A co-op FPS set in the reality-bending universe of Control? It sounds like a great concept, but I had my reservations about FBC Firebreak when it was first revealed. We’ve seen a lot of multiplayer spinoffs of single-player diamonds that have been mediocre at best, and flops at worst. If you’re PlayStation, you’ll cancel most of them before they even get out the door. As a result, I treat any game like FBC Firebreak with apprehension. However, after learning more details from Remedy and watching some extended gameplay at a recent preview event, I think I’m now swaying more toward optimism than pessimism.
At a mechanical level, FBC Firebreak doesn’t do much to advance the co-op shooter genre. It’s got an adequately deep loadout system – a primary weapon, a grenade, a piece of class-specific gear called a Crisis Kit, and a lineup of perks. It supports teams of three players in PvE missions called ‘Jobs,’ and gives you an elemental sandbox where water, fire, and electricity can affect the FBC offices you battle in. Jobs take place across different objective zones, and after completing the final objective, you get the chance to escape – you’ll earn and keep XP even if you die during a Job, but you’ll get some bonus currency to buy new loadout gear and upgrades if you make it out alive. There are cosmetic options to customize your character. Gunplay and movement appear solid, but, again, I don’t see anything that strikes me as revolutionary. It’s all fairly standard co-op FPS game fare done to a high standard.
However, I think FBC Firebreak still has a chance to stand out and find success due to three important reasons. The first may not come as a surprise given Remedy’s track record, but FBC Firebreak is suitably weird and zany. There are some intriguing makeshift weapons at your disposal. There are Altered Augments (powerful artifacts, similar to an Object of Power in Control) such as a piggy bank that, when strapped to a melee weapon, turns enemies into a vortex of gold coins. The Job Remedy showed during the preview has the bizarre overarching objective of destroying obscene amounts of yellow sticky notes, including an enormous boss made out of millions of them. Sticky notes can also block your visor and reduce your visibility as an additional layer of challenge.
Remedy says a core pillar of Firebreak is that it should deliver “only in Control” moments – things that it guarantees you cannot see or experience in games outside of this universe. From what I’ve seen so far, it’s nailing it in that department.
The second reason is that Remedy is consciously avoiding all of the draining, frustrating pain points of live service games. No battle passes. No paid expansions or DLC-gated missions (Remedy says all playable, post-launch content will be free). No chasing loot drops or god rolls. No daily challenges or log-in bonuses. It’s also avoiding a free-to-play model in favor of a mid-range price point (I imagine one similar to something like Helldivers 2) and will be available to Game Pass subscribers on day one to get people through the door early.
The third reason is that FBC Firebreak is all about flexibility. Remedy doesn’t want you stressing and grinding, so it lets you tinker with difficulty and the length of a Job to suit how much skill and time your party has. Before each mission, you can pick a Threat Level (which alters the combat difficulty) and a Clearance Level (how many of the three zones in each Job you want to take on before being asked to extract).
So if you’re approaching FBC Firebreak as a co-op FPS player first and foremost, things are shaping up rather well. If you’re a fan of Control, though, it’s going to be even more of a treat.
While there’s no standalone campaign or gradual, CoD Zombies-style narrative to progress through, Remedy assures that there will still be tidbits for “the Control people” to enjoy. Firebreak is set six years after the events of the single-player game and will explore recognizable and all-new locations within the Oldest House offices.
As a final cherry on top for PC players, Remedy says that Firebreak won’t be as demanding on your rig as the likes of Alan Wake 2. It also says it’ll be optimized for Steam Deck. However, for those with beefier systems, it’ll “ship with DLSS 4 with Multi Frame Generation and the entire suite of DLSS 4 technologies.” Firebreak will also support Nvidia Reflex and ray-tracing from day one.
Right now, there are plenty of encouraging signs that FBC Firebreak will be a chaotic and enjoyable co-op game that doesn’t lose sight of its Control roots. Remedy isn’t talking about how much content the game will boast at release, or what its post-launch plans are, so that could be a potential stumbling block if there aren’t enough unique-feeling Jobs to get stuck into. But the game’s foundations look solid, and when you weave in Remedy’s eccentricity and its commitment to flexibility, that should be a winning recipe.