The Remedy Connected Universe plays with your perception, fusing the surreal supernatural with brutalist architecture and contemporary objects. Some of the best parts of Control Resonant play with the capital-W Weird that Remedy is known for. Buildings refract. Dumpsters distort. Psychedelic fractals merge with photorealistic objects, creating haunting, memorable visions.

Within this warped vision of Manhattan, you play as Dylan Faden, the brother of the previous game's protagonist, Jesse. He was responsible for a deadly disaster before going comatose. Now seven years later, multiple extradimensional forces have ravaged Manhattan, including a new one called the Pattern, and it's up to Dylan, after being awoken by Jesse, to save the city. At the same time, Jesse goes missing, so he has to go it alone.

Everywhere he turns, however, he's met with disdain and distrust. Even his handler Zoe holds him at arm's length, seeing him as nothing more than a tool against the Hiss. What follows is a story about redemption, reunion, and recovering from trauma. Control Resonant is carried by strong character moments, memorably weird set pieces, and at times strong writing. But Remedy's new foray into hack-and-slash combat comes with a few boring limits along the way.

Manhattan Everywhere You Look

There are points in Control Resonant where buildings will very literally surround you. I mean, when you look up, there are some sideways and upside-down skyscrapers. The city itself bends and folds around you, and that's not even half of the weirdness you'll encounter here. There are fractal platforms made of multiple instances of the same taxi intersecting with itself. It's a surreal fever dream.

It's a fever dream you can pretty fully explore. As you explore the world, you'll unlock traversal abilities that help you get around. You start off already with a double jump and double dash (both on the ground and in the air), and early on, you'll get the ability to augment a jump and float, much like the previous game.

The most mind-boggling maneuvering you'll do in Control Resonant involves shifting gravity. If a road bends 90 degrees, you can approach it and essentially walk on walls. Though this wall is also now the ground? As long as it looks like ground, you can shift your gravity to walk on it. However, you have to be careful when exploring the world—if you go too far away from the new gravity field, "real" gravity still applies, so you could accidentally fall up into the down.

This all applies to combat, too. You'll find enemies oriented to the relative wall or ceiling, and sometimes after fights, I really don't know which way is up anymore. Thankfully, there are some hints; the dust you kick up while running will always fall according to real gravity, and the same goes for enemy corpses.

An Open(ish) World

While Control Resonant technically is made up of multiple interconnected open zones, it feels a lot like an open world, for better and for worse. The map isn't littered with unsatisfying collectible icons, but there are a lot of nooks, crannies, and little puzzles to explore. Every time you do something in a zone, you'll increase its level, which rewards you with more Source (a mix of experience points and currency), better vendor items, and better resources from chests (which you use to improve your weapons).

Leveling up each zone just sort of happened for me, in a good way. It didn't feel like a chore; I was just fighting enemies, doing quests, and finding random treasure chests of my own volition, and the numbers went up. Completing major quests gives a big boost to the zone level, too, and you'll want to pursue these quests to get new powers and movement abilities.

Aside from the main story beats, there are two major side quests that you'll have to pursue: finding Jesse and eliminating world bosses known as Resonant Entities. You'll search for Jesse at places called Faults, which are spaces between dimensions. Through these, you'll learn more about where she is, as well as her history with Dylan. Additionally, completing each Fault gives you a new traversal ability.

The Resonant Entities all have their own unique, tragic stories that explain why they exist (sort of—you know how cryptic Remedy can be sometimes). You'll discover their story through environmental storytelling, which gave me a deeper appreciation for their aesthetic and move set. It's a testament to the writing and lore-building that makes this world feel more lived in, despite how foreign and otherworldly it is.

Plus, the new powers you get usually tie into what these bosses are. For example, defeating this fire giant boss gives you a choice between a fiery aura that augments every basic attack or a flaming shockwave that you can do in rapid succession. Both build up the fire status effect, which will passively deplete health and build falter (the enemy's stamina bar, basically).

It's worth hunting down all the Resonant Entities and all the Faults before finishing the story in Control Resonant. Well, the Faults are required for the story, but you can skip some Entities if you want. However, then you'll miss out on new powers, which are crucial to making the combat effective and, more importantly, fun.

Control Resonant's Combat Is a Big Swing

In this game's predecessor, Jesse used the Service Weapon, a shape-shifting supernatural pistol that made the combat essentially a third-person shooter. In Control Resonant, Dylan uses Aberrant, a shape-shifting shard that transforms into all sorts of hack-and-slash weapons. You can choose from three primary weapon styles and three secondary styles, and you can equip one of six combo finishers that activates at the end of a three-hit primary combo.

So how does this all look in action? Well, it looks a lot cooler than it feels, especially over the course of a couple dozen hours. Your primary options all have their strengths and weaknesses; the daggers are great for racking up critical hits, while the scythe hits many enemies at once (which some combo finishers scale off). Your secondary weapon options are a giant warhammer that destroys shields, a wide-reaching whip that rewards precise timing, and a single-target drill that absolutely shreds. I found these to be pretty situational, and sometimes, I felt pigeonholed into using the hammer because of all the armored enemies.

The last vector of Aberrant's toolset is the combo finisher. Of the six, I only found maybe half of them really useful, but they all provide some utility. For example, the uppercut is great for launching enemies, leaving them vulnerable to more damage (depending on your build). Alternatively, the wide swing is just a big, honkin' buster sword that does massive raw damage.

Unfortunately, the combat is arguably the weakest part of Control Resonant because of how limiting it feels. You can't swap your weapons on the fly. Whenever you need a new one, whether it's to spice up your gameplay or to counter an enemy, you have to pause while not attacking. It sounds like a pretty whiny gripe, but it really disrupts the flow of combat.

To make matters worse, that flow itself can be a little bit dull, especially in the first half. The finishers are one of the most useful parts of Dylan's kit, but to use them, you have to press primary attack four times in a row. There's no meaningful variance in how you can express yourself with the buttons; the only way things change is through the loadout menu.

Early on, I invested a lot in the uppercut because I love aerial combat (shoutout to any Devil May Cry fans out there). In practice, this made every combat encounter a practice in pressing and holding square to the same, monotonous rhythm. Sure, you can use the secondary weapon whenever you want, but that's also a single-button affair—as in, now you're just pressing and holding triangle. There's very little interplay between them outside of a single square-square-square-triangle combo that you can unlock later. That combo doesn't meaningfully change the game, though, and by then, the sense of dullness really sets in with the combat. The only break in the rhythm is executing enemies after filling their falter meter.

Dylan's saving grace here is his supernatural powers. After getting a couple, there's more interplay between using Aberrant to build your meter and violently pushing enemies into the void or smashing concrete into them. These powers feel pretty satisfying to use, and on a DualSense, the haptic triggers add a nice little touch. Really, I can't express enough how much fun it is lobbing a flurry of fiery shockwaves until an enemy burns to death.

However, these powers are also arbitrarily limited. When you defeat a Resonant Entity, you have to pick between two options (aside from the first set, which gives you three options). What the game doesn't clearly tell you is that you can try out both powers before committing to one. Learn from my mistakes, because once you commit, you have to use a respec item to change things (which is rare). You can always see your choice of powers, but you can't freely swap between them in that menu, which feels like a constant taunt. Sure, choices matter, but in an action game, having choice unnecessarily removed feels limiting.

I eventually landed on a build that felt really strong. I could summon a little army of minions to help me fight, and they would help me make enemies explode thanks to some status effects. Combat finally felt pretty fun, but I didn't land on this build until the last third of the story. Your mileage may vary, but I think generally, fewer limits would go a long way to making the combat feel fun sooner.

The difficulty curve in Control Resonant doesn't help, either. Your upgrade trees all feed into a build level, which sort of incentivizes you to invest in upgrades whenever you can, even for a weapon you don't like using. Enemies just one level above you already make things pretty difficult. Two levels or higher and you're in for a bad time. The game doesn't guide you to "recommended" areas based on your level, but it can feel a bit misleading. I didn't realize that zones varied in level until after I slogged through a harder area—an area that seemed like the correct priority for the story. If I were approaching it now, I'd treat it more like Elden Ring and simply explore somewhere else if an area was too hard, rather than treating it like a linear story game.

A Story Carried by Characters

Don't let the game's open zones and flashy combat fool you, though: at its core, Control Resonant is all about the story, as is usually the case for Remedy's games. The Hiss, the previous game's main threat, has broken free from the Oldest House and is taking over Manhattan. In the meantime, the Mold, a supernatural fungus-like substance, is also infecting people and claiming territory. To make things even worse, an unexplained phenomenon called the Pattern is refracting reality as we know it, messing with time and space. People's sense of reality is becoming more unstable by the minute, especially when these three forces interact.

As mentioned previously, Dylan is seen as a necessary risk by the Federal Bureau of Control. No one likes him, no one trusts him, but everyone needs him. You can choose dialogue options for him throughout the game, and while it seemingly doesn't affect the direction of the story, it does affect your perception of Dylan as a character. Does he cynically resign himself to being a tool? Or does he yearn to be treated like the human being he was never allowed to be?

Throughout the story, you'll learn more about his history with the FBC and Dr. Darling, who constantly pushed Dylan in increasingly concerning ways. As you learn more about him, it's engaging to see how his relationship with Zoe changes from being strictly all about business. Their back-and-forths are where the human heart of Control Resonant lies. Amid all the spooky woo-woo weirdness going on, it's nice to see someone earn their redemption and be treated with the kindness they deserve.

Unfortunately, the overall narrative ends in a somewhat dissatisfying place. I won't spoil anything, but it leaves a major thread hanging, which is clearly an opening for future DLC. It's a shame, because the journey to the end is adorned with pretty solid character writing. Even most of the side quests, including the more fetch-quest-like ones, have some charm to them.

Control Resonant Review | Final Thoughts

Control Resonant has some pretty staggering, memorable, visually awe-inspiring highs, but they're unfortunately dragged down by somewhat mundane combat, which unfortunately plays a major role throughout. It connects every moment, between thrilling traversal through mind-bending vistas and intriguing plot points that leave you wanting more. By the time the combat feels good, I was in the final act, which is a long wait. There's a combat section in the last hour that feels absolutely fantastic, and it's a shame that that's the only time it feels that thrilling.

Still, there's a lot of good in Control Resonant. The overall journey in the story is full of wild twists, striking views, and insightful characterization. Don't skip the notes and audio logs—they really flesh out the world. Though if you were a big Remedy fan already, I'm sure you knew that. And I'm doubly sure that you'll find a lot to love in Dylan's story.

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TechRaptor reviewed Control Resonant on PlayStation 5 with a code provided by the publisher over the course of 27 hours of gameplay. All screenshots were taken during the review process.