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Resident Evil 0 for the most part is a totally confident game that probably gets too much shit over the years for trying different things but not completely following through on them. First off I’ll state that my nostalgia wasn’t completely ruined, it was more affirmed while playing. As said, I thought I would be saying “I remember this” quite a bit while playing, and that certainly was the case as I came across things and I would go “ugh….I remember this.” Not all of it was bad but it was a lot of annoyances came flooding back to me. My nostalgia for the most part allowed me to remember what I loved most about the game (isn’t that what nostalgia is supposed to do), but replaying the game didn’t ruin still what I enjoyed most about the game, so I’m happy and not in a dark place. So let’s get into it.

As said, RE0 tried to do some new things but just didn’t quite take it all the way. First and foremost the 2 protagonists and the ability to switch between them. I still think this was a cool idea and the execution of the mechanics are awesome. You can leave your partner in another location and they will have to defend themselves if something bad were to come at them. Your characters are always in danger and that adds tension. I always hated leaving one character alone not knowing what could potentially happen to them. But for the most part that was never the case and I can only now think of a handful of times where the protag I left was even attacked. It should’ve been a big deal for them to stay in a single spot in a creepy mansion/train/facility. So while it worked for me, eventually the tension wore off and it wasn’t a big deal that I was using the hookshot to leave Billy alone, rather they have never been safer in the game when I have to leave them, that stinks.

My next issue isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but something I wish didn’t occur so often. That would be how often the team was split up in uninteresting ways. I was surprised how often I was leaving one character alone or a character disappeared for “x” reason. This leads to a lot of how I felt in the above paragraph, separating should’ve been tense, rare, and only done when needed. Rather I might argue that you spend most of the game controlling one character while the other is waiting, trapped, in trouble, etc. How did a puzzle not involve that both characters had to move to separate parts of a setting to do two things at once BUT both were in danger and you had to switch back and forth to make sure they were doing ok. The train could've done this but rather only one character is in danger while the other just chills in the control room, a lot left on and off the table with this design choice.

The puzzle solving between them could’ve been better, and they showed signs of some interesting ideas but again, didn’t execute. I look specifically at the box puzzle near the back ¼ of the game where one is trying to make a line of boxes and the other is controlling the obstacle in the way. This is probably the only puzzle in the game that I will remember as it took time (but not too much so it would become frustrating) and took coordination as both protag’s job depended on the other. It was a perfect balance that hadn’t been seen in the game yet. The rest of the puzzles were more annoying or lacked imagination. I don’t remember RE1 extremely well but some puzzles are ripped right from that game, and then the puzzle solves itself for you (tablets to lower the observatory, I was surprised I didn’t have to actually place them in the order of the motto). This is a lead in to the next big issue.

The Mansion. This place is the least imaginative and the most “by the numbers” feel and leads to the middle part of the game feeling meh. I understand why it is there in that they wanted to try and create the feeing of the first game again with the mansion. But that really only works when the entire game takes place in and around a singular place, you become familiar with your surrounding and eventually you know this place like you know your own home. Maybe it’s unfortunate that the mansion comes after the train which is a wonderful, claustrophobic, tense setting but even then I don’t think my opinion would change that much. This was the part of my playthrough where I was most worried that my nostalgia would be crushed, but Capcom came back with the Water Treatment Facility which is a very interesting and engaging setting.

Some other annoyances and problems:

• I hate the leech zombies, they were just bullet sponges and just got more and more annoying as I got deeper into the game. I swear the first few I encountered could be taken down with several shotgun shots, by the end I had to empty an entire clip of shotgun into them and even then they might not have gone down.
• Forgot about enemy invincibility frames, which that might be the big issue I had with enemies as I never quite adjusted to the time frame of when they are vulnerable and when they are not. It’s just weird that some enemies you can always damage and others have a good 3 to 4 seconds in between opportunities to punish them. Led to a lot more wasted ammo than there should’ve been.
• The church/gondola part sucks ass. While the mansion is disappointing, this part was by far worse, thankfully it led to the Facility otherwise I could be singing a different tune about the game.
• I was surprised how many bosses were fought solo, just caught me off guard. Thus I was surprised how few bosses there were and how big of gaps there were between them, I don’t know how much time exactly but I could easily argue at least 2 hours if not more between the centipede and the bat.
• Lugging the hookshot around sucked and probably should’ve just been swapped with Billy’s lighter, that was only used one damn time and you didn’t even have to burn bodies or anything like you had to in the REmake. At least make the hookshot a one slot item rather than two. One of the major highlights of the game was finally getting rid of that bullshit item.

Now comes what I loved. I still like both main characters. I really don’t get the hate that Billy receives (if you want to bitch about the Matrix stuff then go ahead), it seems unwarranted and I’m glad he was just different. I like that he isn’t apart of STARS and friends/acquaintances with all these other characters beforehand. I would argue he is the one thing the developer took a chance on and succeeded. I really like his backstory of being wrong conflicted for war crimes and the idea that he was being transported to the Umbrella facility to be tested on (something I never put together years ago but did now). If anyone would like to state why they think he is a bad character please post, I would love to read why because I currently don’t understand that thinking.

Rebecca is young and naïve and it works, her interaction with Billy wouldn’t make sense if she was someone with a lot of authority; that relationship would’ve ended on the train when they first met if that was the case. She severs her role well and look forward to how she is portrayed in Resident Evil as I’m planning on doing a Chris playthrough. She grows up over the course of the game and is reminiscent of the most recent Tomb Raider (obviously not as dramatic or up front as TR, but I’m connecting the dots).

I still think the game looks gorgeous for being as old as it is. It's crazy how well the Gamecube REmake and RE0 have held up over a decade now. The lighting effects are fantastic, the sound design was top notch in my book.Overall technically impressive

Those are the main things I wanted to talk about after beating RE0. It’s a weird experience as it is the first RE game I’m playing in this process so my opinion could drastically change by the time I hit RE2 for an example. Even though I listed far more problems than things I liked, overall I did really enjoy playing it and better yet I'm excited to jump into the next RE game. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone who isn’t already a fan of the Resident Evil series, but I have a hard time seeing this as the black hole of the series some people over the years have labelled this game. As said, maybe in a game or two I will think this was an absolute pile of shit, we shall see….

On to....(or read my thought on RE:DC here)