It's now been five years since the release of the game Control. In that time it has grown from cult favourite into a powerhouse of the medium. Now, both a sequel and a film adaptation are reportedly on the way.
The game's success has also helped elevate the company that made it, Remedy Studios, into a major player. It spent years building a strong reputation with releases including Alan Wake, three Max Payne games and Quantum Break, and also established an intricately-woven shared universe that the company later expanded in its other games.
Based in Finland, the studio is spearheaded by creative director Sam Lake, a designer of the Max Payne games who has taken an overseeing role since Alan Wake’s release in 2010. Lake wrote the story for Control and is considered to be the creative force behind the studio.
To celebrate five years since game's release, here we explore what makes the game unmissable and how well it sets up the shared universe that was further explored in Alan Wake 2, released in 2023. We also look ahead to the anticipated sequel, Control 2, and how a newly-announced collaboration with Annapurna studios will affect the game.
Supernatural bureaucracy: The story of Control
Control is an action-adventure game set wholly inside a brutalist office building, named The Oldest House, that has supernatural powers. The building is the headquarters of the Federal Bureau of Control (FBC), a fictional government entity tasked with tackling everything unexplainable and bizarre in life.
The protagonist of the game is Jesse Faden, a young woman who arrives at the building to search for her long-lost brother. Jesse is guided there by a force only she can feel that tells her what to do. Upon her arrival, Jesse finds out that the FBC is under lockdown due to an outbreak of a supernatural force that infects people.
As she navigates the building, she is made director of the bureau after displaying powers of her own, and gradually she grows these abilities to include levitation, telekinesis and telepathy. Jesse's prime directive is to find her brother, who is in the building somewhere, while also helping cleanse the bureau from the corrupting forces infecting it.
Brutalist splendour: Why people love Control
There’s a beautiful juxtaposition on display when playing Control, as a drab and boring government building becomes a bastion of supernatural wonders, terrors and ever-mounting mysteries.
The marriage of these opposing elements becomes even stronger when the building begins to display signs of having a mind of its own. Rooms move around, portals open into different dimensions, and the physical space defies logic by housing far more than one building should be able to.
All this gives the player an eerie feeling, knowing that anything could happen as macabre elements hide in the mundane. This tension ratchets up once Jesse is told about the existence of altered items, such as an antique refrigerator that houses an ancient creature.
The ever-growing Control expanded universe
In the eyes of many fans, the most exciting thing Control confirms is a shared universe with Alan Wake. That character, a writer stuck in a dark universe in which he must write stories to escape, appears at the end of the game, setting up Alan Wake 2.
Remedy used many new techniques in Control that elevated the gaming experience, including inclusion of video elements, large scale battles and a new technology called ray tracing. All of these were then improved in Alan Wake 2, bringing attention to the work Remedy has been doing to push the gaming envelope.
By February 2024, four months after its release, Alan Wake 2 had sold more than 1.3 million copies worldwide, becoming Remedy’s most successful game to date.
What to expect from Control 2
Control ends with more questions than answers, and fans who have completed the game will attest that there’s much more to explore from there. Jesse accepts her role as director of the FBC after finding her brother and purging the infection in the building.
Remedy has been tight-lipped about the Control sequel beyond confirming that it is coming and releasing a piece of single concept art which suggests that the game will take part outside the walls of the bureau’s building.
Because of the jump in quality between Control and Alan Wake 2, fans expect Control 2 to be Remedy’s most ambitious game experience yet.
According to reports, the game is in the production readiness stage and should enter full production by mid-2025.
Control film and TV adaptations: Everything we know
On Thursday, Remedy announced a partnership with publisher Annapurna to co-finance Control 2 as well as confirm that the two companies will reportedly collaborate on potential film and television adaptations of the stories in Control and Alan Wake.
Remedy's CEO Teo Virtala confirmed that television and film adaptations are in the works, though no details have yet been announced.
THE BIO
Born: Mukalla, Yemen, 1979
Education: UAE University, Al Ain
Family: Married with two daughters: Asayel, 7, and Sara, 6
Favourite piece of music: Horse Dance by Naseer Shamma
Favourite book: Science and geology
Favourite place to travel to: Washington DC
Best advice you’ve ever been given: If you have a dream, you have to believe it, then you will see it.
Who's who in Yemen conflict
Houthis: Iran-backed rebels who occupy Sanaa and run unrecognised government
Yemeni government: Exiled government in Aden led by eight-member Presidential Leadership Council
Southern Transitional Council: Faction in Yemeni government that seeks autonomy for the south
Habrish 'rebels': Tribal-backed forces feuding with STC over control of oil in government territory
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
UAE%20v%20West%20Indies
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Countries recognising Palestine
France, UK, Canada, Australia, Portugal, Belgium, Malta, Luxembourg, San Marino and Andorra
