You did it, after seventeen years you finally found the Federal Bureau of Control in the form of The Oldest House. What do you know, the clean up crew has a vacancy and you’re the perfect candidate. You’ve always wanted to work here, but you also want to find your brother who seemed to land a gig here ages ago. All you have do is ace your interview, right?

You can always stick to working in the mail room, but suddenly, after some weird shit, you’re now the Director of the Federal Bureau of Control. Talk about the fast track for success.

Next thing you know, the building is on lock down and it’s become your job to clear out the Hiss, a resonance from another dimension that infects people’s brains and turns them into nightmarish monstrosities that suddenly attack you. Isn’t upper management all about endless meetings and emails?

Don’t worry, here’s a survival guide to keep you on your toes on your first day at work. Trust us, it will be a long day. And you don’t even get an executive assistant to grab a diet coke or pre-order Returnal for you.

Run and Gun

In your previous work experience, you probably are used to combat cover. It’s what Gears of War has trained you to do and it’s what’s worked in Call of Duty throughout the years. It’s not wrong, but it won’t get you far into this new job. Remember, your past experience is great to get you through the door, but to actually step up in this organization, you have to learn some new skills.

If you take a look at our videos, you could see that the combat cover style of combat is competent, but it won’t get you far. The other video shows you how an aggressive run and gun method would lead to your success. Because that style works best in traversing into the Oldest House and also when you come across stronger Objects of Power. Think of it as third person doom and you’ll be well on your way to success.

Clean up Middle Management

It is tempting to inspect other sections of the Oldest House right away when you first get started. However, when you meet Emily Pope after clearing out the Executive Branch of the Oldest House, you won’t be able to get far on your current skills alone. First you have to take out Tommasi from Communications and serve him a termination notice. Literally fire him, multiple rounds to his head would do.

Tommasi is classified as a Hiss Elevated, meaning he can float and unlike the guards and marines you have fought earlier, they’re almost similar to you. Assuming you’ve picked up the Floppy Disk, the object of power that grants you the launch ability, Tommasi has that too. Also he can levitate, which you won’t be able to do until much further professional development has been initiated.

It would be best to combine run and gun techniques with cover combat in this instance. Every time he launches debris at you, the damage will more or less kill you in two hits. Distract him with a launched object and when he dodges fire multiple rounds at him. Aim for the head for maximum damage. When you do get hit, he will summon some extra guards to aid him in combat, so take them down to heal yourself. Be careful not to stand next to combustibles as they can hurt you. Toss them his way for some extra chip damage.

Energy over Health

Once you defeat Tommasi, you will get access to upgrade screens on the Control Points you’ve been cleansing. While it is tempting to prioritize Health, it would be best to do a 2:1 ratio on Energy. For every two points invested in energy, invest one in Health. While it prevents you from dying right away, since this is a run and gun style, it’s best to take down your adversaries first. They can heal you in the process.

Skill points are difficult to come by, you usually have to complete missions and side missions to attain them. So be careful as you invest in your professional development. Invest wisely.

Launch Harder

The best style that works is interchanging between your service weapon and your launch skill. It takes time to recharge your service weapon once it is depleted of ammo and the same goes for your energy. Hence why we recommend investing in energy. The larger your energy pool, more you could attack and also utilize defensive mechanisms, which we will talk about in a bit.

Take heed to power up your launch skill in conjunction with your energy. The stronger your launch, the easier it will be to vanquish enemies. Also invest in being able to launch enemy explosives. That means remote bombs and rockets. They can take out larger enemies like troopers and rockets deal splash damage to hiss agents clumped together especially in tight spots.

Defensive Tactics

As you progress from the executive branch of the building to other areas such as the Research Wing and the Maintenance Area, you will encounter faster enemies and more formidable foes. They will also increase in number, meaning more rockets and bullets will be fired in your way. You will learn two defensive tricks during the Maintenance area of the game – Shield and Evade.

We personally recommend evade as it has more versatility and synergizes better with the run and gun method. When you have spare ability points, power up your shield every once in a while. It’s a good tactic to use during low health moments. Once you learn the levitate ability much later, you could combine all three defensive mechanisms to dodge, shield, and fly out of the way of your enemy attacks.

Your Service Weapon

Your service weapon is able to change forms from a basic semi-automatic to other variants that provide varying degrees of performance such as rate of fire increase to charged attacks. We recommend sticking with the basic semi-automatic. While it isn’t special, it gets the job done. You may fire from the hip or you may aim for more accurate shots. As you progress, firing from the hip becomes a better option to blend with the run and gun style.

Another form we recommend is the Spin function as it is a fully automatic variant to your service weapon. It is good for frenetic battles where stopping to think isn’t an option. It’s mainly fire, launch, evade, and levitate out of the way. Surge is a personal favorite because it is a sticky grenade launcher that you can remote detonate. It’s tons of fun especially with levitate. Whatever suits your style could work with any of the variants, but the Grip/Spin style has worked the best with us and later on Grip/Surge.

Try to secure rare Weapon and Personal Mods as you progress with your professional development. They can elevate the performance of your service weapon along with its various rarities for its forms. Take care not to deconstruct Mods with Absolute rarity as the material used to craft them and the challenges you take to acquire them are considerably difficult.

Your service weapon could be upgraded to level 3. Each level strengthens your weapon’s damage and gives you more mods to play with. When you reach level 3, each weapon requires an ultra rare material called untapped potential which could only be acquired by defeating rogue Altered Items. They can range from varying degrees of cosmic horror difficulties. Our favorite is Former, it is the Federal Bureau of Control’s own Ultra Tall Lady. Although while she not as visually appealing as Lady Dimitrescu, she will gladly stomp on you.

We hope you enjoyed our guide to surviving your first day on the job at the Federal Bureau of Control.

Control Ultimate Edition is available on the PS5, PS4, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and the PC.