Of the mainline entries in the long-running Resident Evil series, Zero is perhaps the most obscure. You could chalk part of that up to originally being a Nintendo platform exclusive, with its original release dated all the way back in 2002 on the GameCube, before eventually receiving a lackluster Wii port in 2009. However the lauded remake of the original 1996 Resident Evil, often coined the 'REmake', is without a doubt one of the most celebrated games in the series despite also for the longest time existing as a GameCube and Wii exclusive.

That people don't tend to bring RE0 up very much in RE discussions is thusly less to do with its limited playerbase and simply down to how it's... just not all that great. While it's not quite bumping elbows with such bottom feeders as Resident Evil 6 (which is still in a league of its own as far as bad RE games go; Code Veronica makes for the second worst by the by), within the pantheon of the core releases at least it's really not that far off.

So, what is it exactly that buries RE0 so far down into the dirt? Well for starters, you have the very component that sets it apart from the likes of every other survival horror entry of the franchise, being its two character setup. Most RE games tend to give you a choice between two characters to play as, though RE0 was the first to feature two characters operating simultaneously. It's certainly an interesting idea in theory, and it seems like it was inevitable given how even the original Resident Evil was at a time designed with two characters coexisting together. Unfortunately there's really not very much benefit to the dual-protagonist setup, and in most cases actually hinders and pulls the game down to new disastrous depths that could have been avoided. For one thing you have your playable leads, Rebecca Chambers and Billy Coen.

Combat for Two

From a story perspective they're perfectly fine, but Capcom's meager attempts to mechanically separate the two results in a few silly contrivances even by RE standards. Like, for one example, how they've made it so only Rebecca can mix herbs--healing poultices--together. In a vacuum wherein no other RE game exists, sure, it makes sense given that she's been specially trained as a medic and all. But there's been a lot of RE before then, and it's already been established that seemingly every citizen of Raccoon City knows how to mix some leaves together. As a result Billy is (and continues to be this many years onward) quite literally the only character in the entire video game franchise that can't mix herbs together. It's absurd!

The only other most notary difference between the two is how much damage they can withstand. Billy is a bloody tank and can take a rather copious amount of damage. More so than your average RE protagonist even far as the survival horror entries are concerned. Rebecca by comparison is a porcelain vase, which is fair given that he's a marine and she's still only an eighteen year old girl that specialises in the medical field. However what this results in is Rebecca often times feeling like a liability. If you're to play this game how Capcom (most likely) intended, then you'll have both Rebecca and Billy rollin' together. What this then leads to is Billy leading the charge, while Rebecca just sorta stands beside him, maybe occasionally chipping in if you set her behaviour to attack. If you're to attempt to flee or avoid enemies instead of taking them on, having two characters doing so simultaneously can lead to a few complications. For one most of the game's environments are as closed in and claustrophobic as you'd expect, especially in the Train and Training Facility sections. It can be hard enough to maneuver through a horde with one character, let alone when you have another that's just as vulnerable as you trailing behind or to your side.

The character differences simply aren't drastic enough to give either character their own role beyond Billy = Leader and Rebecca = ...? Rebecca for example has a medicine case as her personal item, but it's only used on two separate occasions to solve a puzzle, reducing it to nothing but an extra inventory slot you probably wish could house something else. I would have hoped that it could have been used to reverse the effects of healing items, exactly like what George could do in the RE: Outbreak series. Meaning you could add a blue herb into the mix so it can instead heal you, rather than simply curing you of poison. Billy's the same way, again with his one major benefit being that he can take more damage. As such they fall into very restrictive roles, with Billy again clearly operating as the leader who handles most of the combat, while Rebecca basically functions as a pack mule to carry more stuff.

Thanks to the two-character setup the combat is also kind of a mess. You do have a couple of basic AI guidelines that determines whether your partner will attack or not, and whether s/he follow or stay on the spot. But in the heat of you fighting for your character's life the AI is merely a handicap; an additional health bar you have to watch to keep the 'You Are Dead' screen at bay. When standing by your side, even with attack mode on, their rate of fire is pretty slow, meaning they don't really contribute much to the fight. And considering that they still of course use up whatever ammo they have in the process, it's preferable in most cases that they don't attack. If you try to run away, with attack on or off, they'll follow you without any concern of any enemies in their path, sometimes resulting in them taking damage. Given that combat can oftentimes result in a lot of shooting, running to a safer area, and then shooting some more, the AI lacks the intuitiveness to really keep up. You can at least use the right analogue stick to move the AI manually, but in the midst of all that may be happening it gets to be a hassle that I really wish I didn't have to deal with. Especially since you may accidentally move them outside of the camera angle you're in. So, what's the alternative? You basically explore as a single character, and must then potentially kill any enemies on your way to provide a safe path for your other character, or you attempt to avoid enemies with one character at a time. When you consider the first option... well, what's the bloody point of having a secondary character? And when you're avoiding combat you're still having to do so twice, with one also essentially having half the health of another.

Then there's the inventory, which honestly feels like another contrivance to justify having two simultaneous characters. Both Rebecca and Billy have but only six slots (which at least makes sense for Rebecca since that's how many she in the first RE), and most weapons that aren't handguns require two slots to carry. This thusly makes trying to eke out on your own a doomed affair, which is only compounded further by the lack of item boxes... Yup! No item boxes! You can at least drop items on the ground, but whereas with item boxes you could always store stuff knowing you can recollect it later on, once you've dropped an item in RE0 it's staying put unless you decide to return and pick it back up.

However there are quite a number of segments spread throughout the game will split the not-so-dynamic duo up. On two occasions you're forced to only play as one character, though for the most part such occasions typically involves one character having to use a hookshot to reach a different level of the area. From that point they each explore different segments of the location, sending items to and fro via a dumbwaiter if need be. On one hand this actually makes smart use of the two characters, better than any occasion where they're together. But on the other this then also brings me back to the inventory. When you've got both characters with 12 slots altogether, even if they're still split between two characters, it's reasonable enough as to not get in the way too much. But when you're forced to split up, while also having to account for weapons (and the hookshot too for that matter) that take up two slots, the level of inventory management can take its toll. The game isat least generous enough to allow you to use items immediately upon deciding whether to pick it up or not. Though besides healing items that's only if you have a spare slot available. So, say you want to make a molotov? You have the empty bottles but can't carry the gascan; rather than being able to combine them right there, you must first drop something onto the ground, then pick up the gascan, combine then together, and then pick up whatever it is you dropped. That is if you can find it, since items can sometimes overlap one another and certain camera angles can completely obfuscate just where the Hell the game placed them.

Then there's the issue of understanding which weapons to give each character. Without foreknowledge of what's to come, you're basically making a guess over which character may need the grenade launcher more for example. And such weapons are too big to trade via the dumbwaiter as well, so one character will likely have to be stuck with inferior weaponry. Separate saves are a necessity to say the least.

Even after saying all that, what is probably the best part of the whole game is actually when the game forces you to play as Rebecca on her lonesome. This is funnily enough the best outcome of the two character setup, for how it first lulls you into a sense of comfort from having played as Billy for so long, only to then be forced to play as the weaker of the game's two protagonists. It's a pretty great 'pulling the rug from beneath you' sort of moment.

Unfortunately the inventory issue plagues even this. Because there's no actual warning to when the event occurs that leaves Rebecca on her own, you could potentially find yourself ill equipped to temporarily continue on as Rebecca. If you're playing it the way you probably should, she ordinarily exists to carry all the healing and key items. The only weapons she'd have are ones that are out of ammunition. And then there's still the problem of her only having 6 slots at that. In fact for my own latest playthrough, even though I knew when it was coming, I decided to still leave her with the grenade launcher thinking there'd be ammo to collect for it down the line. There wasn't, and due to also carrying the handgun w/ ammunition, and then soon procuring the magnum w/ ammunition, I kept having to drop the grenade launcher, pick up key item, use key item, and then recollect the grenade launcher. In fact one time during this process I actually lost it completely! Shortly before you face the Proto-Tyrant, you need to collect a key to start the elevator. I thusly left the grenade launcher on the turntable I used to get there in the first place. However the boss battle brings a shutter down, halting any potential backtracking to the area. Even though you can make your way back to where you first took the turntable down, it can't be brought back up. The grenade launcher was thusly lost for good. Until I reloaded my last save, meaning that I had to face the Tyrant again but now at least with the knowledge of where not to drop... anything. So, that happened.

There are terrible demons... Ouch!

While Billy is a perfectly fine RE protagonist, in that he's not exceptionally annoying and has just enough personality to set him apart from the likes of Chris and Leon, since the years have passed I've often begun to ponder a particular 'what-if' scenario within the RE0 canon. One wherein he was replaced by fellow STARS member and eventual giant snake chow Richard Aiken. Rebecca and Richard had already been established via the game manuals as being somewhat close, with Richard taking it upon himself to try and make the rookie of the team feel a little more confident in her incredibly stressful position as a police officer. A buddy, of the cop nature, if you will. In the original RE it's also possible for you to meet Rebecca looking after Richard and his ugly snake bite, whereas in the REmake that's actually the only method to meeting Rebecca for the first time. They're the only Bravo members in the whole game (the first RE is) that are seen to interact, hinting towards a friendship that may have been important amidst the goings on of everybody somehow splitting up and becoming zombie (and crow, snake, dog ect.) fodder. Furthermore, in Umbrella Chronicles, there exists an unlockable campaign that stars Rebecca and Richard exploring the Spencer Mansion leading up to Richard's inevitable injury. That may have been released in 2007, but it still adds to my disappointment of envisioning RE0 instead featuring Richard as the leading lad rather than Billy.

Billy is again plenty suitable for the game, but he hasn't been seen or even mentioned since. I'm sure they're probably gearing him up to reappear amidst their current battle plan of ''PANDER TO YOUR HEARTS CONTENT'', but nonetheless it's hard not to imagine a slightly more tragic relationship centred on you playing as Richard, all the while knowing his ultimate fate in the next chronological game to follow. With Richard in the role instead, there'd also be no pressure for Capcom to reintroduce another long-forgotten character later in the series, as that character 'arc' would have long since been wrapped up as it were, too.

And speaking of the characters, the dissonance that is now created concerning Rebecca is hard to ignore. In RE0 she's one of the leads, and while you can (and should) largely play most of the game when possible as Billy, there are sections where you have to brave the monsters as Rebecca. Hell, she manages to (temporarily) take down a Tyrant! Point is RE0 puts Rebecca forward as being a pretty capable young woman... only the original Resident Evil portrays her as somebody who can't even hold her own against a single Hunter. It's not like she's merely a damsel in distress, and must even save Chris on up to two separate occasions, but given that she technically has an awful lot more experience with this stuff before the Alpha team have even arrived, you'd think she'd be the one leading the charge. As opposed to primarily hunkering inside medical rooms. Though they do at least make a cute reference to her inability to play the piano perfectly.

The story itself is serviceable, and Rebecca and Billy mesh pretty well together as a team. Though their lack of interaction beyond cutscenes is pretty noticeable, which creates this huge gaps of the two not saying a whole lot until the next cutscene. A different time of course, but considering how chatty the characters all are in Revelations 2 of last year, going back to RE0 has only highlighted the lack of dialogue between the two.

I quite like the premise of Billy's marine backstory, but they unfortunately do very little with it. It honestly feels as if there's some serious material at play here, concerning his unit that decides to just lay waste to an innocent village. But then given Capcom's level of storytelling it was probably for the best they didn't indulge much further.

Monkeys, bats, and leeches - oh fuck!

This may seem like a given to most, but RE0's controls are a little stodgy. Now yes yes tank controls blaarg, but I'm talking even amidst the series own standards. The remake is a prime comparison of how much more fluid the controls feel even with the tank control restrictions. For Zero however, it's as if everything has a few extra frames to it. Everything just seems to take a little longer than it would in other RE games. And no more is this a pain than against a few particular enemy types:

Annihilator

A pretty generic (if appropriate) term for them, but they fit right alongside the likes of Hunters and Lickers. These furry little fuckers are introduced before you've even put the main HUB area behind you. And while they look like they might resemble the Hunter equivalent of a faster, more ferocious enemy type, Hunters are in fact in RE0. And they got nothin' on Annihilators.

For one thing they're pretty damn small, while also being much faster and more aggressive than any Hunter. They have a similar assortment of attacks and are probably just as powerful - speaking for both their offense and defence capabilities. The worst part of it all is when there's multiple of them (so, always), because even if you keep one at a bay there's bound to be another that leaps right at you. And once they're close enough, they will just keep on slashin' at your heels as if they're peeling an onion. Their attacks are also so fast that the simple animation of aiming your weapon down to get a shot at them is too slow. Before you can even pull the trigger chances are you receive another slash and will flinch as a result. When you've got two or three all around you doing this you're essentially stunlocked until death. It's fucking maddening.

Giant Bat

This is a boss battle as opposed to an enemy type, thank god. Still, it's probably one of the series' worst I'd go as far as to say. Since it can fly, you thusly have to aim upwards to get a shot at it. Problem is the angle isn't the most sufficient to really see just where it's hovering and where you should shoot. Fortunately the game has auto-aim! Oh, but what's that? Now it's decided to spawn a bunch of smaller bats thereby giving you a dozen more enemies for your auto-aim to track? Well ain't that swell! The most suitable weapon is the shotgun given its trademark spread, but if you don't have enough ammo and have to fall to a different weapon, then know that I emphasise with your plight.

Marcus Mimics

Theeese antagonising shits. These Marcus Mimicking motherfucks! Seriously, for all of the fear and anguish that was spawned surrounding the Crimson Head zombies in the remake, they're mere rotten flesh waiting to be redeaded compared to the Leech zombies of RE0. Hell, Nemesis feels like he's more of a pushover than these guys!

God, where to begin? Well for starters they're extremely durable, as you may expect. They can withstand more damage than most bosses in this series. And you'll encounter multiple throughout the game. They're not mandatory to kill, but in some cases might as well be since they're likely patrolling areas you'll want to backtrack to. Also, for as durable as they are, if you don't kill them with fire, then before they die what remains of them will then begin to convulse and bubble up before exploding - which can often times kill you if not at least deal a significant amount of damage should you be caught in its range.

Their offensive capabilities are just as terrifying, too. Their main attack involves a gooey pimp slap, which has a lot of reach and can be pretty damn difficult to avoid. Though what's even worse is that slap of theirs often also brings them in close, giving them ample opportunity to do a bite, making for its one-two punch (and bite) equivalent. If you're playing as Rebecca you're likely being taken down to half health if caught within their leechy web. They're real fast too, course, and since you often encounter them in corridors and such they can be almost impossible to avoid without taking some damage in the process.

As said before fire works best against them. Though your only means of fire is incendiary rounds for the grenade launcher, which are pretty rare to find, and molotov cocktails, which are far more plentiful. The problem is the actual animation of you throwing a molotov has a windup; when viewed outside of any combat it seems hasty enough, but in the heat (hur) of combat with one of those things on your ass? forgettabouiiiiiit Similar to the situation with the annihilators, their attacks are so damn fast that they can often cancel out the animation of you trying to light up some leeches. They're an absolute pain and one of the most infuriating enemies throughout the whole series, right alongside a similarly stretchy enemy type by the name of Bandersnatchers. Which also happen to be from Code: Veronica, FYI. Follow the mo- bad video game design.

So... how is it as a port?

It's pretty solid, as to be expected. It's received practically all of the same polish and spit-shine as the remake saw a year before (jeez, how time flies...), with an alternate analogue control and widescreen options to boot. Though I can't say I approve of the added eyeliner they draped over Rebecca; that and her eyes in general look like marbles they're so weirdly reflective and shiny.

What's probably the biggest addition to the port is Wesker Mode, which you unlock upon completing the game. Though while it seems pretty zany at face value it's unfortunately rather bland. All it does is switch Billy for renowned series antagonist Albert Wesker, dressed in his RE5 attire as opposed to his STARS uniform I'm disappointed to say. He does have a couple of unique abilities, being a hilariously janky looking sprint and this weird Optic-Blast thing - an ability he's never exhibited in any other game in the series. Wesker is thusly extremely overpowered, making it a literal breeze to rush past enemies if you don't instead decide to make all of their heads immediately go pop. Oh, and Rebecca's still there, too. Sporting some admittedly awesome new digs that make her resemble a sort of Weskerette. But this mode honestly only makes Rebecca even less ancillary, as she herself doesn't gain any new abilities. It's fun for maybe the first hour, but really you're just playing through the main game again only now with the removal of any challenge whatsoever.

It is kind of funny to have it essentially make a complete mockery of what is otherwise the hardest entry in the survival horror era of games, but it's hardly interesting enough to still justify another playthrough. That it's still Billy's voice coming out of him in the cutscenes is kinda goofy, though. It would have been pretty incredible if D.C. Douglas could have just recorded all of Billy's dialogue (if not some new stuff) with Wesker's trademark inflections! But as is he only provides a few lines of dialogue when you tell your partner to follow or stay put. Again, it's kinda meh and the novelty is very short lived. Still probably a better alternative to playing the Leech Hunter minigame at least.

Honestly the best thing about this whole port is how you can change between your costumes on the fly in your inventory! The game's default costumes are unlocked from the start as well, however all of those new ones I've been hyping are all either preorder bonuses or DLC... I totally put down the £2 to get those alternate STARS outfits for Rebecca.

Oh! Conclusion

To put it simply virtually everything that RE0 still manages to do right has already been performed better in other RE games, and everything else it has to offer for it to stand out ironically enough has only made it worse. At its best it's still generally pretty average, but it fails to keep to even that level of quality in large part due to its attempts to strike out and carve its own path. While it deserves the kudos for at least trying something different, a failed experiment still amounts to a failure. And there's ultimately nothing in RE0 that you couldn't get out of the far superior REmake, to the point where RE0 kinda feels borderline obsolete within the series as a whole.

It sure does look pretty, though.