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Control Ultimate Edition > Guides > Cahalith's Guides
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Hiss speaking different languages? Fix it!
By Cahalith
A quick guide on how to force the floating Hiss to do their chanting in a different language than what your OS is set to
   
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Created by
Cahalith
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Category: Modding or Configuration
Languages: English
Posted
Updated
22 Nov, 2020 @ 12:58pm
13 May, 2024 @ 12:44pm
4,396 Unique Visitors
26 Current Favorites
Guide Index
Overview
What's the problem? 
The fix 
An example 
Known issues 
Comments
What's the problem?
When you're playing Control in one language but your operating system is set to a different language, the floating Hiss bodies will do their chanting in whatever language your OS is set to. Changing language settings in-game doesn't fix this, and for reasons of keeping compatibility with certain region-dependent (Windows or third-party) services, you may not want to switch your OS language or region setting every time you play Control. Simply switching out a few files is a more permanent solution.
The fix
  1. Go to the Control game directory (typically Steam\steamapps\common\Control\)
  2. From there, go to the sub-directory data_packfiles.
  3. In this sub-directory, you'll find a bunch of files named ep100-000-generic and so on. All of these files except for the first three have labels which tell you what language they refer to.
  4. Delete the three files marked with the label that corresponds to your OS language.
  5. Create copies of the three files marked with the language label for the language you want the Hiss to speak.
  6. Rename the three copied files you just created with the language label for your OS. Do not delete or rename the original files!
This fix causes the two splash screens at the start of the game (epilepsy warning and save icon notification) to break, but I haven't found any problems in-game yet.

Note: If you update Control after applying the fix or if you try to verify the integrity of your game files, Steam might identify the re-named files as faulty, downloading the "correct ones".

Please let me know in the comments if this fix causes any problems with your game.
An example
Let's say we're trying to turn German-speaking Hiss into English-speaking Hiss:
  1. Find the files named ep100-000-generic-de.bin, ep100-000-generic-de.packmeta and ep100-000-generic-de.rmdp ("de" for "Deutsch"/German).
  2. Delete these three files.
  3. Now create copies of ep100-000-generic-en.bin, ep100-000-generic-en.packmeta and ep100-000-generic-en.rmdp in the data_packfiles folder ("en" for English).
  4. Rename the copied files using the German-language label: ep100-000-generic-en - copy.bin ➤ ep100-000-generic-de.bin and so on. Do not delete the original English-language files.
Known issues

It's not possible to combine interface/subtitles in your OS language with English Hiss voices
It seems that copying and renaming the files in the way outlined above means that you'll overwrite all of the text in the UI with the target language (i.e. English). This also means that if you change the language of the interface/subtitles to whatever language your OS is set to, the game will bug out.

In short: I don't think it's possible to have - for example - a Spanish interface while having the Hiss speak English using this fix.

Differences between the Ultimate Edition and non-Ultimate Editions
This fix works for Control Ultimate Edition on Steam. If you own the Ultimate Edition on some other store, I'm assuming it will work there as well.

However, I've gotten feedback which suggests the fix does not fully work on the standard (non-Ultimate-Edition) version of Control which was previously sold on some other stores. The fix should still make the floating Hiss use the correct language in the standard version of the game, but it does not work for some special Hiss added via the DLC - notably Hartman in AWE. That's because the standard version (with the DLC bought separately) appears to use a different file structure compared to the Ultimate Edition.

I'm assuming you can change the language of the Hiss in the DLC by switching around the files responsible for the DLC via the same method outlined above, but since I only own the Ultimate Edition, I have no idea which files need to be switched in the standard version.
26 Comments
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ADMNtek 5 Dec, 2022 @ 12:03pm 
concerning the region stuff the only thing you have to change atleast on win 10 is the region format. my OS is in German but i have the gamme fully set to english. by just changing the region format.
Cahalith  [author] 11 Aug, 2022 @ 10:26pm 
Been a while since I checked the comments section here, but I'd still like to address macslate's criticism:

First of all, I'm not 100 % sure changing Windows region settings is enough - I know some games actually draw language information from the active language package on the OS. And some people might not want to change their entire OS language for one game, nor do they want to switch OS language every time they start the game.
Secondly, if it's really just the Windows region setting, then I don't know what else changing that might affect. I believe Microsoft themselves say that changing region settings may affect which Windows services you can access.

So call me overly cautious, but I'd rather switch a few files around. The fix presented above works 100 % of the time, it's permanent and it does not affect any other programmes or Windows services. Everyone can decide for themselves which fix they'd like to use.
macslate 2 Apr, 2021 @ 1:59pm 
Or you could just change your Windows region settings.
Sazor 4 Jan, 2021 @ 2:09pm 
Haha, my dumbass thought this was a feature and was incredibly creeped out when they spoke german. I think I´m gonna leave it this way but great guide!
Cahalith  [author] 31 Dec, 2020 @ 11:45am 
If I remember correctly, Hartman has unique dialogue, but he does have subtitles, so you can read along .
EsElNoba 31 Dec, 2020 @ 10:23am 
Does Doctor Hartman only repeats the Hiss incantation? Because if so then I'm ok with it. I'm only a few hours into the game and I already know it by heart lol.
Cahalith  [author] 30 Dec, 2020 @ 6:28pm 
Ah, that would explain it. And here I was hoping you'd have found a way to fix the game for your specific language combination :/

Still, I hope you can enjoy the game even without the chanting. You should probably also be aware that since you've now essentially disabled the chanting, I think the voice of Hartman in AWE will probably also be gone.

Maybe you should just learn the chant by heart and repeat it to yourself while playing :D
EsElNoba 30 Dec, 2020 @ 6:06pm 
Hi it's me again. My claim wasn't correct, now that I've played the game more.
There's a Hiss chant that comes from enemies before they notice you (which I can hear), and then there's a Hiss chant coming from the floating bodies. The one that you should hear normally is still silent. The reason why I thought restarting the game fixed it was because when I did it, I was respawned near an enemy.
Cahalith  [author] 30 Dec, 2020 @ 5:45pm 
Ok, that's weird. I had the same situation where I didn't hear the Hiss chanting but I didn't check whether leaving the game and going back in would fix this (I mean, why would it???)

Thanks for the info, Ther77, I'll check this out and then amend the guide accordingly. If you run into any problems with the files changed like this, I'd be happy to hear about it so I can add it to the guide as well :)
Cahalith  [author] 30 Dec, 2020 @ 4:15pm 
Seems we got there at the same time :D

I hope you have fun with the game anyways!

And if anyone can figure out a way to have functioning English Hiss voices and Spanish text/UI at the same time, feel free to comment and I'll add it to the guide.