After Remedy's fantastic Alan Wake 2, expectations were sky-high in the lead up toControl Resonant. The sequel to 2019's Control looked to continue the studio's hot streak with a mind-bending open-world action RPG just in time for an awards season that favors that kind of game. After all that hype, the reviews are finally in, and Remedy did not disappoint, even if it didn't quite leap over the bar set by Alan Wake 2.
Control Resonant reviews are... pretty decent!
Currently, Control Resonant is sitting at an 84 on Metacritic and an 85 on Opencritic. Those are solid aggregate scores, though it lands the open-world adventure in an increasingly crowded field of solid games that will be fighting for a spot at the top come Game Awards season. It's the same mid-80s aggregate zone as hits like Star Wars: Zero Company, The Blood of Dawnwalker, Onimusha: Way of the Sword, and Mixtape. Still, it has reviewed better than 2019's Control, a critically acclaimed game that went on to be a serious Game of the Year contender in 2019.
Though its awards hopes will hinge on reactions to upcoming games like Grand Theft Auto 6, critics are still largely loving Remedy's latest. In a glowing 9/10 review for GameSpot, Remedy aficionado Mark Delaney praised Resonant for its excellent world and design.
"This vision of New York is unlike anything I’ve ever seen, and though trailers have hinted at some of the arresting art design Resonant features, it’s truly something special to behold," Delaney wrote. "Scenes of the city folding in on itself à la Inception are merely scratching the surface. Both the world and the enemies, especially the bosses, are nothing short of jaw-dropping."
IGN's Michael Higham was similarly impressed with Resonant, scoring it an 8/10 review. The world design was a highlight for Higham, as was Remedy's signature storytelling. Higham specifically gives some flowers to Dylan Faden, the game's hero, for making it all work.
"Dylan is a real sad sack who feels sorry for himself, and it's quite tragic as you unpack what really happened to him as an FBC experiment," Higham wrote. "And that's what makes Dylan so compelling and easy to root for; he's not a complex character, but he is a good guy and a clear lens to demystify a lot of the esoteric concepts of Control's world."
While there's a lot of praise going around, some critics aren't quite as enamored with the series' pivot to open-world hack-and-slash action. In a three-star review for Eurogamer, Alexis Ong was more critical of the move away from Control's Oldest House and into a less compelling world pulled more from a standard cinematic blockbuster. Ong wasn't too impressed by the serviceable melee combat either: "Inquiring minds will want to know if Control's combat has improved, and the unfortunate answer is not really."
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There's a sense that Resonant, with its pivot away from Control's third-person shooting, could stand to be a little polarizing. ComicBook's Michael Leri scored the game a 2/5 in a much more critical review. Leri got technical to break down where the hack-and-slash action winds up feeling shallow rather than expressive.
"To say Resonant is restrictive is a massive understatement," Leri wrote. "There’s no creative thinking when it comes to combos, movement tech that requires expertise to master, or clever ways to combine its tools; it’s all just mashing, mashing, mashing. Thoughtlessly pounding on the same button is at odds with the freedom of expression present in the genre’s best. The Devil May Cry, God of War, and Bayonetta franchises and even the relative newcomer Hi-Fi Rush — while of different complexities — all revolve around giving players a sandbox to explore and are genre heavyweights as a result. Resonant fails to grasp that fundamental concept and suffers immensely because of it."
Polygon's own Willa Rowe had similar critiques to Ong and Leri — Rowe found Resonant to be a step back from Control in nearly every regard, from the way it sidelines the first game's protagonist to the way it pads out its open world with rote activities. "Missing is that all-important Remedy magic that makes its games so compelling," Rowe wrote. "Without it, Control Resonant completely falls apart."
On the whole, it seems likely that Control Resonant won't quite enjoy the same universal praise as Alan Wake 2. Still, never count Remedy out; its games have a way of sticking with players long-term, as evidenced by Control's 82 on Metacritic, a snapshot that's much more modest than its legacy.
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Image: Remedy Entertainment
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