Control

***Control*** is a 2019 action-adventure game and is on the list of games that will eventually be played on ***Butt Spectrum Club***. Control is the third entry in the ***Alan Wake & Control Series***, following up ***Alan Wake's American Nightmare***, and was followed up by ***Alan Wake (2021)***.

## Game Info

Control is a 2019 action-adventure game developed by Remedy Entertainment and published by 505 Games for the PlayStation 4, PC, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Stadia.

Control is played from a third-person perspective. Control is set within the Oldest House, a featureless Brutalist skyscraper in New York City, and the headquarters of the fictional Federal Bureau of Control (FBC), which studies Altered World Events (AWEs) and collects and studies Objects of Power from these AWEs. The Oldest House, itself an Object of Power, has an interior far larger than its exterior; an enormous, constantly shifting supernatural realm that defies the laws of spacetime. At the onset of the game, an entity called the Hiss is attempting to cross over through a dimensional barrier into this reality and has taken over numerous parts of the Oldest House, reconfiguring its architecture to its needs, as well as many of the FBC employees to fight for it. The player controls Jesse Faden, who has come to the Oldest House seeking answers about her brother after a prior AWE, and becomes involved in the fight against the Hiss.

Control is built in the Metroidvania format, with a large world map that can be explored at a nonlinear pace, unlike Remedy's previous titles which were primarily linear. As the player completes the main story missions, they will encounter areas known as Control Points, which can be unlocked after clearing the area of enemies and then used both as save points and for fast travel throughout the building to previously unlocked Control Points. As the player completes missions, they unlock more of the building to explore, along with additional side quests, in addition to various rewards. These include skill points which can be used to improve psychokinetic powers that Jesse gains over the course of the game, such as projectile-launching debris at enemies or seizing control of enemies' minds temporarily to turn them into her allies. Mission rewards include resources that can be used to improve the function of the Service Weapon, a special gun that can take on multiple forms, ranging from a close-range shotgun-like blast to long-range sniper-like form, with each form outfitted with various perks. The player can equip perks to improve Jesse's base attributes. Various side-quests and optional time-limited mission alerts are available with additional rewards if completed.

An A.I. system known as the Encounter Director controls interactions with enemies based on the player's level and location in the Oldest House. Enemies in Control are predominantly human agents of the FBC possessed by the Hiss, an otherworldly force. They range from standard humans carrying firearms to heavily mutated variations that possess a variety of superpowers.

## Plot

### Control

In October 2019, Jesse Faden arrives at the Oldest House following a telepathic message from Polaris, seeking the whereabouts of her kidnapped brother Dylan. Inside the building, Jesse discovers the lifeless body of Zachariah Trench, and is instructed by Polaris to pick up his fallen Service Weapon. Jesse is translocated to the Astral Plane, where the Board appoints her as the new director of the FBC in Trench's stead. Exiting Trench's office, Jesse is attacked by FBC agents possessed by an entity Jesse dubs "the Hiss". Jesse learns that the Oldest House is under emergency lockdown following the Hiss's spread, and that everyone in the building has been possessed by the Hiss except those wearing Hedron Resonance Amplifiers (HRAs), devices built by missing Bureau scientist Dr. Casper Darling. Jesse agrees to aid the surviving agents in reclaiming the building and containing the Hiss, in exchange for Dylan's whereabouts.

Using an Object of Power known as the Hotline, Jesse communicates with the deceased Trench and learns that his former management team knows the secrets of the Bureau. After lifting the building's lockdown in the Maintenance Sector, Jesse enters the Research Sector in search of Helen Marshall, one of the members of Trench's management team, whom she helps secure the production of more HRAs. Marshall reveals that Dylan, known to the Bureau as Prime Candidate 6 or P6, was being groomed to succeed Trench as the Bureau's director due to his immense supernatural abilities. However, after killing several Bureau agents, Dylan was deemed too dangerous and locked away in the Containment Sector. Jesse rushes to the sector to find Dylan, only to learn that he has escaped and surrendered to the Bureau in the Executive Sector. Dylan reveals to Jesse that he has embraced the Hiss, and that the Hiss entered the Oldest House through the slide projector Object of Power the Bureau recovered from Ordinary.

Ahti, a paranatural entity who manifests as a janitor, gives Jesse a cassette player which enables her to navigate an elaborate maze protecting the slide projector's chamber in the Research Sector. She finds the slide projector missing, but learns that Trench and Darling used the device to enter an alternate dimension known as Slidescape-36, where they discovered an entity they dubbed Hedron. Jesse finds Hedron and discovers that it is Polaris, but moments later, the Hiss attacks and destroys Hedron. Jesse's mind is invaded by the Hiss, but Jesse is able to rediscover Polaris within herself, allowing her to fight off the Hiss and save the Bureau. In the process, Jesse learns that Trench was the first individual to be possessed by the Hiss during the expeditions to Slidescape-36, and was responsible for releasing the Hiss into the Oldest House. Jesse finds the slide projector in the Executive Sector, where Dylan and the Hiss are attempting to enter the Astral Plane through a portal and overtake the Board. Jesse deactivates the slide projector and seemingly cleanses the Hiss from Dylan, which closes the portal but leaves him in a coma. In the aftermath, the Oldest House remains infested by the Hiss and under lockdown to prevent its escape, but Jesse has come to terms with her new role as director and resolves to find a solution together with the FBC's surviving personnel.

### The Foundation

Jesse is summoned by the Board to the Foundation, a cavernous area lying at the center of the Oldest House which houses the Nail, an object that connects the Oldest House to the Astral Plane. Jesse finds that the Nail has been seriously damaged, which is causing the Astral Plane to leak into the Oldest House, with potentially catastrophic consequences. As Jesse attempts to restore the Nail, she seeks the whereabouts of Helen Marshall, who entered the Foundation during the Hiss invasion, and has gone missing. Meanwhile, Jesse discovers logs left behind by Theodore Ash, Jr., the former Head of Research who was part of the first expeditions to the Oldest House in 1964. Ash reveals that Broderick Northmoor, the director who preceded Trench, fell under the Board's influence during the expedition, and was responsible for radically changing the Bureau in order to serve the Board's interests.

As Jesse continues to restore the Nail, she encounters Former, an extradimensional entity which grants Jesse a new ability, enraging the Board. Former claims to have once been a member of the Board, but was exiled after being blamed for an unknown transgression. Torn between the two entities, Jesse is eventually able to restore the Nail, but tremors occur between the Oldest House and the Astral Plane which threaten to destroy both dimensions. Jesse reaches the base of the Nail, where she finds Marshall possessed by the Hiss. With the aid of Former, Jesse kills Marshall and cleanses the Nail. Jesse learns that it was Marshall who damaged the Nail, as a preventative measure against both the Hiss and the Board. Marshall's HRA was destroyed soon after, with her believing it to be retaliation by the Board, allowing her to be possessed by the Hiss. With the crisis averted but her faith in the Board shattered, Jesse vows to lead the Bureau her own way.

### AWE

*AWE* is a crossover between *Control* and Remedy Entertainment's previous title, *Alan Wake*. *Alan Wake* takes place in Bright Falls, Washington; in that game, writer Alan Wake finds himself coerced and trapped by the Dark Presence that inhabited Bright Falls' Cauldron Lake, a dimension able to turn works of art into reality. Following the events of *Alan Wake* (as described in *Control*), Emil Hartman, a psychologist who attempted to investigate and exploit this power, was confronted and arrested by agents of the FBC, who confiscated all of his research on the lake. In a final act of desperation, Hartman dove into Cauldron Lake and was possessed by the Dark Presence. Hartman was subsequently captured and brought to the Oldest House by the Bureau, who attempted to contain him in the Investigations Sector. However, after Hartman breached containment, the Bureau was forced to completely abandon and seal off the sector. During the Hiss invasion, the Hiss mixed with the Dark Presence in Hartman, twisting him into a monstrous entity which haunts the sector.

Jesse is summoned to the Investigations Sector by an apparition of Alan Wake, who otherwise was considered missing after the events of *Alan Wake*. She encounters Hartman and is warned by FBC agents that he cannot be allowed to escape the sector. As Jesse attempts to traverse the Investigations Sector and destroy Hartman, she receives visions of Alan revealing that he was responsible for writing Hartman's escape into existence, using Cauldron Lake's power to influence reality using works of fiction. Alan also implies that his writing helped cause the Hiss invasion, as to create a "crisis" for his "hero", Jesse, as part of his attempt to escape from Cauldron Lake. Jesse reaches the Bright Falls AWE area of the Investigations Sector and destroys Hartman. She is informed by FBC agents of a newly detected AWE in Bright Falls, the date of which is several years in the future.