Resident Evil 4 - Be afraid, be very afraid. (Resident Evil 4 (PS2))

Member Name: Souther

Product:	Resident Evil 4 (PS2)
Date:	20/02/06 (109 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Graphics, level of detail, length, variety and very solid gameplay

Disadvantages: None that spring to mind

The Resident Evil series seems to have been around for quite some time and there are more instalments than I care to mention. It was also viewed as successful enough of a series that two films were released: Resident Evil (2002) and Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004) – let’s just say that neither of them won any Oscars and leave it at that. The thing is I never really enjoyed any of the past Resident Evil games. I haven’t played all of them by any means, but I’ve played enough of them to know that I wouldn’t have ever bought one. Why? Once you’ve shot one unexciting zombie and backtracked your way in every possible direction to find a blooming key and realise that this is what the entire game is like, you may become bored to tears. Don’t get me wrong, these series of games were immensely successful when they came out on the Playstation and brought more of an audience to survival horror games. The fact is, when I played Resident Evil 4, my opinion changed completely. I actually enjoyed it.

If you have never played one of the Resident Evil games before, it may take a little while to get used to the controls, as they are quite fiddly really. You have to draw a weapon first by keeping hold of a shoulder button and then use the X button to fire. Another possible annoyance is that the camera angle is always positioned behind Leon’s shoulder, which again, can be quite disorientating as normally the first or third person viewpoint is fitted as standard. Whilst both of these things may put you off (most people like to get straight into the action without having to worry about adapting to control/viewpoints they are not used to) they actually work very well in the long run. Instead of having a weapon drawn constantly and pressing X to fire, the added effort of drawing/aiming the weapon makes the player feel more in control of the character. The camera angle, whilst strange at first, heightens the tension and atmosphere by positioning the camera closer to Leon’s line of sight. This means that you might see something move from the corner of your eye and, along with the very atmospheric music, this creates fear and sometimes panic – Yes, this is a game, but it will genuinely scare you in many ways.

The variety of different enemies that you come across add to the fear factor as many cannot simply be killed by unloading as many bullets as possible to their chest. Doing this may actually be a bad idea anyway as you may find that you run out of bullets quite quickly. Try killing a group of angry, pitchfork wielding, virus infected enemies with a small knife – then its time to get scared! Both the enemies and the environment (which by the way pushes the Playstation 2 to its limits graphically) mean that you really have to think before you go shooting. Run into an abandoned house for shelter, maybe push cabinets in front of doors and windows to slow the enemies down, dive through an upstairs window to escape, there are many things to think about. It’s the variety of the situations, the enemies and the weapons you can use that makes this game purely absorbing.

If this wasn’t enough of a reason to try this game out, the storyline of this game is better than both of the film adaptations combined. The script isn’t convoluted, and is genuinely purposely funny in places. As with a film, if you don’t care about the characters or what happens to them, it’s never going to grab an interest in my opinion. In a sense, the game is so much more absorbing than a film as you have direct control over the main character and the progression of the plot is the reward for completing episodes (amongst many other things). The experience is very satisfying.

An intelligent, varied, lengthy and absorbing game is what you will find in Resident Evil 4. It is graphically excellent and detailed, lots to explore and accomplish with many bonus features and unlockable content. I challenge anyone to not enjoy this game.

Summary: Never boring, very addictive, great storyline - Goodbye social life!