Resident Evil

Ah Resident Evil, a series of games close to my corrupted heart. While I must admit I have not played any in many moons, they are still games that hold dear. I also have to admit that I have not played all of the games, the titles I have owned including the original on PS and DS, RE2 and then Code Veronica. Now I know I have not experienced many of the newer games, so I will keep this article about the ones I have.

Resident Evil is one of the best known video game franchises. Developed by Capcom, the Osaka based company behind other iconic gaming moments such as Street Fighter and Mega Man. RE's huge popularity is due to many reasons, mainly its scary atmosphere, well developed plots, excellent and innovative gameplay, great cinematics, exciting combat and a general love of the undead. In RE you usually play as a lone protagonist fighting their way through the recent apocalypse trying to stay alive and escape to some form of safety.

One of the first things to strike you about this game is its unusual name. RE has been in the collective psyche of gamers for nearly 15 years now, so most people don't stop to think about what a bizarre name for something this is. Resident. Evil. What the fuck does that even mean? I had heard a rumor that it was something to do with a direct translation from japanese, but I this sounded fairly dubious. Luckily, so dedicated am I to my new love of blogging, that I went to the trouble and researched the truth of the matter for this piece of material. As we all know, RE was to be called Biohazard (and still is in Japan), however, the guy in charge of marketing for Capcom in the US pointed out that it would be impossible to register that in America as it was already in use for a variety of IPs. So Capcom held a company wide competition to find a new name and the mysterious winner was a nameless developer who worked in their digital studios. So there you have it. Resident Evil is born. I wonder where that person is now....

In RE, the player must navigate through a series of locations, finding objects and clues that will enable them to progress through the game. You face many perils on your journey, including legions of undead, huge mutant monsters, treacherous team mates and malignant corporations. Combat is straight forward and fun, often requiring the player to sprint to safety as it can be easy for the inexperienced player to overwhelmed. The games puzzles have a steady difficulty curve and the player never really feels completely defeated by them. The gameworld is also richly detailed. There a big emphasis on exploring and the player can find lots of interesting information scattered throughout the games that build up the backstory. These can be very interesting and adds a lot of depth. Graphically, RE is a feast for the eyes. The pre-rendered backgrounds are very detailed and spooky, with the characters moving realistically and smoothly. The enemies look the part and there is lots of blood and violence to bask in.

Oh shit, did i disturb you??

The games most iconic baddies are the zombies. RE's particular flavour of zombies are dead humans who have been infected by a virus that can somehow reanimate their bodies and turn them into mindless shuffling monsters. The game came out in a time before the masses were introduced to the much more terrifying fast zombies (28 Days Later, Dawn of Dead etc) that are now so common in games. So in comparison with more modern games like Left4Dead, RE's zombies seem quite tame and its quite possible to simply walk around them as they dont pose much of a threat on their own. However, when RE came out, it was very scary. The zombies though slow, were tough and hard to kill and if the player wasnt careful, it was easy to get cornered. The atmosphere of these games is one of their strongest features. The music is creepy, the graphics were great and the cinematics were way ahead of anything else at the time. Who can forget that first zombie encounter where you interrupt one busily munching through the face of one of your missing comrades? Excellent stuff.

Despite all this greatness, there are a few points that have to be made. For a start, the voice acting is atrocious. Some of the dialog is mind numbingly awful and its almost as if some of the dialog was put in as a joke rather than as serious plot building elements. The RE has the dubious distinction of having one of the worst quotes from a video game as voted the IGN, "Jill, why don't you, the master of unlocking, take this lock pick." Yikes. Some of the characters are very cliched and unimaginative the overall story line of the games has numerous contradictions and continuity issues.

Hmmmmm

Another point is the main overall villain in the game, the Umbrella Corporation. Umbrella, hmm, not the most sinister inanimate object that could spring to mind. While this entity has all the usual hallmarks associated with big evil corporations, ie defence contractor, secret bioweapons research, control over the world economy and governments, something named after a rather useful and non threatening everyday object tends to suck much of the menace out of its presence. Names like Cyberdyne, Weyland-Yutani, Omni Corporation, Disney, LexCorp and EA all sound much more evil. The little umbrella logo is also something you would expect to see on a toilet seat, rather than a vial of a deadly zombification virus.

Duhhhhhhhh......

The movies also need a mention here. While not technically the game, the long curly turds that are the RE movies have in my opinion thrown a terrible shadow over the games franchise. Once again, another promising premise for a movie is ruined by putting the films creation in the shit covered hands of the producers behind the other aweful video game movies. The original RE movie was made by the asshole behind Mortal Kombat, the laughable Soldier and the other genre destroying shit storm Alien Vs Predator. So once again, we are subjected to cheesy, over the top crap that is an embarrassment to the franchise. Predictably, they fooled lots of interested gamers into watching them, thus generating lots of revenue for the execs and thus spawning several sequels all worse than the last. When will people learn...

I hate Tofu!

On the other hand, RE has some truly excellent moments. One of the best things I found about the different RE games Ive played is their high replayability. Being able to play as different characters whose stories intertwine with one another is great. Each characters game plays differently. The take different routes through the game and have many unique locations and items. In RE2 this is especially good with each character taking very different routes through the game with much more specific content. Depending on the speed and number of saves used in a game also gives the player different rankings when they complete the game. High rankings unlock cool extra features and game modes like unlocking different outfits or getting a Gatling gun with infinite ammo. There are also extra game modes where you play through a very tough section of the game as a heavily armed SWAT team member or as a large walking block of tofu. These extras make replaying the game much more appealing and interesting.

My personal favourites include the starting screen warning the player that this game 'contains scenes of extreme violence and gore'. Nuff said. Also, in the first game, the famous 'Keepers Diary' describe one persons personal experience as they slowly change into a zombie. If anyone has not read these I urge you to google it. The games spectacular cinematics were a great reward to finishing the games.

RE has had a long existence and have been updated nicely over the years. While I havent personally played any past Code Veronica, they look fantastic and have thankfully evolved past zombies as their primary enemies, with the Los Ganados & Majini in the last two games a cool new take on the franchise. While, like many of my peers, I am starting to get a little bored with the zombie franchise, I will never forget these games due to their excellent blend of engaging gameplay, encompassing plots, creepy atmosphere and a high replay value.

I want to dedicate this review to an old friend who shared a passion for this game and spent many an afternoon in Limerick exploring Racoon city with me. Congrats dude.