Remedy is finally breaking free of the linear narrative formula that it has damn near perfected over the past 20+ years. For its seventh game, Control, it’s wading into the waters of the open-world genre.
We were shown a 20-some-minute hands-off demo that elaborated upon how exactly Control is structured. The most notable takeaway is that it’s open-world, or at least open-ended. There’s a large(ish) environment that you can move about freely, eventually revisiting places and accessing new areas thanks to some abilities that are acquired further on in the story. It’s seemingly a metroidvania-like bent although that term was never brought up.
The reason open-world feels like a slightly-off description is because it appears as though the majority of Control will take place indoors. Protagonist Jesse Faden has been promoted to director of the Federal Bureau of Control after the previous director died in an attack by the “otherworldly” Hiss group. Although there are other locations, Remedy confirmed that most of the game is set inside the FBC building which is hilariously named “The Oldest House.”
Source: Destructoid Remedy’s Control might be the studio’s first major game that puts more emphasis on gameplay than narrative