#yet to play Quantum Break or any Max Payne game so

[div-divington]

things Remedy could definitely sell in their Official Merch Store that would undoubtedly make them A Sum of Money (a very serious and extremely cost-friendly non-exhaustive list):

- Black mug with the Federal Bureau of Control's seal on it (either the simple, clean, modern all-white version or the full coloured version)

- plushies of The Former. they're cute and i like them.

- mini-fridge that looks like AI10-KE (the Arctic Queen)

- literally just normal stationary with FBC imagery attached. Lemme buy Pope's clipboard.

- Oceanview Motel & Casino keychain

- Inverted Black Pyramid keychain

- Replica posters for all the fun little posters in the Oldest House (Do as you're told! Don't eat the Mold!)

- Get a real actual wizard to curse a buncha rubber duckies so they actually follow buyers around and quack at them (may not be profitable depending on wizard rates)

- The hairclip Jesse gets when she finishes the base game

- just. That poster Ahti has on his office door. Of himself.

- Tiny Little Hotline

- hoodie with Bureau seal on it

- small high-detail statues of Jesse and other characters (Emily, Arish, Langston, Marshall, idk) in action poses (or just dynamic poses)

- a vinyl record featuring literally nothing but Langston's freestyle poetry/rap from AWE on loop (on both sides) (cover art should be a low-res PNG of Langston with 2013 MLG sunglasses Photoshopped poorly onto him and "Langston's Greatest Hits" written in hot pink Comic sans font)

There are also a buncha Alan Wake options too:

- Life-sized cutout of Alan complete with book-holding shelf

- book sleeves so you can dress any unrelated book up as a litany of Alan's literary wonders

- Oh Deer Diner mug

- More of those thermoses (I will eradicate the scalpers that bought them all within literally seconds of them being made available)

- all the Manuscript pages from all the Alan Wake games (including the tiny amount we hear him narrate in AWE) in either an FBC "CLASSIFIED" folder or a dirty envelope

- real gun

- any and all posters from any and all AW games. Like the ones advertising Tom Zane's movies, or the ones telling you to celebrate Deerfest or the ones telling you to visit Coffee World

- plushie of Mayor Setter :)

- plushie of the Coffee World mascot (make it do the terrifying laugh when you squeeze its hand too)

- Barry Wheeler desk statue where the headlamp and Christmas lights light up

- "Not The Worst Mom" mug (PLEASE)

- deer masks

- anatomically accurate Taken-Nightingale statue with removable heart (show me the terror)

- just a framed print out of Alex Casey giving us the Look he always does

- Dr. Hartman's "The Creator's Dilemma" book sleeve so we can bask in his smug smile

- official Alan Wake branded flashlights

- Saga's sweater/sweaters?

- for $3000 Sam Lake just personally shows up at your house and sends you to the Dark Place

feel free to add more

[fridge-reviews]

Control

Developer: Remedy Entertainment Publisher: 505 Games Rrp: £24.99 (Epic) and £34.99 (Steam [Ultimate Edition]) Released: 27th August 2019  Available on: Epic (Steam in August 2020)  Played Using: Mouse and Keyboard  Approximate game length: 20 Hours

Usually if you tell someone that the walls are moving they will assume you're high or delusional, possibly both. Not so in the Oldest House, the walls moving is a daily occurrence and something barely worthy of your notice. However the rubber duck that is sitting on your desk that wasn't there a second ago, that is important.

Welcome to Control, the latest game by Remedy Entertainment whose previous works include Alan Wake, Quantum Break and the Max Payne series. You control Jesse Faden, a woman who's on a mission to find her long lost brother after he was taken by shadowy government agents when they were young. Now its important to note that I said you control her, not that you play her, she has her own thoughts and feelings that you have no say over, she's a character in her own right. It's an action adventure game with some platforming and light RPG elements thrown in for good measure.

The game (mostly) takes place within New York City specifically within the confines of 'The Oldest House'. This building is unique in that most people don't even know it exists and yet it stands within one of the most populous cities in the world. If I had to put the general feeling of this game in a single word it wouldn't be excitement or horror (though there are elements of that) it would unsettled. From the very beginning of this game everything just feels... off and that feeling only grows the more you play. Part of this is due to the fact that you start the game in media res and are essentially playing catchup for the majority of the game. You don't even know Jesse's life story for a very long time.

As you play through the game you attain special powers, most famous of which (as is shown on the box art) is telekinesis, allowing you to rip up chunks of the building to hurl at... well whatever you feel like really. Using these powers uses up energy, which is illustrated as a white bar at the top of the screen when in use, this energy bar refills while powers are not being used.

The first and only weapon you get in the game simply has the title of the 'Service Weapon', like with the powers the Service Weapon's ammunition regenerates when its not being used. This means you can alternate from the Service Weapon to your powers and back again. The Service Weapon can take on several forms that change the way it behaves, these forms include a pistol, a machine pistol and a shotgun. At the start of the game the Service Weapon can only assume a single form called 'Grip' which is the pistol form.

So I've mentioned the powers you get and the Service Weapon but not the enemies. Well for the most part your enemy is a force known as the 'Hiss'. These Hiss come in a variety of shapes and sizes, from your standard grunt with a pistol to beings that fly in the air and attack you with debris through to invisible enemies that unleash powerful attacks when you least expect it. When enemies die they drop health as well as occasionally mods and materials. These materials have names like 'ritual impulse', 'house memory' and 'hidden trend'. Killing enemies also gives you a resource called 'Source' (more on that shortly). Combat in this game is quite difficult, even with all the extra skills you gain. You'll constantly need to be on the move or you'll quickly get swamped and don't think that you can hunker down for too long behind cover as most of the scenery in this game is destructible.

In the inevitable event of Jesse being killed she will respawn at the most recently accessed Control Point and will lose ten percent of the Source she has acquired. Control Points are areas of the Oldest House that are the most stable, once you claim a Control Point you can fast travel to it from any other Control Point. These Control Points allow you to allocate any ability points you gain from completing missions or finding hidden areas. They also allow you to upgrade your Service Weapon to become more potent.

You can apply mods to your service weapon as well as yourself. These mods can also be broken down to provide Source. Source and materials can be used to craft new mods, weapon forms and upgrade existing ones.

As you play you will find that there are many notes, videos and documents to read through. With a lot of interesting lore and information to find. Most of this information is essentially useless but provides extra flavour to the game.

It's clear that a lot of care has been taken in the creation of Control and it wears some of its inspirations upon its sleeve, such as the SCP Foundation and X-Files (and I've found interviews with the creators that confirm this). All in all this is a great game, I've thoroughly enjoyed playing through this from beginning to end. I've logged at least a good sixty hours into this game and I still keep finding more things to do and explore. And then I look to the coming months and see that there are two DLC's coming... and I have to get them.

If this appeals to you perhaps try;

Alan Wake Star Wars: Jedi Fallen Order Resident Evil 2 Remake

[audiogrizzly]

Top 5 Games of 2019

It was a little tricky to construct a top 5 for this year, though there have been a couple of surprises.  I wasn’t expecting the year to be a bit crap as we are no w on the cusp once more of a new generation.  But 2012 wasn’t all that bad of a year (PS4 and Xbox One would release in 2013) and at the moment, everyone is doing alright.  PS4 has sold through over 100 million systems, Nintendo are definitely on an “on” generation with Switch, Xbox has been able to get back into peoples good books with things like Game Pass (on both Console and PC, their PC side they seem to really be turning around), there’s even interesting things happening in the mobile space with Apple Arcade.

This won’t be the last year where my top 5 games are full of current gen titles, I am expecting the new systems to drop in around November, last time it was hard to find a top 5 specific to PS4 (as I listed each platform separately back then).  It IS however, another list of mostly AAA tier games.  If you want to know what smaller more “interesting” games I have been playing, check out my honourable mentions at the end.

Also, follow me on Melee.  It’s this new image blogging service from Imgur which you can download now on the IOS App Store (its just on iPhone at the moment) and it has seemingly been built to help people share gaming related clips and images off of places like Twitter and Instagram (and err, here on Tumblr).  I posted a couple of daft clips of me failing in Modern Warfare and Destiny 2 and it didn’t take long for them to amass a few likes and comments.

That sounded like a sponsored advert but ain’t nobody paying me for this.  Let’s get into my top 5

5. Star Wars Jedi Fallen Order

I was about to select Gears 5 to be my number 5 until I saw sense and cast my memory back to when I started playing Jedi (all the way back in November.  I was impressed by its intense action, impressive visuals and great characters.  I especially enjoyed the 4 armed pilot who always complains.  I did feel that towards the end I got sick of managing large groups of enemies so I dropped the difficulty to get through it, but I still haven’t achieved 100% of activities on all planets so I can still go back to it one day.

4. Borderlands 3

We all knew this was coming but not even I had any idea that we would have been actually playing it in 2019 way back at the start of the year.  For me, I look at the game.  I don’t care about weird magicians or their insane sounding legal woes, all I’m interested in is the work of a team who deserved better for their last title, but am still glad returned to what they do best, looting and shooting.  I enjoyed rejoining these characters I have followed over the last 10 years, all the referenced to older games, cameos from characters from Tales From the Borderlands and The Pre Sequel and was sad to see some people go.  I still have about a year of extra content to go through and I really appreciate the efforts they have made to make the game last longer than just one playthrough through in the Proving Grounds, Circle of Slaughter and Mayhem modes.  Though I have always tended to stick to Borderlands games and create builds for each and every vault hunter, so I will be doing that.

3. Mortal Kombat 11

It’s been a while since I last put a fighting game into my end of year round up.  And I HAVE fallen off MK11 a little bit, but this entry reminded me of how impressive it is for Nether Realms to pack their fighting games with some many things to do and keep people playing outside of just going into matchmaking and fighting others.  The Vault this year is basically another little adventure full of exploration and puzzle solving and the Towers of Time give you plenty of challenge and direction of many months to come.  You also have to give the developer credit for never backing down on the brutality of the game, they must have all got their heads together after DC Universe vs. and vowed never again to make watered down versions of Fatalities.  It is a game that keeps getting better and better.

2. Call of Duty Modern Warfare

I was debating whether or not to include this years CoD.  I always get the same type of enjoyment out of it each year, people complain that it never changes but I’m glad it sticks to a formula.  Of course they are not identikit games, there are new maps, new modes, new ways of building your loadout and new touches, like how in this year you can snap to edges to stay in cover while you shoot, there’s the new special equipment system where you can drop ammo or reduce your footstep noise.  Having doors you can either peek through or smash open adds another level of strategy, there have been times where I have been able to escape being under fire by closing a door, re-positioning and then wasting whoever just wanders in.

The campaign this year, good to see it back, but whatever, the co-op mode is Spec Ops again, like it was back in MW2 and 3 but on a much larger scale, I have yet to complete one of these btw.  But as always, it’s the multiplayer that does it for me and Modern Warfare deserves credit for being what must be the first AAA game to feature cross platform play, not just launch with it.  I know that games like Fortnite are popular, but I don’t see that as a AAA title, it doesn’t have the full package, it’s just a mode and it started off small.  Call of Duty is expected to be big each year, has a lot riding on it and allowing for cross play is a big step.  I especially appreciate being able to play with a keyboard and mouse on PS4 and being able to matchmake only with people playing with controllers on PC, in fact, I have never really given the game much of a shot on PC before as I know people just fall of it, there has often been low player numbers reported on the PC versions of CoD and it looks like it won’t have that problem this time round due to cross play.

Modern Warfare still has to contend with Destiny 2 and Overwatch for my time as my main multiplayer game but it’s still as fun as ever.

1. Control

Put this down as my main “surprise” game of 2019.  A game which was not on my watch list, though I was aware of it as you can’t ignore a game from the makers of Max Payne (I did skip Alan Wake and didn’t care much for Quantum break though).  Bought it at the last minute before its release, downloaded it and was wowed by the sinister nature of the environment you run around in.  This weird fictitious US government agency which looks into paranormal activity which you seem to have become in charge of because you picked up a mysterious weapon from the deceased Director while searching for your brother.  What then follows is about 12 hours of wacky powers and odd video clips as you unearth what has been going on in this strange ever morphing building.

I especially loved how the game never holds your hand too much, the map of each floor is vague enough that you also have to rely on in-game signposting to move around, as well as a bit of memory work.  There is also great humour involved too in some of the PSA posters on a lot of the walls, the antics of the caretaker and the videos you find of Dr. Darling throughout the game.

I did have a few weird technical issues with the game throughout playing, but still found it to be visually pleasing, there was this weird hitch that used to appear after coming out of the pause screen that always threw me, it would be followed by a few moments of low performance before getting back into the smooth action.  But this didn’t stop me from having a great time with Control.  Perhaps the game that will be the most prominent in my head when I think of 2019.

So there you have it, control is my best game of 2019.  But let’s look at the other new games I played throughout the year in my honourable mentions:

Gears 5

The Outer Worlds

Days Gone

Apex Legends

Far Cry New Dawn

Trover Saves the Universe

Concrete Genie

Devil May Cry 5

Tom Clancy's The Division 2

And also a special mention to these old games that were rereleased/remastered/repackaged etc in 2019:

Borderlands Game of the Year Edition Remastered

Halo Reach

And now, a look at the games I have on my watchlist for 2020:

Cyberpunk 2077

Last of Us Part 2

Ghost of Tsushima

Halo: Infinite

Watch Dogs Legion

Phantasy Star Online 2

Gods & Monsters

Doom Eternal

Overwatch 2

Diablo IV

Minecraft dungeons

Marvel's Avengers

Carrion

Streets of Rage 4

Will they all even come out?  Let’s find out, happy new year!

[kyndaris]

A Heady Feeling

I was unsure what to make of Control when it was first announced. Though the premise intrigued me, the first few trailers hardly hyped up the title. Still, when it released, I was one of the first in line to purchase the game. I mean, who wouldn’t want to have telekinetic powers? It was also a game from Remedy. That, in and of itself, gave the game a kind of pedigree. This was the team behind the likes of Max Payne, Alan Wake and Quantum Break. And, for the first time in a long while, their title would not only come out on Xbox but PlayStation as well. 

Of course...should Naughty Dog release a new IP, I would be just as eager to pick it up, if not more so, having been a fan of both the Uncharted series and The Last of Us. Particularly because I adore how much the studio devotes to telling blockbuster narratives, with a strong focus on single-player, and who pull on the heartstrings.

But back to the title that released on the 27th of August.

The story of Control centres on Jesse Faden, a woman looking for her brother after he was abducted after a tragic incident in their hometown of Ordinary. After searching for approximately a decade and a half, Jesse stumbles upon the Federal Bureau of Control in the heart of New York in a building called The Oldest House. Minutes after she enters the 1950s style building, she finds the Service Weapon in the Director’s Office and, after picking it up, becomes the new Director. Her first day on the job, though, is complicated by the presence of the Hiss. A menacing force that is represented by a red eerie light and a consistent chant that follows you as you journey deeper into The Oldest House.

As I played through Control, I was reminded strongly of Prey (a title from Arkane Studios that is known for the Dishonored series). While the settings could be considered quite different: one being in a space station and this latest title exploring the paranatural Oldest House, the unsettling feeling of both locales, the mystery behind the enemies and the scattered documents and media collectibles helped cement my initial impression. Another contributing factor, I think, might have also been the architecture of the buildings. Perhaps it was because Control focuses on the brutalist movement, one that came about in the 1950s and the core of the Talos space station was also supposedly built in the same time period. In any case, there is a certain vibe that permeates both games and it doesn’t help that there were so many sectors to explore, all of them leading back to the other through elevators.

This is further compounded by the fact that much of the Bureau is empty of life. Only a select few humans remain, protected by a strange device that is strapped to their chest: the HRA. As MacGuffins go, it isn’t completely terrible and as one progresses through the story, there is an explanation for how it prevented the Hiss from taking over other employees of the Bureau (whether or not there’s any basis in science for how it works, I can’t rightly say either way).

Control also features intuitive gameplay. While there seemed to be a few performance issues in my playthrough on my PlayStation 4, I still found it great to run and gun or launching fire extinguishers at the Hiss. In fact, unlike other third person shooters, Control encourages the player to keep moving. Whereas other titles would have their main characters pressed up against cover with their health recovering after a few seconds, Remedy took a page out of id Software and the Doom series. Health is dropped by enemies, not regenerated automatically. This, in turn, meant a much more aggressive style of play in order to survive. And while cover still exists, Jesse does not stick to it. Depending on the angle, one can crouch behind partitions or stand behind pillars. However, staying still also meant enemies would zero in on your position, flanking or flushing you out with a few choice grenades or rockets.

With regards to the boss battles, though, I’ll admit to cheesing a few of them. Particularly against the optional ones against Mr Tommasi and Essej. In fact, I found them quite challenging and had to develop certain strategies to defeat them. It’s quite shameful to admit, but I died numerous times trying to find the best way to bring them down.

What proved a little disappointing when I first started the game, though, was discovering that there was no option to change the difficulty setting of the game. While I did struggle on occasion, it meant that Control may not be as accessible to other gamers.

Though there are a few stand-out moments with the characters of Control, such as the films featuring Dr Casper Darling and Emily Pope, I could not help but feel that many other characters could have been better fleshed out. It would have also aided the game if we could help understand more of Jesse’s motivation in finding her brother beyond stumbling upon a few documents or reports that detailed the events of the incident in Ordinary. Yes, there were recorded sessions Jesse shared with a psychiatrist, but there was a sense of disconnect between it all.

Marshall, the head of operations, also disappeared halfway through the game. Despite the fact that several characters comment on it, none of it was properly followed up. Although, perhaps it might be done so in a future DLC.

Still, while I would have preferred to fall in love with the characters, overall, it felt the stakes were not as high as I would have hoped (particularly after playing through Fire Emblem).

I would have also preferred a photo mode. Unfortunately, at time of playing, it had yet to be implemented. 

Gripes aside, I managed to wend my way through the story and even managed to achieve a Platinum trophy (a fact that provided me a bit of an ego boost) due to my unflappable curiosity and need to dig down further into the mystery. For those looking for something beyond the norm, and watching everyday objects from the previous decades become important power pieces that Jesse can bind to, look no further than Control. Whether that be an oversized floppy disc that was purported to contain the launch codes for nuclear missiles, a Home Safe or a Merry-Go-Round Horse. That absurdity made trawling through the Federal Bureau of Control, at least for me, such a joy from beginning to end.