Control (Gaming)

by Cody Miller , Music of the Spheres - Never Forgot, Tuesday, January 25, 2022, 10:38 (819 days ago)
edited by Cody Miller, Tuesday, January 25, 2022, 10:49

Control was my first jump into nex gen. Or is it current gen now? I don't know.

I played in Graphics mode. The one with Ray tracing. That was cool. The non organic objects looked great. Light filled rooms and bounced around, gave body to objects. It's great when things start exploding or when you levitate objects to block and direct light. But the humans look even worse than last gen. The hair has no consistency, vanishing and reappearing. The faces are wooden, emotionless. Mouths move wrong and creep you out. This is the uncanny valley. But only in motion. It looks great in stills. I'm sure entering photo mode turns everything up to max.

A handful of games have ruined all others. Last of Us 2, FF7 Remake, Death Stranding, and believe it or not Life is Strange True Colors. The people in these games look like people. I emotionally attach to them as people. The people don't look like people in Control. Dead eyes, stiff faces, and janky motion capture with boring autocutscenes. Whenever someone speaks the illusion breaks down. Maybe this is why nobody talks in the cutscenes.

Emotionless people for an emotionless story. Is some weirdness all it takes to impress these days? Everything has to be explained rather than experienced. The emotional stakes are absent. I know nothing of Jessie's relationship with her brother. I know nothing beyond the fact she was the chosen one blah blah it's all bullshit. You won't be invested in a second of it.

I'm assuming lack of character detail is a tradeoff. Because not much is fixed down. You can blow almost anything up. Hurl almost any object. And they will all react, break, shatter, and bounce around. There's a sense of kinetics and realism. It feels good. Playing the Yuffie DLC for FF7 Remake afterwards left an impression. It was the opposite. Everything was locked down.

There is lore… tons of it I'm sure. But in the most boring format. Collectables. Audio logs. I just can't. Who wants to chase down this shit when you could tell the story with sound and picture?

The aesthetic of the Oldest House would be cool to fight in no? Twisting, moving panels of wall that would have to be navigated through and utilized to fight. But no. It's all just for show. You end up fighting in familiar office settings. The ashtray maze everyone raves about, probably because it at least attempts to fulfill that promise, is itself not even a maze. It unfolds in front of you as you step through, unfurling just for you, leading the way, rather than being an adversary.

The gunplay is mediocre, and unneeded. Launch is simply too powerful. Your best option is always just to hurl shit. Enemies are all defeated the same way, minus one of the DLC bosses. I take that back, the ones with shields you have to time exactly when you hurl shit. Worse, you don't even need to manage things to throw. You can just look at a wall, and rip out some concrete. There's always something to levitate. I beat the game easily without even getting shield or seize.

Random "kill X number of Y in Z location" missions appear fullscreen during a tense battle. Really?

The upgrades are uninspired. Boring. Just altering numbers. More damage. More health. Etc. They don't change the way you play.

Levitation is at least satisfying. The thrust upward accompanied by the animation of Jessie throwing he head and hands back. It became a lone source of joy.

The absurdity and artificiality of the environment is laid bare. You're the director of the Bureau, and yet you are denied entry and need keycards. Even though you can backtrack, you don't have to - the story moves you forward from new place to new place. The welcome choice of not having waypoints is offset by the fact it's still telling you were to go. It doesn't feel like I need to explore. This is no metroidvania. The things I found might be interesting… if I cared about the story.

I see and appreciate the artistry that's there,. but so much of the experience in playing control was standard and familiar. And yet so highly praised. Am I out of touch? Or are the kids wrong?