Control is a third person shooter from Remedy that puts the player in the shoes of Jesse Falden, a women who has stumbled upon the secret Federal Bureau of Control in search of her brother, Dylan. Unfortunately, Jesse finds the FBC under assault by an otherworldly entity known as the Hiss, and most of the Bureau is possessed. The story is heavily influenced by Twin Peaks and the X-Files, and while it's not exactly scary, the atmosphere is topnotch. The Bureau's janitor Arish, who is definitely not just a custodian, speaks in a strange Finnish drawl that is almost indecipherable, and he's a pretty obvious nod to the work of David Lynch. The rest of the cast isn't particularly memorable, and Jesse's only a little interesting because she's carrying an extradimensional hitchhiker in her head. Because of a childhood encounter with an altered object (in this case, a film projector), Jesse has paranormal abilities. Finding more loose altered objects eventually grants Jesse the respective powers: launch (basically Force-throw), levitate, evade (a super-fast dodge), seize (allows you to switch an enemy into an ally), and shield. She also has a shapeshifting pistol, the possession of which grants her the title of Director. Launch pretty much makes the game. Remedy has filled the highly-detailed FBC with typical office decor, all of which will come in handy as makeshift projectiles. It is hugely satisfying to rip a piece of concrete out of a wall and hurl it at an enemy like a drunken Yoda. My only complaints are a few too many difficulty spikes, and a rushed ending. I'm assuming Remedy ran out of development time and had to release the game, that's how quickly it's over. However, it took me about eighteen hours to beat the campaign, and I didn't do all of the side quests. This is also a beautiful game that requires some serious horsepower to run at max settings at higher resolutions. I would say Control is worth sixty bucks for fans of Lynchian surrealism. You can currently play it on X Box game pass.
Crysis Remastered is more of a mixed bag. Crytek and Saber have updated the classic FPS, adding high resolution textures, an updated lighting system, software ray tracing, and more. On a mix of medium and high settings at 1440p, it looks great, and much closer to my memory's conception of the game. However, Crysis Remastered is based on the console version of Crysis, so some features, such as leaning and the original nanosuit controls, have been removed. Purists might be disappointed; personally, I think the game plays better. Instead of switching to speed mode, you simply hold down shift as you run; similarly, performing a power jump requires you to hold down the jump button instead of switching to power mode. There are also a few bugs, such as floating Koreans. Check point saving replaces the original's save-anywhere function, which stinks, because Crysis is a pretty challenging game on harder difficulties. Still, the graphical upgrades are really nice, and the gameplay still holds up. Crysis Remastered is currently on-sale for fifteen bucks on the Epic Games store, and I'd recommend it at that price.
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