Name: Resident Evil Village
Item: Resident Evil Village
Rating: 9
Author: robiu013

Resident Evil was my unexpected addiction over the last 10 months. After finally getting hooked on Resident Evil 4 I went back and played through 3 more of the franchise's games available for PS5. It's funny to look back at, but it didn't actually all start with RE4 for me, because I had Village collecting dust on my shelf for way longer than I owned RE4.

Yeah, I admit Village sparked my interest into buying it after watching some let's plays and liking what I saw conceptionally, but gameplay-wise I just didn't feel it on my first boot up of the game. I didn't quite understand the gameplay loop initially and what makes it so great, because the first hour of gameplay just doesn't care to show you much of it. Yeah, Village is not quite as hands-on as RE2 or RE4. You're not let into the action in a traditional sense, you're dragged into the cinematic roller coaster ride that while entertaining makes you feel somewhat helpless and unaware how the rest of the game is to play out. I'm sure dedicated RE fans loved it, because they knew it's just the calm before the storm.

Anyway, Village or Resident Evil VIII is technically story-wise the latest entry in the Resident Evil franchise at this moment, though the RE4 remake is a newer game released 2 years later. Village is also the entry that just goes wild with it's story. RE2 was a grounded story about a zombie epidemic hitting a police station and later the whole town, RE4 is where the story steered a bit away from the zombies and introduced a cult as new enemies, as well as a bunch of almost mythical creatures like the Gigante. Flash forward a couple more entries to Village and the inspirations are off the charts: large vampire ladies, weird fish people, killer dolls, a Frankenstein-inspired scientist who creates zombie-cyborgs and controls metal like Magneto from the X-Men... yes, Village gets pretty crazy.

The story once again follows Ethan Winters for his second headliner tour after surviving the events of RE7: Biohazard. Happily reunited with his wife and child things are coming up Milhouse, but not until recurring character Chris Redfield breaks into his house with his troops, confusingly shoots his wife and drags him into a strange eastern european village. Needless to say, much like other RE locations the village isn't quite the peaceful little place anymore.

One cool aspect to RE8 is that the gameplay actively tries to shift things up with each section of the game: starting with a somewhat guided cinematic start, leading into the Castle Dimitrescu section which faithfully follows the traditional 3D shooter RE gameplay loop of exploration, taking down enemies, looking for secrets and treasures and taking down bosses. The more unexpected shift is perhaps the House Beneviento section were the game strips you off your possessions and begins playing like an escape room. The reservoir section evolves into a kaiju survival level were you initially just work towards shifting the tides in your favor before finally taking on the boss in a traditional way. Last but not least the factory takes things back towards old reliable RE-style, so the game doesn't push too hard with the experimentaion. 

I played the game in 3rd person mode which is available if you purchase the DLC. I guess I did that because my history with the RE franchise is with the 3rd person shooter games. That said it's perhaps not the optimal way to play the game, after all the game was designed with a first person perspective in mind, which of course lowers your field of vision making the game a bit harder, but also in effect more suspenseful and scary.

Furthermore the 3rd person perspective comes with additional weaknesses: Gameplay feels stiffer in comparison to even the older games RE2 and RE3, enemies were programmed with the player's 1st person view handicap in mind which in a 3rd person view results in quite a bit of awkward waiting from the enemies for the player's reaction which a 1st person view might obfuscate and last but not least, some Ethan animations are omitted to not mess with the original game's pacing (for example: when unlocking doors, Ethan doesn't actually make any movements. The key just appears mid-air in front of the door and does all the work by itself).

But don't get dissuaded from playing 3rd person mode. It's perhaps easier than the original experience and while stiffer than even some older 3rd person shooter games it's still a blast to play.

Graphics look great of course. Perhaps in some instances even better than the newer RE4 - mostly because the characters were designed to jump at your face with more detail thanks to the 1st person focus of the game. Meanwhile sound offers the same chilling feeling of alertness as RE2 in what might be hiding around the corner.

Overall I enjoyed my RE8 experience. It's a continued evolution of the games in the right creative direction. I would probably still put it behind RE2 and RE4 with RE2 just being the quintessential introductory game to get yourself into the franchise and RE4 just offering excellent action-filled fun, but I would view RE3 as a weaker entry to Village in most aspects. But overall all 4 RE games I played were solid and fun.

Resident Evil Village

Resident Evil Village

Player Score

robiu013