Resident Evil 5: My Thoughts.

Posted by Blackett on Mar 23, 2009 in Features, Games, X Box | View Comments

Ta Da, I have finished Resident Evil 5, purely on my lone self with no walk through or guide and now I feel rather proud of my self I will share with you the my thoughts on a game that alot of people have waited almost 5 years for.

The story carries on in a loose way from Resident Evil 4. Zombie like people are popping up all over the globe as part of bio terrorism after the break down of Umbrella, Chris Redfield (who has taken more than a few steroids over the last couple of years) is part of a crack team to investigate another outbreak in Africa. The story takes Chris and his new side kick Sheva down a very twisty path which explains the origins of Umbrella, what is Wesker and what ever happened to Gill.

The game looks beautiful, lighting and shadow are used in full effect to make the African setting look sun drenched and as the game progresses the world changes around you taking you to a variety of setting which look just as incredible.

This is a possibly a problem I have with the game, it is rather sprawling. You travel from African village, to boat yard then of to tribal shanty towns  and beyond (im trying my hardest to be spoiler free.) Some of the areas feel rather random and its difficult to connect them to the story. The game also seemed to be lacking an iconic area that will have people talking about in years to come, like the castle from Resi 4 or the Racoon City police station. And although the worlds you traverse are rather varied there is definite set paths you have to walk along, which is hunky dory at times as the point of this game is to get from cinematic to cinematic but when you cant walk through some small bushes or through a washing line of clothes you get the impression that it all could have been a little bit more polished.

On the topic of being polished I cant help but feel as though Resident Evil fans are being taken for a little bit of a ride. Before the game was launched Capcom announced downloadable content that would be ready for download only a few weeks after launch. I am all for extras being available at some point during a games life cycle but for it to be this close to the launch it feels a little too much like leaching money from your customer. Then there is my issue with the special edition, Halo Wars cam out a number of weeks ago and the special edition included extra content for the game and an art book for only £5 more than the normal game where as Resi 5 special edition only included a making of DVD and were asking £10 more than normal edition. It angered me slightly.

The final point I would like to talk about is the issue of racism in this game. There was alot of flack towards the game when the first teaser trailer appeared online. A white man going into a village full of black people then killing them all was bound to cause a bit of a stir. But when you look at the lineage of the game I think this could be argued as a leap forward in racial equality (stick with me on this please.) For years I have played games where I have shot white people, alot of white people have died under my trigger finger and its only fair that other races get in on the action. It is also deep in the Resident Evil Mythology that it all began in Africa so it was only natural that this would be where the series ends up and it would be more racist if they had filled these shanty towns with white people. It would be different if you were killing them because they are black, but your not its because they are infected with an evil virus that will destroy life as we know it. The only time when I felt a little bit iffy about the racism question is during a brief section where you destroy religious altars and artifacts, but I suppose we did the same in 4 so that makes it OK.

But dont get me wrong I did love this game, my main issue is that Resident Evil 4 re-invented the wheel and I was expecting the same huge change in 5 but I got more of the same, which is far from a bad thing but it has left me longing for the claustrophobic atmosphere of a zombie infested mansion. The game is beautiful, the story is engaging and the production values are incredible. I will give this game a 8 out of ten and as much as I moaned about the downloadable content I know I will be buying it.

What do you guys think? Have you played it? Are you wanting to play it? What are your favourite moments in the old games.

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