Remedy Entertainment has always rewarded players who look closely. But in Control Resonant, the Finnish studio’s follow-up to 2019’s Control, the joy of discovery works differently, and it turns out to be rewarding in an unexpected way.
Control Resonant (Credits: Remedy Entertainment)
Control Resonant’s Manhattan is a character of its own
Where the original Control kept its secrets inside the Oldest House, a bureaucratic yet mystical building stuffed with clues about the wider Remedy Connected Universe, Resonant breaks those walls down and sends protagonist Dylan Faden out into Manhattan. The city is under siege from its own paranatural threats, but before that, it was just a city, and Remedy treated it that way.
“It was important for us that our version of Manhattan has a character of its own,” Remedy concept artist Mikko Kinnunen told GameSpot. “We were aiming for a timeless feel that plays with archetypal New York elements from movies such as Taxi Driver, avoiding direct comparisons to modern-day reality.” The result is a city designed to feel like it has a life and history of its own, rather than a billboard for the studio’s next game.
That shift initially surprised longtime Remedy watchers. Players who spent hours freeze-framing trailers and hunting for threads left by 2024’s Alan Wake 2 found few direct connections to Alan Wake or Saga Anderson in Resonant. But once the hunt for puzzle pieces stopped, something else came into focus: the sheer voice of the city itself, expressed through its billboards, posters, flyers and signage.
Control Resonant’s signs are hand-made, not AI-generated
One of the most striking details is that none of that signage appears to have been made with generative AI. Kinnunen confirmed the work was authored by artists, saying there is “a feeling of cohesion you get when everything is authored by artists with a shared creative intent. It’s not just what the artwork looks like, but why is it there in the first place?”
That intent shows up in the details. Many of the game’s signs feature photographs of Remedy’s own developers, the result of what Kinnunen called an “internal lighthearted casting round” in which staff had their likenesses photographed and placed in scenarios that fit their vibe, such as gym staff and restaurant employees. Even the animals on the signs are the companion animals of Remedy staff.
For a studio famous for mixing media forms, using real faces in its fictional city feels less like a gimmick and more like a signature. It is the kind of detail that only reveals itself to players willing to slow down and look, which is exactly the audience Remedy has been building for years. Control Resonant may not hand you the next chapter of the connected universe, but it gives its city a voice worth listening to.
Source: GameSpot — read the full story there.
