I have to admit I was a little worried about Jesse's inner monologue getting a bit annoying before playing, but it really works well because she's as much of a mystery as the setting.
I'm actually more confused by her thoughts than the main plot so far, it's great.
I love how this game pulled me into the lore and got me naturally reading everything and paying attention to every little detail in the environment to form a story. A lot of games try to go for this "there's a lot of lore to the world for players who want to explore", but they fail to capture me by telling a story that's a bit too straightforward, and gives me no incentive to dig deeper.
Control makes me feel like part of a narrative triangle, I'm not just joining Jesse in trying to figure out what's going on in The Oldest House, I'm also trying to get a read on her and what's going on with her. I have to think twice about every bit of information I encounter.
Little things like how the painting around where the message pipes go through the wall (it's so cool to see the capsules moving inside them!) near the Director's Office being broken, indicating that they were built there after that part of the building was already done, but that not being the case elsewhere, so the rest of the building was probably prepared later, and built around the Director's Office.
That is later on pretty much confirmed by seeing that the Service Weapon was found out the same day as they found the Bureau (seriously, how does that work? How the hell does one "find" a giant building in the middle of NY?), and then the file saying that they turned the room they found the weapon in into the Director's Office. So the whole building was indeed prepared around that office.
I also really appreciate how out there Jesse is as a protagonist. I kind of expected them to be a little more conservative with her, given that she's their first female protagonist, but they're going all in. That makes her really unique in this industry. It would already be a very different protagonist as a man, but being a woman just makes her even more fresh. A lot of the good female protagonists in games, especially action games, tend to be defined as "a badass", which is great, don't get me wrong, but Jesse is just
weird. And that's awesome.
I'm having waaay too much fun running around melee-ing the environment.
Also I don't know if it's aim assist or what, but I have better aim while shooting from the hip. Jesse looks way cooler too.
Yeah, the hip fire in this game is even more generous than in Uncharted. Which I personally love, the more incentives a game with movement as a big part of its gameplay gives players to keep moving while fighting, the better.
I imagine that weapons I unlock later on will make better use of precise aiming, especially for long distances.
