Resonants are a new class of major boss enemies in Control Resonant, and the game takes its title from them. Each Resonant is a major boss with a distinct moveset and visual design, six of Manhattan's seven zones hold one, and defeating one is the main route Dylan Faden uses to expand his combat toolkit. For wider context, see the Overview and the Melee Combat page.
What a Resonant Is
Public descriptions place Resonants between named bosses and a structural enemy class. They are people corrupted by the same paranatural force that has spilled across Manhattan. That framing gives each fight a story-bearing role rather than just a difficulty wall.
On the gameplay side, every Resonant fight is hand-tuned. Movesets, attack patterns, and arena geometry are bespoke per Resonant, and the developer commentary released alongside the public previews has highlighted shield-blocking windows, deployable shields, and openings created by reading a Resonant's tells.
Rewards for Defeating a Resonant
Beating a Resonant unlocks supernatural combat abilities for Dylan. The reward is a player choice rather than a fixed grant.
Field | Detail |
|---|---|
Reward type | Up to three new combat abilities offered, with the player picking which they take. |
Build implication | Talent branches gate other choices, so a single playthrough cannot take everything on offer. |
NG+ change | In New Game Plus, the player can equip multiple different combat abilities from the same Resonant, opening synergy combinations that were locked off in the first run. |
Resonants reward combat abilities rather than new forms for the Aberrant: according to guides to the released game, the forms not picked at the start are bought later in the Gap with Living Shards.
Resonants by Zone
The released game has six Resonants. Six of Manhattan's seven zones hold one each; the Evacuation Zone is the only zone without a Resonant. Remedy's launch patch notes name three of them, the Artist, the Dancer and the Deserter, and coverage of the released game names a fourth, the Collective, the Mold Resonant first shown in the gamescom 2026 demo. The Resonants of the Underpass and The Unknown sit late in the campaign; pre-release material did not reveal them, and this page does not yet cover them, to avoid late-game spoilers.
Zone | Resonant | Profile | Ability Choice |
|---|---|---|---|
Downtown | The first Resonant and the boss that closes the opening quest: an enormous face embedded in the pavement that hurls cars, rocks and girders at Dylan. Required for the story. | Barrage, Volatile Anomaly or Shield | |
West Incursion Zone | Deft, masked figure that fights with dual mallets, with attacks built on spins and wide swings. Fought in the zone's Theater Hall, which Dylan can only reach once he has Shift. | Ground Slam or Push | |
Central | Towering figure barely holding its molten body together. Spits magma, pours lava across the arena floor, throws flaming projectiles and stabs with the red-hot pipes driven through its frame. Fought beneath the Patterned Factory, and grows more aggressive as the fight runs on. | Ignite or Inferno | |
The Park | A heaped mass of Mold anchored to its arena by tentacles that must be cut before its body can be damaged. Optional, like The Park itself. | Spore Burst or Growth | |
Underpass | Not covered on this page | Late-game encounter, held back to avoid spoilers. | Not listed |
The Unknown | Not covered on this page | Final-zone encounter, held back to avoid spoilers. | Not listed |
The Artist is the only one of the four named Resonants that offers three abilities; the Dancer, the Deserter and the Collective offer two each.
Hotfix 1.3.3, released alongside the game on September 24, 2026, reduced the base health and the required Falter (stun) level of the Dancer and the Deserter, along with most regular enemies, and made the Artist drop two Reset Items instead of one. Remedy said the changes answered early feedback that enemies took too many hits to Falter and that Dylan felt underpowered early in the game.
Persons of Power and the Patterning
Pre-release coverage described Resonants as former Persons of Power. They are described in public press as the largest and most formidable enemies in the game, and the game's title is drawn from them. They differ from the Hiss and the Mold, which are faction-wide enemy types, by being singular antagonists each tied to their own arc.
Coverage of the released game, and Remedy's own developers before launch, describe Resonants as people twisted into monstrous bosses by the Patterning, the game's word for the force reshaping the city.
Three Powers Per Defeat
Defeating a Resonant is the primary route by which Dylan expands his combat ability roster. Each Resonant offers up to three abilities at the point of defeat, and the player picks one. The choice is exclusive on a first playthrough but not permanent: the pick is made in the Gap after each fight, and the Mural there lets the player change it later by spending a Reset Item. The build identity that emerges across the campaign is partly shaped by which abilities the player took when. New Game Plus relaxes this rule: on a second run, Dylan can equip multiple different abilities sourced from the same Resonant, which is one of the main reasons NG+ exists as a buildcrafting playground rather than a power-fantasy victory lap.
The Collective
The Collective, covered in full on its own page, is the Resonant that grew out of the Mold beneath The Park, first shown in the playable gamescom 2026 build: a heaped mass that forms scowling faces and anchors itself to its arena through tentacles embedded in the surrounding walls. The encounter is built around those anchors rather than around the body. While they hold, the mass takes no damage, so the fight becomes a traversal problem, shifting gravity to walk the walls and cut the tentacles down while the Collective throws projectiles and calls in lesser enemies to interrupt the route. Destroying all of them opens weak points on the mass itself.
It is also a useful illustration of how varied the class is meant to be. Where the Artist, the Dancer and the Deserter are fought head-on, the Collective is a static, environmental encounter that cannot be approached the same way at all. Remedy's design team has said publicly that no two Resonant fights are meant to resemble each other and that each is tuned to test a different skill, which is also why artifact loadouts are expected to change between them.
Pre-Release Descriptions
Two platform-holder hands-on accounts, one of the June 2026 Summer Game Fest build and one of the full game ahead of release, describe the first Resonant of the campaign the same way: an enormous head embedded in the pavement, cut off at the mouth, that telekinetically lifts rocks, garbage, taxis and girders and throws them at Dylan. The later account calls it a giant porcelain doll's face. Neither account named it; Remedy's launch patch notes identify the first Resonant boss fight as the Artist.
One full-game review published on September 18, 2026 also mentions a giant fire Resonant whose defeat unlocks a fire enhancement for the Aberrant that raises both damage and Falter output. The review did not name the boss, but the description fits the Deserter: it is the fire Resonant, fought in Central, and its reward choice includes Ignite, which sets the Aberrant ablaze and adds Burn and Falter to its hits.
Order and Optional Encounters
Remedy told press at gamescom 2026 that the first and last bosses are fixed for every playthrough, while every Resonant in between can be taken in any order. The studio also said that not every Resonant has to be defeated, and a full-game review published on September 18, 2026 confirms that only a few are required to advance the story; the rest can be left for later or skipped, which also gives a player stuck on a story boss room to explore and get stronger first. Skipping them leaves Dylan with fewer ability choices, since Resonants are the main source of new combat powers.
In the released game the Artist is the fixed opener. The Collective is optional, since the story never sends Dylan to The Park, and guides list the Dancer and the Deserter among the prerequisites for a later main quest, although one guide treats the Deserter's factory as side content.
Defeating a Resonant also changes the world around it. Three independent accounts describe remaining enemies in the area growing stronger and world activities refreshing after a Resonant falls. The mechanic has been given two different names in coverage and none in first-party material, so this page describes it without naming it.
The number of abilities offered has varied between showings. The June 2026 hands-on presented three options after the first Resonant, while the gamescom demo showed a choice between two inside The Gap immediately after the Collective, and one account of that demo quotes the developers as saying that only one can be held at a time on a first playthrough, with the other unlocked in New Game Plus, which matches the rule described above. The released game uses both counts: three choices after the Artist and two after each of the other named Resonants.
Role in the Wider Combat Loop
Resonants are not the only fights in the game, but they are the load-bearing rewards in the progression structure. The combat loop on every page rests on three pillars: build resources by stringing melee strikes, spend them on a supernatural ability, exploit the stun for an execution that grants a temporary damage buff. The buff feeds the next exchange. Resonant rewards are how new tools enter that loop, and the player's choice of which ability to take from a Resonant shapes which version of the build keeps growing.
Unconfirmed Details
The following were not covered by first-party material before release and have not yet been checked against the released game:
Difficulty scaling rules outside of the New Game Plus notes that some bosses surprise the player with new behaviours.
Whether a defeated Resonant can be fought again within the same playthrough. Re-picking its abilities does not require a rematch, since the Mural in the Gap handles that.
Which Resonant closes the campaign. Pre-release material did not reveal it, and this page does not yet cover the story beyond the four named Resonants.
This page will be updated as more is revealed.