I finished Resident Evil 4 quite a while back, but – in case you haven’t heard -- I’m lazy. I figure I’d better write a review of it before I forget the details. No matter how much time passes, though, I’m not in any danger of forgetting how unbelievably good this game was.
When this game was under development, Capcom seemed to take great pride in teasing us with the fact that it would have “no zombies” in it. Instead, as it turns out, this installment stars Spanish villagers “possessed” by parasitic creatures known as “Las Plagas”. Same diff, you say? Not in the least. Rather than mindlessly lurching towards you and trying to bite your neck off, these enemies will charge at you, dodge your bullets, shout curses in Spanish, and work as a team.
You play as Leon Kennedy from Resident Evil 2, now out of the police business and working as a secret service agent. The President’s daughter has gone missing, and you’re off to agrarian European locales to search for her. That’s when everything goes predictable nuts as usual, sans the requisite T-Virus outbreak and Umbrella Corporation secret base crawling. But who really cares about the plot when the game is this fun to play? Think of any aspect of Resident Evil 0, 1, 2, 3, or Code Veronica that just flat out annoyed you. You know, all of the things that have traditionally defined “Survival Horror” as a genre. Let’s go down the list and see how Resident Evil 4 blows away the stereotypes:
Survival Horror Cliche' No. 1: Tiny Inventory Capacity
How many times in a Resident Evil game have you had to decide what useful item you should drop in order to pick up a necessary item, such as a miniscule key? Well, worry no longer: Capcom finally wised up. Items such as keys and mandatory puzzle-solving items do not take up any space in your inventory, saving that space for ammo, weapons, and healing items. This also means no more annoying “This key is no longer needed. Want to drop it?” dialogs. Survival Horror Cliche' No. 2: Clunky Controls
A scary game should not be scary simply because the controls are so bad that you’re afraid you won’t be able to turn quickly enough to attack your assailant. Thankfully, the control scheme has been completely reworked. You can reload on the fly, and always have an over-the-shoulder view with a handy laser sight on all of your guns. Switching to your knife requires simply holding down a shoulder button so you can smash barrels and slice enemies quickly without wasting precious bullets. Context sensitive use of the A button will allow you to kick a stunned opponent, dive through windows, or perform other actions when they are available to you. Intuitive controls in a survival horror game? Yes, seriously!
Survival Horror Cliche' No. 3: Limited Saves
Ugh. Whoever came up with the idea of having to collect ink ribbons (and using up precious inventory space) in order to save your game was a sadist. RE4 still uses typewriters for the method of saving, but thankfully you can save as often as you like without the need for ink ribbons.
Survival Horror Cliche' No. 4: Unlimited enemies, limited bullets.
Backtrack through areas in an earlier RE game and you will often find them re-populated with zombies you have previously expended valuable ammo to clear out. Of course, the ammo and medical supplies would not be replenished, just the baddies. Not so in RE4. Ammo and healing items can be found on defeated enemies, and areas usually do not spawn new villains after you’ve been through once.
Survival Horror Cliche' No. 5: Bad Voice Acting
Okay, so the dialogue is still goofy but the lines for the most part are spoken very well. Don’t be picky…in RE 1 the voice actors couldn’t even pull off lines like “Don’t OPEN that DOOR!” with believable inflection.
Survival Horror Cliche' No. 6: Monotonous Backtracking
Unlike previous installments, RE4 doesn’t attempt to make up for the lack of locales by forcing you to walk back and forth through them. Instead, they *gasp* actually made the game world HUGE. I was shocked at how much ground I had covered while playing, and then realized I hadn’t even finished with disc 1. The bottom line is that this game is fantastic in just about every way you’d hope it to be. There are tons of unlockables that add to the replay value (new weapons to buy from the merchant, a shooting gallery with collectible bottle caps, even an additional story to play through), and it’s worth playing through more than once.
And that’s a big testament to the quality of this game. Nowadays I have so many games backed up that I rarely even get to finish them. This one I played through twice, which is something I haven’t done in a long while.
If you have a PS2, this game will be available to you soon. The graphics obviously won’t be quite as good, but it will include some extra bonuses and, of course, still be a joy to play. Be sure to check it out.
So RE:4 came out on the Gamecube first? Interesting... I wouldn't mind playing it but I'm still waiting on a copy of Katamari Damacy to cheapen up so's I can buy it.
I promise, once I get that truck paid off, I'm going into a comic- and game-buying frenzy.
*wets lips, wrings hands* Yes....
Posted by: Jay | September 05, 2005 at 07:25 AM