Resident Evil: Village Review
Credit to: CapcomIt sure is… uh… something.
Welcome back! This time around, we’ve got ourselves our first official game review. After all that running, shooting, problem solving and confusion, I’ve got quite a few things to say about Capcom’s latest addition to the Resident Evil series. To make the review as thorough as possible, I’ll have three sections: A section for the pros, a section for the cons, and a final word section with a rating system, rating it up to five points. There will be spoilers, you have been warned! Without any further ado, let’s jump straight into it.
PROS:
For starters, I have to say, the graphics are absolutely beautiful, especially on a next-gen console. As far as I’ve noticed, there hasn’t been any major flawed detail that’s really taken me aback, other than a few minor glitches. Overall, the game is beautifully designed. The areas themselves are really fun to explore, and provide good ways for random enemies to sneak up on you for a good little jumpscare. While certain areas can make it tricky to find things relating to the objective, that gives it part of its charm. After all, it is a Resident Evil game. There are bound to be puzzles every once in a while. Each area fits its enemies perfectly.
The undead enemies are a bit more fun to fight this time around, as they can wield sickles, swords, have wings, have chainsaw arm… things… and other weird, dangerous weapons. The design of them, alongside every other enemy in this game, is very unique and fascinating to look at, even when they swing their weapon at you with murderous intent and their chilling groans and gargles. The Lycan enemies are equally as fascinating. The viciousness they display in their mannerisms really do make you feel unnerved, especially when they’re in groups. I prefer these enemies over all other enemy types in this game, due to how wild they really are. The five main villains of this game also have very interesting designs. Even though thematically, they all feel forced together, they do still have very impressive designs and mechanics to them.
While I can’t say that I was necessarily scared during my playthrough, I did definitely feel disturbed quite often. Staring at the faces of the Lycans genuinely was pretty unnerving, as were my experiences during the four main boss battles. Though, absolutely nothing in this game made me as uncomfortable as my experience against the baby illusion. Never, and I mean never, in my years of gaming, have I seen anything that has made me this startled and uncomfortable. In this section of the game, you are alone in the dark, without weapons, with a giant, slimy, slug-like baby creature, who has a massive, gaping mouth, adult human arms that it uses to drag itself along, and backwards facing human legs. Not to mention that in its wake, it leaves behind bloody, slimy markings on the ground. This section alone, earned this game one point in the creepy factor.
Cons:
Yikes, where to start. Well, for starters, this game is very confusing. It is a Resident Evil game, so it’s bound to have some odd things in it, but boy this game takes it to a whole other level. The theme starts off as a vampires, undead, and werewolves sort of deal, which makes sense, as that’s a genre that many fans of all sorts of thrillers enjoy. But, towards the end of the game, you face off against… metal monsters? I’m not exactly sure how to describe them, but these enemies are just randomly thrown at you in an environment (a character named Heisenberg’s area) that thematically makes no sense with its surrounding area. After fighting these metal monstrosities, you’re pitted against a mini-boss with a propeller as its upper body. While it was surprising to see at first and confused me as to why it even exists in this game, I came to realize something. This creature is shockingly almost exactly like a monster we see in the 2013 horror, Frankenstein’s Army, directed by Richard Raaphorst. The Dutch film director himself has actually openly accused Capcom of stealing the design, but that’s an entirely different topic.
Now, the enemies. You know, this game just doesn’t have that much of a challenge going for it. The enemies just feel so weak, that it genuinely takes me out of the experience. While I do love the designs of them, I hate the fact that I find myself rarely feeling pressured when attacked. The times I do feel slight pressure, is when the Lycans completely swarm me, but with the powerful weapons you can get early access to, they really don’t pose much of a threat. They just slowly creep up on you, maybe dodge to the left or right for no reason, and attack you with the slowest speed possible. The bosses also have this issue. Of course if your weapons aren’t upgraded and you don’t seek out more powerful weapons, then your time against these foes is going to be tougher, though most people do take the time to search for any extra loot which would help in the long run. You find plenty of Lei (currency used in-game), and there’s plenty of new weapons to find, so your time against these enemies really won’t be very difficult. The bosses don’t really provide much of a challenge, and that’s really unfortunate. They look so powerful and impossible to fight, but in reality, they just don’t stack up to their appearances.
All in all, the theme of the game is all over the place, the enemies are so underwhelming, and you find yourself babysat with all the loot that you don’t even need to search that hard for.
Final Thoughts
Unfortunately, this game leaves me unsatisfied. The plot twist for the main character is kind of weak, just like the enemies, and the story is a bit too hard to follow. The graphics and design of the entire game is absolutely stunning to look at, and the characters look so interesting. When stacked up against the past Resident Evil games, this definitely doesn’t land in my personal top five. Such a shame, but it is what it is. That’s gonna do it from me, but let me know what you think! This has been The Wolf Den.
