CONTROL Resonant‘s puzzles usually offer something nice, as long as you can crack the code. Some are easier than others, and the Laundry puzzle in Central may be among the hardest to solve.
Central is one of the first areas you explore in CONTROL Resonant, and as you’re taking down hordes of Hiss, you’re bound to stumble upon the Wear ‘Em and Wash ‘Em laundry in a city square. This establishment has a secret behind it, evidenced by the keyhole symbol drawn in one of its walls, but cracking it open may be tricky.
As usual, you get a couple of hints, but this one may stump you if you don’t know exactly what to look for. I didn’t, so I asked an engineer friend for some help, and he nailed it through my awful Excel diagrams without even seeing the actual gameplay (thanks, Rafa!). Here’s how you can solve this riddle.
CONTROL Resonant Laundry Puzzle Solution (Central)
The game gives you two cryptic hints: one is a “fun” number puzzle from the laundry owners, and another is a complaint that “there’s not a single f*cking row where all the machines actually work.”
The laundry machines are disposed of in a peculiar way, with most displaying an “out of order” sign. The ones that actually work can be turned on or off, which matches the binary used in the code. If you just want the answer, we’ll tell you what you need to do next. But if you’re curious about how to get there (I know I was!), we’ll have the full breakdown after that.
To solve the puzzle, turn on all machines on the left half of the room, then only turn on the machine that’s closest to the door on the right wall, the sixth one from the entrance. This should open the secret door in the back of the room, giving you a Health Upgrade and some lore on a secret organization.
How to solve CONTROL Resonant‘s Laundry Puzzle in Central
The solution we found is to rotate the coded message 90 degrees counter-clockwise, then invert it vertically. This matches the riddle to the room’s layout, which indicates the machines that should be on (1) or off (0). The second row of laundry machines on the right (the one closest to the door) operates as the seventh column in the diagram, starting with the one you must turn on.
This isn’t CONTROL Resonant‘s only puzzle, but it may be among the trickiest. Exploration is usually worth it in the game, though, so keep your eyes peeled for anything that seems remotely enigmatic in the Hiss-infested Manhattan.
