“It’s interesting because every
one of us is a storyteller but not
everyone is a writer”
the way we connect it to the world
will feel a bit different I think to most
other games.”
Remedy’s strong suit is in
storytelling, and this is Jesse’s story
as much as it is an action game.
“Jesse comes to the Bureau Of Control
looking for answers to her past,” says
Brooke, “so a lot of it is very personal
to her. When she inadvertently finds
herself as director of the Bureau,
she has to figure out what that role
means to her and how to enact the
responsibilities that come along with
that, in a situation of crisis.”
Getting a story across in a game
requires a close symbiosis between
narrative teams and the level
designers, who translate those story
beats into a seamless gameplay
experience. “As a narrative designer
I work quite closely with a number of
different teams to talk about how to
articulate key story moments in the
script,” says Brooke. “For example,
in the side-mission you saw, I’m in
contact with the level designers and
lighting artists and gameplay, who
are responsible for whoever that may
impact, and then we talk about the
best way to get the story across but
also in a way that feels good to play.”
“It’s interesting because every one
of us is a storyteller but not everyone
is a writer,” says Paul. “It’s a really
difficult discipline to take the stories
and then be able to communicate
them in a really interesting way.
And it was this really nice back and
forth between the narrative team
and the level designers, Sam [Lake,
creative director] and the narrative
team started out by giving us the
overarching world design and intent
and the general story, and then
we took that and figured out ways
to break it down into individual
missions for the game. Each of
the mission designers would put
their own stories in there, we do a
lot with environmental storytelling
and try to build this real living,
breathing interconnected world. Soit’s very much a back and forth. The
narrative team would write a bunch
of side-missions and then level
designers would build that up and add
additional flavour to it. So it’s really
the combination of us both working
together where it elevates it to a
really great experience for players.”Face the strange
By the end of our time at Remedy,
we feel we’ve barely scratched the
surface of Control’s world and deep
lore. We are assured, though, that
when we get to play the game, there’s
plenty of its rich world to be found for
those willing to dig a little deeper.
“There are a number of audio logs,
documents and videos you can find
that build up the lore in the world,”
confirms Brooke Maggs. “Anything
from Bureau documents involving
altered items to... I don’t think I can
say too much more! But yes there is
rich lore there that people can dig into
if they want to. It doesn’t lean heavily
on those objects in the world to tell
the story, but it makes it a richer world
and one that feels alive and active.”
One of the most intriguing features
of Control is Jesse’s service weapon,ABOVE Remedy is
really flexing
its creative
muscles when it
comes to
Control’s
environments.
BELOW The Bureau
might look
inconspicuous on
the outside, but
its interior is
an entirely
different story.050 THE OFFICIAL XBOX MAGAZINE