It's been available for a short while actually, since yesterday. But anywhoo I tried out the 360 version least (currently downloading the PS3 version now) and, well... it's sorta weird.
I guess it shouldn't shock most people these days given the state Resident Evil is in, but the two problems that quickly stood out to me were the controls and the camera... Make no mistake, it doesn't reach the same muddy mess that is controlling RE6, but it definitely still feels a bit awkward. There's two control schemes, ''shooter'' and ''classic'', and both didn't feel quite right for me.
Being the old-school RE aficionado that I be, naturally I went for the classic RE4 style controls first, which was how I exclusively played RE5 at that. However, while you can now still direct the camera with the right analog stick, it tends to actually stick in place and doesn't waver about like it did in RE4 and RE5. That wouldn't matter so much perhaps, if the camera wasn't also so zoomed up against the character like it is. Furthermore, to both shoot and move you have to hold in the LT/R2 (also the same for strafing), but that only allows you to move and shoot, not aim and move, which is also a little cumbersome.
The shooter controls function a little better as they allow you a lot of the movement mobility you'd expect from a modern shooter, though the way you can strafe around corners looks super strange and this control scheme removes your ability to move the camera around too. Neither control scheme feels quite perfect for me in any case, or at least I'd be totally fine with classic if the camera was better positioned and the camera movement controls felt like RE4/RE5's. I know that plenty of people played Revelations on the 3DS sans circle-pad pro anyway, so playing it while still being glued to the floor looks like it'll be perfectly viable all the same. For a company like Capcom that is known (almost to a fault) for their detailed animations, it was definitely a little surprising for Revelation's to look a bit weak.
Also, you run automatically in this game and to walk you have to push on the stick a little lighter. Now that I'm really not a fan of.
OK, so while I've started off a little negative here, I otherwise liked most of what else I saw in this roughly 15 minute long demo and wanted to get the problems I have outta the way. I think they actually nailed a pretty decent style of atmosphere, with the gloomy hallways and quiet, ambient soundtrack, if there is any music at all. The little map up top makes it easy to navigate the many corridors too. The enemies certainly don't function like the prior ganados/majini/j'avo either. From my experience at least, it isn't all about shooting a fellow in the head and then falcon punching him afterwards. The enemies don't appear to react to bullets at all actually, though they're still far from invincible mind you. The idea that you don't collect ammunition from enemies and must instead seek it out with your scanner device seems pretty neat as well.
While I'm a little disappointed with stuff like the camera and the whole running automatically thing, I'm otherwise still looking forward to playing the whole game. Graphically it looks... a little washed-out, and obviously doesn't quite reach the prowess of RE6 nor even RE5 I'd say. Lip syncing could be better, too. But again, it at least has some actual atmosphere in here, so that I'm happy about.
I mentioned this already, but I also want to reiterate that this demo is damned short as well. The file size will have certainly given that away anywhoo, only at around 500 something MBs. Even on the PS3 it's only taken about 5 minutes to download at that.
So they're my impressions least. I'm really curious to hear from the people who've already played through the 3DS version, to see if they can note any particular changes. I would have liked if they gave you like a single map of RAID mode to try out, just to get a feel for a more hectic, combat-focussed environment, but ah well. I feel like I'll probably want to switch between the two control schemes per mode in any case.
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