FBC: Firebreak To Ignite Co-Op Shooter Genre | Everything You Should Know

With FBC: Firebreak, an upcoming co-op shooter that adds to the Control universe in wonderfully weird and creative ways, Remedy Entertainment is diving right back into the weird world of The Oldest House. Firebreak will be out on June 17 for PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PC (Steam and Epic), and Game Pass and PlayStation Plus Extra and Premium from the very first day.

Remedy is known for combining deep storylines with mind-bending gameplay. It looks like the company is going all out on its craziest setting yet, turning the supernatural weirdness of Control into a team-based game. From sticky, smart Post-it notes to electric gnomes, FBC: Firebreak doesn't look like your average co-op shooter.

If you've played Control, you may remember the Oldest House, which is a brutalist skyscraper that is always changing and is home to the Federal Bureau of Control (FBC). This haunted office building is your battlefield, staging area, and reality-warping maze in Firebreak. After six years, things still haven't really calmed down since the Hiss took over.

The FBC no longer has to deal with normal maintenance problems. Instead, they have to deal with supernatural crises, like office supplies that go missing and turn into monsters. For these reasons, the FBC made the Firebreak Initiative, a quick-response team of combat engineers sent out in groups of three to contain, clean up, and sometimes just stay alive, whatever new horror had crawled out of the building's walls.

There are three different loadout kits, or "Crisis Kits," in FBC: Firebreak. Each one has its own set of tools and gadgets that help you play your role in the field:

The Splash Kit gives you a fluidic ejector that you can crank to spray water on enemies, put out fires, and even heal teammates who are under status effects. And yes, spraying teammates with water does help them get better.

The Jump Kit comes with an electrokinetic charge impactor that works like a close-range electric shotgun and speeds up movement. You can get into the air with it and fix electronics with it.

Fix Kit: This melee weapon, whose name is misleading, is called the "Big Wrench." It can fix key tools like turrets and healing showers.

You can also add Altered Augments to any kit to make it better. These are powerful upgrades with strange effects. For example, the Splash Kit can add a boiling teapot to its weapon to make it deal fire damage. The Fix Kit's piggy bank blows up into a storm of coins, while the Jump Kit gets the show-stopping garden gnome, a little electric threat that moves across the battlefield and calls down lightning.

Forget about the usual shooter goals; FBC: Firebreak's mission variety goes into the wonderfully weird. You could be told to get rid of talking sticky notes or lead a minecart full of radioactive pearls through a scary hallway. The game's dual-layer difficulty system makes each job unpredictable and playable again and again.

Missions are set by two main factors:

• Threat Level: This level shows how many enemies there are and how aggressive they are.
• Clearance Level: Adding more zones changes the length and difficulty of the mission.

Your clearance level goes up as you complete missions, letting you access more areas within each mission map. It's not a joke, though. If your squad runs out of "volunteers" or lives, you fail the mission and lose everything you've collected. You still get XP, though, so even runs that don't work out help you move forward.

Depending on how far along they are in upgrading, your character can have up to nine perks. Being able to double or even triple a single perk is what makes Firebreak unique. This makes its effects stronger and, when you reach three stacks, you can share them with teammates nearby. This gives you important options: do you focus on making a few overpowered skills to help the team, or do you spread your power around?

During combat, you can only work with other people. Teamwork is essential not only for strategy but also for mechanics. The Jump and Fix kits can fix different kinds of gadgets. The Splash kit, on the other hand, can put out flames and take away enemy buffs (because the Hiss gets stronger in hot areas). You can even do combo damage based on an enemy's element. For example, dousing an enemy in water and then zapping them with electricity will unleash devastating chain lightning.

Corrupted items, which are twisted rogue objects that change the rules, add another layer of variety to missions. For instance, a haunted traffic light means that you must stop moving when it turns red, or you will do a lot of damage. These change the game in unexpected ways, forcing squads to stay alert and flexible.

Furthermore, there are environmental risks such as cold showers (yes, real showers). Even though cleansing stations usually heal you, sometimes their heater breaks, which makes you move more slowly afterward. There are both logical and illogical ways to play the game, and creative problem-solving is often rewarded while careless rushing is punished.

Requisitions are a way to level up in FBC: Firebreak and unlock cosmetics, gear upgrades, and augments. These work like battle passes, but there's a nice difference: you don't have to worry about running out of time or missing out. Remedy has confirmed that all game content will be free after the launch, and you can do the requirements at your own pace.

After the game comes out, more reward tracks and maybe even new kits will be added. This will ensure a steady flow of new content without forcing players to do the same things every day—a less tense way of doing live service content that prioritizes fun over getting things done quickly.

FBC: Firebreak will be released on June 17, 2025, for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, S, Steam, and the Epic Games Store for PC. It will also be available on PC Game Pass, Game Pass Ultimate, and PlayStation Plus Extra/Premium, so subscribers can get it on all of those platforms right away.