Released: February 2019 Originally Released: February 2000 Developer: Capcom Production Studio 4 Also Available For: Dreamcast, PlayStation 2, GameCube, PlayStation 3, and Xbox One
The Background: After redefining the survival/horror genre with Resident Evil (Capcom, 1996), Capcom were under pressure to release ports of their popular franchise onto consoles other than Sony’s PlayStation. Unable to get a port of Resident Evil 2(ibid, 1998) for SEGA’s ill-fated Dreamcast off the ground, and with Sony claiming first-dibs on Resident Evil’s next numbered sequel, producer Shinji Mikami opted to develop two concurrent Resident Evil sequels. While Resident Evil 3: Nemesis (ibid, 1999) continued the story of Jill Valentine and was, largely, simply a side-story to Resident Evil 2, Resident Evil – Code: Veronica reunited Claire Redfield with her brother, Chris, and utilised the superior processing power of the Dreamcast to diverge what was quickly become a stale narrative formula into a more global story.
The Plot: Three months after escaping the destruction of Raccoon City, Claire Redfield is captured and imprisoned on Rockfort Island while attempting to reunite with her brother, Chris. After an outbreak of the Tyrant-Virus (T-Virus), Claire soon finds herself teaming up with a fellow inmate, Steve Burnside, and once again battling through hoards of zombies and the malevolent Umbrella Corporation’s Bio-Organic Weapons (BOWs) in a desperate attempt to survive.
Gameplay: Code: Veronica features exactly the same survival/horror gameplay as its predecessors; players once again utilise “tank controls” to navigate Claire, Steve, and Chris through a number of environments but, like in Nemesis, players can now pull back on the analogue stick while pressing A to perform a quick 180-degree turn, which makes dodging BOWs and attacks far easier.
Item management is key to your survival.
As is the tried-and-true Resident Evil formula, players must pick up files and notes to flesh out the game’s story and earn hints as well as collect and combine weapons, ammunition, key items, and healing times (herbs and first-aid sprays) in order to progress. It is crucial to your survival to be constantly aware of your environment and your resources as running out of ammo or herbs can be the difference between life and death. Players can store their items in Item Boxes, which are generally located in safe areas where players can restock and save their progress using an Ink Ribbon and a typewriter. You’ll need to make frequent use of these rooms in order to tackle the game’s puzzles, which can be as simple as moving crates and as complex as risking your life to crush a glass sphere under a massive weighted block.
You’ll get to play as this asshole a couple of times…
Unlike the first two Resident Evil’s, but almost exactly as in Nemesis, Code: Veronica sees players jump between different playable characters as they progress through the story. You begin as Claire trying to escape the zombie outbreak on Rockfort Island but also take control of the irritating Steve at one point, before switching to Chris about halfway through the game. Like in previous games, each have different skills that help them progress (Claire has a lock pick, for example) and players can choose to help out their sibling by clearing areas of enemies or leaving weapons or items behind for them to acquire.
Graphics and Sound: Unlike its predecessors, Code: Veronica ditches the classic pre-rendered backgrounds for three-dimensional environments that are rendered in real-time; this means that, while there are still some examples of fixed-camera angles, Code: Veronica features the most dynamic and cinematic camera the series had ever seen at that point. This works fantastically with the game’s incorporation of new, foreign locations for its story; while many of the game’s environments will be familiar to Resident Evil veterans (mansions, underground facilities, sewers and the like), you’ll also travel to the frozen wastelands of Antarctica and visit some gothic-inspired locales, though the “HD” makeover isn’t anywhere near as extensive as it has been in recent Resident Evil renovations.
Claire is suddenly a bullet-time bad-ass…
Thanks to the power of the Dreamcast, Code: Veronica not only features a much higher level of detail in character models, faces, and zombie details but also steps up the game’s use of CG cutscenes, which specifically portray Claire in a far more capable and tougher light than she appeared in Resident Evil 2. Just as Leon S. Kennedy jumped from a relatively competent rookie street cop in Resident Evil 2 to a martial arts superspy in Resident Evil 4 (Capcom Production Studio 4, 2005) with little in-game explanation, Claire is suddenly dodging bullets (from a helicopter, no less!) and performing grandiose, bullet-time actions. The game also features a foreboding soundtrack that echoes those of its predecessors; a lot of the time, areas are devoid of music, meaning all you can hear is the shuffle of rotting feet, the moaning of zombies, or the ominous growling of some unspeakable mutation. Subtle, soothing tunes let you know when you’re in a safe area and the dramatic score kicks in as monsters attack and dies down once they’re defeated, which is all standard fair for these early Resident Evil titles.
Enemies and Bosses: Code: Veronica features a lot of the standard enemies you’ve come to expect from a Resident Evil title; you’ll mainly encounter rotting, bloody zombies who shuffle about, claw along the floor, or burst through windows in their droves. There’s possibly the most variety in the zombies’ appearance here, though, as there’s reanimated corpses from a cemetery, naked zombies in a sauna, zombies with little worker hats, vomiting zombies, frozen zombies, and even zombies with glowing eyes like Albert Wesker. Speaking of which, Code: Veronica inexplicably returned Wesker to the series after he was skewered into ribbons of bloody flesh in the first Resident Evil; while you don’t get to fight Wesker here, he is heavily involved in the game’s plot, which revolves around Alfred and Alexia Ashford developing a new T-Virus strain.
I’m seeing a few similarities here…
The T-Veronica Virus offers a variety of additional BOWs for players to contend with; some will be familiar, like the deadly Hunters and giant spiders, and others are new, like the Tremors (Underwood, 1990) inspired Gulp Worm and Code: Veronica’s most persistent new enemy, the Bandersnatch, which can grab you from afar with its stretchy, clawed arms and will leap and haul tiself around the environment to get at you.
Good luck hitting this fucking thing!
You’ll also battle some messed up, multi-formed bosses that owe more than a small debt to John Carpenter’s The Thing (Carpenter, 1982); there’s a particularly gruelling close-quarters fight with a Tyrant in a plane, the blind, spider-limbed Nosferatu (who can swipe you right off a helipad and must be awkwardly shot at with a sniper rifle during a blizzard), Steve’s transformation into a hulking, axe-wielding frog-like creature that can only be ran from, and Alexia’s mutation from an insectile creature that flings flaming blood at you, bulges out into a grotesque, bug-spewing monstrosity, and finally ends up as a dragonfly-like annoyance that will take not only your best weapons (usually the Magnum) but also the unwieldy Linear Launcher to defeat.
Power-Ups and Bonuses: In true Resident Evil fashion, you can find additional and more powerful weapons as you play and explore your environments; both Chris and Claire can obtain an assault rifle, dual-wield submachine guns, the go-to fan favourite shotgun, and a grenade launcher with four different types of ammo while also being able to upgrade their base pistol to a burst fire mode or improve its power, respectively.
Additional Features: Players can unlock a couple of bonuses through gameplay. Completing the game unlocks “Battle Mode”, a time attack survival mode where you must battle hordes of enemies with infinite ammo and lets you pick between third- and first-person perspectives. You can unlock not only Steve but also Wesker for use in this mode and, as you might expect, finishing the game with an S-rank unlocks an infinite rocket launcher for your use. There’s also a handful of Achievements you can attain but, as this was originally an Xbox 360 title, they’re mostly tied to gameplay progression rather than Easter eggs or obscure actions on the player’s part.
The Summary: Resident Evil – Code: Veronica X is about as classic a Resident Evil title as you can get; it hits all of the beats you would expect from Capcom’s survival/horror franchise while also expanding its scope beyond the confines of Raccoon City for the first time. Narratively, this is also where the series begins to kind of fall of a cliff as the plot suddenly becomes far more dense, layered, and convoluted and shifts towards a focus on Wesker’s evil ambitions and away from a faceless corporation’s machinations. Yet, for as good as it is, Code: Veronica doesn’t really offer anything new; despite the benefits offered by the Dreamcast, the game is firmly entrapped in the gameplay mechanics and restrictions of the series, meaning that it’s more a case of the same-old, same-old rather than offering the fresh take on the series we’d see in Resident Evil 4. However, for those (like me) who were disappointed with the brevity of Resident Evil 3: Nemesis and like jumping back into a traditional survival/horror title, there’s enough here to sustain your interest and engagement, though you’ll most likely soon forget the experience once you jump to one of its successor titles.
My Rating:
⭐⭐
Rating: 2 out of 5.
Could Be Better
What are your thoughts on Resident Evil – Code: Veronica X? Did you play the original Dreamcast title or, like me, discover it through one of its many ports? Would you like to see an HD remaster of this title as well or do you think that it’s best left as it is? Sound off in the comments and come back for more Resident Evil content coming soon.
With Resident Evil VII: Biohazard (Capcom, 2017), I’ve finally reached the end of the big pile of Resident Evil ibid, 1996 to present) titles I got for Christmas. I was making decent progress in the game but kept getting distracted with life, work, and other games but, now that I’ve finally finished one of the most lauded Resident Evil titles ever made, the question is: does the game live up to the hype? After the absolute, balls-to-the-wall action-heavy approach they turned the franchise into in Resident Evil 6 (ibid, 2012), Capcom decided to answer their critics and bring the survival-horror aspects of Resident Evil back to the series but with a twist: this time, it’s in first-person!
Not gonna lie but I struggle with first-person perspective…
This was a bit of a hurdle for me right off the bat as, traditionally, I don’t really get on too well with first-person videogames, primarily because I don’t like being attacked from behind and I find them to be uncomfortable to play at times. Like, I enjoy the dread and constant tension the perspective offers here and in other, similar games but, when you’re just trying to have a bit of a casual play, it can be draining to be constantly on edge and first-person perspective can hamper controls, combat, and camera angles at times.
The charming Baker family invite you to dinner…
However, Resident Evil VII: Biohazard utilises its new perspective to great effect as players take on the role of Ethan Winters; unlike other Resident Evil protagonists, Ethan’s just…a guy…nothing special. He’s been drawn to an abandoned house in search of his wife, Mia, who has apparently taken a bit of a turn for the worst. After he’s attacked and has his hand cut off, Ethan is left at the mercy of the mental Baker family, a bunch of messed up back-water hillbillies who make the Texas Chain Saw Massacre’s (Hooper, 1974) family look normal. With his hand reattached by staples (…just go with it) and forced to cobble together items to survive and find a way out of the booby-trapped house, Ethan is relentlessly pursued by Jack Baker, who smashes through walls and attacks without mercy, repeatedly coming back from severe trauma and injury to torment you again and again as he absorbs blows, shrugs off bullets, and your supplies dwindle away to nothing.
The Molded are viscious buggers, far from your typical zombie fodder!
As Ethan progresses, solving puzzles, battling the bullet-sponge monstrosities known as the “Molded”, and exploring the Baker’s estate, he comes across Zoe Baker, who offers to help cure Mia by developing a serum to combat the infection that has warped her family. The source of the infection turns out to be a young girl, Eveline, who can control the minds of others, and Ethan is eventually forced to battle her in her monstrous final form. Resident Evil VII: Biohazard is unlike every other Resident Evil title before it. Sure, some tropes remain (Item Boxes, herbs, having to manually save (though using a cassette player rather than a typewriter), limited supplies, and a claustrophobic atmosphere) but, aside from some brief last minute (literally the very last minute) references to the previous titles, this looks and plays like an entirely different game. It’s a shocking departure, even more so than when the series switched to an over-the-shoulder, slightly more action-orientated approach in Resident Evil 4 (Capcom Production Studio 4, 2005); it seems that, every time Capcom wants to spice up their survival-horror franchise, a dramatic shift into another genre generally does the trick as long as there’s some restraint placed on the player to emphasise the survival aspects.
Things get very large and very ugly by Resident Evil VII‘s end…
Resident Evil VII: Biohazard definitely emphasises this aspect as supplies are criminally low; it’s not really enough to have a herb anymore as it’s far more beneficial to also pick up some Chem Fluid to restore more health (as in other recent Resident Evil titles, this can be done with the touch of a button). This extends to ammo as well, as Ethan can combine different objects to create more, or new, ammo combinations. However, there’s never enough to truly feel comfortable in combat; the Molded take multiple shots (even from a good, old fashioned shotgun blast), forcing you to think strategically about when to fight, when to flee, and how to plan your route around enemies when a swarm turns up. Resident Evil VII: Biohazard’s bosses have quite a bit of variety; you start off desperately battling to survive as Jack Baker relentlessly attacks you with an axe or a chainsaw, progress to blasting a giant, slimy creature with the traditional giant red eyes, and end up blasting an enormous, pissed off woman right in the face. The first-person perspective makes these boss battles particularly intense as it doesn’t lend itself to the game’s limited combat; it’s tough to see where a boss is when its scurrying around you, even tougher to get a good shot off, and tricky to pull off sudden, quick-time event-like moments when you’re busy trying to get your vision lined up.
Trust nothing when it comes to Lucas’ escape rooms…
Once you’re made it through the main campaign, you can take on a variety of additional modes. Not A Hero follows series staple Chris Redfield (once again completely redesigned and working for the now-benevolent Umbrella Corporation) as he battles through the game’s last area to (what else!) a secret laboratory while End of Zoe follows Joe Baker, a slightly more hinged member of the Baker family who uses his apparently-superhuman strength to smash apart Molded and find a cure for Zoe. You can also race against the clock and blast the Molded to feed Jack in Jack’s 55th Birthday, face death again and again in the impossibly-difficult Ethan Must Die, and take on a few other similar survival modes. Despite its dramatically new approach, Resident Evil VII: Biohazard feels a lot like the original Resident Evil in many ways, mainly in its atmosphere and aesthetics. Like the original title, doors are arbitrarily locked by themed keys, Ethan must solve puzzles to open new areas (or to escape death traps set-up by Lucas Baker that more than resemble the Saw (Various, 2004 to present) films), and combat is an intense, strategic action.
You’re never short on horror in Resident Evil VII.
It was an interesting experiment by Capcom to use the restrictive first-person perspective to enforce the survival-horror aspect in a new, exciting way; it’s not exactly unique, as there’s lots of first-person games that take a similar approach, but it definitely worked to shift the franchise back towards survival-horror. Having played this before and after Resident Evil 2 (Capcom R&D Division 1, 2019), it’s clear that Capcom took a lot of the lessons they learned in developing Resident Evil VII: Biohazard and applied them to their remake. While I doubt that Capcom would ever use them in a full game again, I actually wouldn’t be averse to seeing first-person sequences return in future Resident Evil titles (maybe as side quests similar to the videotape flashbacks seen in this game); however, the important thing here is that the tense, atmospheric horror is retained and, given how well Capcom did in applying this atmosphere to Resident Evil 2, we should hopefully be in for some gory, engaging, terrifying Resident Evil titles once more thanks, largely, to Resident Evil VII: Biohazard.
So there’s been a bit of a delay in my playing and completing of the Xbox One Resident Evil (Capcom, 1996 to present) titles due to life and the release of Resident Evil 2 (Capcom R&D Division 1, 2019) but I finally played through and completed Resident Evil 6 (Capcom, 2012). Resident Evil 6 is the culmination of the more action-orientated approach the series took from Resident Evil 4 (Capcom Production Studio 4, 2005); while Leon S. Kennedy went solo in that title and played babysitter to the otherwise-useless Ashley Graham, players were forced to constantly play in co-op, either with a friend or with a questionable AI, in Resident Evil 5(Capcom, 2009), a title which also upped the action-centric focus of the franchise.
Chris and Leon get into a bit of a dick-measuring contest…
Resident Evil 6 continues down this route but expands upon it in numerous ways; the most obvious is the amount of playable characters available. Players can choose from four campaign modes, three of which follow the same mechanic of the Resident Evil: Revelations(ibid, 2012; 2015) games and lumber classic Resident Evil characters with a new companion. Players can pick between playing as Leon and Helena Harper of the Secret Service agent, Chris Redfield and BSAA grunt Piers Nivans, Albert Wesker’s son, Jake Muller, who teams up with the returning Sherry Birkin, now a member of the Division of Security Operations, or go it (mostly) alone as Ada Wong. Each character has their own narrative to follow and, as you play through each campaign, you will visit the same locations as other characters, though sometimes at different times, encounter some of the same enemies, and interact with the other character’s stories at various points. This results in perhaps the most complex and connected Resident Evil story ever; you’ll play a lot of the story events out of order so it’s only by playing through each campaign will you truly get a sense of what’s going down.
Things go to hell when another virus is unleashed…
Essentially, though, it’s the same Resident Evil storyline you’re familiar with only with everything ramped up to eleven and taken to the extreme; a terrorist group known as Neo-Umbrella, apparently under the direction of Ada, develops a brand new virus, the C-virus, and unleashes it at various locations across the globe, causing people to turn into zombies, grotesque mutations, or enter a chrysalis and become these weird, insect-like creatures. Each of the characters pursues different goals in service of ending this threat: Leon and Helena find themselves framed for the murder of the President (who had become a zombie) by Neo-Umbrella affiliate (and National Security Advisor) Derek Simmons and fight to reveal Simmons’ role in the whole conspiracy; Chris and Piers relentlessly pursue Ada after she wiped out their platoon; Jake finds himself recruited by Sherry to bring down Neo-Umbrella because he happens to be carrying the anti-virus to the C-Virus in his blood and they are pursed by Neo-Umbrella’s Usantank; and Ada sneaks around aiding the other characters at various points, obtaining data and information, and uncovering the origins of her imposter.
It’s quite the twisting narrative, to be sure. To differentiate each campaign, the characters all receive slightly different HUDs, weapons, and melee attacks; Leon can duel wield pistols, for example, while Jake can switch to an unarmed mode to pummel enemies. Every character can use melee attacks, however, to stun enemies and set them up for instant kill moves or knock downs but these all drain a stamina meter that can only be filled by standing still. Disappointingly, and somewhat strangely, Jake has this meter and I didn’t really notice it refilling faster than any other characters; I kind of expected Wesker’s son, who is portrayed as this tough, semi-superhuman badass, to have an unlimited stamina meter, especially as he has less weapons to begin with. Another slightly annoying aspect of the weaponry is that the knife is back to being an equippable weapon, so you can’t shoot enemies and then switch to slashing and stabbing with a simple shoulder button press like in Resident Evil 4 and 5, which seems like a step backwards to me.
The HUDs look different but the gameplay is mostly identical.
Also a step backwards is the inventory interface; while other Resident Evil titles favour a grid-like system that clearly displays all your items and weapons, Resident Evil 6 opts for a linear interface that makes selecting a weapon far more time consuming, switching to a sub-weapon (like a grenade) feel very rushed, and forces you to combine herbs into pills and then store them in a pill case. While this means you can recover health at the push of a button, the entire interface makes it very difficult to juggle your inventory; I was playing for most of Leon’s story before I realised that the inventory isn’t unlimited, which it appeared to be, so you have to be constantly reloading every weapon and combining those herbs, which gets especially complicated when your pill case can only hold so much. All this serves to slow the gameplay down quite a bit, at points, or make combat very stressful as you’ll be desperately scrolling through the inventory to select a different weapon or combine your herbs so you can heal. This is also quite complicated and time consuming as, when you press the button to eat a herb pill, your characters will enter into a short animation where they pop the pill out and swallow it and you’ll only regain health once this animation is complete; I was killed quite a few times during this animation, which was very frustrating. Also frustrating is that pressing the button only restores one block of health; you’ll need to press it multiple times to recover enough health to actually have an impact on your gameplay.
Your partner is actually quite useful for taking out enemies.
Luckily, your partner is always on hand to aid you in these times of crisis; while you can’t swap and change items like in Resident Evil 5, the partner AI will still come over and help you if you get knocked down and are near death and their ammo appears to be unlimited, which can be useful in tough battles. What isn’t useful, though, is how unbelievably weak all of the characters are; it’ll only take a few bites from a zombie to sap all of your health to one measly block; enemy gunfire and attacks also have a really annoying habit of knocking you to the floor, forcing you to crawl around on your back trying to unload a shot and get to safety. The enemies are quite varied, which is nice; you’ll get the usual zombies, of course, but some of the weirder mutations, similar to those seen in the Revelations games, have deadly weaponry merged into their anatomy, like a particularly nasty chainsaw-armed asshole. Similar to Revelations 2, though, a lot of the intermediate and advanced enemies have seemingly unblockable one-shot kill attacks (I say “seemingly” as it may depend on how much health you have; if you have more than one block, you might be able to fight back in a quick-time event), which is made more annoying by the unskippable and overly long death scenes that accompany these enemies.
Resident Evil 6 loves a good quick-time event…
There are some new enemy variations at work here, too; there’s one enemy that will burst from its chrysalis as a swarm of insects, which is one of the more annoying and tougher enemies as you have to either chuck an incendiary grenade at it or wait until the big bug appears and hope you can kill it before the smaller bugs swarm over you and drain all your health. Comparatively, the boss battles are much less of an annoyance; they are long and consist of multiple stages and elements, but they generally boil down to a simple tactic of keeping your distance, shooting at the big glowing eyes/boils/similar weak spots, and let your partner do a lot of the shooting. Unfortunately, the enemies all tend to be bullet sponges; in Resident Evil 5, I found I could blast away with reckless abandon and there would always be more than enough ammo to find to keep going but Resident Evil 6 really cuts down on the resources. While I appreciate this as a fan of the classic Resident Evil videogames, it does kind of run contrary to the game’s heavily action-orientated approach; how are you expected to blast through hoards of enemies when your ammo drains away like nothing and the drop-rate is so low? Resident Evil 6 tries to compensate for this not only with the aforementioned melee attacks, which can be useful for conserving your ammo, knocking down enemies, and landing an instant kill, but also in its overabundant use of quick-time events (QTEs). Literally anything could be a QTE in this game; while I don’t recall too many happening in cutscenes like in Resident Evil 4, there are plenty at work in the videogame proper here. Grabbed by an enemy? Waggle the control stick! Being chased by a boss on a mine cart? You better press X and A together to duck under those low-hanging planks of wood! Tackled by a bigger enemy or brought another boss to its knees? Better hit that A, X, or R-trigger and then mash away at X to pummel them! It’s kind of fun in some cases, like when Leon is desperately trying to pilot a helicopter through China, but it’s a lot more fun to do a similar mission with Ada, where she can fire the helicopter’s weaponry.
A story this big and complex needs a lot of cutscenes…apparently…
Resident Evil 6 also really loves its cutscenes; you’ll sit and watch a cutscene filled with some suitably-dramatic tension or an impossible situation and then maybe take two steps forwards and another cutscene will happen. Similarly, you’ll be tasked with defeating a boss and struggling to take aim with the game’s janky sniper rifle controls and then suddenly a cutscene will interrupt you and you’ll realise that you wasted your ammo on the first couple of stages of the battle as all you really need to do is trigger the cutscene and survive to the final stage of the fight. Don’t get me wrong, I found the story interesting and complicated but it got very annoying to be constantly interrupted with the explosive arrival or return of a massive enemy or another twist in the tale. Also, call me crazy, but I don’t see the gameplay benefit of forcing me to walk sl-low-ly from one point to a door just to trigger another cutscene; just show Chris entering the building in the damn FMV! As in Resident Evil 4 and 5, Resident Evil 6 features numerous autosave points and adopts a chapter-based structure; each character’s story is split into five chapters and each chapter is maybe the length of two of Resident Evil 5’s, making casual play a bit more of a chore this time around. At the end of each chapter, you’ll get a medal based on how well you performed, maybe earn a dog tag (which can be customised and used as your gamer profile banner, I assume), and will be able to use the points you earn to buy new skills to equip. Again, though, this is a limited system; unlike previous Resident Evil titles, you can’t upgrade, improve, or buy new weapons between chapters and can only assign three skills at a time.
There’s a lot of online modes in Resident Evil 6.
There are bunch of skill slots available, though, and you can switch between them in-game, but being able to equip only three at a time does make the entire skill tree a bit pointless. I would have much preferred being able to upgrade certain things, like weapon accuracy or melee effectiveness, for each character rather than being forced to equip better ammo pick-ups or infinite ammo as a skill. Like many of the other Resident Evil titles of this era, there are some additional modes available; the “Mercenaries” mode returns, where players to survive as long as possible against waves of enemies across the game’s various maps. In “Onslaught” mode, two players battle against waves of enemies while “Predator” pits up to six players against the Ustanak and “Survivors” is more of a classic death match set-up. I’ve only really played a bit of the Mercenaries mode as I have no desire to be depressingly owned by twelve-year-olds over the internet but I can’t say any of these extra modes hold much appeal for me. Unlike other Resident Evil titles, there aren’t really many incentives for completing the single-player campaign. You’ll get an extra scene at the end of everyone’s credit rolls, unlock New Game+ to play with the weapons and items you’ve previously acquired, and eventually unlock the ability to equip infinite ammo for various weapons but there are no additional costumes to unlock except for in the online modes. There are Serpent tokens hidden throughout each location that you can shatter to unlock concept art and the like, and you can play through each campaign again as the partner character, if you really want to play as Sherry again, and there are obviously a lot of Achievements to unlock, but I really missed unlocking extra costumes and weapons after a playthrough. I heard a lot of crap about Resident Evil 6 but I didn’t really believe it; I figured I would be happy to be playing as Leon once again and returning to his Resident Evil 4 style of gameplay but, ironically, Leon plays very differently to how he did in that game. Instead, every character feels and plays like they’re from Resident Evil 5; much more tactile, combat-focused, and relying on a bunch of over-the-top, QTE-heavy melee attacks to dispatch enemies. I was a bit confused, to be honest, as I figured Resident Evil 6 was going to mash together the Resident Evil 4 and 5 playstyle, the more first-person-shooter approach taken by Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City(Slant Six Games/Capcom, 2012), and an entirely new, melee-centric playstyle.
Don’t even get me started on this fucking thing!
This seemed like the perfect time to mash together the older, more popular style of gameplay with Capcom’s newer, faster, FPS approach but…that’s not what has happened here. Instead, every character is essentially exactly the same, which doesn’t offer a lot in the way of variety; obviously, the Resident Evil characters were never that different in the original titles but that was more due to hardware limitations. Resident Evil 6 can’t really use that excuse, though, and really should have tried to make the characters more distinct in the way they play. In the end, I did enjoy Resident Evil 6 but it was much more of a slog to get through than any of the other titles; as annoying as I found the Revelations games, at least their chapters and missions were short and could be played in a casual burst. Here, everything is an annoyance; you’ll constantly be sent flying, knocked to the floor, run out of ammo and resources, wrestle with QTEs, die a lot, and probably get sick of seeing the same boss enemies crop up again and again and again. I found it much more enjoyable to focus on one campaign at a time and leave a little gap between starting the next campaign, which is a bit of a shame as I didn’t feel as fatigued playing through the campaigns in the previous games.
I had a plan. It was a simple plan. I would buy up all the videogames I hadn’t yet played for Xbox One at a rate of about one a month, complete them, maybe review them, and get as many Achievements as possible, all so that I could justify buying Resident Evil 2 (Capcom R&D Division 1, 2019) on release day. As you have gathered, that plan got a bit side-tracked as I ended up with every single Resident Evil title for Xbox One; though I managed to get through four of these (I didn’t actually do a review of Resident Evil 4(Capcom Production Studio 4, 2005)…my bad), I’ve had to put the last two on the back-burner to play this highly anticipated game. And it really was highly anticipated, especially by me. Resident Evil 2 (Capcom/Rockstar San Diego/Factor 5, 1999) was my gateway into the franchise; an essential purchase during my Nintendo 64 days and I used to waste entire weekends blasting through the different story modes as quickly as possible thanks to the infinite health and ammo cheats made available in the N64 version. I had an equally enjoyable time with the GameCube remake of Resident Evil (Capcom, 2002) and segued into playing the titles without the aid of cheats but the question remained as to whether I would actually be any good at the Resident Evil 2 remake without infinite health, ammo, and factoring in the new graphics, layout, and over-the-shoulder perspective.
Safe to say these two have had better days…
Resident Evil 2’s story is largely unchanged from the original; rookie cop Leon S. Kennedy and college student Claire Redfield arrive in Racoon City just as the entire population is turned into zombies due to exposure to the Umbrella Corporation’s new G-Virus. Taking shelter in the police station, both characters are pursed by a hulking Tyrant variant (“Mr. X”), encounter a constantly mutating creature (“G”), and run into various other characters as they try to survive the horror and escape the city with their lives. First of all, as you may have heard, read, or seen, Resident Evil 2 is an incredibly gorgeous creation; graphically, the game has no equal right now and the characters, environments, and creatures of the franchise have never been more realistic and frightening. The game’s use of light is fantastic; there’s hardly any areas of the game fully lit, so Leon and Claire are dependant on their torch to scan their environment for resources and enemies.
Tension is high as you explore your envionment.
This makes simply exploring rudimentary areas incredibly tense in a way that is so beyond the original game’s fixed camera angles; this tension is expanded further through the winding, claustrophobic nature of the environments. The police station has very few open areas and those it does have are either poorly lit or eventually become hazardous when Mr. X comes plodding along; the cell area, sewers, and laboratory are all equally closed in, meaning that you’re never quite sure what will be waiting around the next corner. Resident Evil 2 is a fantastic return to form when it comes to item management and conservation of resources; fresh off of three of the more modern titles, the sudden return to having very little in the way of ammo and health was jarring. Leon and Claire have a very limited inventory, so you’ll want to make use of the magic Item Boxes and multiple pouches to expand your inventory wherever possible. You should also take every opportunity to combine herbs and gunpowder for additional ammo as you’ll definitely need it in the game’s later stages. Because of this, you can’t just run around blasting zombies like fish in a barrel; the game actively discourages this as these zombies are built to last! A headshot may, if you’re very lucky, result in a one-hit kill but, nine times out of ten, you can empty an entire clip into a zombie’s head and it’ll still get up and keep coming for more. Discretion is definitely the better part of valour in Resident Evil 2 but you’ll be forced to make some tough choices when Mr. X starts chasing you through pitch-black corridors filled with zombies or Lickers!
Don’t even try fighting this guy; just run, quickly!
Fortunately, there are other methods at your disposal; you can board up windows to stop zombies breaking into the station and counterattack any enemy with a knife, flash grenade, or hand grenade. These can also be used as regular weapons but the knife won’t last forever, so you can’t just go stabbing away without a care in the world. None of these weapons have a hope of killing Mr. X, though; unlike in the original game, he can only be momentarily stunned and will pursue you, even through doors, until you manage to give him the run-around.
Use your wits to out-manuevure “G” and blast his weak spot!
You’ll also encounter a few boss battles, mainly against different forms of “G”; in the more modern games, these may have included quick-time events or button mashing sequences but, here, you are forced to go old school, dodging his attacks and waiting for the right moment to shoot his massive eyeball. It’s an exhilarating return to form as you’ll only have yourself to blame for not conserving your ammo or stocking up on healing items. Other boss battles, such as the one against the giant alligator and when you face “G” in the sewer, require you to set traps to win the day to help mix things up, while disgusting G-Virus monsters take the place of the giant spiders and appear as tougher enemies in the sewers.
A myriad of puzzles will test your skills.
Also returning from the original game, but greatly expanded upon here, are the classic Resident Evil puzzles; as a former museum, the police station is full of weird shit, items, and mysteries that you’ll have to find, solve, and piece together in order to progress. One thing that is a bit odd is that, unlike every single Resident Evil title ever, you do not automatically discard items or keys once they’re no longer needed; instead, you have to do this manually, which is the only negative thing I have to say about the game and it’s purely because this has never been necessary in the past, but it’s an extremely minor complaint really. Navigation is pretty easy thanks to the map screen, which clearly shows you rooms you’ve been in, doors that are locked, and other points of interest, though it doesn’t hold your hand like some of the later titles and you’ll be required to use your brain and remember the layouts pretty well to get around obstacles or Mr. X and reach new areas. There’s a lot of variety at work in the game; at certain points, you’ll switch to playing as either the mysterious Ada or the adorable Sherry, both of whom play very differently to each other, not to mention Leon and Clear. Completing the game also unlocks variant costumes (including classic attires) and the “Second Run” mode, which tells the story from a different perspective, swaps around a lot of the item locations, and features different boss battles. Completing the game on each of these playthroughs is essential to battling the true final boss and seeing the game’s true ending; it’ll also unlock the “Fourth Survivor” mode, where you take an Umbrella commando through an infested police station, and the “Tofu Survivor” mode (…where you play as a piece of tofu) makes a welcome return.
If you want the best, you’ll have to be at your best!
You can also unlock in-game models, concept art, Achievements, and even infinite weapons if you dare take on some of the game’s more challenging options. Resident Evil 2 has three difficulty settings: Assisted (aim assist, weaker enemies, health recovers a little bit), Standard (no aim assist, no health regeneration, normal-strength enemies), and Hardcore (no aim assist, no health regeneration, tougher enemies, Ink Ribbons are needed to save at Typewriters, no auto-save points…basically the classic Resident Evil formula, meaning all of us old school gamers must be Hardcore by default!). To get the best weapons and reap the best rewards, you’ll be required to beat the game under a strict time limit on Hardcore mode but, with trial and error (or a handy online guide), you will find that the game can be beaten in under three hours. However, this doesn’t make Resident Evil 2 any less desirable to play; the tension and atmosphere alone are worth the price of admission as the game finally returns the franchise to its survival-horror roots. Newer gamers may struggle with this; enemies don’t drop gold or resources, you can’t punch boulders, and there’s very little hand-holding throughout the game. Either you stay sharp and be smart with your resources and pick your battles, or you get injured, waste your ammo, and die in short order, just like in classic Resident Evil tradition. Resident Evil 2 is nothing less than a masterpiece, from the graphical quality of the game to its gore, soundtrack, and the amazing job it does staying faithful to the original title, and the time period it was made, while still bringing everything a quantum leap forward using modern gameplay mechanics and capabilities. The game is a solid five-star effort and I can only hope that, going forward, Capcom leans more towards this formula for future Resident Evil titles and away from their more action-orientated approaches.
Continuing my ongoing slog through a backlog of Resident Evil titles, I recently played through, and completed the main campaign of, Resident Evil: Revelations 2 (Capcom, 2015) on Xbox One. After struggling a bit with some aspects of the first game, I had hoped to be more comfortable going into Revelations 2 but Capcom made a few changes that make this title almost unrecognisable from its predecessor. Firstly, unlike its predecessor, Revelations 2 was released for main consoles right from the start, rather than being a HD port of a Nintendo 3DS game. However, rather than being a complete package, this title was released in episodes, presumably to encourage players to become immersed in its storyline; whether this actually worked or not is beyond me as I played the Xbox One version, which contains the entire game on one disc.
Never has a skill tree been more unnecessary…
Revelations 2 brings Barry Burton and Claire Redfield back to the franchise; like the first game, each is lumbered with a new character who acts as their partner as they fight to escape from an island that is crawling with infected monstrosities. Claire, partnered with Barry’s daughter Moira, attempts to find her way off the island while Barry, teaming up with Natalia, a young girl suffering from amnesia, arrives at the island some six months later in search of his daughter. Like many of the Resident Evil titles released around this time, Revelations 2 plays from a third-person, over-the-shoulder perspective; as in its predecessor, players have complete freedom of movement, can shoot and reload while moving, and can use healing items at the touch of a button. Well, not quite a touch; this time, players must hold down the R trigger to use these items rather than simply pressing one button. This mechanic is directly tied into the game’s unnecessary and largely pointless skill tree; completing each of the game’s chapters and meeting certain objectives earns the player with BP, which can be spent upgrading certain skills, such as how long it takes to use a herb, how effective they are, and other actions tied in to combat and the player’s partner.
Natalia will point at enemies…it’s super useful…
Unlike in Resident Evil: Revelations (ibid, 2012), players can switch between the two team-mates and even play the game with a friend in co-op mode. Unfortunately, whether you’re partnered with Moira or with Natalia, you’ll find the partners to be next to useless. Neither of them can use firearms; Moira can blind and stun enemies with a torch and bash them with a crowbar while Natalia can sneak around unnoticed and throw bricks at zombies. One of the things I disliked about the first game was the “Genesis” device that forced me to constantly scan enemies and the environment for resources. A similar function exists here, unfortunately, as players can only find hidden items with Moira’s torch or Natalia’s convenient “sixth sense”, which means that you’ll have to jump back and forth between your two characters to find everything in each area. While the first game featured some unique enemy designs tied directly to its water-based environment, Revelations 2 opts for the more traditional zombie-like enemies and mutated creatures favoured by the series after Resident Evil 4(Capcom Production Studio 4, 2005). The major difference here, though, is that these creatures appear to be made of sponge; they will soak up your bullets and still keep coming and some of the larger and more violent enemies may require other tactics to get around.
Seriously, fuck this fucking thing!
Barry, for example, can sneak up on enemies and dispatch them in one move but the Glasp, for example, is invisible, requiring players to switch to Natalia and point out and target the creature so Barry can kill it, which is extremely frustrating when involved in combat. In fact, too many of the game’s enemies have instant kill moves; the reoccurring and extremely annoying bullet-sponge first encountered in the junkyard will have you tearing your hair out as you struggle to hit its weak point and avoid its insta-kill move. Once again, players can use Part Boxes to upgrade their weapons; the game’s extensive (and yet restrictive) crafting system also allows players to craft explosive bottles and helpful items to stop bleeding and wipe away gunk, two new status effects that really add to the game’s frustrations. Personally, I found myself loading tourniquets, wipes, and healing items on the partner character, who will automatically use them when you get stuck in a bind.
This bitch has plans, man…lots of plans!
The game’s narrative is pretty engaging; across four chapters, you’ll attempt to escape from a dire situation and uncover the fate of the characters. In true Resident Evil fashion, though, the plot is far from simple; while it doesn’t jump around as many different places and points in time as its predecessor, it can still be confusing trying to figure out what the mysterious Overseer is up to and uncover the mystery behind the island. On top of that, the game has two potential endings depending on how you deal with the now-traditional “huge tentacle mutating creature” boss battle. This (and the different medals available in each chapter, hidden emblems, and the Achievements) may entice players to revisit chapters from the story once again but, honestly, each chapter is so long that playing casually is not as easy as it was in the first game. Revelations 2 also features a couple of other game modes; Raid Mode returns, this time as a kind of virtual reality simulation that allows players to play as some classic Resident Evil characters in settings that closely resemble those of older games and battle swarms of enemies. Additional side stories also flesh out the main campaign; “Little Miss” sees players control Natalia and her dark doppelganger, sneaking past monsters in an effort to find her bear, while “The Struggle” sees Moira having to hunt animals to survive and clear previous areas of enemies to stay alive.
This bastard alone is enough to convince me to put this game down.
I wasn’t massively blown away by Resident Evil: Revelations; it was a bit awkward in places, the story was all over the place, and the enemies were way too aggressive and annoying. A lot of this is the same here; for everything Revelations 2 does better (graphically the game is superior and the locations are a lot easier to navigate; the story is arguably more engaging as well, if a lot more confusing), it also suffers from some of the same drawbacks as well as some all new ones. Forcing players to switch to their partner, who is as good as dead against many of the game’s monstrous enemies, just to solve puzzles, find items, and get through areas is tedious and annoying; the chapters are also too long, making repeated playthroughs a bit of a slog, and any game that makes a regular mid-level boss more difficult than the final boss is one that irks me, especially when this enemy constantly keeps showing back up and can easily one-shot you no matter how well you’re playing.
For me, the Console Wars extended well past the 16-bit era of videogaming. Unlike a lot of my friends, I did not have the income to justify doubling down so, while they were all off playing PlayStation and PlayStation 2 while alsoa playing Nintendo 64, I stuck with the Nintendo 64 and GameCube since SEGA were no longer in the business of making consoles. As previously detailed, this means that I didn’t have much exposure to Resident Evil (Capcom, 1996 to present) apart from the Nintendo 64 port of Resident Evil 2 (ibid/Rockstar San Diego/Factor 5, 1999). Although I enjoyed the GameCube remake (Capcom, 2002) and Resident Evil Zero (ibid), I yearned for the chance to take up arms as Leon S. Kennedy once again. Resident Evil 4(Capcom Production Studio 4, 2005) changed that while simultaneously changing the franchise significantly. Slowly, as Capcom released more and more titles with newer control schemes and gameplay mechanics, Resident Evil shifted away from being a survival-horror series, where supplies were limited and caution was the preferred choice, and became far more action-orientated. Resident Evil 4 laid the groundwork for this, moving the camera behind Leon’s shoulder and allowing full 360-degree movement, and changed the franchise’s focus away from zombies and the machinations of Umbrella and more towards parasites and mutations.
Gone are the days of collecting medieval-themed keys.
Staying the course, Resident Evil 5 (Capcom, 2009) took these aspects and ramped them up to eleven. Returning Chris Redfield to the series, Resident Evil 5 dropped players into a complex plot revolving around Albert Wesker’s attempts to destroy the human race with the Oroburos virus. Teamed with Sheva Alomar, Chris finds himself on a path towards not just saving the human race but also of vengeance; prior to the game’s events, Redfield’s partner, Jill Valentine, was presumed dead at Wesker’s hands and Chris, having bulked up to stand a better chance against Wesker’s superhuman abilities, is determined to have his revenge.
Think of Sheva as a walking Item Box…
Unlike Leon, who was lumbered with protecting and rescuing Ashley Graham in Resident Evil 4, Chris and Sheva operate as a unit. Two players (or one with the CPU) can progress side-by-side throughout the main campaign; Chris and Sheva each have their own limited inventory slots meaning that, with no Item Boxes present in the game, trading and combining items is essential to survival, similar to the partner system of Resident Evil Zero. Ideally, you’ll want to play Resident Evil 5 with a friend as the CPU is extremely basic; your partner will shoot at enemies, pass you ammo, and heal or resuscitate you when necessary but is just as likely to be found stuck behind objects or running against a wall. They also seem incapable of using any weapon other than the one assigned to the top of their inventory, meaning you’ll probably end up using them as a walking, talking storage system.
Use your hard-earned gold to buy and upgrade weapons.
Supplies are plentiful, however, even more so than in Resident Evil 4; dispatched enemies will often drop herbs, ammo, gold, or other trinkets while breakable pots, chests, and other objects will yield similar provisions. Other treasures can also be located throughout the story and can be sold at the end of each chapter to purchase new weapons; while it is sad to see the Merchant absent from the title, this does make inventory management a lot simpler and easier. In terms of gameplay, the control scheme of Resident Evil 4 remains intact here, with some additions; at certain points, the player must command their partner to pull levers, open doors, or otherwise assist with various, simple puzzles. Quick-time events still pepper certain cutscenes, meaning you have to remain on your toes the entire time whilst playing, which adds a nice level of spice and interaction to otherwise passive gameplay moments.
It’s safe to say that Wesker’s lacking calm in this entry.
The enemies in Resident Evil 5 are many, varied, and plentiful; the first mission alone sees Chris and Sheva swarmed with a seemingly endless horde of Majini and the number of enemies onscreen at any one time is easily double that seen in its predecessor. Beyond the regular zombie-like enemies, players will also face the hulking Executioner, spear and shield wielding foes, the return of the Lickers and chainsaw Majinis, and even a gigantic troll-like creature. The ultimate confrontation comes against Wesker, who faces the player at first largely unarmed except for his superhuman abilities and, ultimately, in a mutated form that closely resembles that of a Tyrant. Beyond the main campaign, players can also take part in the Mercenaries mode (where they must eliminate as many enemies as possible within a strict time limit) and a Versus mode (where players take part in online battles as part of one of two factions) . The story is further fleshed out in two DLC campaigns, ‘Lost in Nightmares’ and ‘Desperate Escape’, which sees players once again back in control of Jill Valentine.
Resident Evil 5 is very enjoyable when playing with a friend.
When I first played Resident Evil 5, I remember being quite underwhelmed and disappointed; I had enjoyed Resident Evil 4 quite a lot, despite the hindrance of Ashley’s dead-weight, and it felt as though something had been lost in trying to do more and more. I don’t really mind the added emphasis on action or co-op as it makes the game a breeze to play; checkpoints and autosave locations are plentiful, meaning you can get a good feel of how to progress past more difficult sections and the freedom of movement is unparalleled. Since playing the HD remake on Xbox One, though, I have found that the title is a lot more fun and interesting than I previously believed. Admittedly, a great deal of my enjoyment has come from playing online co-op with a friend of mine but, even when playing alone, I have found myself returning to the game’s campaign, earning Achievements, stocking up my inventory, and earning more BP to spend on costumes, figurines, and upgrades for my weapons.
Relish the opportunity to wipe that smug smirk off Wesker’s face.
All-in-all, Resident Evil 5 is a great action-horror title; it is not the classic Resident Evil formula but, should you wish to play a game that is, there are plenty of previous titles that are readily accessible. I think the game may have gotten a bad reputation back in the day for straying so far from the survival-horror genre but, now, with the benefit of hindsight and subsequent titles, I can appreciate the faster pace of the title and Capcom’s attempts to keep the franchise relevant in a difficult market.
Despite my affinity for the Resident Evil (Capcom, 1996 to present) franchise, my love for the series actually began with the Nintendo 64 port of Resident Evil 2 (ibid/Rockstar San Diego/Factor 5, 1999) because, as a kid, I was too poor to ever own a PlayStation and hedged my bets on the N64 instead. While this means I had to retroactively catch up with the original title and was forced to play catch-up ever since with each subsequent release, I have attempted to keep the series at the forefront of my videogame library. However, considering I prefer to stick to the main series titles, Resident Evil: Revelations (Capcom, 2012) passed me by. Originally released for the Nintendo 3DS, a HD port of the title was released for Xbox One in 2013 and, fresh off of Christmas, a copy of this version recently landed in my lap. Set between Resident Evil 4 (Capcom Production Studio 4, 2005) and Resident Evil 5(Capcom, 2009), Revelations took main series stars Jill Valentine and Chris Redfield, saddled them with new partners, and dropped them in the deepest of shits on two cruise ships.
Revelations jumps back and forth between many characters.
The story, in true Resident Evil fashion, is both complex and simple: a viral outbreak has occurred on the Queen Zenobia and Jill and Parker Luciani have been sent in to investigate and find Chris and his partner, Jessica Sherawat. Things quickly become far more complicated when the terrorist organisation Veltro seemingly re-emerges, monsters and mutations stalk the corridors and extravagant interiors of the Zenobia, and twists, turns, and betrayals start to take shape. Additionally, the story jumps between three teams of two characters (the two already mentioned and a couple of BSAA hot-heads conducting a further investigation) and various different time points; players will take Jill through the Zenobia at one moment, before flashing back to events prior to the game’s story and taking control of Parker, before jumping into Chris’s shoes at another end of the ship. It all gets very confusing and annoying, especially when you’re trying to put the narrative in some kind of order, but I appreciated the variety in characters, who all play slightly different and have different missions, weapons, and enemies to encounter. Revelations adopts the over-the-shoulder, action-orientated approach popularised by Resident Evil 4 and yet still returns the series to its claustrophobic, atmospheric roots through the effective use of narrow hallways and the isolation offered by the ships being adrift in the middle of the ocean. Therefore, weapons, ammo, and health are in plentiful supply (especially by Resident Evil standards) but you still can’t go in all guns blazing.
Revelations’ enemies are as unique as they are dangerous.
The Queen Zenobia is swarming with monsters the likes of which have never been seen before in Resident Evil; as with all titles after Resident Evil 4, Revelations moves away from the traditional shambling zombies and more towards mutations and monstrosities. Given the naval setting of the videogame, Revelations sees players battling against weird aquatic creatures that sprout tentacles at a moment’s notice or throw spear-like claws at you, bulbous atrocities with fuckin’ buzzsaws for hands, and even a gigantic, mutated octopus.
The scanning mechanic was quite obtrusive.
The enemy design is very unique and makes for far more formidable monsters to fight to the point where even bog-standard enemies will soak up your bullets like a sponge. Luckily, players are equipped with a device called the “Genesis” which allows them to scan enemies and the environment to locate hidden items and build up a percentage score; once this hits 100%, you are awarded with a health item. Unfortunately, this device is cumbersome and you cannot attack while using it; I assume it worked a lot better with the 3DS’ touch-pad capabilities but, on the Xbox One, it reminded me of the scanning mechanics that I remember dragging down Ghostbusters: The Video Game (Terminal Reality, 2009). On the plus side, though, player control has never been better or more fluid; in Revelations, players can move and shoot (or reload) at the same time and healing items can be used at the push of a button without equipping them from a menu screen (in fact, I hardly ever had a need for the menu at all!), making combat much faster, easier, and fluid. The map is pretty poor, especially compared to the one in Resident Evil 5, and it’s pretty easy to get lost on the ship’s many floors and increasingly grandiose locations but, to be fair, that is part of the charm of a Resident Evil title.
Whoever designed these swimming sections needs to be shot!
There are also a couple of fun on-rails sections where players use Gatling Guns to blast at giant tentacles and even bigger bosses. One new feature I did not enjoy, however, were the sections that force you to endure the game’s terrible swimming mechanics. I can only assume that this was originally something players controlled with the 3DS’ gyroscopic feature, which would have made it even more nauseating and difficult to control. Revelations’ single player campaign is broken down into numerous chapters and acts, making the game very easy to pick up and play in short bursts; I often find Resident Evil titles very intense and absorbing and have to play them in long sessions but Revelations was a lot less stressful in this regard and you can play as much or as little as you like. The better you do in each chapter, the more points and rewards you will receive; these can be used in the game’s Raid Mode, which is a pretty nifty little feature similar to the Mercenaries mode of previous Resident Evil videogames.
Raid Mode offers a variety of bite-sized challenges.
In Raid Mode, players can pick a character (usually one of the main story protagonists), assign them weapons, buffs, and items, and take on a series of short missions based on the single player levels. Although these missions will be much shorter, they can be quite tough; players encounter enemies of varying levels (the higher the level, the tougher the enemies are), far less items (and no access to the Genesis device as far as I have seen), and are also encouraged to finish each mission in a decent time while also shooting at tokens for bonus points.
The sea provides some gigantic bosses to battle!
Overall, Revelations was a pretty good time; it was a blast to see some classic Resident Evil characters and enemies recreated and the story, while over-the-top even by Resident Evil standards, was tolerable and entertaining. It’s fun to blast through the main story mode and take on these new, unique enemies even if a lot of them are frustrating and annoying, especially when you’re low on ammo and can’t be bothered to waste time scanning with the Genesis to get more health. While I found myself getting lost quite a lot due to the poor map and would rather bite a limb off than ever take Jill swimming again, I otherwise really enjoyed the more action-orientated combat and the tense, claustrophobic atmosphere afforded by the game’s narrative and setting.
It seems blasphemous to say it but, sometimes, films do deserve a modern remake. The stigma that remakes are “bad” or “unnecessary” is one that I have already contested before, as some of the best films in cinema history are actually remakes. However, whether because they haven’t aged too well, or sequels ruined the original concept or expanded upon it in ways that actually affect the original negatively, or there is the potential that some films could just be done better, I put it to you that there are some movies that totally are in need of a remake and here are just some of them.
10 X-Men
I’ve already discussed, at length, my ideas for the surely-inevitableX-Men reboot that will come once Marvel Studios decides to integrate Mutants into the Marvel Cinematic Universe but it needs repeating here: the X-Men franchise is a mess! 20th Century Fox could have rebooted the franchise with X-Men: First Class(Vaughn, 2011) but, instead, they chose to produce a sloppy mish-mash of sequel, reboot, and retcon because God forbid that they lose the revenue produced every time Hugh Jackman’s Wolverine pops his claws. Similarly, X-Men: Days of Future Past (Singer, 2014) could have straightened things out using time travel but that clearly was asking too much; the focus was on powering through with a nonsensical, confusing timeline, not on any sense of continuity or logic. Therefore, X-Men really needs to have the plug pulled and a whole new retelling to help bring some kind of order and logic to one of Marvel’s biggest and most profitable franchises.
9 Street Fighter
What’s that, you say? “Street Fighter already had a reboot; Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li (Bartkowiak, 2009)!” Really? You’re happy for that atrocity to stand as your Street Fighter adaptation? Jeez, at least Street Fighter (de Souza, 1994) was fun; dumb, yes, but fun. The only things Legend of Chun-Li had going for it were higher production values, Robin Shou, and the use of chi; literally everything else was a slap in the face to any fan of the videogames or action movies in general. Now, you might also be wondering why I didn’t pick Mortal Kombat (Anderson, 1995) and the answer is simple: it is a fantastic film; fun, witty, with some great fight scenes and decent effects. Street Fighter, however, is still waiting for a halfway decent adaptation; go old-school with it, make it a gritty, Kickboxer (DiSalle and Worth, 1989)/Bloodsport (Arnold, 1988)-style action movie; maybe throw in some inspiration from Warrior (O’Connor, 2011). In today’s climate, where MMA and UFC are mainstream and popular, Street Fighter has the potential to be a pretty solid action film if handled correctly.
8 The Mask
Our first remake where my overriding advice is simple: “Go back to the source material!” Don’t get me wrong, I love The Mask (Russell, 1994); it’s a great vehicle for Jim Carrey’s talents and looks fantastic as a live-action cartoon but it’s not really a great adaptation of Mike Richardson’s original comic book. In the comics, “Big-Head” was a complete and utter psychopath and the titular Mask was anything but a force for wacky comedy. Therefore, rather than simply trying to ape Carrey’s performance, do a complete 1800 and make a super-stylised, hyper-violent action/horror movie. Honestly, given how successful Deadpool (Miller, 2016) and its sequel were, I am surprised that we haven’t heard rumblings of a new Mask movie as it’s basically the same premise but even more over the top, if you can believe that!
7 Resident Evil
Easily the most inevitable of all of these films given recent news that a director has already been picked, I once again would advise revisiting the source material this time around (or, you know, actually bother to look at the source material at all) as the movies churned out by Paul W. S. Anderson have little to no resemblance to Capcom’s survival-horror series. Seriously, stop trying to copy Aliens(Cameron, 1986) and concentrate on making a dark (literally and figuratively), tense, atmospheric movie where two characters have to survival against some gory, fucked up zombies and gristly, practically-created (CGI just for enhancement, please!) monsters. It’s a bad sign when Doom(Bartkowiak, 2005) is a better Resident Evil movie than any of the actual Resident Evil movies so, come on, bring back the splatter-gore zombies movies of old and make a real Resident Evil adaptation for once!
(Side note: I actually love Doom. Fight me).
6 The Crow
Here’s one that’s been in and out of development hell for decades now. We have come so close to getting a new Crow movie so many times, with names like Bradley Cooper and Jason Momoa both attached at one point, only to have it snatched away at the last second. Honestly, I am fine with this as The Crow(Proyas, 1994) remains one of the most haunting and beautiful movies (and adaptations) of all time. However, while I am in no hurry to see a remake, if we do ever get one I again urge those behind it to look a little closer at James O’Barr’s original 1989 comic book, if only to differentiate the new film from the original. Go for a moody, stylised, neo-noir piece, taking inspiration from Sin City (Miller and Rodriguez, 2005), and craft a dark, sombre film that has little to do with heroism and more to do with cold, uncompromising vengeance.
5 The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
Ah, yes, the film that notoriously caused Sean Connery to retire from Hollywood altogether. Again, I am actually a bit of a fan of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (Norrington, 2003); it’s not perfect but I liked seeing all these literary characters come together and the steampunk aesthetic of the movie. However, I would not be against Hollywood giving this one another go as it could definitely be done better. Keep the steampunk aesthetic but really emphasise the gritty, world-weary nature of these characters; you’re bringing together some of the most beloved, nuanced, and interesting fictional characters ever created so don’t belittle them with goofy antics. Go back to Alan Moore’s comic books, maybe take some inspiration from the second volume in which Moore has the League participate in the War of the Worlds (Wells, 1897) and for God’s sake do not promote the movie as “LXG”!
4 Fantastic Four
Another pick that is surely inevitable given Disney’s purchase of 20th Century Fox, I could go into a lot of detail about how the first family of Marvel Comics should be introduced into the Marvel Cinematic Universe (and hey, maybe I still will!) but, suffice it to say, the Fantastic Four really need a movie deserving of their longevity and popularity. There were things I liked about both of Tim Story’s movies, and even the much-maligned reboot by Josh Trank, but all three films failed to capture the essence of the Fantastic Four and really do them justice. This is a chance for Marvel Studios to make a film with actual responsible adults in it; bring in an older cast for Reed Richards and Susan Storm (Bruce Campbell is a great choice for Reed but may be a bit too old; I’d suggest Pierce Brosnan, if he isn’t used for Magneto), get a popular, utterly handsome guy in his mid-twenties-to-late-thirties for Johnny Storm (Zac Efron?), and use that patented Marvel CGI wizardry (preferably in conjunction with practical effects) to create a truly lifelike Thing (voiced by, I dunno, Danny DeVito?). Whatever they do, though, it is crucial (and I mean absolutely crucial) that they get Doctor Doom right (and I mean pitch perfect); Doom should be a premier villain in the MCU and they shouldn’t shy away from his mystical origins. Get someone who isn’t afraid to wear a mask the entire time and who has the presence and gravitas to pull off such an enigmatic role (again, I would go the older route, maybe try and bring in Arnold Vosloo?)
3 Spawn
Oh, Spawn, you’re so very nineties! A Spawn remake/reboot has also been kicking around for decades, with creator Todd McFarlane constantly banging on about how it’s being scripted, in production, coming soon, won’t feature Spawn much (which is insanity!), will be super dark, super scary, and loads of other talk but, until we see a poster, a trailer, and the film in cinemas it’s just that: talk. Spawn(Dippé, 1997) is not a great film; you could argue that it’s not even a good film. It’s rushed, sloppy, disjointed, and some of the effects have aged terribly. This is the reason we need a new movie, one that isn’t afraid to go dark, be super violent, and really do justice to the character and his original run. Take the effects work from Venom (Fleischer, 2018), go balls-deep with the violence and surreal nature of the concept, take notes from the excellent animated series, and bring in Denzel Washington to play the titular hellspawn and you could have a winning formula.
2 Hellraiser
Here’s another remake that’s been doing the rounds for a while. Despite all the talk and anticipation of a remake, however, it seems we’re doomed to getting ashcan sequels and direct-to-DVD releases that keep this franchise limping along on life support (would you believe that there are ten films in this series!?) Hellraiser makes the list because the original 1987 movie and its immediate sequels have not aged well; in fact, they have aged terribly. I applaud them for using practical effects and making the most of their obviously limited budget but it’s clear to see that this movie could be made so much better with modern filmmaking techniques. Indeed, one of the few good points of the later sequels is how much better the effects are and, done right, a Hellraiser remake could really surprise at the box office. So, I say to you: Go back to Hellraiser and Clive Barker’s original novel, look at the lore and legacy of the series, and put some time, effort, and money into making a truly nightmarish, surreal, and atmospheric horror movie. And if you’re not going to cast Doug Bradley as Pinhead, at least have him dub the lines or something.
1 Highlander
Oooh, boy, this film. Similar to Hellraiser, Highlander (Mulcahy, 1986) makes the list because it just doesn’t hold up; the effects are bad, the fight sequences are shit, and, thanks to all of the nonsense introduced in the sequels, the original movie is a laborious chore to sit through. Yet, the concept is a good one; the franchise clearly had some staying power as well, if the television series is anything to go by. However, we really need to look at the lore and iron out some specifics: what is the Prize? How many Immortals are there and will we address where they come from? What is the exact nature of the Quickening? Seriously, these concepts are so ill-defined in the original and bogged down with retcons and illogical additions in the sequels that I have no idea what’s going on. Either get a clear picture and make a decent fantasy film based on that or ignore some of the sequels and bring back Christopher Lambert in the mentor role; either way, you absolutely must cast Thomas Jane in the title role…and maybe Dave Bautista as the Kurrgan.
As part of my PhD thesis, which revolved entirely around live-action and animated adaptations of videogames, I decided to dedicate an entire chapter to the Resident Evil films. Helmed by director Paul W.S. Anderson, these six movies largely veered quite far from the source material, only including popular franchise characters and situations when it was deemed necessary and financially lucrative. While I, personally, have come to loathe the series (with the exception of Resident Evil: Apocalypse (Witt, 2004), purely because it’s the closest adaptation of any of the Resident Evil videogames) because of Anderson’s insistence on pushing star and wife Mila Jovovich over recognisable videogame elements and his blatant disregard for the shitty continuity he created, they nevertheless reaped over $1,233million in worldwide gross over six movies. This, whether I or any one else wants to admit it or not, makes the Resident Evil films the most successful live-action adaptation of a videogame franchise to date.
While researching Anderson’s Resident Evil franchise, I discovered that the first movie was mired in a tumultuous period of development hell. Before Anderson was given the reigns to the survivor-horror videogame franchise, legendary grandfather of the zombie genre, George A. Romero, was offered the chance to direct a feature film adaptation. Although not a videogame fan, Romero’s 1998 script, available to read here, was produced from a screen story by himself and Peter Grunwald and is surprisingly closer to the aesthetic style and atmosphere of the original Resident Evil videogame than Paul W.S. Anderson’s eventual 2002 film. However, the script contains many issues that, rather than being addressed in subsequent re-drafts, were ignored in favour of a complete overhaul. These range from clichés often closely associated with Romero, to a close, almost uninspired fidelity to the source material. In this article I’ll go through the script and describe some of the plot points and characters and talk a little bit about how Romero’s efforts differed from those seen in Resident Evil.
Chris and Jill are at it in Romero’s script.
Like the videogame, Romero’s script features Jill Valentine and Chris Redfield as the central protagonists. Jill is largely similar to her videogame counterpart, being somewhat overwhelmed by the events surrounding her, rather insubordinate to her superiors, yet militaristic and direct in her actions and capabilities. Chris, however, undergoes a significant alteration; rather than being a member of Special Tactics and Rescue Service (S.T.A.R.S.; here a military organisation rather than being associated with the Raccoon Police Department), Chris is depicted as a “part Mohawk” Native American who has strong ties to the Arklay land and a close association with nature. As part of her cover story, Jill initiates a sexual relationship with Chris in order to gather intelligence on the Arklay Mountains and the mansion where the Tyrant-Virus (T-Virus) outbreak occurs; Chris is swept along due to his need to find answers concerning both the infected and Jill’s betrayal. These alterations are apparently intended to make Chris the voice of reason among the other S.T.A.R.S. members, who mostly follow orders or are concerned with their own survival rather than the implications the T-Virus has on natural life. Chris’s capabilities are severely downgraded from his videogame counterpart and he spends the majority of the script brandishing “an old Winchester rifle” in contrast to the well-armed S.T.A.R.S. members.
The entire S.T.A.R.S. team is represented in Romero’s script.
Jill’s Alpha Team, made up of Russo, Williams, and Disimone, is quickly massacred, leaving Jill the only survivor. Albert Wesker leads Bravo Team, twelve additional commandos (including Barry Burton, Brad Vickers, Rebecca Chambers, Richard Aiken, Kenneth Sullivan, Rosie Rodriguez, Forest Speyer, and Laguardia) to assist, and they are immediately beset by zombie dogs and forced into the mansion, as in Resident Evil (Capcom, 1996). Wesker and Barry are portrayed as old friends, almost like brothers; Rodriguez, ironically much like Michelle Rodriquez’s Rain from Anderson’s film, is a trash-talking tough girl, while Rebecca is a nearly non-existent and inconsequential medical officer. Nevertheless, they closely resemble Resident Evil’s S.T.A.R.S. members rather than being entirely original characters as in Anderson’s film, yet Anderson’s Umbrella Special Forces Commandos fill a very similar role.
The characters still have to solve Resident Evil‘s trademark puzzles.
Wesker also serves as Romero’s principal source of exposition as he relates the mansion’s history, the experiments being performed there, and their mission to rescue Dr. John Marcus and recover key research data. Much of this dialogue is mirrored by the Red Queen (Michaela Dicker) and serves as blatant exposition, sandwiched between moments of gore-filled action, reading very much like the videogame’s passive cutscenes. The team also navigates the mansion using various coloured key cards, solving some familiar puzzles involving grandfather clocks and crests, and utilising a map similar to the computerised system seen in Anderson’s adaptation. These aspects, excised completely from Anderson’s films, are depicted as security measures built in by the mansion’s eccentric architect, yet they make the mansion much bigger than usually depicted in order to encompass the script’s large, shifting labyrinth-like rooms and puzzles, and the decision to replace these with Anderson’s more practical key card/password system seems a wise and realistic aesthetic decision, especially considering the majority of Resident Evil’s puzzles simply provide keys to open new areas.
Chris really hates Wesker in this script!
Depending on the avatar, either Jill or Chris can go missing after S.T.A.R.S. take refuge in Resident Evil; in Romero’s script, both Jill and Chris rendezvous with S.T.A.R.S. at different points to reference this, with both eliminating multiple zombies along the way. Though Jill and Chris both exhibit an uncharacteristically aggressive disrespect for Wesker (Resident Evil depicted both as frustrated by Wesker’s secrecy but nonetheless trusting him until the finale), Chris is far more vocal, turning his confusion into anger at the events which have left his homeland a bloody mess. He directly blames Wesker for these events, and Jill for her betrayal, and he continues to butt heads with both throughout their investigation. Romero’s script draws principally from Resident Evil alone –Resident Evil 2’s (Capcom, 1998) only influences are the mysterious, bloodcurdling, roar echoing throughout the mansion similar to G’s and Ada Wong (albeit as a scientist who assisted in developing the T-Virus and delivering yet more superfluous exposition, rather than being a double agent).
All of the game’s BOWs appear!
The mansion is beset by Plant 42’s destructive growth, infected sharks, a giant snake, and even the murderous Hunters, all lifted directly from the original videogame, and showcasing the scale of Umbrella’s research and the impact of the T-Virus beyond “simply” reanimating dead tissue. Whereas the exact implications of the T-Virus in Anderson’s films is left mostly unclear, Romero’s script openly lifts its purpose – to create nigh-indestructible bio-organic weapons (BOWs) for use in warfare – from the videogame, while this only become relevant in Anderson’s films after the T-Virus was released in the Hive.
The Tyrant is the big bad of Romero’s script.
This research culminates in, like the videogame, the Tyrant, and its subsequent rampage mirrors the closing moments of the videogame very closely. By including these creatures, most of which are rather large, complicated, and cumbersome entities, the budget for Romero’s vision would conceivably far exceed that of Anderson’s originally far more low-key, fixed approach; in Resident Evil: Apocalypse’s director’s commentary, he claims that the Licker was only included in the final stages of the first film’s development, implying that the film lacked even that lacklustre “final boss”. Additionally, the script’s extremely graphic depictions of zombie and creature attacks, with victims being ripped apart and torn open and copious gore that mirrors Dawn of the Dead (Romero, 1978) and Day of the Dead (ibid, 1985), takes it far from an R-rating. Although these comparisons are not only fitting due to the influence Romero had on the creation of Resident Evil but also his involvement in the script, they were clearly at odds with the film studio and Capcom, who desired a more manageable budget and wider audience range, which is also at odds with Romero’s surprising faithful adaptation.
One takes on the script’s characterisation of Wesker.
In addition to incorporating more recognisable Resident Evil elements, Romero is not shy about self-gratification: characters draw comparisons to Night of the Living Dead (ibid, 1968) and call zombies “ghouls”, and the increased emphasis on both military presence and Umbrella’s surreptitious nature is extremely similar to the military’s depiction in The Crazies (ibid, 1973). Romero’s cynicism regarding government and corporate power is reflected in Wesker’s superiors being devoid of personality and appearance: “We see no faces. But expensive watches, sleeves with high-ranking stripes, indicate wealth, power, and a military presence”. Wesker’s depiction is much more military-orientated; his focus on the mission and barking orders reflects this, and it is easy to see how his characterisation could have evolved into One (Colin Salmon). Seemingly the only line of Romero’s to reach Anderson’s is “we live here now”, originally delivered by Rodriguez throughout the script in extraneous reference to her childhood. While the line becomes over-emphasised and is far from relevant in Romero’s script, when delivered by Rain it highlights the dire situation that she and the others are in. Romero’s closer adherence to gameplay mechanics is again evident in the conservation of resources; having been beset by enemies and rendered expendable, Wesker orders the division of ammo and supplies, mentioning that they came unprepared for the odds they face. While Anderson’s Commandos are similarly unprepared, they nevertheless enter the Hive fully equipped and fully armed; such resources allow the protagonists to gun down their zombie attackers without the fear of running out of ammunition, though their armaments are inevitably useless against the Red Queen’s defences. These, specifically the laser grid system, surprisingly appear in Romero’s script, though only as a quick jump-scare, with the true danger coming from the acidic steam the lasers trigger, which causes a gruesome death.
Surprisingly, the famous “laser grid” is in this script.
Thus, both Romero’s mutated creatures and Anderson’s laser grid serve the same ends – the deaths of minor characters, though Romero’s approach to this is much closer to the videogame than Anderson, who has often openly voiced his appreciation for the source material, as opposed to Romero, who largely dislikes videogames. Whereas in Anderson’s film, the lasers are significant, in Romero’s script they are glossed over in favour of an overly complex battle against Plant 42 and a mutated copperhead snake, both more suitable inclusions to a Resident Evil adaptation given their prominence in the videogame, yet clearly more expensive to incorporate than Anderson’s more subdued lasers. As S.T.A.R.S. navigates Umbrella’s laboratory, they are beset by Hunters, which are given an extreme durability upgrade. In Resident Evil, the Hunters were far stronger, faster, and more aggressive than zombies, providing an effective difficulty spike, yet they could still be dispatched using small arms fire (though close-range weapons like the shotgun were more effective). Romero’s Hunters are practically indestructible as their skeletal structure is protected by a metallic coating – the only effective tactic is to aim for their joints (an action that Resident Evil’s stiff, restrictive controls would not allow), and even then they continue their relentless pursuit, crawling and dragging themselves along the floor.
Ada also makes an appearance.
The survivors take refuge with Ada, who wishes to atone for her part in creating the T-Virus. Her videogame counterpart’s lost love, John, is amalgamated with Professor James Marcus, the videogame creator of the T-Virus, to become Dr. John Marcus, a markedly different character whose work Ada describes as being “for humanitarian purposes”, rather than specifically creating the T-Virus for military applications. This is pinned directly onto Umbrella, who corrupted Marcus’ research, and this concept was later explored through Resident Evil: Apocalypse’s Dr. Charles Ashford. Ada, far from her deceitful, untrustworthy, and sultry videogame counterpart, awkwardly explains the film’s events directly to the audience and the characters before the finale, rather than this information coming naturally. Ada’s attempts to keep Wesker out of D Lab are unsuccessful, as Wesker’s true motivations are revealed and he activates the Tyrant, confiding in Barry his intentions to retrieve the creature’s data, sell it to Umbrella, and split the money between himself and Barry as payback for Barry’s loyalty and friendship. Once Romero’s script enters D Lab, it closely follows the videogame’s finale, with Chris, Jill, and Barry openly opposing Wesker’s schemes and the Tyrant escaping and going on a rampage.
This ended about as well as you might expect.
By not resorting to a mid-level enemy like the Licker for his finale, Romero’s conclusion is considerably augmented as the Tyrant is practically unstoppable. Its physical threat, imposing stature, unrelenting nature, and iconography as the classic Resident Evil final boss give the finale a danger and tension that we must be convinced of in Anderson’s finale as his Licker has to undergo a significant mutation into a less-recognisable version of itself in order to match the Tyrant. As in the videogame, the Tyrant tears Wesker apart during its rampage, although Romero’s script describes this death as being so total and horrific that it seems unlikely that Wesker could have revived himself as in the videogames. However, as this was retroactively introduced in Resident Evil – Code: Veronica (Capcom, 2000), Wesker’s gruesome death can be understood as being his much-deserved and overdue fate, rather than a deviation from the source material, as Wesker’s death seemed to be total and final in Resident Evil. As the final countdown to the destruction and eradication of all the evidence of the T-Virus takes place, the survivors are beset by zombies and infected crows, and forced to solve contrived puzzles to access a secret passage. The tension is somewhat numbed by these distractions; typically, Resident Evil players face relatively few enemies and some rudimentary but necessary puzzles while an ominous countdown flickers onscreen (like in Resident Evil 2 when players must activate an underground train to allow the survivors to escape) but few distractions that slow progress to a crawl, as in Romero’s script. Like the videogame, though, the final confrontation between the Tyrant and the survivors is short-lived, as a single Stinger missile is enough destroy it. This ending is more predictable than Anderson’s, which mirrored Resident Evil 2’s ending, but the specifics and fundamental impact deviated quite considerably due to Anderson’s belief that to simply copy the videogame eliminated any suspense or tension for Resident Evil veterans.
The script’s clunky dialogue can be worse than the original voice acting, if you can believe that!
Instead, Romero adheres closely to the source material’s finale, with the Tyrant dispatched almost identically and the final survivors escaping just as and the mansion explodes. Romero deviates by making this explosion powerful enough to eradicate Raccoon City, which has been overrun with zombies, effectively encompassing the ending of Resident Evil 3: Nemesis (Capcom, 1999) and seemingly eliminating the possibility of a direct sequel. Quite how the protagonists survive this is left unresolved, but the imagery suggests Romero intended on a big, gory, explosive finale, one that reads as being very abrupt and total rather than Anderson’s cliffhanger or the videogame’s various endings. Overall, there is very little doubt that Romero’s script is a very (very!) rough first draft; there are clear elements, such as dialogue and characterisation, which require re-drafts to make them less contrived, and the characters more three-dimensional. Largely, it ironically reads very much like the original Resident Evil videogame, with cheesy dialogue and awkward, flat characterisations. These issues were addressed in subsequent sequels and remakes, with the localisation improving over time and characters becoming more detailed and intricate. Thus, it is not too unbelievable that Romero’s script could have been improved and the constant repetition of “we live here now” and Chris’s cringe-inducing speech about evil “[residing] in all of us”, in a contrived justification of the film’s title beyond the simple and obvious fact that evil literally resides in the mansion, could have been eliminated altogether.
The movies love to use those zombies.
Additionally, rewrites could possibly eliminate the larger creatures and emphasise zombies, as in Anderson’s first film, which avoided BOWs completely. The Licker was the obvious exception, serving as the big effects finale, but Romero’s script is littered with BOWs – virtually every Resident Evil enemy is present. While enemy variation is important in videogames to maintain player interest and increase difficulty, on film the appearance of so many different creatures could potentially overwhelm it with underexplored monstrosities. Anderson’s films, after all, rely heavily on traditional zombies and utilise BOWs for the finale, rather than focusing on them, ironically making Anderson’s films more zombie films than Resident Evil movies, as the videogames are generally concerned with addressing the T-Virus’s communicability, and zombies are simply a by-product of this rather than the main objective, and this is very much reflected in Romero’s script. The result is that, oddly, Romero’s Resident Evil is less a Romero film infused with videogame elements, and rather more like a slavish videogame adaptation, with certain elements and characters altered in order to create, or force, friction between the characters and unpredictability. Rather than critiquing society, consumerism, or even videogame culture, Romero delivered a banal gore-fest, one that attempts to cram as much from its source material as possible to showcase its fidelity, rather than attempting to adapt gameplay elements and characters in smarter, more sophisticated ways.
At least Romero’s script doesn’t include shit like this…
While Anderson failed to produce direct adaptations, he nevertheless strived to include a fresh, perspective; beyond Anderson’s quickly-redacted claims that his first film was a prequel to the first videogame, his films have always been more inspired by the videogames than adapted from. Romero’s script, however, is the opposite; even though he utilises videogame characters, they all read very similar, especially supporting characters, and utilising the videogame’s puzzles seems unrealistic within the mansion’s confines, whose architecture, on film, promotes realism rather than fantasy. Finally, while videogame purists and fans may yearn for absolute fidelity, there is a considerable difference between adapting smartly and adapting directly, and Romero appears to have produced the latter. For all Anderson’s faults, particularly in his first Resident Evil, Romero’s script reveals how attempting to incorporate every aspect of Resident Evil into a single movie causes characterisation to suffer and the impact of the various creatures to be lessened. Where Anderson infuses a sci-fi, action-horror aesthetic, pulling visual inspiration from various other successful action movie archetypes, Romero relies solely on gore. By creating a more marketable, accessible, and audience-friendly film, Anderson was able to improve upon any faults in sequels and introduce other videogame elements, even though they clash with their source material. As this aligned with the intentions of the multiple production companies behind the Resident Evil films, it is hardly surprising that Anderson’s vision won out over Romero’s, whose adaptation reads, for all its attempts at slavish fidelity, as unimaginative and lacklustre, literally as though he was given crib notes concerning the general aspects of the videogame and worked from them, rather than attempting to incorporate these elements in a smarter, more inspired way.
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