Resident Evil 5 Demo Review / Early Impressions of RE5

February 5, 2009 at 10:02 pm (Games, Review)

Resident Evil 5 is probably one of the most anticipated games since Halo 3. Personally I’ve been waiting for it since the day I finished resident Evil 4 way back in early 2005. With the huge leaps and bounds RE4 made, Capcom has had gamers waiting in sever anticipation to see what kind of changes would be made to the next game in the beloved franchise.

The very first detail to emerge in the first teaser trailer than leaked years back was that Chris Redfield had returned to the world of Resident Evil. The next thing everyone noticed was that the game seemed to take place in the day time. A first for the series. Well ok, to be fair a very small portion of Resident Evil 4 took place in the day time, but not like it does in RE5.

Of course the biggest piece of news regarding Resident Evil 5 is that it is entirely Co-op. Well gamers of the modern generation (the generation that screams for Co-op in every game no matter how inappropriate…more on this later) rejoiced at this announcement, hardcore Resident Evil fans like myself remained hesitant. Resident Evil is a long standing Survival Horror franchise, and revolutionized the genre by making horror in games on a level not conceived as possible. My biggest problem with the Co-op announcement was in the issue of Resident Evil being a horror game. I just don’t see how you can put yourself in a moment where you are on the edge of your seat and jumping at shadows when your buddy is yammering on the other end of your headset. Resident Evil was the game you played locked in your bedroom by yourself with all the lights out. It is a franchise that has redefined the idea of immersion in a game. Now I don’t mean to say that co-op games don’t possess the ability to draw a player into the story and into the moment. Gears of War (and GoW2) are perfect examples of this. But even at their best, co-op games suffer from the fact that no matter how hard you try to get into a game, if you are playing with your buddy, there are going to be distractions that keep you from getting into a game on the level you would while playing the game on your own. My view on the concept of Resident Evil going co-op, along with the game taking place outside in the day light, makes me very fearful that the franchise is making a big step away from the survival horror genre, and a big leap into the action shooter category. And that makes me very unhappy. There are certain names, certain franchises that you go to for certain things. When I want to play a fun easy quick in and out platformer, I play Mario, when I want a basic shooter I play Halo. You get the picture. Resident Evil, like Silent Hill, is a guaranteed horror experience. Capcom’s decision to change their game plan this late in the franchise seems like a risky move to me. It seems like something that will alienate a lot of hardcore Resident Evil fans and drive them from the franchise. Of course at the same time, building a one of a kind 3rd person action shooter will draw a lot of new fans. I just wonder if Capcom is trying too hard to gain new fans and customers, and are not worried enough about losing the old ones.

But now is a time when co-op faste paced action games are what the majority of gamers ask for these days. And we really won’t know how Resident Evil 5 plays out until March 13th. That being said, lets get into my few impressions from the xbox live demo.

The game play is almost identical to that of RE4. Which I don’t think is a bad thing, as the game play in Resident Evil 4 was a solid as one can hope for. Strangely enough I still think it plays the best on the Game Cube controller, but maybe that is just me. Level design is pretty much what you would expect after playing Resident Evil 4 and seeing the trailers. Levels consist of a pretty basic design, with your main path laid out pretty obviously, and some shacks and whatnot spread around to explore and use for cover. Ammo is dropped and picked up in the same manner it was in RE4. Kill and enemy, and usually there is a box of ammo for either you or your buddy to take.

The co-op partner in this case is a woman named Sheva. So far she has done nothing but annoy me, and I hope she has a use and purpose in the game other than being the other person. It is Resident Evil, so I expect she will have a rather well drawn and interesting back story. I hope. The AI intelligence is not the best and smartest, but not the worst. Think of something in between Army of Two, and Left 4 Dead. Sheva will heal you, and will call for help, and will help you. However she’ll waste a lot of ammo, use med kits (sorry green herbs) when your health really is not that low, she won’t run from enemies, and tends to take the longest routs possible when following you. Of course you can choose to limit some of her wastefulness by picking up all the ammo and health yourself, but then you have to keep an eye on how much she has and supply her with things when she gets low. The amount of commands you can give to Sheva are pretty limited too, consisting mostly of the ‘stay’ and ‘follow’ commands you could give to Ashley in Resident Evil 4. Then again, you could just play co-op, and get around all of this. I wonder if Capcom chose to make the AI less than they could have to encourage people to play co-op. That would be annoying. But not impossible.

Visually the game is great, though Resident Evil has always been at the forefront of the visual experience. The characters are well built, and animations run smooth. There seems to be a slightly larger variation in the appearance of the hostiles than there was in Resident Evil 4. Though you will still find yourself fighting against a set of twins from time to time.

The enemies sound (voice wise) pretty identical to Resident Evil 4, and a few times had me wondering if they just recycled the same sound files. They attack you in the same manner too, running at you in hordes and trying to circle your position. Really nothing new here, disappointingly. Also I have to say, that these guys, the hostile opposition, are very not scary. They don’t look like zombies (ok they aren’t supposed to be zombies), they look like normal people with red eyes. That, coupled with fighting them out in the open in the afternoon…really not scary at all. Actually felt very tepid and uninspired. I know that with RE4 we stopped fighting zombies, but possessed monks with crazy monsters coming out of their heads are much more frightening than random bear foot people in t-shirts. Please Capcom, bring back Zombies. Zombies are inherently scary. The very idea of a dead person coming back to life and trying to kill you is terrifying. And even the slow shambling walk and incoherent moan of a zombie can chill you much more easily than some random guy on the street screaming loudly and running at you. Please, I beg of you, give me zombies. ZOMBIES!!!!!!!!!!

To be honest, based on this demo and this demo alone, I am tempted to call Resident Evil 5, Resident Evil 4.2. But I hope that that turns out to be an unfair assessment. Of course the game will ultimately play out very differently I am sure, hopefully with some new innovations and experiences. And the story looks promising to expose some of the franchies’ long time secrets. I just really hope that the Demo presents the very beginning of a game that takes huge leaps very quickly.

I am of course going to hold back until I get my hands on the retail make before I pass final judgement of any kind. But based on what I have seen, I am fearful that Resident Evil 5 will deliver a very boring and standard issue 3rd person shooter experience. And given the time the studio has been working on this game, and the name that it holds, that will be a huge disappointment.

Here is to crossing your fingers.