T w e n t y S i d e d
Tonight, at 7pm Chris and I are going to be playing Resident Evil 5 together on his Twitch channel. The game was designed for Co-Op, building the combat around the two-person team of Chris Redfield and Sheva. If you play it single-player – which is how I played this back in 2009 – then Sheva is run by an AI. This will be my first time experiencing the game as it was intended to be played.
Chris is the expert on this series, so I’ll let him put the whole thing in context…
The games industry was a weird place in 2008. The Microsoft Xbox had completely changed the console gaming landscape in no small part by making their system the easiest to develop for. This brought in Western developers that would never have crafted experiences for console before, as well as introducing genres to controller holders that held no equal at the time. Launching with Halo: Combat Evolved and The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind was almost a mission statement, and being the only console to have Half-Life 2 and Doom 3 before the next-generation landed was a hallmark achievement. The birth of Xbox Live also introduced the console gaming world to online multiplayer, transforming not only what was being played, but by whom. As the Xbox 360 heralded the dawn of the seventh generation of consoles, it was no longer the Japanese games industry that was dominating the gaming couch.
It is in this environment that Capcom, one of the giants of console games throughout the 90’s, would find themselves. With most of the original creative staff of the franchise either gone or working on other projects, it was up to Keiji Inafune and Jun Takeuchi to decide where to go. Resident Evil 4 was perceived as a success in part due to its departure from franchise norms, and so, rather than try and recreate the prior game, they chose to modify it with a new and popular trend: multiplayer.
If you play Resident Evil 5 solo, it is a relentlessly frustrating experience whose A.I. partner seems dim-witted and even traitorous. Played with a friend, however, it’s… actually an enjoyable experience like no other. Which isn’t the high praise it sounds like! It’s more that you don’t really have a co-op game that does what Resident Evil 5 does, for good or ill. By deciding on “partnership” as the theme upon which the game would be built, Capcom would implement a series of set-pieces and puzzles that demanded two players work together and cooperate in ways only Hazelight Studio (developers of A Way Out and It Takes Two) has really approached. It is, perhaps, for this reason that I find the game to be a guilty pleasure.
Nonetheless, I found it interesting that so many who voted for it did so in hopes of hearing Shamus scream. It’s easy to treat Resident Evil 5 as a punching bag, especially for its nonsensical story. While it has the advantage of looking somewhat more beautiful beside its rather homely looking sibling Resident Evil 6, it is still clear that the game never recovered from its reputation developed at launch. For my part, however, I want to go into this playthrough with the intention of finding what Resident Evil 5 does well, even if my finely honed cynicism and sarcasm will be urging me to point out the title’s every deficiency. This is especially true as I now also compare it to Resident Evil 4, a game whose strengths I’ve better begun to understand over the past year. Does Resident Evil 5 manage to fulfill those same strengths? Does it carve out its own new positives? Or, is it simply cursed to be a lesser version of Resident Evil 4, only this time with co-op?
I’m excited to discuss these observations and bounce my thoughts off of Shamus to see what his perspective is, especially as he gets to experience it with a human companion rather than an A.I. Admittedly, I am also excited to occasionally laugh, mock, and groan with him at the sheer stupidity of the story. I look forward to seeing some of you join us on this journey through nonsense and violence.
I really hope you’ll join us tonight on Chris’ channel.
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Personally, I voted for this because it’s the first Resident Evil since I bailed out of the franchise.
I loved RE4 despite (or possibly because of) the nonsensical story and dialogue. But the very worst bit of the game was the co-op sessions with Ashley. I almost always had her hide in a convenient dumpster and left her there.
So when I read the early reviews of RE5, being forced companion all the time, and the AI being possibly worse than RE4, I noped out. I gamed for fun at the time in small irregular doses, and needing to line up the same friend every time to play a game that I might want to put a few dozen hours into had zero appeal.
But I’m curious what might have been.
Honestly, last time I played, I didn’t find the partner AI THAT bad?
Like, sure, Sheva died a couple of times, but in most fights, she was at least competent.
That was admittedly two-three years ago and the PC version though, and thus after final patches had long since gone live. So I could see how the original slash 360 version could have been a lot worse.
For me, one of the worst things that an AI companion can do is try to help.
It’s Lydia from Skyrim, diving in the way of my arrows, or to getting stuck behind terrain*.
The vast menagerie of companions in the Wasteland games running at the enemy Leroy Jenkins style, ensuring I could never, ever, use the neat Area-of-Effect attacks I had. Or they’d be camping the cover spots my squad needed, standing in doorways, running through fires – all sorts.
Getting dragged out of cars, in both GTA and Saints Row, several times, because the AI couldn’t handle getting in the damn car already.
Ashley in RE4, to her credit, would follow right behind you, duck out of the way of your gun, and would go hide in dumpsters a lot of the time. While she was annoying to have around and a liability**, at least she didn’t actively get in the way.
*It still amazes me how she would vary between the two on order to be as unhelpful as possible. If I needed her, she’d be 15 metres away, trying to navigate an ankle-sized rock. If I didn’t, it was re-enactments of The Bodyguard, every time.
**Whaddya mean ‘You refuse to climb down ladders and I have to catch you’?!
I just found an SMG. Ian, you said you’re good with SMGs, right?
Spoiler:
He is not.I also didn’t find the AI that bad either… though I’m pretty sure I played this on PS3… so maybe the AI was just calculated so slowly, it didn’t have time to actually get in the way of what I was doing? :D
For the most part, the A.I. is competent enough until it’s not. Which no doubt sounds strange to say, but basically, it will contribute somewhat without being totally worthless and will prioritize the player when they’re downed by an enemy or have low health.
The largest problem is how worthless they become as certain threats become increasingly more common or difficult. The A.I. has very poor prioritization, and the only tactic with any gun you give them is “Shoot until ammunition is depleted, then swap to pistol”. They never bothered coding any sort of ammo preservation or selective use of a gun on certain kinds of foes or certain situations. Sniper rifles will be used for close-ranged torso shots rather than long distance head shots, shotguns will be fired at long range, and all will be wasted at any possible moment. Add on to this a certain boss fight requiring the player use a mounted turret, and the player must remember to manually command the A.I. to also mount a turret (repeatedly) or else they’ll use all their handgun ammo in a pointless situation.
Basically, the A.I. is the least competent when you need it to be competent the most, which gives most players the impression the A.I. is dumb and worthless.
I’m an Ashley apologist because I feel like she helps vary the experience of RE4 up, they never give you challenges you can’t handle with her, she ducks out of the way 98% of the time and tries to stick close, and she raises the stakes just when you’ve figured out the local enemies of a region and stop being so afraid, keeping things from getting boring. Most of the time I’ve seen friends that hate Ashley play, it’s because they play as if they’re still solo with Leon and don’t adapt to the new situation, and to me that problem exists between controller and chair, not with the game itself.
Ah, I see. Maybe it’s because I never trust AI with the important weapons/ammo… I was trained by “some game” whose name I’ve lost to the mists of time :D
Oh man, I remember giving a modded automatic shotgun and some special ammunition to a companion in Fallout: New Vegas.
Literally two seconds after I closed their inventory, they spotted an enemy about 40 feet away.
BLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAM
Didn’t even move, just sprayed hand-made coinshot rounds in the general direction of an enemy that hadn’t even seen us yet.
Never trusted an AI companion since.
That’s why I only ever ran with Boone/Veronica, and ED-E/Rex. You don’t need to set them up with ANY extra weapons or ammo to be deadly, at least on normal difficulty.
Well, the Leroy Jenkins is strong with both Veronica and Rex…their complete lack of fear when trying to punch/bite entire swarms of Cazadores to death led to many, many forced reloads.
They were fun to have around, sure, but when I was serious about exploring the Mojave it was always better to do it alone or with a ranged companion.
…one you didn’t give any valuable guns to, naturally.
I’d never trust a companion with an UNIQUE weapon, but some of them become really BONKERS if you trust ’em with even mid-game gear.
Like, Boone especially just becomes a head taking machine if you give him a sniper or anti-material rifle with special rounds, to the point where it’s almost a distraction. You’ll be walking along, and get jump scared by that special death camera showing some ghoul or raiders skull popping like a stepped on cherry tomato.
But yeah, I’d use that old adage about: never lend what you cannot live without. Even when the AI isn’t outright stupid, they still get disarmed and such now and then, and it can take a while to notice.
I’m with you on Ashley. She fixes almost every complaint people have about escort missions, to the point where she’s very nearly an escort subject in name only, yet she still gets talked about as a poster child for “escort missions suck” every time the subject comes up. People have to fall back on the thinnest, most weaksauce complaints (like how you have to catch her jumping down ladders, because that’s apparently such a gigantic goddamn inconvenience) to justify why she’s just SO terrible.
To have problems with Ashley you have to either really REALLY suck at the game, or else be deliberately stubbornly trying to play like she’s not even there. Even the famously annoying way she calls Leon’s name is something you should almost never hear unless you’re dedicated to completely blowing her off.
It kinda leaves the impression that it’s not actually the gameplay that people hate about escort missions, it’s the very abstract idea of being even temporarily responsible for anyone other than the player character. That the complainers consider lone-wolf sociopathy an essential part of their fantasy life.
People will be way more OK with missions where you have to manage the health of your vehicle, or transport an item that can’t take too much damage, or defend a stationary object. There are even entire game genres built around these mechanics, which people not only don’t resent, but will be active fans of. But the moment you give the exact same mechanics a face/character, they turn WAY hostile to the idea. This says something.
The only “escort mission” character I’ve ever seen people be as OK with as they’d be with, say, a tower defense mission is Elizabeth from Bioshock: Infinite. BUT mechanically she’s not an escort subject: she’s a radioman NPC who happens to have a visual presence.
I agree with you and RamblePak64 about Ashley. I find it irritating that people keep complaining about her as if she was the worst example of a videogame companion when she’s absolutely one of the best ones.
Here are some of Ashley’s positive highlights whose complainers love to ignore:
– She hides behind you and keeps close unless directly ordered not to.
– She ducks out of the way when you point a gun her way.
– You can hide her in several places throughout the game while you get rid of enemies.
– Enemies aren’t directly trying to kill her, which means focusing on protecting her isn’t a necessity until she’s been grabbed.
– She will often point out useful items or objects that you might miss if you’re not paying attention.
– As much as people complain about it, the fact that she calls for help when grabbed is extremely helpful (and, as you pointed out, something you’re unlikely to hear unless you’re deliberately ignoring her.
At this point I think people are complaining just to complain.
I never had much problem with Ashley. As far as escort missions go, hers are some of the least offensive I’ve ever encountered. There are three reason why I think people have a problem with her:
– That voice.
– You escort her through several sections just for her to stumble into traps during a cutscene, making the whole exercise pointless.
– The water room. Seriously, fuck the water room.
I just cannot stand her high-pitched “LEOOOON” yell. It’s torture to my ears
I liked RE5 enough to play through it multiple times. Is it scary: no? Is it a good survival horror: maybe not? Is it an enjoyable action game along the line of the better RE movies: yes.
I had a generally tolerable time with RE5. If nothing else, it’s head and cantaloupe-sized shoulders above RE6.
I’m so excited for this! RE5 was the first Resident Evil game I ever played (I had only seen Let’s Plays of the other ones), and I played it in single player. I remember that I loved the beginning, but about halfway through I basically had to force myself to finish it. It’ll be interesting to see your experience through it, and maybe I could figure out why the second half of the game couldn’t grip me as well as the first…
RE5’s biggest failing is that it lacked the tension of RE4. The first 2/3rds of RE4 is a masterclass in pacing and dread. I still have memories of my controller being so sweaty during a tense firefight in 4 that it was hard to hold on to. 5 simply lacked those moments. It could be difficult or frustrating in spots, but it was too “but this one goes to 11” to be unnerving.
So, are you going to flip a coin to decide which of you gets to be Sheva?
Who will be Chris and who will be Sheva, and how did you decide who would play each character?
There is a certain logic to Chris not being Chris.
As ridiculous as the story of this game is (I wrote an abdridged script for it in the style of “The Editing Room” just to mock it, which I might link to if anyone’s interested), I still find the gameplay enjoyable, even solo. I’ve never had as many issues with the AI as others had (though it occasionally frustrated me to no end I never experienced, for instance, the AI character picking up the mines I set on the floor. as I’ve seen it happen to others) and there’s enough variation here and there to keep things interesting (though I could do without the forced turret sections). The whole thing also hasn’t devolved into a QTE-fest the way RE6 would.
Looking forward to the series.
That link sounds like it would be interesting
Sure thing, here it is. It’s a bit on the long side, but you’ll probably figure out early on if you want to keep reading or not.
I hope it’ll be a good time, and I’m gonna be there.
It’s a shame Sony bouht Bungie the other day, ’cause I felt like the narrative was continuing well on from the one the Xbox started with and Chris is describing. Microsoft buying up the western devs that made the console what it is really solidifies the identity it’s already got as far as I’m concerned, as the big Western games console. So if anything Sony should’ve gotten their hands on Capcom or Atlus to solidify its identity as the console that plays japanese games that can’t run on the Switch.
But I suppose Microsoft already had their shot at bungie.
The unfortunate thing there is that Sony has basically all but dissolved their Japanese division completely. The only remaining studio is Team Asobi, who built the Astro games for them. Sony’s headquarters were moved to California and it seems ever since they’ve become increasingly more Western-centric, which can even be seen in their push to purchase timed exclusivity of Square Enix games and… no others, because the big Japanese property the West cares about is Final Fantasy. Dragon Quest? Who cares? Devil May Cry? Yakuza? None of these for Sony!
Which, I mean, good, as the third-party timed exclusivity game is becoming tiresome for me, but in the end, Sony is… I don’t know. I don’t know if they simply believe(d) that the Japanese games industry would follow them as always in an act of hubris, despite seeing more and more Japanese developers move towards the PC (which is funny because that indicates they still don’t perceive Xbox as an option or alternate choice). With the purchase of Bungie and Sony’s own statement that it has to do with Bungie’s experience making a live service game (and the most successful one, when you get down to it), my theory is this acquisition has more to do with Sony chasing VR and metaverses and Bungie is the studio to help them with that.
It has me… curious, but when it comes to Japanese games and their developers, Sony has only minor interest as far as current business goes, but very little in the long term. Still, at least more Japanese developers are releasing on PC and Switch.
….too bad Square Enix is also in bed with Epic Games Store. I can’t wait for the increasingly bad press to hit them like it did Hitman 3, only worse when they finally put FF7 Remake on Steam at what price and how old? What a short-sighted mistake. I only hope they didn’t make a similar mistake contracting FF XVI to such exclusivity on PC as well, seeing as it’s already a timed PS5 exclusive.
I really liked RE5… played it solo but it was my first RE game so it didn’t really matter. I will be watching this in retrospect since there’s no way I’m staying up to 1am in the middle of the work week to watch a stream. Looking forward to it! Hope it goes well!
Everything about how Resident Evil 5 turned out suggests that what came out as a final product was completely different from what was envisioned…
… which IS what made RE5 a rehash of RE4, because it did practically rehash it. So, ‘Next Gen’ RE5 ended up being more like comparing Resident Evil 3 Nemesis to Resident Evil 2. RE3 is a different game… but feels quite a lot like an expansion pack, and was originally going to be a side story using the same relative technology.
The difference is that RE5 took 4 years, whereas RE3 came out in a much shorter timeframe. So whatever single-player ‘Fear the Daylight’ theme they originally went for, with all the suggestions about oppressive daylight, sun-glare, heat got trashed and they said:
Quick! Make RE4 but CO-OP this time! It would be like if it took four years to release a Next-Gen Resident Evil that then feels like a very long Separate Ways expansion.
People do generally forget however that RE5 got 9 out of 10 reviews and was indeed praised for being a glorified rehash of RE4, because around that time it was not clear anymore on how much ‘developmental progress’ was expected from a sequel.
Another close comparison is that RE5 feels like it ended up coasting somewhat with the ‘Call of Duty template’ which blurs the line between sequel and expansion pack.
I also think it is also because of the choice to have stable tech that the decision was made – it is like they got Co-Op sorted initially for Xbox and PC, as a general rule for their engine, but they thought they needed more ‘slickness’ for Co-op further by enabling support for up to 4 or more players (then ultimately scaling back to 2 mostly for the campaigns). Once that decision to have a more demanding player count is made, the level of quality becomes constrained. RE6 having pushed the MT framework engine by scaling it down more into RE: Revelations port quality.
And yea, that’s why RE5 and RE6 turned out the way they did – designed to run on systems with multiple players and they ended up settling for ‘cheap arcade-like’ quality in order to do it. Heck, ALAN WAKE (touted Directx10 uber-game) eventually turned into an arcade-like RE4 clone.
By the way, there IS already a remake of Resident Evil 4, and it is called THE EVIL WITHIN. And that also kind of shows an alt-world vision of a Resident Evil franchise AND entire console generations that promised too much with survival horror games, and then could never quite deliver on until perhaps RE7/Alien Isolation. I like Evil Within.
(And then of course RE F**ked it up again by going back to ‘arcade horror-expansion route’ with RE:Village by taking better tech and blurting out more of the same with it).
Newsflash – Cramped dark and spooky corridors are spooky because they managed to be well rendered – like how Silent Hill’s drawdistance limitation is its defining feature.
3D Graphics were always going to be hit-and-miss with Resident Evil. is a miracle that RE4 even managed to turn out how it did and that was a combination of many developmental retries and kind of following SEGA Dreamcast’s legacy of polished games & attention to detail met with arcade sensibilities.
Nice name, I like it.
I actually did a bit of research into the development of RE5 since I at first believed it was meant to be single-player as well, but all I find is assumptions and speculation but nothing from Capcom. What I can find from Capcom indicates that “partners” was going to be a theme very early on. Similarly, the developers came out and noted that Sheva was there from an early stage. She wasn’t in the first or second trailers because her character model was incomplete, or so they claimed. At the same time, early on she was designed as an NPC rather than a playable character. This doesn’t rule out that co-op was always planned, but it doesn’t support it either.
What I do know is that the game underwent a lot of changes, including the motivations of Chris and its villain. For example, Chris was supposed to be exhausted with the war on terror at this point and beginning to question if it was worth fighting anymore. This would be abandoned for RE5 and somewhat modified for use in Resident Evil 6. The antagonist’s feelings would be similar, but his motivation was to blow everything up rather than… what it becomes (trying to avoid certain spoilers just in case).
It’s hard to find real in-depth info about RE5, unlike the origins of Devil May Cry as the originally planned RE4 but becoming its own thing, and then RE4’s many different transformations. Something else to consider is that Keiji Inafune was a pretty big name in Capcom at the time, and from his perspective Japan was no longer making the best games and was falling behind Japan. It is possible the push for co-op was his idea (he similarly was producer and had his name on games like Lost Planet, whose sequel would also be co-op centric, and Dead Rising, which took place in America with American characters and was heavily inspired by Dawn of the Dead). He was also quoted as discussing more Japanese companies needed to work with and outsource to foreign developers, which is what led to Capcom taking on projects like Dark Void and the Bionic Commando reboot. It was after his departure and after seeing too many failures that Capcom backed away from outsourcing and changed focus.
I suppose what I’m saying is there was a lot of stuff going on in Capcom, and a desire to differentiate RE5 from its predecessor while also trying to maintain global appeal was one of those things.
The one thing they technically did emphasize was that Fear the Daylight, though not in a solid thematic way (especially as it’s only true in the earlier portions of the game). There was a lot of emphasis by Capcom on the lighting engine, which tried to change based on how one’s pupils dilate and adjust to quantity of light. So if you’re outside and look into a cave mouth or a doorway, it looks completely dark inside and you can’t see anything. But once you step inside, things begin to get more clear. On the other hand, it looks unreasonably bright outside. These were impressive changes and advancements in their tech, but it didn’t really impact gameplay that much.
In the end, who knows what could have been if they chose to make it a single player game. At the same time, I can’t agree with your assessment of Resident Evil Village in full due to how much I enjoy it. Am I frightened of where the story could go from there? Oh yes, naturally. It could get way stupid. But man, I’ve played through that game several times and it’s fun each time. But that’s also the problem: if you want Resident Evil to be a Horror Game first and only a Horror game, then you’ll always be disappointed. We’re talking about a franchise where you kill the final boss with a rocket launcher. It was pretty much tradition for a while there. There’s always been action-horror elements. It’s just changed over time.
I understand having a preference for one over the other, but given how many pure horror games there are now, isn’t it time to just accept that Resident Evil will always be action-horror? RE7 was, too, for the most part.
I’m of a similar mind regarding Village. I’ve seen some complaints about it being short compared to 7, and some rumbling about stability issues with the PC version (apparently it has 2 different DRM systems layered on top of each other so they trip on each other’s toes, causing hanging/stuttering issues), but otherwise it seems to have been very well received. Thank You’s implication that it’s counted as a failure is… strange.
One thing I really love about 8 is how on the heels of 7 it establishes a new dynamic of the series becoming a sort of quasi-anthology of riffs on classic horror subgenres. 7 is RE in “hillbilly cannibal clan” cosplay, and 8 is in “Transylvania gothic”. Both of which were executed very well as loving pastiches of those respective genres, while still being true to the series’s own “bioweapon shenanigans” identity underneath.
I love this, both in it’s own right, and as a way of making the franchise fresh again after years of it swallowing its own tail in increasing loops/layers. I though it was a brilliant idea from the moment 8 was first revealed, and am still excited to see what horror subgenre they do next (really crossing my fingers they don’t abandon this direction only 2 games in).
FYI they removed Denuvo from the game after Digital Foundry and others released videos about it. That fixed the stuttering issue, and I bought it then.
Interesting. It still has the “uses Denuvo” curator flag on Steam, but maybe that just hasn’t been updated. I’ll have to look closer. Thanks!
Looking into it further, it appears that Denuvo hasn’t been removed, they just “adjusted” how it worked so it’d conflict less with the Capcom DRM.
Looks like there’s still a VRAM leak causing problems as well.
Something I’m hoping Resident Evil does soon (whether it winds up as a setting in RE9, RE10 or, maybe, Revelations 3) is an infested NASCAR track, finally bringing in the long discarded Elza Walker character into the official canon, even if only as an NPC. (Yes, Elza as either THE playable character or A playable character would be nice, but I’m just talking about minimum expectation.)
I really enjoyed RE Village, and I thought it was precisely because it has no pretense of being anything else. I remember RE5 trying to sell itself as a horror game, which was preposterous, and some people have some very selective memories about the first game, so they seem to believe it was straight horror at some point, but it was always silly b-horror style.
And in any case, Village is one of the very few entries with some legitimately scary moments.
Honestly the thing I hated the most for a game that involved multiplayer is that whoever is playing player 2 ends up with their over the shoulder camera angle done for the left hand. No one ever plays that way and being the second player forced into that immediately makes first impressions terrible.
If Chris doesn’t want to play RE6, there’s also Revelations and Revelations 2?
Hi Shamus,
Thanks you for a measured response to my previous comment.
Would you consider playing RE4 VR? I just finished it and it’s an interesting experience. Then I tried playing the “flat” version and was astounded by the clunkiness of the controls. It’s my ignorance, I somehow thought that since it looks like a TPP game, it controls like one. I knew about “can’t move while aiming” bullshit, but it’s much worse – in RE4 you cannot even strafe! What???? When you turn the left stick left or right, Leon rotates, not strafes. This made my mind explode.
Also the camera control on the right stick is weird because you have some sort od “bounding box”, i.e. you cannot use right stick to turn 360 degress, because at one point you get to the “edge” of the box and will not move futher.
The FOV was also extremely narrow and suffocating, luckily there’s a mod that improves it.
There’s a rumored RE4 remake in the making, I hope they remake the controls too, they did not age well.
I am fully preprared for RE ultras to try and convince me that this control scheme is game’s DNA and cannot be ever changed.
My second suggestion for you is playing It Takes Two, preferably with Heather :)
Regards,
Simplex
RE5 is the same. They didn’t add strafe controls until RE6. It takes getting used to it, but the controls are like that on purpose. They only seem clunky if you expect a different kind of game. The cramped controls in tight spaces and lack of camera freedom helps maintain a sense of claustrophobia that cannot be achieved when you have complete freedom of control. All RE games have been like that from the start. They got rid of that when they went full action, but that didn’t last either.
Add all of the things you ask for and the game becomes ridiculously easy. Even in a more action-focused game in the series like RE4 was there was still a need to establish a sense of loneliness that cannot possibly exist when you play as a one-man-army action hero. This isn’t Gears of War.
“This isn’t Gears of War.”
Tell that to whoever designed Chris Redfield’s character model.
The truth is that RE5 has no idea what it wants to be.
Is it trying to scare me with zombies? The ultra-macho military protagonist suggests not.
Is it trying to be empowering? The awful-on-purpose-is-still-awful controls say probably not.
Is it trying to tell a dramatic story? The outrageously preposterous Wesker scenes say NO.
Is it trying to be a “comedy” like RE5? The pervasive imagery of literally the poorest people on Earth suffering at the hands of BioTerrorism says I’m not supposed to be laughing.
I find the entire series to feel like a typical Bollywood movie: A constant shift between incompatible moods that leaves western audiences amused and baffled.
OK, but yet again you’re judging the entire series based on the couple of games you’ve played, which happen to be the silliest ones. Like I mentioned up there, RE is basically b-horror, which tends to be campier rather than actually scarier, but most of the entries in the franchise are considerably more serious (or, at the very least, with a more homogeneous tone rather than the constant radical shift from the 4th-6th games).
I know RE5 is preposterous. I’m not defending the game. Read the file I linked to up there if you want to see my critique of it. I’m simply pointing out that the game’s controls are, for better or worse, a choice made for difficulty.
Look, I’m perfectly fine if you never want to play the rest of the games in the series based on your experience with these few ones. That’s a perfectly reasonable course of action. People keep telling me Final Fantasy XV is a lot of fun, but after my experiences with a few previous titles in the series I’ve decided not to keep engaging with the franchise. But I don’t go around forming an opinion on the entries I haven’t played.
Gears of War was inspired by RE4, and RE5 came out 4 years after Gears of War was successful… so yea RE5 is basically Japanese Gears of War.
I’m starting to think that the mystery behind RE5’s development is that they looked at Street Fighter 4’s Stage plans and basically copied the layout. So there’s Africa Stage, Industrial Stage, Lava Stage etc. Wesker is basically like M.Bison (or ‘Vega’ for those across the sea) and Chris Redfield breaks boulders with the power of spirit like he is Ryu. It’s funny because Chris was likely the LEAST played character in the franchise. In the first game he is basically ‘Hard Mode’ built into a character, and he only pops up during the second half of RE:Code Veronica. I’d challenge anyone to say that they remember their time playing as Chris more than Claire, Jill, Leon etc.
Not to mention the obvious RESIDENT EVIL PAUL W.S ADERSON MOVIE STYLE CROSS-CONTAMINATION that started happening. You can see Resident Evil 4 running into the corner away from The Matrix and pulling out the old VHS collection of Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Rambo, and anything else not related to the late 90s or early 2000s.
Also they did Jill Valentine BAAAD in RE5. I have probably ranted about this before, and I think they likely started doing that excess Matrix-Fetishism in RE5 so they could later have an excuse to double down on it with the movies.
The Lickers are clearly in RE5 because it makes people think of the CGI monsters of the first Resident Evil movie.
RE5 came out on a console generation (Xbox 360/PS3) that seems defined by mostly homogenised third/first person gameplay standards and not many memorable non-action focused horror or survival horror games. Probably inspired by many magazine-led rants and discussions about backtracking being ‘wrong’ for gaming somehow. Then Dark Souls came out and suddenly backtracking and Metroidvanias were all the rage again. Backtracking is now so popular that ‘time loops’ are the epitome of if. Dark Souls basically is Resident MediEvil, right down to the blood red ‘You Died’ font.
What Resident Evil needs is a proper Metroidvania attempt. Heck, I’d probably play the RE2 Remake Ad infinitum if they juuuust added support for a more randomised item layout, monster placement etc etc once the standard game (speedrunner mode – yes I’ve done it) was beaten. As it stands, missing out on developing that seems like a wasted opportunity.
“Add all of the things you ask for and the game becomes ridiculously easy.”
I played the VR version where you have first person perspective and absolute freedom of movement – strafing, moving while shooting, the works. And the game was still difficult for me, I barely scraped by, I always managed to get by by the skin of my teeth, I died multiple times, both from mooks and the bosses. So I disagree that it makes thre game ridiculously easy – perhapes the makers of the VR version (who were assisted by capcom, BTW) took that control scheme change into account and upped the difficulty, but I doubt it.
Also as far as I remember that game had dynamic difficulty, so wouldn’t that kick in if the game became “ridiculously easy”?
And while these controls would pass muster 17 years ago, in 2022 they are outdated and archaic. Which means I accept them for what they are because I am aware that I am playing a 2005 game, but I fully expect modernised controls from the rumored RE4 remake.
It’s nothing personal, but I’ve always hated this excuse. To me, Resident Evil’s controls are the opposite of immersive, the opposite of scary, and directly detract from the games’ good points.
When I’m controlling an ostensibly awesome secret agent / cop / action hero, who’s struggling to fight a zombie that my grandmother could outmaneuver in real life, it’s just annoying. I’m not getting hurt because *I* messed up, it’s that my character handles like an overloaded supermarket trolley and seems incapable of making simple movements that I could do with my eyes shut.
I’m willing to believe it’s deliberate. But I’m less sure it’s for ‘horror’ reasons – the cynical part of me wonders if slow-moving enemies that telegraph their attacks are either easy to program, or something that can be ported over from previous games.
(Not that I have any proof of this, of course…)
I’ve played quite a few other survival / horror games that allow the player more movement. They still managed to be scary – but of course, the enemies are smarter, and faster moving too.
It also struck me that RE4 has no dodge/roll mechanics. So you tell me it’s on purpose that a top agent Leon Kennedy cannot even dodge an atack? Not to mention parry.
Funnily enough, I’m a fan of the Pre-4 Resident Evil controls but for the opposite reason: Given the very specific constraints of the time, tank controls are good, actually. The about-face button introduced in RE:0 was long overdue, though.
Simple answer: Legacy Support for single D-Pad controllers. And the design of the Gamecube controller.
Tank Controls work with the fixed camera angles of the original games and the non-analogue stick controllers that were around at the time. If you play with the ‘Modern’ controls in the HD ports of the classic RE games then it causes a sort of ‘rubber banding’ effect while moving and the character both turns on a dime and catapults all over the place, whereas with the old controls if you press the forward direction then you remain going forward, which is good for stability.
So, for example, you can even play an action oriented Resident Evil 4 and 5 with an ARCADE STICK!!!
RE5 has options to turn strafing on and off built in to its control types.
I’ve done it with an Arcade Stick and it works! Aiming is manageable. Sometimes I don’t want to use keyboard for quick time events, and I also had a graveyard of normal Xbox 360 PS3 Controllers over the years. Using simple controllers is something you just cannot do with modern controls of RE6 or other games. It would also be difficult to play Dead Space without dual sticks. Theoretically you could control Leon from RE4 on something like a Nintendo 64 Controller also.
It is a shame really that Dark Souls is SO CLOSE to working on an arcade stick out of the gate, except that it also relies on the use of two sticks to turn around. It might be possible to simulate that with buttons (or touchpad – Steam Button mapping) but it would require thinking up a whole new custom button scheme and I haven’t bothered yet.
Ah, yes, I forgot the first games predate dual-analog as a standard. The “fixed-camera third person” thing is what sells it for me; nowadays, when even console players are used to “right stick to move the camera” (and PC players will find this sort of thing even less necessary) then people rightfully won’t stand for it.
I played the original RE:2 when it was still relatively new and I actively prefer the tank controls for stuff like this hallway compared to a “good” control scheme.
Yeah, dodging Zombies with quickturn or ‘modern turning’ equates to leaving your back exposed and turning into them! It is unlikely that people would do that IRL. No police officer is going to admit to quick turning away from a drunken assailant, leaving their back exposed.
The old scheme means you can press backwards while still remaining forwards…
…Which is something you cannot easily do in RE2Remake since to avoid a lunge a ‘Quick-Snap-Turn’ has to be done which is not even remotely the same as pushing back to run backwards… where you turn but swing your back into danger then cannot see what is now in front of the character!!! – thereby playing a disembodied camera controlling a character.
That and actually use Defense Items against the Tyrant. I loaded up an old save from way back in the RE1(Make) boss fight and it turns out if he is about to grab-kill, defense items work. I NEVER KNEW THAT BEFORE! (Never got in that situation).
… but in RE2Remake Leon’s scenario that final lunge is supposed to be a final run-killer and I don’t really appreciate it. Sometimes my framerate sucks and the shot doesn’t register, or other times the defense item I throw goes off too early – or fractionally TOO LATE! In fact the only time I have really successfully avoided that damn attack is by being behind the rubble that appears. It is a final gambit from a tired old boss that kills more than Dark Souls.
I have none of these problems in RE4 whatsoever…
(but hardest difficulty RE5 Boat Boss QTEs be damned!… I think they’re supposed to be either really hard or cheesed by unlocking the Rocket Launcher from speedrunning).
Just another of those little things that gets overlooked because the boss fight designs in RE2Remake seem halfway along to something like Umbrella Corps or RE6. Dead Space bosses are probably a little bit more solid in that regard. – I can’t remember many of them, but I can remember that a lot of RE2/RE3Remake bosses effectively copy the style of obvious glowing weak point.
Quick Turning has been around since original RE3 on PS1.
So Code Veronica then had it, as did the RE1 remake.
Quick Turn was not new by RE0. Really, not much was new about RE0 at all – it’s like a sideways expansion of the RE1 remake… and had been in development as a PS1/N64 era Resi. It is all classic Resi albeit with two characters at the same time instead of one. The gamecube ‘c-stick’ or basically second analogue stick allowed for manual control of the second character (although could be done without it so again technically playable on an Arcade Stick).
Oh, wow…did…did I somehow play CV without ever noticing that? Dang.
Probably also something to do with framerate at the time. 30FPS is should be considered a curse in any language.
Regarding controls, if you take Metal Gear Solid as a counterpoint example of opposites, well those controls were basically what people claim to crave as ‘modern’ yet they are very FLOATY. Proper positioning outside of wall-hugging is very difficult. I love MGS1 but even at the time as a kid I would consider that the setup with what is effectively character auto-turning makes for some frustrating gameplay because of the lack of weight to the movement (final fights especially). It has taken MANY YEARS and arguably taken until MGSV to really get the system right (and because MGSV ‘Stealth’ is practically for babies compared to the master-like complexity of MGS3). You can almost see the deliberate shifts in control mechanisms in MGS4’s final fight being like an apology for how wonky MGS1-3 final fights can be at times.
And I defy anyone to say that they don’t secretly miss the original Tomb Raider style control scheme (also playable on Arcade stick) where traversal is actually precarious and requires thought to it. I love the updated climbing in Tomb Raider Legend as much as the next person, but still yearn for an actually complicated Tomb Raider game (TR: Underworld was close).
Uncharted + Tomb Raider 2013 were not that. Uncharted is quaintly simple, generic to control because it was released with the intention of being as mainstream as possible. Sticky-Auto-Cover-Based third person shooters that plagued us for years were INVENTED because floaty dual analogue controls on a Third Person Character while not slow-walk-aiming would lead to crappy positioning problems in a 3D space.
Take 2D fighters as an example also where Mortal Kombat Characters have been notoriously finicky. Street Fighter also but I now love the fast pace – but they still don’t have that sense of weight to them (used to prefer 3D fighters like Tekken and Soul Calibur but now like all sorts).
Now all we need is a proper Metal Gear Solid Namco/Tekken/Soul Calibur Style Fighting game with Mortal Kombat type special moves + projectile attacks and everything will be fine.
I never played RE5, but I compared notes with a friend who did. They prefer female protagonists and so played as Sheva instead of Chris. The result was that the AI partner wasn’t only as dumb as dogshit, but took up 5/8ths of the screen whenever they got closer than 15ft.