052 THE OFFICIAL XBOX MAGAZINE
Even last year, the biggest successes you
could argue were single-player, where there
were strong characters and strong stories.
We are about that as well, and we feel we
have something that will differentiate from
those games as well.You’ve talked about the idea of Control being
more of an open game than previous, perhaps
more linear, Remedy titles, what does open
world mean in terms of Control?
We hesitate to use the word ‘open world’,
this is not GTA or anything like that,
it’s an open-ended adventure game
with supernatural action. There’s this
Metroidvania-type approach where you
will encounter situations, places you can’t
access immediately, but as you go through
the game you’ll find reason to return to the
areas you’ve visited before. Then there’s also
layers of other missions you can do besides
the main campaign, which is a new thing for
us, it’s something that we deeply wanted
to do already, earlier on. Especially for me it
was important that we start to create games
where we utilise the world in a more efficient
way, in a stronger way, and we squeeze out
as much as we can – because we spend a
lot of time thinking about the world we are
creating. In previous games, often you just
run past a room in ten seconds, and we’ve
put a lot of love and energy and thought into
those places! So here it was important for
us that we create an interesting world, and
then let’s find ways for people to really spend
time there and enjoy it. Also having a sense of
choice for the player so they can choose how
they go through the game, what they want to
actually pay attention to. That’s a huge part
of what Control is, giving that choice to the
player. I’ll be honest, it’s our first step into that
direction and it’s us trying to find what’s the
Remedy way to do it. So it’s exploration for us
as well, and we hope we succeeded with that.What lessons had you learned from your
previous games, that you were you able to
bring to Control?
The importance of certain elements: the
world, and what it brings to the experience,WE SIT DOWN WITH DIRECTOR MIKAEL KASURINEN TO TALK ABOUT
REMEDY’S AMBITIOUS, NO-LIMITS SHOOTER
Strong writing has always been at the heart
of Remedy’s games. Now more than ever in
games, with multiplayer and games-as-a-
service, how important is strong storytelling?
It’s extremely important, I think as a studio
that’s one of the things that sets us apart,
having strong context, strong characters and
a world that feels interesting and different,
and a concept that takes a few risks as
well. We’re ready to be strange and deal
with things that maybe not everybody will
immediately get, but they feel as though they
want to. We don’t want to go with something
that everybody else is already doing, and
I think there is an audience for the type of
games we’re doing.Is it a challenge, with those games being so
popular, to make a single-player game now?
Of course there’s always a challenge, there’s
a limited time people have playing games and
so much out there competing for their time,
but I think at the end of the day doubling
down on a single-player, very gameplay-
driven, strong world, and an immediate
progression for the player and good
story, there’s value in that.