacing hiccups that make some quests feel less like breathing room and more like busywork for no reason other than to fill up space. I'm speaking about moments where you're tasked with clearing out nameless pockets of Hiss corruption or restoring utilities, which feel mechanically thin, or straight-up futile.
On the technical front, I must say Control has matured like fine wine, and what was once a notorious GPU stress test has become surprisingly accessible thanks to years of patches. Nowadays, the game feels polished, stable (save for occasional crashes), and is the proper showcase it was always meant to be. And credit where it's due, the developer's post-release support extended well beyond expectations, delivering not just bug fixes but meaningful content expansions that dig deeper into both Jesse's journey and the Bureau's secrets.
Yet, even with all the gloss of updates, there's an occasional undercurrent of friction now and then. For example, enemy variety leans a bit too heavily on humanoid gunmen with red fog oozing from their faces. Not to mention, the combat scenarios themselves can be a tad repetitive, at least until your arsenal gets to fully mature. In any case, that's a conversation better saved for later, because how you fight in Control is a whole beast of its own, one that deserves far more than just a passing mention.
Anyhow, despite these occasional issues, the takeaway is that Control isn't a common third-person shooter—not in the slightest. It's a meticulously crafted descent into the absurd, built on an intoxicating mix of narrative intrigue, visual spectacle, top-tier gameplay, not to mention, it's also one of the craziest games I've ever played—that's got to be worth something, I guess... But, of course, mood and mystery alone don't hold a game together, and soon enough, the question shifts from "Why am I here?" to "Why am I still here?", and to answer that, we'll obviously need to go further down into the rabbit hole.
Nothing but a Typical Day at the Office: Reciprocating Their Aggression .
For a game that's thematically obsessed with control, there's a sweet irony in how often it reminds you that you have absolutely none of it. There is nothing that's predictable here; good luck guessing when the floor will turn into a ceiling, or when a group of enemies will appear out of thin air to target practice with you. In that vein, treating the game like a traditional shooter is a death sentence, primarily because the game ties aggression to your survival; the best tactic isn't hiding behind cover, but rather moving forward while strafing left and right like a crab, since enemies have Stormtrooper aim as long as you're not standing still and the only way to heal is by downing enemies, therefore passivity isn't really an option.
That's the game in a nutshell: a beautiful mess where the sooner you accept the chaos, the sooner you can thrive in it. At the center of everything is the Service Weapon, an infinitely reloading firearm that's either the coolest gun you've ever seen or a slightly underwhelming sidekick to your far flashier psychic toolkit. It swaps between classic archetypes like pistol, shotgun, SMG, and sniper, but it's all one gun that functionally exists to give your psychic powers a break.
And speaking of psychic powers, this is where the game stops pretending to be a shooter and starts feeling like a superhero simulator. The vastness of what you can do is almost absurd, starting with Launch, a devastating skill that lets you rip walls, furniture, or take debris from the environment and deliver them to enemies like guided missiles—a good rule of thumb is if you can see it, you most likely can hurl it. This skill is just so powerful that upgrading it is basically a no-brainer, given that it can strip enemies of their armor while dealing massive amounts of damage when not straight-up one-shotting them.
There's also a melee strike, but I personally found that it was useless outside of rare emergencies, since its range is short enough to guarantee you'll catch a bullet to the teeth before it connects. In terms of usefulness, the ability to mind-control enemies is a lot more interesting—it allows you to temporarily seize weakened foes to fight on your behalf, acting as sort of free, disposable meat shields that can be a very powerful tool if used correctly. The catch is that activating it requires a few uninterrupted seconds of channeling—an eternity in a game where doing anything but shooting is such a huge risk.
A classic power fantasy where you start as a normal human, then eventually become unstoppable like a force of nature, with practically nothing able to withstand your abilities.
Most of these powers run off a shared energy meter, meaning you can't just spam abilities, which keeps things balanced. However, some abilities don't cost anything at all, which gives you breathing room to experiment without fear, while the overall system still serves to keep you grounded. This is very good because some abilities are so hilariously overtuned that if they were the only ability in the game, you probably wouldn't miss anything else for several hours, if not for this cooldown period.
Additionally, it's worth noting that not all abilities are offensive; some are more tactical and frequently tie into exploration, making it so that few corners remain unreachable for long. In fact, the game nails movement in a way that most shooters can only dream of. There's a dash that allows you to instantly reposition to avoid damage or close gaps, while a hover lets you briefly take flight, turning you into a nearly untouchable aerial menace. Both are absurdly useful, not in a game-breaking way, but in the sense that they're necessary to keep pace with the torrent of chaos the game throws at you. And if things happen to get a little too spicy, you can always throw up a kinetic shield—a cloud of rubble that intercepts projectiles thrown in your general direction until you're ready to go back on the offensive.
As for the enemies themselves, they're alright for the most part. Not exactly what I'd call "iconic," but functional enough to keep the pressure on. As stated before, most are humanoid gunmen, occasionally mixed with grenade lobbers, sniper variants, heavily armored brutes, and airborne nuisances that scatter like roaches the moment you target them. Every now and then, bosses do show up, often with unique mechanics, but typically, many of them quietly graduate into being regular enemies later on, which, depending on your perspective, is either a cool way to escalate difficulty or a lazy approach to pad the roster.
In summary, the thing that stands out most about Control's primary gameplay systems is the gradual journey from standard to extraordinary. What begins as a conventional experience blossoms into something else entirely only when you've unlocked enough powers to fully wield the surreal toolkit at your disposal. And while it borrows elements from many different genres, it never feels stitched together due to how confidently it reshapes the rules. Pair that with fluid controls, pristine movement, and a top-notch combat flow, and you get something that's uniquely exquisite.
Let Them Come and We'll Be Ready: What We're Truly Capable Of .
If combat is a hurricane of psychic violence, then progression is the eye of the storm—the quieter, more methodical counterbalance that lets you catch your breath before getting flung back into the swirling chaos. There's a strange sense of rhythm to the madness that gradually reveals itself as enemies grow more aggressive, more erratic, and better adapted to your evolving arsenal. It creates a subtle but effective feedback loop: as you grow stronger, so does the world, nudging you to engage more aggressively, experiment more often, and never settle into a single groove for too long.
In short, the progression loop looks familiar, except for the fact that it comes with a paranormal coat of paint. It revolves around harvesting enemy drops, converting them into upgrades, unlocking weapon forms, and slotting mods to fine-tune your build. On paper, it sounds like a robust, engaging system, but in practice, it leaves a lot to be desired, being serviceable at best or plain lackluster at worst.
Speaking of which, the mod system is where things get interesting, or mildly disappointing, depending on your perspective. Coming in a variety of tiers, both Jesse and the Service Weapon can be slotted with mods, ranging from very basic, such as increased damage and lower energy costs, to slightly more advanced ones like reduced bullet spread and higher fire-rate. The main issue is that it's customization in the most mechanical sense, where the numbers get bigger, but nothing feels different. There are no weird synergies, no wacky combos, no crazy perks—just basic skill bumps and modest stat boosts that don't make you rethink combat, which, to me, was pretty lame.
Much like the mods, crafting also feels like an undercooked attempt to give the game an RPG flair. To that end, materials drop from enemies, supply crates, and mission rewards, and you'll have to burn a bunch of them to upgrade your weapon forms or craft new mods, assuming the RNG doesn't work in your favor. And even though the Service Weapon can be upgraded, the upgrade path is painfully linear, given that you're not tweaking it to fit your playstyle, but rather unlocking more mod slots and marginally improving stats, with almost no customization beyond that.
Upgrades come in a variety of forms to help bridge the gap between us and enemies, evening the playing field without transforming you into an overpowered godlike creature.
On the flip side, the ability tree does fare a little better, mostly because it leans on that old-school formula of "spend point, get stronger"—a safer design but one that gets stale after a while. Likewise, it's not a particularly complex system, but at least it lets you steer Jesse toward your favored playstyle. That said, it's a bit underwhelming when you realize how few choices actually matter, as in, everything's useful, but not equally. And once the key upgrades are unlocked, the rest feel more like formalities than exciting milestones you'd otherwise look forward to, had the system been projected to keep you interested on the long haul..
To fund these upgrades, you'll need points obtained from completing quests or discovering locations hidden from prying eyes, encouraging going off-route even if the rewards aren't always worth the detour. As for exploration itself, it leans heavily into the Metroidvania structure, but it's less about backtracking for cool new areas and more about opening locked doors with keycards, only to find yet another note you won't care much about. Either way, the bigger issue is that you never know when to go back to a region because the only indication you can't go somewhere is a beeping red light that tells you nothing, except for "you're not allowed in there yet; come back later," and nine times out of ten you do come back, only to still be barred entry, rinse and repeat.
Even the Control Points, our main method of locomotion, try to inject a little friction into your ventures. They serve as fast travel hubs, upgrade stations, and save spots, which sounds perfectly fine until you realize the game refuses to autosave outside of them. This creates occasional moments of tragedy where you wander too far, quit the game, and lose progress because you forgot to reach the next checkpoint before leaving. Even if it's undoubtedly your fault, it still feels like an awfully unforgiving and cheap restraint that has the potential to negatively impact the experience... and if I sound sour, let's just say that that exact scenario happened to me more than once.
It's fair to say that the auxiliary systems in Control reflect a game that's aware of genre expectations but slightly disinterested in polishing them to perfection. Sure, they provide some sense of depth, but not the kind that invites any length of obsession. They're there to keep completionists busy, give min-maxers something to chew on, and let the rest of us pick at the edges without needing to dive all the way in. In that sense, they feel like functional window dressing—adding enough flavor to enrich the main course but never quite stealing the spotlight.
Final Thoughts: Now You're Finally Face-To-Face With The Beast .
All things considered, Control isn't a game that bends to accommodate everyone's tastes—and frankly, it never wanted to. It's deliberately obtuse, narratively cryptic, structurally weird, but also undeniably fascinating. While some friction points rear their heads—be it in the form of half-baked progression systems or the game's fondness for leaving players scratching their heads—if anything, the weirdness is the point. The game isn't only drop-dead gorgeous; it's meticulously designed to feel alien, oppressive, and magnetic all at once.
Beneath the layers of cryptic nonsense and design quirks sits a game that's genuinely rewarding to sink into. It doesn't hold your hand, it doesn't over-explain anything, and it absolutely doesn't care if you walk away confused. It feels like the kind of game that was designed with a very specific kind of player in mind, and instead of sanding itself down to be universally approachable, it actually leans harder into its eccentricities.
This is a game that knows how to make a place feel haunted, not in the "there's a ghost in the closet" sense, but in the way where nothing is quite right, and the walls themselves might be creepily watching your every move. Every flickering light, every empty hallway, every object humming with unnatural energy sells the illusion that this building is a living organism... one that barely tolerates your presence. This level of immersion is something that very few games have ever managed to replicate so effectively.
It's also incredibly rare how it's willing to slow things down and let discomfort build, trusting the mood to carry the moment instead of rushing to the next thrill. That approach can make the experience feel oddly paced or even disjointed at times, but it also gives the game a strong sense of atmosphere you don't shake off easily. Here, things aren't about loud beats or clean arcs—it's a slow, steady spiral into strangeness that keeps warping the deeper you go. And while that rhythm won’t be to everyone’s taste, it's hard to deny how effective it is at keeping you off-balance in the best possible way.
Even the stuff that lands somewhat poorly doesn't derail the experience so much as expose the seams of a game that was more interested in tone and tension than in mechanical perfection. The flawed progression systems, the underwhelming mod mechanics, and the occasionally clunky pacing are noticeable, sure, but never absurd to the point of being deal-breakers. And although this was my first time playing a Remedy game, it surely won't be the last, because if this is the kind of experience they usually dabble with, then I definitely want more of it.
In summary, if you're drawn to games that make you feel just like another piece on a larger board—something tiny caught in the machinery of forces way beyond comprehension—Control is about as good as it gets. Without sugarcoating anything, I'll admit it won't be for everyone, but it really never pretends to be, so there's that. And if you're the type who doesn't mind the occasional rough edge in service of a stronger vision, then this is genuinely worth diving into. It's one of those games where the experience is overwhelmingly positive, even if some individual bits can't quite keep up with the sum of its parts. Either way, love it or hate it, Control is the kind of game that sticks with you—and honestly, that alone makes it something special in its own right.
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Incredible atmosphere and world-building, creating one of the most immersive settings in gaming.
Satisfying, physics-driven combat where blasting psychic powers never stops being fun.
Striking visuals and top-tier audio design, making a surreal audiovisual feast that elevates every moment.
Unapologetically weird narrative that embraces mystery and ambiguity in a way few games dare.
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Shallow progression and crafting systems that are functional but uninspired, offering little meaningful customization.
Pacing can feel uneven, with long stretches of downtime or confusing navigation can kill momentum.
Weak mission variety, with a lot of tasks boiling down to going somewhere to clear enemies, repeat.
Confusing story that may be hard to grasp and not everyone will click with its vague, fragmented lore beats.
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Control
A surreal action game that nails atmosphere, combat, and visuals, with incredible world-building and punchy combat, driving a one-of-a-kind experience. A highly captivating, immersive, and lasting experience that leaves an impression that's hard to shake.
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Caius, The Psychic Director
June 21, 2025
9.0
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