Resident Evil Village: 7 Was Not a Fluke

Can we take a moment and admire the total renaissance Resident Evil is experiencing right now?

From about 2012 (Resident Evil 6) to 2016, the series felt, for all intents and purposes, dead. The action slant that had begun with the brilliant Resident Evil 4—its innovative over the shoulder camera (something something Killswitch did it first something) combined with its taut pacing creating a tense experience that could not be put down—had devolved into straight-up action in 5, and into schlock in 6. 6 has its defenders, usually in the “well Resident Evil was always dumb!” “it’s so bad it’s funny!” and “the combat wasn’t that bad!” camps. But mooooooost people, especially older Resident Evil fans, saw it for what it was—the end of the series as we knew it.

Until Resident Evil 7. I can’t tell you how invigorating it felt when that came out—all the promotional material leading to its release pointed to it being an also-ran Amnesia or PT wannabe, so imagine what a pleasant surprise it was when it turned out to be a classic god-damn Resident Evil game. More so than 4. It wasn’t without its problems, (that last third, oof,) but the first-person perspective of 7 translated surprisingly well to the slower paced, clunky combat of RE1-3, and the emphasis on exploration. Now, the looting involved much cleverer hiding spots, with valuables beneath beds and in dark corners you’d never look at twice in old Resident Evil. Finally, the explicit Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Evil Dead inspirations brought the series back to its long-abandoned B-movie roots.

It wasn’t perfect. But Resident Evil was alive again, dammit.

Then the Resident Evil 2 remake came along and reinvigorated what classic third-person Resident Evil could be again, as well, with the brilliant re-imagination of Mr. X tying into—and I don’t say this lightly—perfect gameplay loop. Of course, Resident Evil 3 remake was a bit of a dud, but not for lack of competence. It was well-made, just pulling from worse source material than 2. So in 3 years, we had 3 back-to-back competent Resident Evil games, and 2 of them were some of the best the series had ever seen.

So, you can imagine my excitement and creeping dread when it was announced that Resident Evil: Village—the next installment in the first-person branch of the series—would take its primary inspiration from Resident Evil 4.

Look, About Resident Evil 4…

Now, don’t get me wrong, Resident Evil 4 was my introduction to the series as a whole. I love it to pieces. I’ve played it to completion 4 times on the Wii, 3 times on the Xbox 360 re-release, and 3 times on the most recent PC HD remaster. I’ve even considered getting the Switch version. But despite the special place 4 holds in my heart, I had come to acknowledge that it pretty much helped kill the series. That, what made it truly great, despite its action leanings, was how the feel and design of that combat made even a pitched fight with dozens of enemies feel like a scene from a horror film, and no game after managed to strike the same balance. The lack of movement while aiming, the constrained camera, and the premium placed on deliberate placement of shots (aim for the knee or the head, always,) did the impossible and made action still feel tense. Plus, the pacing was just perfectly set to always overwhelm you. And attempting that lightning in a bottle combination of action and horror again with Village? Good fucking luck.

The early footage and demos didn’t help my anxiety, either. The additional focus on combat, while still building on the intentionally clunky foundation of 7—with its emphasis on blocking I never truly got, other than as an acknowledgement of “yeah, you’ll get hit, a lot,”—seemed like a poor fit to me.

And then it came out a few days ago, and here I am, having finished it in two sittings, and with a foot in my mouth, again. Because Resident Evil: Village rules. I have a lot of problems with it, mind you, but it still firmly falls in the “good” Resident Evil camp.

The Story in Like Two Seconds

It’s fine. A lot has been made of Chris being a “villain,” which if you have two brain cells or can remember any marketing about a hero being a villain in any game before (coughcough Halo 5 cough), you will know how that turns out.

I do enjoy the characters a lot, especially the goofy bosses of the village. Dr. Moreau might be an all-timer, who just oozes (literally) pathetic energy and pity. A lot has been made of tall-vampire-lady Dimitrescu, and yeah, she chews up the scenery every chance she gets, and it’s wonderful. But on the whole, the story’s just there to get you from tense encounter to tense encounter with as little friction as possible.

SPOILERS:

Resident Evil IV-II

Resident Evil: Village, for better and worse, is an incredibly faithful retread of a lot of the same beats from 4. I would list every beat borrowed from 4, but that might constitute spoilers to some, so I’ll just leave it at this: any time the question is, “how did Resident Evil 4 do it?” Village responds by doing it the same way. There’s very little subversion going on in its most explicit homages. In short, you get in a boat, and hmmm what’s going to happen next? I wonder.

But that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Village, true to its title, really improves on the design of the village and how much there is to do there as you revisit it over the course of the game. In RE4, you retreaded the village twice, and each time it was the same, just with more enemies populated for you to fight. In Village, you’re constantly returning to the village, with new abilities to unlock certain paths, new hazards to face, and new treasure you can find. The map system borrowed whole-cloth from Resident Evil 2—still one of the best maps in video game history—helps facilitate this marriage of the dense level design of old RE, with the linear spectacle of later RE. From the village hub, there are four branches, each to a different boss’ region. Some are totally linear (and are my less favorite,) but a couple are whole new multi-leveled spaces to explore and unlock secrets within over time. It really works, and the classic horror trick of revisiting old areas, only to be shocked by a new threat, works wonders.

Village also improves on 4 in shockingly specific ways. Back in 4, there were random animals scattered around that you could, for very little reason other than verisimilitude, kill. Chickens would sometime drop eggs, cows would kick you if attacked, fish could be attacked and put in your attache case as a free (if not space efficient) health item. Now, aside from the free health, there wasn’t much use for these animals. In Village, however, a light cooking system has been added, where you can take meat, poultry, or fish, and give these ingredients to the merchant for permanent health, speed, or guarding upgrades. It’s not a big deal, but it was fun having a reason to seek out animals in the environment, especially the rare ones hidden off to the side that can help cook the most valuable meals.

Oh, by the way, you didn’t misread that a couple sentences ago—there’s a merchant in Village. He even says, “What are you buying? An old friend of mine used to say that!” Having a physical merchant is such a welcome return after the menus of 5 and the birdcages of 7, and his character is a bit more involved in the story than I would have initially expected. The Duke, as he’s called, serves as the “objective guy” more often than not, telling your protagonist, “Hmmmm, maybe check out this building?” and then Ethan saying, “Rrrr, I don’t trust you, but OKAY,” and this repeats several times and then the game’s over. That, and the character is just one long-winded fat joke.

Grousing about the narrative delivery aside, the merchant and upgrades function almost identically to 4. Firepower, rate of fire, reload speed, and ammo capacity can all be upgraded, but like 4, you’ll find yourself not upgrading guns for (warranted) fear of better firearms showing up down the line, making your upgrades, essentially, wasted. You can still do the trick of upgrading ammo capacity when you have 0 bullets in a gun to get free ammo, which I appreciate. (Though tellingly, there’s only one magnum ammo upgrade due to this trick.) Weapons, aside from being upgraded at the merchant, can also have custom upgrade components attached to them which you find in the environment; so, even if you never put a single Lei into them in the shop, when you sell them back to the merchant they’ll have a little more resale value, which is a nice touch. Shockingly, you can buy ammo now, which feels a little sacrilegious, since I was over-replete with ammo for my entire playthrough anyway, so being able to buy more feels excessive.

On a similar disappointing note, the inventory system from 4 returns (yay) but necessary inventory management is non-existent (boo). This is a matter of taste, I suppose, since I know lots of players absolutely despise having to think about inventory space or encumbrance in general, but inventory management is a fundamental aspect of Resident Evil. It’s what drives you to make hard decisions even after every enemy is dead and you’re just looting the world. But, where 4 had this great balancing act of making your inventory feel unbearably cramped for about a chapter or 2, and then releasing that tension with a new inventory upgrade available in the shop, I feel like Village lets up the pressure too early for each inventory upgrade. Don't get me wrong, Village still scratched that itch of making me constantly organize my inventory to make it as pretty as possible, so it did something right; still, I was always in a position of buying new inventory space before I honestly needed it, and then seeing after the fact, “oh yeah, I guess I needed that!” Therefore, I didn’t think of my inventory once while picking items up, leading to a mindless hoovering of everything in the environment. It was certainly a streamlined experience, but was it Resident Evil? Ehhhhhhh…

And that’s honestly how I felt about a lot of Village compared to 4, whose shadow looms over every aspect of this entry, from the setting, to the focus on combat, to the upgrade loop. It’s a better game and more intelligently designed, no doubt, and there are an admirable number of quirks from 4 that have carried over for uber-fans like myself. But one too many concessions have been made for me to comfortably prefer it. The ammo situation, on Normal, is too forgiving. The inventory never makes you think. And while there are great moments throughout it, no moment in Village rises to the level of the best of what 4 had to offer. (Though there are some deliciously stupid boss fights near the end that had me cackling and turning to my friends, “are you seeing this?” To which they replied, that, yes, they were seeing this, and it was indeed incredibly stupid. But in a good way.)

The good news, however, is that we are literally comparing Village to one of the best games of all time, even if it’s inviting that comparison, and it’s coming out… okay? So how is it on its own?

Like I said earlier, great!

The Actual Game

In a vacuum, Village would best be described as a survival horror game that, like 7, walks the line between modern horror (Amnesia, run the hell away at all times, you are a powerless infant,) and older survival horror (you can fight, but have to choose your battles). Except, unlike 7, you never really have to worry about ammo on normal, and you can pretty much kill every enemy you encounter with no ammo concerns.

It’s a good thing, then, that the enemy encounters, especially early on, are generally well done. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I think they’ve decently emulated the combat loop of “shoot enemy in head, stagger them, retreat and turn to shoot again” from 4 in the first person. The guns all feel great, there’s a satisfying head pop effect on critical hits (a must for a quality Resident Evil game), and after a little futzing around, I started to get into the old flow of “stun a guy, knife him, go back to shooting.” With the more precise aiming (especially on mouse and keyboard) afforded by the first person, the design of the game compensates with even more cramped spaces and a general lack of visibility. Fog, darkness, fields of wheat, water, all of these and more will make sure that you don’t have a lot of time to react when an enemy appears, or that you’ll hear them before you see them. It’s a simple, but effective trick.

A couple of grievances with the combat linger, however. For one, a whole game later, I’m still not entirely sure what function block serves in the combat loop. I get it—if the enemy attacks you and you can’t get out of the way, you can block and take less damage. But isn’t that kind of a consolation prize of “hey, here’s the chance to fuck up slightly less?” I never found that fully satisfying, and easy enough to ignore. It wasn’t until a late-game encounter that I discovered you can actually push enemies back when they hit you with an attack, which gives me fuzzy “Leon S. Kennedy roundhouse kick” feelings, and it’s a very welcome crowd control tool, in a game that can honestly use more of them.

Except not? The design of some of the spaces, especially later ones, resort to either throwing a gaggle of enemies at you, or are too forgiving to the point of letting you stand still and headshot three enemies to death before they ever get close to you. So, in theory, I wish there were more crowd control options in this game, but I never really needed them, so…

It’s here that I feel it’s important to say I played the game on Normal, and while I wouldn’t call myself a Resident Evil expert by any means, that was apparently too easy an experience for me to enjoy like a Resident Evil game. I’m planning to replay Village soon on Hardcore, which I’m sure (or hope) addresses a lot of these concerns.

I implied it a little earlier, but this game falls into the same trap that every modern Resident Evil appears to—ending on a really stupidly bombastic note. After, say, the third of four bosses is defeated, the game just starts chucking enemy after enemy at you in an attempt to test your combat prowess, but really just giving you a chance to fling about the disgusting amounts of ammo you’ve hoarded up by that point. There’s nothing as egregious as the boat sequence from 7, but they’re never as engaging as the earlier encounters. Now, there are two moments that are so stupid they come back around to kind of working, but for the most part, I just sort of rolled my eyes and went, “I guess we’re in this part of these games, now.”

A slightly more successful attempt to mix things up is present in some of the game’s unkillable foes. Lady Dimitrescu and her daughters will stalk you through their castle, and those are some effective scenes. I was continually shocked how much the devs were willing to put even Ethan “My Wife Chainsawed my Hand Off” Winters through in terms of body horror in that section, but it works. A similar, if less effective section involves a creepy doll that makes you hallucinate things. You already know what that is. There’s one genuinely unsettling image from that section, but it’s the kind of thing that’s only going to be a pain to replay on subsequent playthroughs. I can see myself now, just sprinting past the creepy monster—“can I get back to the game now?” But it’s fine enough on an initial run.

This is also a gorgeous game that runs well. There’s a running joke in my friend group that “snow levels in games are the best levels,” and Village has a snowy mountainside aesthetic I never tired of. Again, things get a little more generic by the end—an industrial setting at the end of a Resident Evil game, wow, so original—but for the most part, it’s a looker. I found the basic enemy design (the Lycan-esque humanoids) to be great, and a lot of the other enemies to be a little lackluster. Here’s a guy in a robe with a sickle. Here’s a naked zombie guy with a sickle. Here’s a buff man with a big axe. Here’s a buff man with a big hammer who has more hair. It’s an improvement on 7’s mold guys, but… not by much.

Despite all these complaints, I really did enjoy my time with Village, and the pacing ofit is fantastic. I just didn’t want to put this thing down, to the point of playing for 3 hours starting in the evening when it first unlocked on Steam, to playing the rest of it in one day the day after. The loop of “fight enemies, scavenge an area, use new tools to unlock sections of old areas, return to merchant to upgrade, fight enemies,” just kept me engrossed throughout.

Resident Evil Continues

I remember, after having finished 7, I had a moment of cynicism. I thought to myself, “this is great, but they can only hit the reset button once here.” In other words, bringing the series back to the original—in this case, RE1—can only be done once, and after that, you have to start introducing new things again, and risk making the exact same, or worse mistakes, as you did before. (See here, rebooted Star Trek.) And after finishing 7, I worried that the series wouldn’t maintain its momentum.

So, one new entry later, and here we are. I can say confidently that 7 was not a fluke, and this incarnation of the series is here to stay for some time. I can point to lots of little disappointments that make me, overall, still call 4 my favorite entry in the series, followed closely by Resident Evil 2 Remake, but Village does so much more right than wrong. It gets the pacing right, the tension right, the combat right, and the level design right. In short, it hits the nail on the head in the moment-to-moment experience, which probably contributed to how quickly I played it. And even after finishing it, I want to dive back in.

There were a couple secrets I missed, a few ways I could optimize my upgrade and ammo situation, ways to challenge myself on higher difficulties, and plenty of fun unlocks for new runs. Village has me excited to download it the way I downloaded 4—learn every nook and cranny and play through it blindfolded—and for all my complaints, it’s so nice to feel that again. To feel like this is not only a game I can master, but is worth mastering.

But seriously, you can’t rotate items upside down in the inventory? How the hell can you call this a successor to RE4 without the ability to organize your inventory entirely flipped like an imbecile?

If you read all the way down here, thanks! This one was slightly less holistic/artsy fartsy than my other essays because my impressions of this game are still so recent. I'm looking forward to getting back into Village on higher difficulties and seeing how the new Mercenaries mode stacks up, but if you enjoyed what you read, I have more essays over at my blog, Lapses in Taste.

It's a really recent release, but how have y'all found Resident Evil: Village so far? Expectations exceeded? Met? Undershot? Still miss "old" Resident Evil, whatever that qualifies as in 2021?

I’d shake this teams hand if I wasn’t sure they would cut it off.

@efesell: I hear in 9 they're just going to start the game with your character losing every limb in a woodchipper. Then you wake up the next day with a couple of staples and some duct tape on your character model and it's A-Okay from there.

I find myself very interested in the coverage of this game. I keep reading everything I can find about it and really admiring all the screenshots. It’s an odd attraction, though, because I played about an hour of 7 (made it up to the dinner table scene) and then just noped right out and uninstalled it. I’m not particularly squeamish and I like a good horror movie from time to time but that game was just very much not for me and I don’t quite know why. I guess I’ll just admire this one from afar?

Cool write up, I’ve also been developing a lot of thoughts and feelings on this as well. Platinum’d 7 when it first came out, not sure if I’ll get around to village’s stuff the same way, but who knows. Definitely a blast so far.

@crashman06: I will say, there is a lot less of that dynamic in Village, ie, here's a menacing figure you can't kill but who will chase you around the house. The castle has a lot of that, but that's pretty much it, save one sequence a little later.

But that is still present.

Edit: Also that game opens up with your wife trying to kill you with a chainsaw and then you shooting her in the head, I think it's totally reasonable to nope out at that point, lol.

I've really only just begun(I just took down the first lord last night) so I can't really comment too much on the quality of the game/story overall yet...but I do have 2 things to mention. First off, in the dark post 6 pre 7 we did have one glimmer of hope! Revelations 2 came out and was way better than expected, bringing back Clair and Barry and actually nailing unique co-op in a Resident Evil game that doesn't negatively impact the single player (lookin' at you, RE5), I do hope we get a follow up on the dangling plot thread left at the end at some point.

The other thing is....you can totally rotate inventory items, on PC I think it's the shift key? I don't recall the key off hand but I 100% totally did it to neatly organize all my ammo(guns on top left, explosives and health on the right, ammo everywhere else).

@panfoot: Ahem. You can rotate items to be vertical or horizontal, but you cannot deliberately meme your inventory to be straight up upside down, either vertically or horizontally! They will always be properly upright, no matter how hard I mash the rotate key.

I DEMAND JUSTICE, CAPCOM!

In all seriousness I had no trouble organizing my inventory but it bummed me out I couldn't do silly stuff like having my guns upside down.

I finished this today and while good it has the same issue RE7 (and RE3 to a much bigger degree) had where the beginning is all about exploration then after the castle it turns into a bunch of disconnected set-pieces and borderline linear combat areas (the factory) near the end. Atmosphere and writing-wise just like 7 the most interesting parts are when it starts diverging from the series lore and delving into surreal horror even if all that ends up getting explained near the end anyway.

@lapsariangiraff: Ahhhh...that I did not notice, dang.

@brick_shithouse: I didn't mind the factory so much because I got some off-brand Regenerator vibes from the Soldats, and there was some backtracking with Heisenberg's key, but for me the breaking point was the stronghold with endless Lycans to fight. I actually backtracked a little to pick up some loot, and you can retrigger the "here's a lot of guys showing up to fight you" moment multiple times, which feels like a huge oversight in scripting. Literally just ran away from them and yelled "fuck you, game," as I proceeded. Also, if the 4 comparison tracks, and the big hammer guy is kind of like the Big Cheese, then he's a way less interesting fight than that guy was.

I beat this game 3 times between the release day and the day after. Needless to say I had a blast and this game is pretty good.

@crashman06: totally understandable, if RE7 wasn't a resident evil game I would have opt out too. The premise wasn't interesting to follow and the house was too boring to explore with an invincible maniac chasing you around it.

I have started playing RE8 recently but I think I have progressed far enough to tell that it is better than 7. The game follows RE4 school of thought in every direction where it feels like a reimagining of RE4 in first person view with Ethan instead of Leon.

You will have interesting places to explore and notes to read, interesting characters and interesting premise in RE8.

@topcyclist: Totally, I tried to get more of my positivity across with phrases like "hey, these are only problems compared to one of my favorite games of all time," but the piece is definitely nitpicky on the whole.

I've been enjoying my Hardcore difficulty playthrough a lot though! I hear the one above that, Village of Shadows, is just insufferable on a new save file. That might be intended for New Game +.

Speaking for all people who hate scary games, the thing that Resident Evil has going for it that isn't all that dissimilar from most of the mascot horror from the '80s is that there is a ridiculousness in its soul that makes the horror almost more of a sideshow than the main attraction. Yes, dogs will jump through windows and crows will squawk from light fixtures, but ultimately it's a series with Jill Sandwiches, a leech brood masquerading as a man, somebody who punches a boulder to make it move, a military base staffed by Spaniard zombies who really delight in the power of electricity and fireworks, "itchy...scratchy..." and so on. I don't do scary movies and I don't do scary games (hence why I played the RE2 remake, and loved it, right up until I knew I would let it alone forever nor have any interest in RE3/RE7) but when Resident Evil strikes the right tone and embraces its knack for earnest absurdity the series shines like very few other things in this hobby.

Even Resident Evil Remake, as horrifying as the Crimson Heads and Lisa can be, it is so slow and thoughtful that the fear factor of its horror angle is significantly dampened with down time and moments when you're just absorbing the beautiful art, music and ridiculous architecture. The more I see and hear people comparing RE8 to RE4, the more I wonder if I could get past the first person perspective and find that same sort of joy I've got out of RE1/REmake, RE2/half of REmake2, RE0 and RE4.

@nodima: Resident Evil Village is... deeply goofy. If "less scary, more B-movie" is what you want from your RE, then I think you'd like Village a lot. There are a couple of more horror-y bits, but they are the exception, not the rule.

@lapsariangiraff: Oh don't take my stuff to heart, I loved the impression. I got right into your mindset and haven't played it (full game), but know it's at the least pretty competent from the demo. The polish on some well-made games these days kinda will have you sounding like you don't like em as much as you do, since you'll find the few things that don't work and those things will nag at you since everything else is so good. Like weapons breaking in Zelda (seemingly good for some people) causing someone who's not a fan of it but who loves the rest of the game, to come off like they think the weapons issue is the worst when it's just a problem they're making sure the reader knows. So again, I also got the idea you really liked the game, I was mostly messing with ya, and rambling out loud after reading. Thanks and I'll check out more of your stuff.

Wrapped it up in about nine hours on PC. Enjoyed the majority of it, not so much when it turned into combat areas. The story also became your typical RE nonsense by the end , but the journey to reach it was entertaining.

I wish Capcom could leave the RE ip out of their next first person action/horror title and just make something original, instead of having to tie up the series legacy to every part, even when they sort of rebooted it with seven.

@giant_gamer: Maybe part of it is that I have essentially no history with the RE series, having spent almost all of the PS1 and PS2 era exclusively on PC. This one still sounds interesting though!

I'm hoping you guys can help me make up my mind on buying the game or not. I have a couple specific questions, and I'm sorry if they have been answered in the post but as I'm on the fence and kind of want to play the game I've been trying to avoid spoilers.

I've watched a few playthroughs of 7 and have played RE2 Remake, and I'm wondering how much of 8 is avoiding an unkillable monster that stalks you throughout the level. This has to be my least favorite game mechanic and made me put down RE2 multiple times. No offense to people who enjoy that, I just it extremely unfun.

I have read little bits of preview coverage and have seen the comparison to RE4 multiple times, how accurate is that? Playing through RE2 Remake and watching 7, those definitely felt slower and more deliberate (in terms of a smaller number of enemies along with less ammo) compared to 4. I am not the biggest survival horror fan and playing a more action oriented Resident Evil appeals to me, if that is truly the case.

Lastly, and this definitely isn't a deal breaker, but how jump scare heavy is the game? I'm a pretty anxious person and jump scares aren't my favorite thing. But again, that's something I can deal with if the game is fun enough.

I've played a bit, up unto the first type writer and it hasn't really hooked me. I still have an hour of play time until the return limit on steam and am grateful for any input you guys can give

@david3cm: Hey, happy to answer those questions.

There are exactly 3 unkillable character sequences. I think they make up significantly less time than they did in 7 or 2 Remake, but I'm listing the specifics in case you want more details.

(Spoilers)

1. Lady Dimitrescu and her three daughters in the castle. All are eventually vanquished, but for the 2-3 hours you play in the castle, they will stalk you intermittently in the main halls, and the opera hall. If you run to a different area, they'll give up the chase pretty quickly, with one big exception of a scene where you can't fight Dimitrescu and have to run around her to open a gate. That's the most glaring one, and how long you actually spend avoiding them depends on how much you backtrack for extra treasure in the castle. I'd say of the 2-3 hours in the castle, you spend about 10-20 minutes actually in their vicinity without being able to kill them.
2. There's a PT esque "oh man I'm hallucinating going through these halls" sequence that is almost entirely threat free, except for a big enemy you have to get around twice. It's a very simple "let them come one direction then walk the other" or "hide under this bed for a second then run past them," and they move slowly, and their presence is announced beforehand.
3. On one of the return trips to the village, there is an enemy you cannot kill until you come back with a new weapon, so you just run/crouch by him once in the village to the next area, (it's a short walk in a straight line) and the next time you see him you can kill him in 2 shots.

And that's pretty much it. There's one specific later game enemy you can choose to run or sneak past, but they can be pretty easily defeated as well.

As for jump scares -- it's Resident Evil. It never felt oppressive or like it got in the way of my enjoyment in my playthroughs, but there are several jump scares, either in cutscenes or while you're playing. There was only one that really got me.Most of the time it's pretty predictable "open door, pull lever, push button, and THING HAPPENS!?1" kinds of jump scares. And even then, it's often a cutscene, so you don't have to react immediately a lot of the time.

Hope that helps!

@david3cm: Yeah, as stated above, there are some unkillable enemies in there, but it's a pretty short-term thing compared to the RE2 remake, for instance, which I also found annoying. It was little enough in this one that it didn't bother me.

Jump scares, eh, not really a lot of those.

It definitely becomes somewhat combat-focused once you get past the slow and on-rails first hour or so. You know where Brad and Vinny stopped in the QL? Well, after that cut-scene, there's a scripted chase sequence, and after that is when I'd say the proper game more or less begins.

I'm really enjoying it after beating the game a few times already (becomes pretty quick to do when you've done it once). The way you describe what you're looking for, I'd say you should keep going, I think it's worth the money.

This is considered heresy by those that... like to create fights online with people who don't like the games they like, but I believe Resident Evil 4 was when Resident Evil began a down hill trend. Resident Evil had gone meh at RE3 and then became bad at RE4. I never thought it was a good game. It's not scary, and it's action focused but doesn't play well enough to handle that. The attempts at scares are all flat and the gameplay is tedious which ruins the action focus. It just doesn't work and it never has for me.

I realize people like it, and that's fine there's nothing wrong with liking things even when they're bad. I'll never stop saying it. Just because you like something doesn't mean it's good. It's why I prefer to call entertainment "fun" or "enjoyable" when referring to things I like. Because "good" or "bad" is technical. But "fun" and "enjoyable" are emotional response and individual. My emotional response to entertainment will be different than yours. It's subjective. All these words are misused often in entertainment conversations, but especially in review of them (I'm even guilty of that at times).

Anyway, why I bring it up is I believe RE:Village makes good on RE4. It does what RE4 wanted to do and more. It has spooky stuff in it (I don't find Village scary but its certainly a little creepy at the beginning of the game), and it has a lot of well done action. It does both fairly well. If I had a problem with that it would be that I would like it to mix the two slightly better as the game kind of lives on a slope and each individual part happens one at a time rather than all together. I found that to be strange, especially because I didn't find any of it to be all that scary. It even stopped being creepy the moment you leave the first area. For me anyway.

But anyway, it's a great game and Kudos to Capcom for letting it happen. I think both 7 and 8 are great games. I look forward to more which I haven't felt about a Resident Evil since 2.

One thing I do want to say about this game--and I may eventually write up some sort of blog post on other games that do this well--I like that it's okay with basically letting you break it. And in this case I mean something pretty specific when I say that.

After you beat the game the first time, the "extra content shop" opens, which allows you to buy stuff for "completion points" (CP), which you gain from completing one-time "challenges" ranging from killing X enemies with Y weapon, to completing the whole game in under three hours, etc.

(Incidentally, many of these "challenges" are also achievements--or maybe even all of them, I'm not sure?--but in this case I actually feel much more incentive to do them because there's an in-game reward for doing so. If only all achievements were like this.)

One of the main draws of the extra content shop, besides a few extra weapons you can get, is that you can unlock infinite ammo on a per-weapon basis, which can then be toggled on and off from the main menu.

But the thing about this that seems to run counter to what most modern games are doing is that there is no associated penalty for turning infinite ammo on. It doesn't disable achievements, and it doesn't even disable completing other challenges. E.g., one of the challenges is to finish the game on the ultra-hard "Village of Shadows" difficulty setting (not even available until you beat the game once), but the game is just fine with you beating it by blazing through with your maxed-out, infinite-ammo magnum.

I really, really like this as a design decision. It emphasizes that the game doesn't take itself too seriously (as was discussed on today's Bombcast), and is simply a ridiculous murder-playground for you to screw around and enjoy yourself in. They just aren't being "precious" about achievements and such in the way that so many games are nowadays. Love it.

FWIW, it took me something like 13 or 14 hours to clear the game the first time through. The second play took a little over 5 hours, since I knew where everything was and did a lot less aimless wandering around (I didn't have any infinite ammo weapons at that point, either), so it really does get to be pretty quick to complete. Then I did a third play on the "casual" difficulty setting just to do the "complete the game in under 3 hours" and "knife only" challenges, and managed to do it in 2.5 hours, but man, that went against all my instincts to scour for treasure, you basically have to run past everything and everyone as fast as you can to get it done safely. Now I'm doing a run on the highest difficulty with the aforementioned infinite-ammo magnum, and having a blast with it.

@atheistpreacher: I really enjoy this aspect of it, too.

I kiiiiiinda wish Village of Shadows was a little more reasonable on a fresh save? But it's great that they let you have fun with it any way you want. Doing a hardest difficulty run with an infinite ammo magnum after beating Hardcore on a new save, and it's really fun just zapping guys down, especially in that first village fight.

@cornbredx: I think Resident Evil: Village improves on a lot of aspects as 4, as well, (especially the design of the main village, they get so much more use out of the space now,) but I don't think we see eye to eye on 4 itself at all. I'm happy to chalk up it up to subjective/personal differences, because it sounds like you've gotten into one too many fights online about this already, ha.

Personally, I find some of the straight-up combat sections in Village to be slightly underwhelming? There are a few sections, either in the blood-flooded dungeons of the castle or Heisenberg's factory or the zombies near the Beneviento house, or some parts of the village, where you can see weaker guys from a long way away and draw a bead on them with the pistol before they get even close to you (on Hardcore, at least. I wrote this when I had just cleared Standard, and I just finished Hardcore). But I've been really enjoying it.

@lapsariangiraff: RE the infinite magnum, I found it even more fun to kill those guys who pop out of the water at the bottom of the castle. Reason being that they sort of pop up one by one as you moved forward, and each time spooky music would juuuuust start to play... and then stop pretty much immediately as I magnumed the guy down. So there was something like six or seven times in the space of a minute when the tense music just started and stopped in seconds. I found that inordinately amusing. It was like the game was saying, "Surprise! I'm going to kill yo... Oh, nevermind."

As regards RE4, that remains one of the very, very few games (really just RE4, King's Field 2, and King's Field: The Ancient City) that's more than 15 years old that I still go back and play frequently. I replay a King's Field game every year or two. I replay RE4 at about the same rate. The fan-made RE4 HD Project has given me extra incentive, too, and it's almost done after something like eight years.

I've often asked myself exactly why RE4 is so special (remember Steve Gaynor's tweet about his favorite games on each platform he owns?). And here's one sort of weirdly specific reason that probably isn't highlighted enough: it's that combat loop of shooting an enemy in the head/foot, doing the roundhouse kick/suplex, and knifing them for all you're worth. That and the fact that your complete invincibility during those kick animations allows you to control large crowds with just a single pistol bullet. It means that however overwhelmed or low on ammo you might be, you always have the tools to take care of business. The game does do many other things well, but think about it... take out those kicking and suplex animations and it's just not nearly the same game anymore. And I don't think any game, even in the RE series itself, has been able to replicate it since... or perhaps simply failed to understand it fully. I suspect the upcoming remake may well miss the boat completely on this aspect.

Which is all to say that while I'm enjoying the hell out of RE8, I don't think it can ever match RE4 for me. Probably nothing can. RE8 is also less of a pure action game than RE4 and tries to do some diverse things, which in one sense I applaud, and yet in another... there are aspects of it that, while they're good on a first playthrough, don't do so hot on repeat plays, and they're obviously aiming for you to replay it a lot. The whole dollhouse section was very cool the first time, for instance, but it's going to be the exact same the tenth time as it was the first time, so in that sense it just becomes this repetitive thing you have to power through yet again. It doesn't really work when you've already done it and the mystery and suspense is gone. The game also starts kinda slow, whereas RE4 puts you right in the action from minute one.

@atheistpreacher: I agree completely re: 4. (Heh.)

I think the pacing is rock solid, and it lends itself well to multiple playthroughs because, while there are gimmicks, there are very few times that you lose control to an unskippable cinematic, so it can just go.

Similarly, I replay it a lot. And that combat loop is a huge part of it. Sometimes people say it controls poorly, but I think it controls perfectly for what you're being asked to do. You're not being asked to be a crack shot (though it helps) -- you're being asked to control a space. A space that is constantly trying to get away from you, with guys spawning behind or inching to your periphery. And when you best them, when you maneuver in such a way they're all lined up in front of you ready for *one* shotgun blast or *one* grenade or *one* well-placed kick -- you've already won. And that feels great. And I never feel like I'm in control of the space in Village -- I'm just hitting as many headshots as I can as the enemies come toward me, and then running over to another side of the room when they come close to me to do it again.

But I'm experiencing some similar fatigue in Village with the nonstop unskippable little animations, and the kind of "setpiece" moments that are neat the first time but then I never want to play again. Every time I replay this thing, I'm going to have to walk and not really "play the game" for a solid 5-10 minutes at the start. Every time. And that doesn't sound like a lot, but by my third go around, I find it... tiring. Also, I'm sure it's a back-end thing with how scripted events are handled, but why are some first person cinematics skippable and others aren't? I can skip this small bit of Ethan jumping out a window, but I can't skip this long elevator ride up to the courtyard in the castle as he glues his hand back on. There's no discernible rhyme or reason to when you can skip, so until I've just memorized it, I'm going to mash the pause key during every mildly scripted thing to see, "can I skip this? can I skip this?"

Hopefully the devs patch in a "speedrun mode" or something that can cut to the quick faster.

@lapsariangiraff: Yep, we are sympatico. I likewise agree with everything you've said.

I really like the way you've described RE4's gameplay as "controlling a space." I think that's exactly right, you're working for that moment when a single kick or shotgun shell or grenade can take out everybody, or at least knock everybody down. Whereas in RE8, that's rarely possible, because enemies on average are much speedier, more dangerous (individually), and have better AI and animations for avoiding your attacks. I think it makes fighting the average single enemy in RE8 more difficult and more interesting, actually, but nothing beats the gameplay of RE4's crowd scenes (which is most of the time in that game, really).

And yeah, funny that when you mentioned some of the unskippable scenes, the one with the hand was the one I immediately thought of before you even mentioned it. I've done that exact same thing many times myself already.

I was not interested in 7 in the slightest but I am having a blast with 8. RE4 on Gamecube was my first in the series when I was 10 years old and this is potentially going to be my second favorite. There are some issues I am having with the gameplay feel and some of the creative choices abut I am nearing the end of my first playthrough and its just such a videogame. I'm getting that "they don't make em like this anymore" feeling throughout. The only issue I have with how close it harkens back to RE4 is that every time they do something I don't like as much as the previous title it really sticks out. Regardless, definitely the most fun I've had with a new game this year.

@lapsariangiraff: @atheistpreacher: Thanks for the thoughtful replies. It definitely sounds like there is something there for me, I'll stick with it and hopefully start warming up to it

Howdy, just want to let you know that 'good' and 'bad' are subjective terms, not technical. It is raining, is technical. There are 52 litres of water in this tank, technical. You cannot say resident evil 4 is bad, and simply be correct. Just wanted to point that out, sorry.

@giant_gamer: this is good to know. i didn’t really like 7 but am nonetheless interested in 8 because of how everyone is talking about it.

I'm really liking it so far. I started a new save on hardcore difficulty after finishing the castle section on normal just cause I wanted to see what it was like, and holy shit the game is vicious now. It's forcing me to think my actions through and keeping me on my toes in a way that it kind of wasn't before, and I gotta admit I'm actually finding it more engrossing this way. It reminds me of how hard the original RE's could be if you mess up too much.

@owl_cave: I definitely enjoyed my Hardcore playthrough more than Normal.

@pimpslappp: One of the reasons why I didn't like re7 and liked re8 are the characters, you'll enjoy seeing them and reading about them throughout the game.

I found that players and reviewers prefer different characters over the others which is always good in my book :)

Just don't expect much from the story.

RE8 is a step in the right direction and hopefully Capcom will improve on the formula to make it more closer to classic RE games.

Im nearing the end of my first playthrough and I've enjoyed most of the game tremendously. Then I got to the factory. It was almost unbearable. It was such a boring dingy and repetitive environment. The map there is so convoluted and requires so much backtracking through rooms that are barely distinguishable from one another. I know that this is essentially par for the course with Resident Evil games but they are always the worst part of every game (in my opinion). This one felt especially aggregious mostly because of how great the earlier parts of the game were. The castle and the mansion were particularly good. I play these games with my girlfriend and we have still loved our time with it and most likely will play it a couple more times, but I really wish Capcom would stop feeling the need to make these kind of set pieces for the end of these games because they always detract from the overall experience. I would also love to see an entire resident evil game like the mansion area. I know games like that exist but I would like to see if RE could pull off a full game of that.

I tried to get into RE when RE4 was in the zeitgeist, but could not get into it at all.

I just started playing 7 on Game Pass, and am liking it so far. RE 8 sounds to be paced very well and that is intriguing to me. I may pick it up, after I complete 7. Also, I am a sucker for games/levels that take place in snowy locations.

@wardcleaver: Snow levels are the best levels, after all! :P

@giant_gamer: how about enemy variety and level design? In 7 I found both very lack luster in the later stages.

@pimpslappp: this is one of the things they improved in this game. There is a variety of enemies as every large map has its own theme and monsters. Although, lycans appear in most of the game.

@owl_cave: Yeah, you know, I think Hardcore on a fresh save probably is the sweet spot. I started on Normal and did a game on Hardcore with upgraded guns... and it was too easy, really. Village of Shadows is the only difficulty level for which upgraded weapons from a previous playthrough feel almost required.