Remedy Entertainment revealed Control Resonant during The Game Awards, confirming the game as a full sequel to 2019’s Control. The announcement trailer showed off a dramatic shift in setting, protagonist, and gameplay style that positions the sequel as a major departure from the original.
The game moves away from the Oldest House entirely. Instead, players will explore a paranormally corrupted Manhattan where reality itself has been twisted by supernatural forces. Hinted at during previous Remedy title Alan Wake II, a major plot point appears to be the Hiss escaping the Oldest House.
Dylan Faden takes over as the playable protagonist. Jesse’s twin brother spent most of the first game in a compromised state, influenced by the Hiss and connected to the mysterious Board. Now he’s front and center, wielding massive melee weapons and performing stylish aerial combos.
The gameplay looks nothing like the original. Control was a third-person shooter built around Jesse’s shape-shifting Service Weapon and telekinetic abilities. Control Resonant switches to melee combat with swords, hammers, and close-quarters action. The trailer shows Dylan launching enemies into the air and juggling them mid-combo, drawing immediate comparisons to Devil May Cry‘s hack-and-slash style.
Jesse appears in the trailer but not as the hero. A brief voiceover has her telling Dylan to “pace yourself,” while the Board’s distorted voices inform Dylan that his sister has “gone rogue.” One shot suggests a confrontation between the siblings, potentially positioning Jesse as an antagonist.
The Board remains a central force in the story. The extradimensional entity that guided the Federal Bureau of Control now appears to be directing Dylan, possibly using him as a weapon against Jesse. Their signature reversed speech and ritualistic audio design feature heavily in the announcement trailer.
Control mixed paranormal activity with mundanity
The first Control took place in the headquarters of the Federal Bureau of Control, a government department that investigated paranormal phenomena. Players controlled Jesse Faden as she became the Director and fought the Hiss, a hostile resonance possessing staff members. The game earned praise for its world-building, art direction, and weird fiction atmosphere inspired by the SCP Foundation and X-Files.
Remedy has a pattern of never repeating the same genre twice. Max Payne was a noir shooter, Alan Wake focused on light-based horror combat, Quantum Break added time manipulation, and Control went for telekinetic sandbox action. The shift to melee-driven gameplay fits this tradition of experimentation.
The announcement trailer blended live-action performance with in-engine footage, keeping Remedy’s signature mixed-media presentation style. An actor on stage was integrated directly into the game footage, creating a seamless blend of real and digital that echoes the studio’s approach to storytelling across all their titles.
No more Epic exclusivity
Control Resonant will launch on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC through both Steam and Epic Games Store. This avoids the Epic exclusivity that limited Alan Wake 2‘s PC distribution and drew criticism from fans who prefer Valve’s platform.
The cause of many of Remedy’s platform distribution woes have been down to the many different publishers that have picked up their games. Control was published by 505Games, whereas Alan Wake II was by Epic. Prior to both of these, though, was Quantum Break, the time-bending adventure published by Xbox in 2016, which was not available on PlayStation.
