Resident Evil 7: Biohazard - Not A Hero

I briefly played Not A Hero in VR and found that it was extremely nausea-inducing within about 15 minutes of play. My VR controls were set for smooth gameplay instead of set angle increment turning, which likely contributed to the motion sickness, but the fact that it felt so different from the main campaign’s VR was unexpected. I had to remove the headset and take a breather because that was the closest I’ve ever come to losing my lunch due to PSVR.

Not a Hero and End of Zoe are, ultimately, not afraid to try new things, to break away from the structure that defines the base game of Resident Evil 7– and for that, both DLCs have to be applauded. Does everything they do work? Not exactly. But both these DLC packs are worth playing, if for very different reasons.

Capcom needs to pick a concept and a genre, and stick with it. Not a Hero takes almost everything that made Resident Evil 7 so great, and tosses it out of the window. The emphasis on action in this DLC is far too dominant to be considered survival horror. Sure, it may well indeed be free to download, but that doesn’t give it a free pass. It’s lazy, it’s uninteresting, and it’s utterly underwhelming. The very few marginally interesting elements of play does not save it from that.

As a fan of Resident Evil 7 and a huge fan of the series, I thoroughly enjoyed Not A Hero for what it is: Resident Evil from concentrate. It takes all the tropes from the series and crams them into a nice hour long DLC that anyone who owns Resident Evil 7 should sit down and play through on a bored weeknight. It may not be a selling point for the whole package, but it’s a nice bonus.

It’s hard to complain about an additional two hours of Resident Evil 7: Biohazard – especially when it’s free. There’s some fun lore for fans to soak up here, and some pretty tense scenarios, too. While it never really has anything to rival the main game’s best bits, it’s worth the bandwidth for Redfield’s masterfully manicured mane alone.

Both of these DLC chapters are, as I said earlier, easily the best of the additions to Resident Evil 7’s post-release content, though neither come close to the quality of the game proper. Chris Redfield’s chapter is nervy and panic-inducing, tying up the most significant loose end, but the introduction of Joe Baker feels a little unnecessary, rather than giving Zoe a proper shot at the limelight. Given that Resident Evil has created some truly memorable female characters in its history, it’s a shame that RE7 insists on focusing on the men.