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🎮 Control (2019)

I got this game for free on Epic Games. In the past I've enjoyed Max Payne by the same software house (Remedy) in Finland and I was eager to play this title.

You are in control of Jesse Faden, a random girl entering into a secret bureau somewhere in New York. With her you'll discover her past and the reason she's there.

Story is so so, gameplay is good with some weird bug on my system (it all turns black and I've to restart the game). It's not a branched storyline like Mass Effect (kinetic and not visual) so it's all pre-written in one way only, but you can choose optional missions like Board Countermesures, Juke Box expeditions, secondary objectives.

Modding is fairly good: you have a Service Weapon capable to assume 4 forms (Grip, Shutter, Spin, Charge) plus one I've not seen (Surge).

You got some abilities: you can run, you can jump, you can climb, you can telekinetic launch up to 3 objects, you can fly for a limited time, you can control up to 2 low-health enemies. These abilities apart from the first 2 aren't related to a tutorial or a mission, but the other are taught by a mini-mission in a tutorial on the Astral Plane, a cubish universe where at the end you get one of these abilities.

You can also change outfits but nothing naughty, probably because main characters appearing into the game are real actors and characters are modelled on them: apart from civilian outfit, I liked the Asyncronous Suit and the Assistant outfit. Director is good too. I haven't got the Golden Suit or the Expedition one and the other are pretty lame but some other players seem to like them (e.g. P7 candidate).

Game playing in normal mode has some balance issue but you can overcome these simply by levelling up the character, discovering areas where some weapon mods or personal mods are hidden.

Tutorial on the web are quite detailed but I encounter some errors or wrong suggestion, e.g. to avoid the Spin form: it's a bad weapon form only before level 3 of weapon mods. If you fill all 3 weapon mods with 3 mods of level 3 or greater, then the weapon is a life-saver on the most challenging missions and sectors.

Special mention to the king of the weapon forms on late game: Charge with all 3 slot filled up on blast radius enhancement, or 2 blast radius enhancement and 1 damage enhancement, can blast away a good number of enemies but it can solve some puzzle too relying on an about +180% cumulative blast radius increase. You have to find some fungi on a sector and blast off all the mold hosts? No problem, simply start to blast everything in a 180 degrees radius. Puzzle solved in two moves, one on one side of the sector, one on the other.

Need to blast away enemies on 2 levels up in the Panopticon? No problem, simply point some walls or some floating enemies and pull the trigger. Blast radius will do the job and you cannot get any damage hidden behind a solid concrete pillar below.

Some consideration:

Anyway, thank you for the free ride. It was a pretty nice one.