Seven years after the events of the original Control game, the sequel, titled Control Resonant Lives, returns players to the enigmatic world of the Federal Bureau of Control (F.B.C.), a fictional agency investigating supernatural phenomena. The new installment centers on Dylan Faden, a character who played a pivotal role in the chaos that engulfed the bureau previously. Now free from confinement, Dylan navigates a radically altered Midtown Manhattan, distorted by an alien contagion that has reshaped the environment into a surreal, dreamlike labyrinth.

Dylan’s backstory reveals a traumatic childhood spent under the bureau’s custody, where his supernatural abilities were studied and exploited. The game unpacks this history through scattered notes and audio logs, depicting his upbringing as one marked by isolation and mistreatment. Despite this, Resonant shows Dylan embracing a newfound freedom as he moves through Manhattan’s twisted cityscape—a place where traditional physics give way to impossible spatial curvatures and suspended architectural fragments.

Gameplay features emphasize fluid, dynamic combat and traversal, with Dylan wielding supernatural weapons such as a glowing scythe and a massive hammer against mutated adversaries. Players leap between skyscrapers and explore environments that defy conventional logic, including inverted buildings and cavernous chasms. This striking visual design underscores the game’s dreamlike tone, allowing the world itself to evoke wonder rather than relying heavily on exposition.

Narratively, Control Resonant Lives explores themes of guilt, loss, and identity primarily through cut scenes and scripted encounters. Dylan’s dialogue characterizes him as socially awkward and haunted by his past, especially in moments that reference his long-lost sister, Jesse. Certain missions delve into their troubled history through interactive memories and environmental storytelling. However, these weightier narrative moments contrast with gameplay, which centers on uninhibited movement and combat, often treating story elements as secondary to action.

Boss encounters depart from traditional combat patterns by incorporating performative and unconventional challenges—a dancer engaged in a solitary routine provides one example, while another involves battling a tormented giant constrained by machinery. These sequences contribute to the game’s atmosphere by blending spectacle with creative uses of space and movement.

While the original Control relied heavily on notes, videos, and dense lore to convey its eerie environment, Resonant opts to let its visual and spatial design speak for itself. The narrative, while present, is more subdued and occasionally feels disconnected from the player’s active experience. Moments intended to probe Dylan’s internal struggles are largely confined to non-interactive sequences, limiting emotional engagement during gameplay. The tension between Dylan’s coerced violence and his personal turmoil remains unresolved as the game restricts player agency to combat scenarios, with narrative self-reflection taking place only in cut scenes.

Overall, Control Resonant Lives offers an immersive and visually inventive continuation of Dylan Faden’s story, balancing its dark themes with exhilarating gameplay and a surreal urban setting that challenges perceptions of space and freedom.