LTTP: Resident Evil 3 [PS5]

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Resident Evil 3 Remake felt like an expansion to Resident Evil 2 Remake which made the original $79.99 asking price a tough one to stomach. On its own, Resident Evil 3 Remake can be seen as “too short” and “too straightforward”, but I bought it for less than half the asking price and as a standalone expansion, it was fine. There wasn’t much exploration and its hook, Nemesis, was more of an ongoing gag than something to be feared.

The return of Jill Valentine was the highlight of the game; it was good to see her back in action. She held her own and didn’t take nonsense from the other characters which fed to the mystique as a “super cop” and veteran of zombie fighting. 

Carlos actually felt like a soldier equipped to handle a zombie apocalypse which made his segments more of a cakewalk than I was expecting. However, it wasn’t a foreign feeling as the RE2 Remake’s alternate character sections felt similar. I just wished they didn’t have to lean into “finding the cure” trope again.

The predecessor was a lengthy adventure, but it was padded retreading familiar territory twice.  RE3 Remake intertwined with the timeline of RE3 Remake, which meant visiting familiar territory for a third time, but thankfully the vast majority of the game was new. 

Jill and Carlos felt more nimble thanks to their newfound ability to dodge attacks. They also discovered knives that didn’t shatter through the course of a 6 hour adventure. Those two gameplay tweaks along with the muscle memory developed by playing RE2 Remake made for a breezy feeling game. There were spots of uneasiness, but I have to admit, RE3 Remake felt like a romp compared to my first run through the RE2 Remake.

I enjoyed my time in Raccoon City again; especially for the very modest price of admission nowadays. It’s a well made modern Capcom developed Resident Evil game which wasn’t something we could count on not so long ago. It may not be as meaty or impactful as its predecessor, but it’s still worth checking out Jill Valentine being a super cop.

Verdict
I liked it

Ratings Guide

LTTP: Resident Evil 2 [PS5]

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I played the original Resident Evil 2 on the Sega Dreamcast of all consoles. It was my second Resident Evil game after finishing Resident Evil: Code Veronica on Sega’s impressive 3D console. In fact, the only reason I even played Code Veronica was because of a school friend who bought his Dreamcast for the exclusive. My impressions of the original RE2 were not as glowing as I hoped. I was coming from a game that refined tank controls and generationally superior in every technical aspect. 

I recall finding it neat that it had two playable characters, but at the same time, I was disappointed that I was essentially playing the same 10 hour game twice. Coming from the 20 hour epic campaign of Code Veronica, it felt like things were wrapping up as soon as things started moving. 

I’m the weirdo who would have preferred a remake of Resident Evil: Code Veronica over Resident Evil 2. With that in mind, I still recognized Leon and Claire’s first adventure has its place amongst fans of the franchise and video games at large. I was curious if I would enjoy the remake more with a fresh new coat of paint and a revised perspective many years later.

The remake’s philosophy seemed to have been: “Keep the spirit and hallmarks of the original while modernizing just about everything that makes sense.” Third person over the shoulder camera established in Resident Evil 4 made its return. I found the first person camera in Resident Evil 7 fine, but to me, it doesn’t feel like a Resident Evil game unless its in the third person. 

A generous checkpoint system, friendly controls, and melee counter options gave Leon and Claire more fight and capability than ever, but they were still bound by the confines of the original’s design. They could jog and jump down in this game, but a 3 foot gap was too much to handle. They still had to re-arrange giant bookshelves just so they can build a makeshift bridge across the library’s second floor.

I was generally impressed with how the game looked technically; I was playing the PS5 upgraded version at 120FPS mode. My only gripe was with the screen space reflections which were a distraction. I would have switched on the ray tracing mode to fix those flaws, but the performance issues in that mode deterred me from staying with that mode.

I was also a fan of how the zombies, police station, and just about everything aside from Leon and Claire looked. I found both protagonists looked and sounded derpy with their awkward lines. Ada Wong and just about every other character came across fine, but Leon and Claire were a couple of awkward fools that didn’t quite grasp the gravity of their situation. 

Playing through Resident Evil 2 twice wasn’t satisfying. Claire’s playthrough was faster and had a handful of interesting moments, but it didn’t warrant retreading so much of Leon’s adventure. I understand this was a relatively novel idea when the PlayStation version debuted, but I’m just not a big fan of having to go through games multiple times to unlock true endings — especially when the differences aren’t enough to warrant it.

When I was in the thick of it, creeping by a licker because I was low on resources or just jetting through the station because Tyrant was nearby, I was loving every second of Resident Evil 2. The game was in its element and executing on every level. It’s unfortunate that there was just a tad too little of it and the experience was watered down with the Claire playthrough. 

Verdict
I liked it

Ratings Guide

LTTP: Resident Evil 7: biohazard

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It took a while but I finally played Resident Evil 7: Biohazard. I haven’t touched a Resident Evil game since Resident Evil 5 for the PlayStation 3. The demo of Resident Evil 6 was ridiculous but reviews scared me off. I didn’t consider either of them horror games – I didn’t even consider Resident Evil 4 a horror game. The last Resident Evil game to unsettle me was the Resident Evil Remake on the GameCube.  

It’s been well over 10 years since I considered a Resident Evil game unnerving and I’m glad they’re back at it with Resident Evil 7: Biohazard. 

A brand new engine, aptly dubbed RE Engine, adorned RE7. It’s a solid engine and ran well enough on my GTX 1070 powered PC but it certainly showed its age when compared to the likes of Resident Evil 2 or Devil May Cry V. Textures were especially grimy looking in daylight. The night is full of terror — or at least — dimly lit and grungy confined spaces are. RE7 was in its element in the opening hours where everything is still a mystery and the imagination is running wild.  

The new first person perspective placed me right in the front row of the horrors. Gruesome faces and brutal attacks that would normally kill any human were directed right at me. I may have been playing as Ethan but I felt those knife and chainsaw attacks. The combination of disturbing faces and spine tingling sounds worked together to unsettle me.  

Resident Evil games were at their most unnerving when they were set in disheveled but familiar places. The creepy houses wrought with cobwebs, dust, and remains that lead imaginations down cynical paths built tension. RE7 had a handful of those houses. I found it a little silly that the Baker family had so many houses on their property. It lead to a couple of excellent areas in which to scare me but its believability unraveled with each passing hour. 

RE7 may have started out as a grounded horror game but it quickly revealed itself to be a tried & true Resident Evil game and all that entailed. Herbs? Knife? Inventory juggling, weird specialty keys, and light puzzle solving all surfaced themselves as the game and story unfolded. Umbrella Corporation, talks of cover ups, and biological weapons testing came back in force by the end of it all. It was somewhat predictable and trite, but it was classic RE fun. 

Fun scares and puzzles but the combat was by far the game’s weakest element. One could argue they’re continuing the franchise’s classic roots but that’s not a valid excuse for lame boss or easily cheesed enemy encounters. It felt like I was supposed to employ lame tactics in order to overcome the adversities. I didn’t enjoy the fact that I was just going through the motion of avoiding enemies or watching some dumb boss attack a pillar in a pathetic attempt to get to me.  

The controls took a bit of getting used to. Years of muscle memory with first person shooters built-up an expectation with regards to speed. There was a deliberate sluggishness to the Resident Evil 7. I was able to pull off everything I wanted but I was forced to play at their pace. Reloading of weapons took longer than I was used to. I also had the turning speed of a tank which could have been remedied by utilizing the classic Resident Evil quick turn, but it rarely came to mind in the thick of it. It reminded me of Red Dead Redemption 2’s first person mode. It felt like they literally took classic Resident Evil and plopped in a first person view. It works but it takes a bit of getting used to. 

After finishing Resident Evil 7: biohazard, I came away rejuvenated with the Resident Evil franchise. It’s fun dumb horror and I’m glad Capcom found their groove with this franchise again. I look forward to playing Resident Evil 2 Remake and the upcoming Resident Evil 3 Remake, but I hope to see Capcom return to a first person Resident Evil game again. They’ve proven it works and they’ve also proven they’re good at it. 

Verdict: 
I liked it

Ratings Guide

Devil May Cry V Xbox One Review

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It’s disingenuous since I haven’t gone back to play it in a long time, but in my mind, Devil May Cry V feels like another Special Edition of Devil May Cry 4. I know it isn’t; It’s more refined than that PS3/360 era game. But – for better and worse — the feel and structure of the game felt deeply rooted in the past.  

I don’t like how Dante looks in Devil May Cry V. Nero, V and Lady were fine. Trish looked oddly out of place and along with the goofy looking Nico who continued to remind me that people’s teeth shouldn’t be that defined. I understand the desire to move beyond the anime-inspired art styles but I wasn’t keen on this realistic bent they took in this game.  

In the end, how Dante looks is a non-factor. How he, Nero, and V plays are what makes or breaks a game in this genre. Nero and Dante were stylistically familiar with tweaks and reintroductions to freshen things up. Like in DMC4, Dante was the more diverse and varied character. Nero wasn’t nearly as complex but they did give him swappable arms that enabled abilities beyond simply snatching enemies from a distance. I wished these arms were selectable like Dante’s array of arsenal though.  

V’s style of play was the intellectual highlight of the game. Beastmaster classes and characters have been in games like Final Fantasy and Diablo for ages, but I’ve never seen them in action games and I certainly haven’t seen a game execute on that idea so well. Capcom mapped the different beast summons to each button which resulted in V’s attacks functioning like Dante’s or Nero’s but at a distance from V himself. The closest analog I could think of is God of War’s Atreus where these proxies interweave in combat. I wish they could have an entire game dedicated to V where he captures/acquires different beasts.  

It’s been a long time since Devil May Cry 4. The franchise went on a bit of a tangent with DmC by Ninja Theory and Platinum Games put forth a few action bangers of their own with Bayonetta and Metal Gear Rising. That lineage of action games went places and I felt DMCV was a bit of regression in several key areas. The stylish act of beating on fodder was comparable to its contemporaries but it failed to match the spectacle and progression variety offered by them.  

DMC4 was criticized for recycling their boss fights and I cannot help but wonder why they found fighting Urizen over and over again would fly in DMCV. They may have cobbled some narrative reasons to justify it but it just hammers home the fact that this game isn’t very fun outside of its sole core competency; fighting low level monsters. 

Finally Capcom concocted a reason for Vergil to make an official return to the Devil May Cry universe. Vergil making an appearance in a DMC game is just as much of a surprise as Vegeta making an appearance in a Dragon Ball Z game. I wasn’t impressed with how his return was handled. It felt needlessly long winded and very much like Dragon Ball: inevitable.  

For fans of the series, Capcom delivering on Devil May Cry V’s combat was enough to win them over. I liked Devil May Cry’s combat but it takes more than just a flashy and stylish combat scenarios to keep me playing. I struggled to maintain pace with Devil May Cry V. It took me well over two weeks to complete this relatively short game. I never felt compelled to play multiple chapters in a row because I wasn’t interested in what was happening. The introduction of new foes early on would just be enough to keep me coming back the next day but rarely in a single sitting. I was happy to see Devil May Cry make its triumphant return but I would like to see Capcom take a massive step forward in the next installment. 

Verdict: 
It was okay 

Ratings Guide

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