Andrew Gormley

So us PlayStation 3 users finally got a chance to dip our toes into the waters of Resident Evil 5.  The 900+ MB demo was released on the PlayStation Store earlier today and I just finished playing through both sections.  This series is near and dear to my heart because I’ve been on the ride since the beginning. The second PS1 game I ever owned¹ was the original Resident Evil and I have it in the big bulky box to prove how old school I am. I think to properly do this first impression right, I’ll give a gist of the previous titles in the series and how we’ve arrived at this fifth installment.  If you’re not much for history, skip over the section labeled “The Backstory” to get right to the heart of the review.

The Backstory

The original Resident Evil was simply a great survivor horror game. In hindsight, it’s easy to pick apart all of the things that were wrong with it (poor voice acting, clunky controls, bad camera angles, oft-idiotic AI, etc) but it was also nothing short of revolutionary. The claustrophobic feeling of being trapped in a mansion with the undead lurking just beyond every door was an experience that walked the fine line between excitement and terror. I was probably a little young to be playing it (12 years old when I bought it), but that made it all the more frightening and memorable for me. I recall some of the simple pleasures: killing a group of zombies on my way to poison Plant 42, draining the water in the basement lab so the sharks wouldn’t tear me to bits², and who could forget the final battle with the Tyrant?

The games following in the series improved upon a winning formula.  Resident Evil 2 had very unique story lines for each of the main characters that changed and explained more and more as you switched back and forth between them (A game and B game), interlacing perfectly and adding more challenges as you made your way (Mr. X, anyone?).  Resident Evil 3 seemed more like a side story then part of the main canon, but added some cool new features like timed dodging and the infinitely useful quickturn.  Another great element was regular enemies could now pursue you up and down stairs and Nemesis could even chase you between areas, adding a constant feeling of suspense.  Code: Veronica was technically the fourth game in the series but, despite having two previous main characters and a very solid story, was deemed a tangent. This was the first game that dropped the pre-rendered backgrounds for fully 3D ones and had some cool other features added like instant continues rather than starting over from a save point.  We then go back in time for a prologue called Resident Evil Zero that literally ends at the beginning of Resident Evil 1 (and cleverly weaves it all together).  This game added in a partner system for its entirety that was necessary for solving all of the main quest puzzles.  You controlled your character of choice and the computer would control the other, following you closely and assisting in combat.

Models of Leon from RE2 and RE4

Then we arrive at the one big one that reinvented the series, one of two games I purchased a Gamecube for: Resident Evil 4.  All convention was thrown out the window for this release because, well, the old formula was stagnant.  Gone are the fixed camera angles, replaced with an over-the-shoulder view that zooms in slightly when taking aim.  Speaking of aiming, this game also added a laser sight to most weapons as well as enemies who respond differently to being shot in various areas.  Overall, I thought RE4 was an excellent game but not a survival horror game.  When you can just purchase a machine gun 2 chapters in and obliterate everything in your path with ease, the feeling shifts from surviving to completing.  You no longer needed to conserve ammo like a crazy person (read: Chris’ game in RE1), so getting caught in a room full of monsters with only a knife is a situation that just won’t happen.  This isn’t a bad thing, because it allows the pace of the game to stay strong and consistent but detracts from the general creepiness and paranoia that was prevalent early in the series.

RE-finement of the series

Resident Evil 5 seems to do very little that’s new.  Instead, it’s a refinement of the system introduced in RE4 with, of course, the obligatory graphical enhancements that come with developing on a next-gen console.  Based on the demo, the game looks to be nothing short of visually amazing, which is no surprise.  My real hope is that it continues to shape the Resident Evil story in a positive way that keeps me, the player, engaged and caring about the fate of these characters.

A look at the graphics from Resident Evil 5

The controls have been reworked a tad and while the addition of strafing is very nice, is does take some getting used to.  Since Resident Evil 4, it’s becoming apparent the series is akin to an action game with “zombies” rather than a survival horror game with action sequences.  As I’ve said, this isn’t a bad thing unless you go in with the impression that it will control like your standard action game.  There’s no run’n'gun here – every time you raise your weapon you’re locked into place.  It’s a blessing and a curse: standing still allows you to focus your shots accurately on various body parts using your laser sight, but leaves you vulnerable to attack from the sides and behind.  I found out, the hard way, that the best course of action is to take a few guys down, run, shoot, run again, shoot again, repeat.  The amount of enemies that are coming after you at any given time is overwhelming, so you can’t just sit around in one place and hope to take them all down.

The partner system from Resident Evil Zero has returned with some refinements.  Your partner will now help you if, say, you’re in a grapple with an oncoming foe or they’ll revive you with a green herb if you’ve taken a critical hit.  They’ll also pick up various ammo and health items as enemies drop them and give them to you if your supplies are low.  I like this insofar as the demo let me experience it, but I worry about having to babysit for my partner when I find myself in a heated situation because if they die then it’s game over.  An improvement to this system entails 2 player co-op (both offline and online) so you can run through the game with a friend, which I think would be great.  Bluetooth headsets are also supported, so you can coordinate your attacks or just yell to a friend in trouble: “He’s friggin behind YOU OH NO!”

I might be the only person I know who liked the attache case inventory in RE4 if for nothing else than the realism, but they’ve done away with that in this game.  The new inventory system allows you and your partner each to carry a total of 9 items (possibly more as the game progresses), 4 of which can be assigned to the D-Pad buttons for quick access – things like guns, grenades, herbs, etc.  This system works well until you find yourself surrounded and needing to navigate to a healing item because, unlike all of the previous games, bringing up your inventory happens in real time so you can still be attacked while selecting an item to use.  I have mixed feelings about this, but definitely appreciate the added level of difficulty.

It’s hard to draw solid conclusions from a demo.  I mean, they have a screen in the very beginning dedicated to telling us that it is, indeed, just a demo and some bugs may be present.  Regardless, I’ve had a lot of fun playing it thus far and am hoping for many great things when it’s released early next March.  The solid visuals combined with a pretty decent partner system and a refined RE4 control schema give me a lot of confidence that Capcom has really put their all into this, one of their flagship franchises, and we won’t be disappointed.