Resident Evil 5, the newest iteration of the greatest survival horror series has a lot to live up to… Read on to find out if it’s worthy of standing beside its big brothers or if its the black sheep of the series.
The Resident Evil series is one of the most long-standing and prestigeous games within the survival horror genre. When it first arrived on the scene back in ’96, gamers around the world were creeped out by the logic-defying puzzles and brilliantly designed enemies. The first game basically defined the genre by itself, and every game since then has refined the genre further – our first trip into Raccoon City showed us multiple perspectives as well as multiple scenarios with which to play through while our second trip gave us a feeling of suspense not unlike that we felt while playing Clocktower. After various spin offs, from the Outbreak files to Veronica, the series finally came back with Resident Evil 4. Acclaimed as one of the best games ever, it rejuvenated the series in ways nobody thought possible.

This progressive, er, progression of the series is one of its many allures, to be short. So when Resident Evil 5 was announced, fans were told to expect to fear the light as much as they had feared the darkness. Expectations were incredibly high, so Capcom had a lot of work to do if they wanted to appease their fans. Did they do what they set out to do? We’d have to say, sadly, no. While Resident Evil 5 is a very good game, there are many things that make it fall short of the greatness that the series is reknowned for. For every great thing it achieves, it seems to fail in achieving many others. While many say it isn’t right to compare two different games, that in itself is the nature of gauging how well a game fits into the series it hails from.

The very first thing that fans of the series will notice is the heavy shift in the focus of the game. Cooperative play drives this entry, whether beside an AI partner or someone from the real world, and you won’t find yourself walking anywhere alone for more than a few moments. This adds to the game in some ways, in that some bosses require clever teamwork and the satisfaction of surviving tough situations is doubled when you have someone to share the moment with. Sadly, as well, this removes all possibility of atmosphere. There won’t be any nervous moments of apprehension as you hear the bated breath of Regenerators, nor will there be a chill going down your spine as you see what’s coming. It’s a shame, really, since that was always a strength of the series – setting up the atmosphere, keeping you on your toes, only to throw you into an incredible scenario that you can’t get enough of. Resident Evil 5, in keeping with the mantra of accessible gameplay for short (twenty minutes max) periods of multiplayer gameplay, however deems it more appropriate to concentrate heavily on combat – progression within the game is marked much more by how many waves of enemies you’ve killed than anything else and there’s only one chapter in the entire game with any actual puzzles.

Upgrading your weaponry was a highlight of Resident Evil 4, the entire system being incredibly intuitive, simple to use and bolstered by one of the quirkiest characters in the series to date. Weapons had a certain level of upgrades (between none and four, depending on the gun) for their firepower, rate of fire, reload speed and capacity. Upon fully upgrading a weapon, you would unlock an exclusive weapon for that gun and that gun alone – ranging from boosts to firepower and ammo capacity to increased range or piercing power. In Resident Evil 5, however, there is no Merchant. You may only upgrade your weapons either before or after each chapter or after you die. No longer restricted to simply “levelling up” your gun’s stats, you now increase the stats over inconsistent increments (one upgrade could increase the firepower by 150, the next by 400 before dropping down to 200). Upon fully upgrading a weapon in Resident Evil 5, you unlock nothing further until you’ve beaten the game once – afterwards, any gun that has been maxed out can then use unlimited ammunition. Sadly, after you’ve beaten the game a single time, generally a weapon’s only important statistic is its firepower (since you become John Wayne, never needing to reload).

In terms of difficulty, it’s safe to say that Resident Evil 5 is abysmal. Amateur fits the name of the mode perfectly, as you’ll never find anything of any remote challenge and you’ll probably finish the game in less than four hours without even attempting to speed run. Normal, sadly, isn’t much better at all and Veteran feels more like what Normal should have been. Veteran, in itself, is a mode that seems to vary in terms of consistency of challenge. Most areas are very simple to get through without getting a scratch, while there are a few areas here and there with some interesting challenge. For many long-time fans of the series, Professional Mode is where the real challenge should lie. Sadly, that mode is marred by the worst problem that could ever afflict a game’s hardest difficulty. Professional Mode isn’t necessarily harder, it’s just easier to die. As most of the game is easy to get through on Veteran without a scratch, and Professional uses the same enemy placements and toughness from Veteran, you’ll find that (as long as you beat Veteran) you’ll know everything coming your way and will get through 90% of the game without getting hit even once. The only time you’re ever likely to die is in one of the very few chapters (such as 5-2) that prove difficult to not get hit in if you either lack the proper approach or a suitable partner willing to risk themselves as you do – you won’t, after all, get far in Professional during these chapters by playing safe. Ammo scarcity, something that has always been in the series – even in RE4 – is a thing of the past as well. Guns can be bought indefinitely, then sold on. You keep the ammo, of course, so 8’000 Gold will net you 200 machine gun bullets or 12 Magnum rounds (between two and four full clips, depending on the price of the gun, basically). This is a major shame because, as fans are well aware, one of the greatest appeals of the magnum was how hard the ammo was to come by. You had to save every bullet of that gun in case you got into a tight situation. But now, in Resident Evil 5, you can use it as if it were a handgun with heavy recoil. Did I mention the first section of 4-1 yields at least 16’700 Gold every single time?

Story-wise, I’d have to say the game is incredibly weak. Sheva’s inclusion into the series is very strange and doesn’t really make much sense at all. Honestly, Claire would have been much better in that position – the brother/sister relationship being stronger than this pseudo-nonsense about partners (after you’ve played through the game once, you’ll probably want to shoot yourself whenever you hear that word thanks to the overuse). The antagonists of the game, as well, lack the charm that the antagonists from Resident Evil 4 had. Even Wesker is weak in this game, personality-wise, a stark comparison to his awesomeness in older games. The other major players are just forgettable, though. None of them have the charisma of, say, Salazar, Birkin or Nemesis and you feel almost no emotional attachment to anyone in the game (save for one character).

Overall, Resident Evil 5 is a good game. It has plenty of replay value, more than enough unlockables to keep even the most rabid of collectors content and the fun really only begins after you’ve beaten the game once. Alone, this is a action horror title that tacked on the Resident Evil name for quick sales. With a human partner, this is one of the most fun games you’ll play this year. The game is geared more towards playing with a friend than on your own and the structure and pace of the game is shifted accordingly. But this is no Resident Evil game, even if it shares a few characters with the series. The atmosphere is gone, the challenge is gone, and all-in-all Resident Evil 5 feels like Capcom tried to make a game better than Mikami’s masterpiece by using parts OF that masterpiece. It’s just a shame they went and picked the wrong parts.

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