While I devoured Alan Wake II in just the weekend it came out (in those innocent days of 2023) that also sort of makes sense for a survival horror game, which tend to be a bit shorter in length (you probably wouldn't want to be in such tension for such an extended time). Control Resonant now game out about a week and a half ago, and I'm sure my hours in the game are far more than they were in my first AWII playthrough (maybe total, actually). In comparison to the first Control, Resonant is for sure bigger, and its open-world design of course extends the length of the gameplay if you are doing lots of side objectives.
The main thing is that I've finished all the Side Stories, the last being the one where you have to find an Altered camera that appears in various locations across the world. There's like, more than ten of these, and you have to piece together where the camera can be found based on photos you find shot from the camera's perspective. The final stage, after finding them all in any order, is to do one last sequence where you have to capture one of several iterations of the camera in an area near the Oldest House one after the other, and if the cameras catch you, you're set back a step (it starts off with like seven of them, but the number diminishes each time you sneak up behind them and close a lid).
Anyway, not a terribly lore-heavy quest (though I really wondered if they were going to tie it to Alice Wake, who literally described photography as a means to "put a cage around the infinite," freezing a moment in time much like these cameras do. Maybe one little Alan Wake easter egg is enough) but fun enough. I should go talk to Langston and see if he has more dialogue about it.
Oh, another late-game side quest involves an experiment by Pope, and in the aftermath of this sort of dubious success, we get a bit of confirmation that while she and Jesse didn't have a relationship beyond a close friendship and professional respect, Pope had feelings for her that presumably went beyond the platonic. I don't know which way Jesse swings, but I know that Monty Zander (creator of the insanely amazing Alan Wake II review "Beyond the Lake" that is honestly a work of art in and of itself) is a... Jemily? Papen? shipper, so he'll be pleased that we've got at least a lean toward this.
I also finally found the last of the "Secret Organization" hideouts across Manhattan, and Dylan calls Zoe to tell her about all these spots. I am about 90% convinced that this is the Blessed Organization, but if we were hoping for more concrete answers about what is going on with Blessed, the game refuses to be explicit. Indeed, we do see Blessed-associated businesses mentioned and find a voicemail that could be Chester Bless himself speaking (if that's not a pseudonym, of course) but these explicit links to Blessed are in a separate sidequest with no explicit connection to these hideouts.
I think if we're seven years on and Remedy doesn't want to get explicit about Blessed, maybe we shouldn't hold our breath for them to become a major factor in the RCU. Still, if memory serves, the Cult of the Tree was hinted at in the Night Springs easter egg in Quantum Break (I never played that, as I've had PlayStation and Nintendo consoles for the past couple generations, but no Xbox) and that certainly played a huge role in Alan Wake II.
Like I often do with games I've really become invested in, getting to the stage where I can finish the main story (and to be fair, maybe there's a lengthy chunk of finale to get through) I find myself hesitating. On the other hand, I'm also really keen to avoid spoilers (which I've done a decent job of so far) so I might want to get in there before a random YouTube video's title or thumbnail gives something away.
Quick spoiler cut:
I'm actually hoping that, given Arish's fate, it would be kind of redundant to just have Jesse turn Resonant and be a boss we kill. I think she still very much might be a Resonant, but just as Jesse saved Dylan from being one of the Hiss, he might save her from Hedron.
The siblings balance one another, and can be a sort of yin and yang to create stability. I'm not ruling out their fusing into a single being, either, given all the repeated references to there having been only a single Faden child originally (like their grandmother being confused when hearing about kids plural).
That would be weird for sure, but I think you could also do something crazy with a third Control game (which I hope is more likely given the sales of Resonant) where you play as both and kind of "shift" into Jesse or Dylan as you decide whether you want to go ranged or melee.
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