I wanted to like Control, I really did, but after giving it time I have decided to shelve the game for good.

I'm sorry if this comes off as another takedown review, but that's what it's shaping up to be. Control, the highly praised thrid-person-shooter from Remedy Entertainment is a beautiful and well-made game, no doubt about that, but it felt repetitive and hard to navigate, which is why I gave up. 

Control won the 2020 BAFTA Games Award for Performer in a Supporting Role,  as well as The Game Award for Best Art Direction at the Game Awards. Control has an 82% positive rating on Metacritic, a 3/5 on Common Sense Media, and an 84% on Open Critic. 

In addition, it was rated an 8/10 by IGN, an 8/10 by GameSpot, and was called a "technical marvel, and an artistic achievement" by Polygon. And for the most part, I agree with these sentiments. The game is gorgeous, the sets expansive, the guns and lore interesting, but still I found things that bothered me beyond reconciliation. 

For one, they really phoned home the map and directional settings. Like, really, wtf is this? Am I supposed to use this map? Because it's pretty unusable. 

As someone with half a working brain on a good day, I need my hand held when playing games. And the map function ensured I never knew where the hell I was going or what I was doing. Most of the time I had to wing it and when that didn't work I had to look up where to go on YouTube. I know I'm an old, but few games I've played have had map function this useless. 

Now, this is a criticism that extends beyond Control, but I found the AI to be too predictable. With the rise of co-op play and multiplayer games, it's understandable that AI has taken a backseat in game development, but as someone over the age of 30, I can't help but feel cheated here. Have there been so few improvements for enemy AI functions over the years? Because spending twenty minutes finding my way to a new section just to fight the same set of enemies over and over got boring extremely fast. 

If you're a graphics head, then feel free to pile on, but personally, I think graphics don't really make a game better, while they do contribute to the experience, or help immerse you into a game, for me, they're pretty surface level. As someone who grew up playing GoldenEye, and Counter-Strike, the real fun is what you do, not what you see, and for me, Control was lacking in the latter department. 

Lots of beautiful stuff, cool guns, rooms, and even a few fun enemies, but behind the picture-perfect graphics and smooth controls, I found a game void of any life at all. It started to feel choreish, so I stopped playing and won't be going back. 

The final test is the PISS test. 

Playability: Yes, beautiful and well made. 

Interesting: Less so the more you play. 

Sick: It has its moments. 

Shelf-life: Nada. 

Let me know what you think. Am I an idiot? Did you also hate the map? Should I jump off a bridge? Let me know in the comments.