This is just Action Movie: The Game. It is hard to classify this as a Resident Evil because besides the name of the game and the characters, it is just a generic action-shooter. That being said, it was enjoyable. I played this in co-op and I think this is the definitive way to play the game due to the partner AI being poor. It felt shorter compared to other Resident Evil games but that is okay due to the nature of the game. Wesker being back is awesome, I love his character. His boss fight theme is incredible, so catchy. This being the last game Jill has appeared in so far his quite a shame however. Gunplay was fine, nothing felt super fun to use but no weapon ever felt useless. I do like the setting of the game, many of the set pieces were fun to experience and look at. Overall, an underrated game, but nothing too special. I would recommend this game to people looking for a fun co-op game to play.

if resident evil 4 was a bold new vision for the future of game design, resident evil 5 is the cold reality of game execs pushing the complete global saturation of boring cover shooter mechanics.

at its core re5 is literally beat for beat the same as re4, but the tedium of its boss fights and level design just utterly annihilates the enjoyability of the gameplay. a lot of the levels here feel the same, just with an african setting and the mexico filter™. they fail at being on the same level of design as re4's frantic arenas and the linearity of many of the fights is incredibly disappointing. plus, you can tell when an area in this game is designed to be played in mercenaries mode lol.

the jill boss fight is one of the absolute worst experiences i've had in a game; it's clunky, the solution is clear but unattainable in a logical way and you have to wait around for 7 minutes if you exit out for whatever reason. every other boss fight and puzzle in this game carries this tedium and lack of polish as well, if you can even call them puzzles.

if that all wasn't enough, the setting is horribly appropriative of african culture. turning the villagers into tribal zombies feels so wrong on every level, there's absolutely no care put into treating the culture with respect. the game even starts with chris talking to a stereotypical arabian guy with a russian accent (why???).

the only part of this game that feels redeemable in any way is the pure cheese of it all. the variety of wresting moves the characters pull off on enemies and the joy that wesker's characterization brings me is immeasurable. i fucking love his matrix-esque dodges and exposition, it's so gorgeously camp. fuck d. c. douglas though, the dead by daylight actor plays this wesker way better. also by the 3rd half of the game, enemies won't be stunned enough to pull off any roundhouses or suplexes, it's so sad.

obviously this is best played co-op to laugh at its quirkiness, but please don't expect a great time at all

This and RE7 are the two series entries I hadn't played the longest and was the most curious to revisit, and with RE8 featuring Chris + many similarities to 4 and 5, I thought this might be a good opportunity to refresh my memory. In the case of 5, I decided less than halfway through that I'd quit because I was honestly kind of bored and time is a little too precious at the moment.

Under that light, this 3 out of 5 score may be surprising; I'm coming away from RE5 feeling there's enough of interest going on here on paper that warrants a quick write-up. You could chalk it up to there being way too much of RE4's DNA in 5 for it to be straight-up bad, but that's a little cynical when it actually does elevate itself meaningfully from its predecessor in a few ways. Being able to quick-select weapons and items with the D-Pad is an obvious QoL improvement that, in practice, legitimately incentivizes more spontaneous play — it’s easy to want to tap into weapons you otherwise wouldn’t if they’re right at your fingertips. But it also goes hand-in-hand with a now real-time inventory that's still one of the most elegant, yet tension-inducing systems I've seen for this kind of thing. While RE4's attache case has become far more iconic, RE5's square grid takes that fun novelty of freely positioning your items and turns it into a legitimately relevant choice: your 3x3 item grid directly corresponds to the four D-Pad directions (so a shotgun on the leftmost square can be accessed by pressing left, while the First Aid Spray in the top right can't be equipped the same way,) which is both intuitive and something you'll have to regularly manage intelligently while under the active stress of combat. From that perspective, even putting ammo on your quick-select and being able to hand it to Sheva more quickly that way becomes a valid consideration.

I guess that’s a good opportunity to discuss RE5’s most divisive aspect. I actually feel deciding what weapons to give Sheva and how to manage her inventory space adds sincerely novel layers to gameplay in a way I haven't quite seen like this elsewhere. I recall giving her a sniper rifle being a good way to keep her from getting hit constantly back on PS3, which is both sort of interesting? Because it's a logical result of the mechanics presented? (it's obvious that she aims extremely well but is also very trigger-happy, so giving her a weapon with high damage, long reach and slow fire makes natural sense to optimize her AI’s behavior) But these kinds of considerations can’t help but come across as unintuitive hacks in the moment: in a game with resource management and non-regenerating health, having to specifically leave the way those resources are spent to an AI + a number of dynamic unpredictable factors never feels quite right. Babysitting Sheva because she will otherwise get hit constantly or churn through different types of ammo seemingly at random ironically feels like what the internet always tries to convince you Ashley (who’s transparently deterministic) was like in RE4.

Which begs the question of whether RE5 would've been better off as a solo-game. Sheva's inclusion has much deeper implications on the flow of the campaign than is initially evident, and it's clear that a lot of the encounter design flat-out isn't as good as it was in RE4. It's most obvious with bosses, where a lot of interesting elements get thrown at a wall, only for the game to not capitalize on them. There's this extended on-rails sequence early in the game, at the end of which you fight one of those El Gigante type enemies from RE4 by targeting its weak spots. You dodge some of its punches with QTE prompts, then watch it pull this long pylon from the ground to hit you with. You would expect that pylon to now present some kind of new obstacle, but instead you end up ALSO dodging it via the same QTE as every other attack in this fight.

Another early boss (the crawling bat thing) is set within this circular arena with a couple huts and some elevation changes. You would expect those level design features to factor into the fight somehow, but instead you’re meant to linearly bait it into some proximity mines (place mine, walk back, wait for it to run in, then dash past it, quick-turn, place another mine.) It would play out the exact same way if the arena was just a straight line instead. In a game with this much intelligent game design, it’s surprising how often newly-introduced elements don’t actually provide gameplay variety.

Those two scenarios also serve as such obvious points of comparison for how RE4 always went those couple extra notches with its encounters. The El Gigante fights in either game speak for themselves, clearly being able to run around and choose weapons freely and having to scrounge for ammo as shit goes down in RE4 is more engaging. But even RE4's take on an on-rails sequence, the mine cart set piece, where you get to move between carts freely, have enemies jump in from all sides, and need to avoid multiple kinds of obstacles, takes such a gigantic dump on RE5 that it's kind of hard to believe it was made five years prior.

While all that sounds pretty negative, I hope it comes across that RE5 is more just... boring, rather than offensive. I couldn't find a smooth segue into the weapon upgrade system for this review, but that shit is still exemplary (love how upgrading capacity restores your ammo) and something more looter-shooter type games should take serious note of more. So while RE5 does overall present something substantial and different from its predecessor, I wouldn't say it's engaging enough to really warrant more than one playthrough when you could be playing that game instead.

(footnotes: the headshot context melee attack being changed from Leon's wide-reaching roundhouse to a more linear punch kinda sucks and doesn't really allow you to take as many risks with crowd-control)

Since its release, Resident Evil 4 has been one of the most celebrated video games of all time, and it’s a project that its creator Shinji Mikami holds dear. It was in a way his magnum opus, as he left the series behind as soon as it was released, his parting message to the franchise he helped spawn. So after putting everything he had into it, only to then suddenly step away from Resident Evil entirely, its likely that that fateful question started bubbling within the rest of Capcom.

“What’s next?”

How do you not only follow up this groundbreaking, industry-redefining, classic game, but do so without any help whatsoever from the series’ captain? Is it really safe to take big, sweeping risks without as much of an understanding of what truly defined the series, as its original creator had? After three years of development, Resident Evil 5 sought to answer that question with a game that’s simultaneously exactly what one would’ve expected, yet still daring and likable.

To me, Resident Evil 4 has always felt as if it wanted more than anything to boldly move forward, to move on from the past and embrace a new status quo. Beyond its wholly new playstyle, its the first game in the series not to be set around Raccoon City, and the villains of those first games are dissolved off-screen before this entry even starts. There’s no item boxes, level design is linear, you’re well rewarded for killing enemies rather than encouraged to avoid combat, the cutscenes are action-packed and feature Quicktime events - were it not for Leon, Ada, and a general zombie-virus theme, this could have passed for a wholly new franchise entirely. Its a bold direction that only truly worked due to the confidence Mikami had in the project, and its a confidence that Resident Evil 5 is very lacking in in comparison. But let’s set it straight: Having that degree of confidence is not always a good thing. Though exploring new frontiers is fun and celebrated by all, its also a dangerous, lonely venture, one that can lead to making terrible mistakes or change someone far too drastically. For as important as it is to innovate, it’s just as important to remember and celebrate your roots, and I find that to be Resident Evil 5’s most defining attribute. It takes 4’s bold steps and innovations, its new style and feel, and weaves connections with it to the old world and characters we once knew from the original trilogy. Just look at our protagonist: It's Chris Redfield! By taking the protagonist of the very first game, and putting him in the playstyle of that bold new direction, it really communicates the wish to bring all walks of Resident Evil together for the future.

Honestly, even though the gameplay sticks quite close to what 4 established, I'm impressed by how different Chris and Leon feel to play almost purely from the overall personality these two games exude. Leon has always been a one-man team, originally not by choice but it led to him becoming a spy, working in secret. Thus his game really does reflect that, with RE4 having a somewhat lonely, quiet atmosphere, and gameplay that most often rewards precision and strategy. Chris, meanwhile, is more experienced than Leon, ever since RE1 he was working with a team and valued charging through with no men falling behind far more than stealthily and effectively clearing a mission. Having dedicated his life to fighting for far longer than Leon, he feels more powerful in a way, delivering punches and takedowns that are less about safely and stylishly executing foes and moreso just about asserting as much force as possible over them. And though they’re likely coincidental, the system changes made to the game also make it feel a lot more in-line with Chris’ armyman personality. You don’t get calming moments of focus and thinking when choosing what weapon to use or heal yourself, as the item menu can exclusively be accessed in real-time: That both makes the gameplay far more tense and exciting, and gives Leon’s way of handling items a sense of connection to him as a character.

The main system change I was referring to though, and the thing this game is easily best known for, is cooperative play. It’s something the series had dabbled in before - funny enough, the prequel game starring the girl Chris helped in his debut title, was about cooperation across two characters. But that was more like taking turns controlling each character, whereas Resident Evil 5 jumps head-first into full-on 2-player action, and if you don’t have a second person around I’m sure the AI made the experience miserable. Indeed, working together fits Chris like a glove, and they weave it into the story really well, but you really aren’t getting the full picture until you play this game with someone else. Even in the hampered split-screen mode I had to use for my own playthrough (seriously, look it up, it’s disgusting) the raw fun of fighting zombies as two people cannot be overstated. Resident Evil 4 was already a fantastically mechanically dense game, with weapons affecting enemies in different ways and combat often being presented as a big maze of options to consider, and 5 takes that exact blueprint and amplifies it with two players in mind. One player can headshot an enemy close to the second player to stun it and letting the second player melee, one player can pass on herbs or grenades to the other who may be in dire need, or both can work together to corner enemies in a way to minimize their options of escape. This is an area where sticking so close to what 4 set out to do really paid off - every mechanic that worked great in 4 still works amazingly here in 5, often times even enhanced when with another player.

“Tense action” is the term Capcom themselves use to describe the over-the-shoulder Resident Evil games of the 2000s and early 2010s, and its a term I really like. Because even with Resident Evil 4, the amount of freedom given in aiming and the high octane action of both the gameplay and cutscenes firmly established it as different from the survival horror roots of the franchise. Indeed, neither Resident Evil 4 nor 5 are about survival, and their horror has diminished substantially because of it…yet tension still remains due to how easy it still is to be swarmed, and how many split-second decisions you always need to be making to ensure you won’t get screwed over later in the game. In a Halo or a Gears of War, though enemies may be oppressive, you’re also fully allowed to simply spray them with bullets, to simply hide to recover your health back up or to do completely reckless but effective strategies with your free movement. What kept Resident Evil 4’s bold step into the future still feeling like Resident Evil was this restraint, keeping things tense, and its why I don’t feel either 4 or 5 “killed” the series: Both games are still very successful in creating stress and tension in the player. The best segments of the game are when you’re stuck in a maze of houses and alleyways, with enemies sprawling out of every crevice, and that isn’t because it allows you to go as hog wild as possible with strategy or feel as cool as possible, but because it creates genuine tension in both players. What if you get too far separated and can’t heal each other as effectively, or what if one gets cornered, or if there’s crucial items to be found in a side path both of you ignored? I’d argue that between 4 and 5, while 4 had a very healthy selection of interesting gameplay twists, in terms of raw core-gameplay content 5 delivers in far greater spades. The standout moment of 4 is the introductory Village fight, and 5 is as if half of the game was just variations and remixes of that fight, in the best way possible. That may once again be showing just how safe 5 prefers to play it over how daring 4 was, yet both games still feel so true to what Resident Evil has always wanted to be: Tense, scary even, yet oh so satisfying to master. Even though the action has been dialed up further and further, inside gameplay and in cutscenes, it feels like a natural progression of the series has been building toward, and in a way shows a kind of growth in the characters you’ve been following for so long.

And that brings us…to Wesker.

God, I fucking love Wesker. I know that Resident Evil 4 is the golden child with the gaming community, and its place is rightfully deserved, but…its story and characters do not hold a candle to Wesker’s performance alone in this game. He ties things full circle, bringing the next installment of the series with a decade-old rivalry with Chris, and does so in spectacular fashion. I honestly think the entire story is great for what it is, it both builds on the Resident Evil world in ways 4 was too distant to want to do while also reintroducing concepts from both 4 and older games in the franchise to really feel as if all of those adventures built up to this. All the encounters with Wesker are the best moments of the game, yet all the new villains and factions are memorable in their own right, just feeling like new pieces to a greater puzzle. The game also looks beautiful, not even just for the time and hardware it was on but to this day: The harsh sunlight and barren, yet beautiful towns of Africa are both striking on their own and play off of 4’s nighttime rural Europe perfectly. The two games bounce off of each other so well as a whole that it’s hard to believe that they’re separated by three years and a totally different director.

And for all the praise I’ve given it here, it sadly is hard for the game to shake that “new director”-feel. While its merging of old and new is almost always met well, there are those moments that absolutely push it too far - the boring turret sections set atop cars and clunky cover-shooting sections feel almost cowardly, borrowing wholesale from the other contemporary western shooters of the era. It’s that lack of confidence again, as if they couldn’t quite decide on if they should do the old, the new, or what the rest of the industry was doing, and decided to do them all in somewhat equal doses. That is what will always keep this game looming in Resident Evil 4’s shadow despite arguably surpassing it in most areas, yet it’s not exactly the worst fate to end up second fiddle to one of the greatest games of all time. Really, its an absolute miracle that the game remains so likable while being so scatterbrained, and it was largely thanks to having such a perfect foundation to build it on. Yet it moves with such love for itself, for the entire franchise, both the legacy and the offshoots, that it just feels like one big family holiday reunion.

At the end of the day, it was working together that saved Resident Evil - both in-universe, and out.

[Difficulty Used: Normal]
[Playtime: 15 Hours]
[Key word: Collective]

I've mentioned playing games with my gf in prior reviews but I really need to hand it to her on this one: without her playing with me I would have probably abandoned this game or given it a way lower rating. she's been playing re5 since she was a kid, so she was able to guide me through a lot of the puzzles and setpieces that I would have been frustrated by otherwise. looking at a lot of the areas in this game, I can not imagine having to drag around an AI that gets stuck on enemies and bleeds health... this game is so much easier when both players can just run past every zombie and deal with puzzles as quickly as possible.

then again, the above design is sort of an issue unto itself. a lot of the areas, especially around midgame, are just not that memorable since you're just solving simple switch puzzles and avoiding enemies. near the end it's a lot more tense given the more difficult enemies (the giant bugs with the instakill attacks are really something else), which is fun even when it's frustrating at points, but prior to that you can sort of breeze through as long as you don't focus on everything that gets thrown at you. the game is very strictly broken up into missions with no overlap between them, so there really isn't much to do other than the above other than optional treasures here and there.

the co-op-specific mechanics are hit-and-miss overall. the game struggles to create situations where each player must simultaneously perform a different task while interacting with the other beyond basic things like "one player runs down a corridor of zombies while the other provides long-range cover." this is especially noticable during the boss battles, which are generally puzzles unto themselves that require some sort of player coordination. a lot of these involve one player using a temporary weapon specific to the fight, and there usually isn't really anything for the second player to do other than stand around and maybe pick off cannon fodder here and there. the wesker fight really rubbed me the wrong way for exactly this reason, as in the first phase I was tasked with standing around with the rpg while wesker stumbles around and my gf ran off to grab missiles (it took us a while to get this one right... the prompts are so strict). other than puzzle areas or the occasional pure combat arena, you also get insanely annoying QTEs everywhere you can possibly think of. it's especially egregious during boss battles, like if there are so many attacks where I have to do a QTE to roll out the way, why weren't the characters just given rolls to begin with? when these pop up during FMVs it pisses me off even more, like I thought I had a moment here to take a break and put the controller down... why am I being hit with this.

I say all of the above with the caveat that in general it's still meaty re4-style mowing down zombies, and I appreciate the switch to L1/R1 firing controls and the addition of strafing. it's a game that legitimately takes a lot of coordination between the two players to succeed in many cases, and I think the skeleton is there for what could've been a really great co-op game. instead it's a game that's solid moment-to-moment when it isn't hitting you with obnoxious bullshit, and it's a real shame that's how it ended up. without a second human player I probably would've liked it even less, but at the very least I had someone extremely compentent to carry me when needed.

played most of the campaign with KB0 as well as some beginning stages with some online randos

fun as dumb co-op bullshit but i can't justify giving it a positive rating on account of it not being good, or well made

wesker has that unspoken 2009 rizz though. mercenaries is fun. they should just move the game to australia or something in the remake

Resident Evil 5 it's a good game, if you have a partner

[Solo Playthrough]

This game is over reliant on co-op, so much so that some sections get overly frustating. The IA companion takes the most irrational decision when possible, so don't expect anything beyond being a sidekick that needs to be watched 24/7.

That's the main problem with this game in my opinion. Most of the time you'll be micro-managing the inventory with your partner but if you are playing solo you'll have manage the IA inventory by yourself.

Most of what RE4 stablished is simplified or weakened by the co-op aspect. From the inventory system to it's level design being more linear than ever before, I'll just call it simple and very arcade-like. You'll actually need to plan a strategy once in a while to tackle some tough enemies instead of just going guns blazing and directly, specially by the end. That was actually great, if it wasn't for the IA companion.

But give credit where credit is due, the IA companion can be useful outside of bosses. It can grab ammo by itself, give it to you if it finds you have a weapon for set ammo and you're running low. Healing is also very helpful since both players can heal themselfs with a single herb or spray if close enough. My best advice is to try to not expect something great from the IA, outside of healing or bosses.

When it comes to the story, is ok. Big evil guy wants to destroy the world, stop him please. Liked the setting. What I did not expect was Zombies, I mean "Majini" with AK-47s shooting at you like it's Gears of War. Not to metion like most third person shooters at this time had at least an implentation of a cover systen, this game is not the exception and it barely works since not even the enemies use it and go directly towards you. It's only useful on some occasions.

At the end of the day it's just a goofy co-op action game that doesn't need to be taken very seriously. But please try to play it with a partner, a friend, your mom, your neighbor or your dad if you have one.

Go
Go
Ok
Come on
Go
Come on
Come on
Thanks
Thanks
Thanks
Thanks
Go
Thanks
Thanks
Thanks
Thanks
Come on come on
Go

Resident Evil 5 was never going to live up to RE4, it’s not awful, it’s fun (with a friend mind) but it really fails to capture the level of atmosphere that RE4 exuded.

Positives:
-It’s fun with a friend, you’ll have a good time this way!
-The set pieces are enjoyable

Negatives:
-It plays like a cheap action movie
-Albert Wesker is completely out of character to me
- That bloody Boulder!

In conclusion, it’s just an enjoyable yet deeply flawed action game with a veneer of resident evil.

This game has so many flaws. The inventory sucks, only being able to hold 9 items at a time on 1 character is extremely limiting and makes me miss the attache case. The bosses are hit or miss with some just feeling like bullet sponges which occasionally have you press a prompt. I don't think the game aged very well graphically either with how pisstained the opening looks and everything after just looks pretty dull. The story is pretty meh too. It feels like one of those straight to DVD action films with none of the self-awareness that made RE4s plot enjoyable. Sheva and Chris also have 0 chemistry and you'd have to be slightly braindead not to see the twist coming. Wesker steals the show in the latter half atleast (best vocal performance ever). This game also has way too much action. You could maybe say the same about RE4, but atleast that game had moments that atleast tried to be horror like the sections with Verdugo or the Regenerators, this game has nothing like that and instead goes the opposite route by cranking the action up to 11. Also, the removal of the merchant guy in favour of a cold, lifeless menu where you just select weapons to buy and upgrade is a crime.

With that said though, I still had a blast with the game since I played the whole thing in co-op with a friend and it really makes the issues that this game has be not nearly as apparent. The two extra chapters are also really fun, especially Lost in Nightmares which was an awesome callback to RE1. So yeah, I enjoyed it even with how many things this game does wrong.

Underwhelming after 4, the jump from that to this is off. Atmosphere wise, maybe if I was in a better place I could've enjoyed it but it was kind of yucky overall. While I was blessed with a godsend of a clean looking game, it didn't play too well. Putting me in the shoes of a random bs agent and telling me to treck Africa, absolute garbage. I didn't at all fw the green crosshair, fuck happened to laser sight? Switching to weapons on the fly wasn't very chalked up either, resource managment in general was shit.

All games are products of their time, even ones which "bucked trends" or "were ahead of their time" are only so in comparison with their contemporaries. RE5 is interesting historically because it definitely screams 7th gen : the color grading pejoratively described as the "piss filter" of brown environments assaulted with bloom, the co-op multiplayer focus of the days where such things were starting to become mainstream in the console market, the mowing down of hundreds of racist caricatures by a buff white guy, the fact that Albert Wesker's tailor discovered normal maps and is really excited to absolutely plaster them on his jacket etc.

Its hard to avoid noticing the main two things which jump at you when playing re5, namely that its RE4 but not as good and more racist. Asset reuse is fine, honestly, even mechanics recycled from re4 arent unwelcome but its the rehashing of re4 set pieces whilst doing them worse that lets re5 down. Similarly, the ingenious inventory management mechanic of the RE4 attache case : equal parts survival horror resource management and tetris space allocation is replaced by a dull 3×3 grid whose ultimate depth involves exchanging shit to your ai partner to reload a weapon before exchanging it right back.

The multiplayer aspect makes re5 have kind of an absurd difficulty curve based on your luck in finding partners. Some sections with the Ai partner were a bit patience testing, given their passive nature and limited commands, but then Id get randomly paired up with a god on their fifth playthrough who'd hand me 300 bullets for the machine gun and absolutely tear mfers up with endgame weapons. Very funny to me as well, how certain doors and weights and stuff require the cooperation of chris and sheva because of course its too heavy for a guy whos built like a brick shithouse, he needs help from a small framed spinning instructor to move it.

That being said, its got its bright moments and thankfully the multiplayer aspect made the use of QTEs for custcenes impossible so it does have that over RE4. In all honesty, its not an AWFUL game gameplay wise. There are a few levels which are quite striking visually, namely the temple areas and the faster arcadey nature of it all makes it not better but different to the pace of RE4. The implementation of a cover system and gun wielding zombies is as stupid and unwelcome as you'd expect, and the smoking gun for me that the island in RE4 is not only the worst part of that game but an incredibly ill omen of things to come for the franchise.

I suppose I should mention the elephant in the room : the game is set in "Africa". Not very specific where in Africa except the locals speak French so theres about 20 countries that could apply to. The spectre of the war on terror looms large as the intro depicts an american leading a counter terrorism operation and soon we see Akihiko from Persona 3 doing an arab accent get executed by frenzied locals riled up by a preacher. And sure, like in re4 the reason for it all is a parasitic infestation but the visual language of the game borrows a lot from contemporary wars that its hard to miss. There are heroic black characters like Sheva and her captain buddy but they seem there more as a pre emptive defense at criticism.
Admittedly, considering the state of AAA games at the time, RE5 is not THAT much more racist that the other shooters about doing imperialism in thr global south; that is until you get to the chapter where the enemies are all black people wearing grass skirts and chucking spears at you. And im sorry but zombie or no zombie, that sequence made me surprised to find out that Rudyard Kipling's ghost didnt have a writing credit in the game.

Smarter and more personally invested people than me have already talked about this aspect so I won't go much deeper into it except to say that its an odd obsession with studios who thrive on schlock and silliness to try to delve into more serious or thorny subjects that they are not equipped to handle.

Oh my fucking god I had tears in my eyes from how hilariously racist this game is. The level of incompetence you could get out of Capcom between 2007-2015 was chefs kiss. And momma-mia this game is a spicy fuckaroni.

Great joy comes at the thought of culturally isolated Japanese people not thinking twice about having their zombie game take place in Africa and have the virus operate like Ebola. Don't worry, the main character is an out-of-place porcelain white dude dressed like Team America World Police agent soldier shooterman. The main villain is a nazi who cosplays as a netrunner from The Matrix. This concept will go really well guys trust me.

The actual fucked thing is the game doesn't do anything cool with it's African setting. Just favela-style infrastructure with melanated folks with huge bloodshot eyes. A majority of the game is just bland building structures that could be anywhere in the world. Boring.

Sheeva is a cool character that should have been the main character, but nothing is done with her other than to spout quips and be the living embodiment of "I'm not racist I have a black friend." as Chris tests Stand Your Ground laws by roundhousing a dude into a ramshackle fish market stand.

Aside from mowing down tribalists in wooden masks who chuck spears at you with a machine gun, the game's racism greatly tones down from Chapter 2 on. The game does a good job of making YOU feel racist by having the pacing fun slow way down after you stop slitting the throats of people and dogs in the street in exchange for some brain-dead puzzles and unengaging co-op platforming.

This game doesn't see color, because everything is brown as fuck. This game was peak sepia-toned nonsense. Fear not, because some sections are instead straight-up gray. You were supposed to be impressed by the HD textures and console performance instead of the color palette. Time has been unkind to that choice.

If this game didn't have good co-op for it's time I think this would have been...not as well received. It's co-op is still fun, but I played through the first couple chapters by myself and I was bored out of my mind. The game structure and setting are mind-numbingly dull compared to RE4. The trends it chased didn't pay off.

This is the perfect Steam gift for that divorced uncle who loves bringing up that Africans owned slaves too.

This is a funny game to rate. On one hand, it has genuinely some of the most annoying and tedious bosses i've ever played in any game ever. The controls are clunky, its not remotely scary and the story isnt all that great but yet, I loved it. The majority of that love is probably due to the fact this was the first game me and my boyfriend got to complete together, but honestly I dont think we could of asked for a better co-op game. Even through the annoying shit and (admittedly enjoyable) shlocky action horror movie cheese we were always having a great time and It's not an experience i'll ever forget <3

Trophy Completion - 53%
In Game Completion - 27%
Time Played - 10 hours 58 minutes
Rating - 86/100
Completion #15 of 2022

A downgrade from RE4 in nearly every way. Your AI companion is braindead, constantly getting herself killed by enemies and hazards and wasting ammo and items (in a particularly frustrating instance she got ahold of a magnum before me and wasted it on some grunts). The bosses and minibosses are tedious and stupidly bullet spongey, unless you buy a magnum before every encounter be prepared to run in lots of circles, taking potshots until you get the melee prompt ad lapidum. And god damn the way they designed the inventory system genuinely boggles my mind, how limiting it is, how some items stack, some don’t, how you can’t expand it, you can give items to your partner, but that runs the risk of them using them on you, it feels designed to be an inconvenience. The story is some self-serious late 2000s action fare, a shame because there is some silly shit in here, Indiana Jones temples, Zulu zombies, boulder punching, they could’ve played up the schlock like RE4, but no, the game always takes itself 100% seriously. As well the game basically gives up on the horror side of things after the first two missions. Towards the latter half of the game the zombies start weilding AK47s and you get this broken cover system in a bizarre, rickety-ass attempt to mimic Gears of War or Uncharted. That said, if you look past all the issues I just mentioned, and if you can accept it on it’s own terms, there is still a semi-competent action game waiting for you underneath, albeit a disappointing one coming off of RE4.

Have to say too, I’m curious to see what they do with the inevitable remake of this.

Resident Evil 5 é um jogo que se localiza em um limbo esquisito. Como seu antecessor, Resident Evil 4, é um dos jogos mais importantes desse século, é curioso saber quais caminhos a capcom trilha para sua continuação.

O fato é que, já em 2009, o impacto de resident evil 4 tinha desdobramentos nos jogos da época. Principalmente nas imagens de Gears of War e Uncharted, os jogos de ação pegaram o que causou impacto em 2005, e transformaram em mais fluidez

Curiosamente, Resident Evil 5 não. A decisão da direção é manter a gameplay a tão fiel possível quanto do 4, com aprimoramentos gráficos, abandono quase total do horror e uma companion, a Sheva.

Sheva, objeto de muito ódio pela fandom, representa a melhor parte do jogo para mim. Além de ser a única com um arco condizente nessa história tão desperdiçada como essa aqui, o cooperativo é o grande toque de Resident Evil 5. E sem dúvidas, é um dos coops mais divertidos que joguei. Manejar munição, armas, combar socos, a presença de diversas setpieces diferentes e momentos de tensão fazem desse um jogo muito divertido. E não só apenas in game, as cutscenes da reta final, que contêm a escrita mais vagabunda que você consegue imaginar, é de dar risadas.

Mesmo que a gameplay represente o conservadorismo e segurança que o jogo apresenta, ainda é objeto de muita nostalgia e satisfação, mas definitivamente não se articula com as hordas de inimigos que têm aqui. É muito por isso que tenho sentimentos conflitantes do Resident Evil 5: É um jogo que não quer saber muito das convenções dos jogos de ação da época, mas o que cria no lugar por ceder tais convenções não é tão potente.

Por fim, é possível tecer um estudo de caso bem interessante sobre Resident Evil 5 e racismo. É um jogo de uma visão japonesa sobre americanos estando na África. Há muita complexidade nesse espectro. No mesmo capítulo, o Chris diz sobre os horrores que o capitalismo faz em Estados, e logo após uma cena absurdamente gratuita de uma mulher branca sendo sequestrada por um homem negro. Não irei me alongar muito aqui, mas é um campo importante de ser discutido.

Até!

Normally, thinking about a sequel to Resident Evil 4 is thinking it to be as simple as copying the system again and being done, how could a bad game come out of there? Even better, smooth the system to focus on combat: more melee options and dynamic inventory management limited on what's important without stopping the action.

Turns out that it was also important to know how to design and place enemies and scenarios, to be put against the ropes depended not only on the system but in always feeling surrounded and having to reposition constantly. Because of this, Resident Evil 5 starts by looking at some of the best ideas of 4, the moment inspired by the first raid at the village appears shortly in an open survival arena where enemies will keep appearing. Obviously, it's a highlight, nothing more is needed to feel constantly cornered.

The way is lost at every other moment. Whether it's trying to take advantage of splitting up and covering your backs in co-op, fighting in a cramped incinerator against a monster almost immune to gunfire, or navigating the dark of the mines, the game doesn't come even close to the tension of its predecessor. On top of that, the slapstick tone is much more blurred, seeming almost accidental, as in the possibility to melee combo some enemies together with your partner. Casual exceptions aside, the hits have lost impact and the cinematography style, there is an identity crisis due to a mishmash of trends of the period between military shooter, giant aliens from Gears of War and Matrix scenes that do not fit at all with what Resident Evil 4 was. It seems that it wasn't as simple as replicating a system and hoping that everything else could hold up.

It's no surprise then that the best part is the mercenaries mode. If Resident Evil 5 looks at the village raid to build its best moment right out of the gate, it can also look at the mercenaries mode derived from that sequence. Here disappears the clumsiness of trying to confusingly replicate without understanding and without genius. It goes the roughest way, to survive enemy waves in the system that could not fail, even with the Frankenstein erratic mashups still well in sight.

Imagine yourself as the director of Resident Evil 5. You have to follow up a game that completely discarded series convention, revitalized an entire genre, and became not just one of the most praised games in the series, but of all time. What’s your plan to follow that up? The safest bet would be to leave things mostly unchanged, and just address the little criticisms most fans agreed on. Ashley was a major point of ridicule, so ditching the escort mission is an easy choice. The mercenaries mode was well received, so expanding that would be great, and playing with your friends would make the game even better. The movement and inventory systems were a little clunky, so some streamlining would help improve the flow immensely. As you probably know though, Resident Evil 5 did all these things, and it still ended up an almost inarguably lesser game. So what happened? Well, it may be hard to admit for a game reviewer, but phrases like “more responsive controls” and “less interruptions” don’t always indicate a better design. Escorting Ashley was a pain, and Sheva was objectively more useful, but that exact improvement is what made the challenges less intense. Resident Evil 4 rarely felt scary in the first place, so the adding co-op should have only increased enjoyment, but having a partner drained the memorable atmosphere. Chris’ simplified grid inventory was much more accessible and easy to use than Leon’s attache case, but it lacked personality. It had no potential for player expressiveness the same way the old system did, and was a downgrade in spite of its better functionality. It’s not that these changes made for a terrible game, they just created a mechanically solid game with less of an identity, less colorfulness, and less uniqueness than its predecessor. For some people, the nuts and bolts of gameplay is all that matters, but I think the difference in each game’s legacy proves that limitations and clunkiness can give a game the charm that sticks with players for decades. It’s easy to think of game design as a set of scientific rules, but it’s important to remember that logic and emotion rarely agree.

Prueba de lo poco que entendemos los videojuegos en realidad, y de que a veces lo que los hace buenos o malos está en los hilos invisibles que sostienen aquello que apreciamos a primera vista.

Resident Evil 5 empeora considerablemente lo conseguido por su antecesor pese a mejorar el sistema de combate, que es la base de la propuesta. Ahora podemos finiquitar enemigos derribados de un pisotón en lugar de esperar a que se levanten, lo que agiliza el ritmo de los encuentros, y el nuevo modo cooperativo propicia dinámicas de compenetración que enriquecen la jugabilidad. El inventario, antes un pequeño minijuego de optimización de espacio, ahora es un plus para la acción: reduciendo el espacio para ítems nos obliga a sacrificar armamento y evita que vayamos sobrados de munición, y su nuevo uso a tiempo real fuerza instantes de tensión cada vez que queremos usar granadas o hierbas curativas o lo que sea. Además, al estar compuesto de unos pocos huecos separados a los que hay asignado un botón, dónde se pone cada cosa importa. Sin necesidad de malgastar minutos colocando y ordenando, librándose de las pausas in-game y reservando todo el tiempo posible para la acción. Debería haber sido el mejor Resident Evil, pero no fue así.

Resident Evil 5 es el primer videojuego de la franquicia ya cien por cien juego de acción. El título está fundamentalmente conformado por set pieces, reduciendo la importancia de la navegación, y con esto se pierde la parte de recorrer un mundo y sentir que uno avanza y descubre y a ver a dónde demonios voy ahora. Además, es todo tan rocambolesco y estúpido y, sobre todo, se siente tan inconexo, que uno nunca termina de estar ahí. No es solo cuestión de atmósfera, sino de continuidad e inmersión. Y lo peor de todo es el diseño. Lo que hacía funcionar tan bien la acción de Resident Evil 4 era su manera de rodearnos de enemigos. Básicamente, el juego se resumía en llegar a un lugar y ser emboscado para acto seguido tener uno que sacarse las castañas del fuego como buenamente pudiera. Control de masas. Y la clave de un buen control de masas está en el posicionamiento respecto al enemigo, cosa que aquel título sabía exprimir con sus escenarios, más cerrados y limitantes. Siempre sentíamos el agua al cuello, incluso cuando no era del todo así, y cada cambio de arma o granada empleada se sentía crucial. Pero en Resident Evil 5 esto apenas sucede. Siempre hay demasiado espacio, siempre es fácil acabar con los esbirros o huir o encontrar coberturas. Y, si no, tu compañero ya te echa un cable. Su énfasis en el espectáculo es agotador y su acción, pese a la aparente mejora, sabe a menos. Es un videojuego decente, pero decepcionante y en cierta medida insustancial.

It's mind-blowingly racist to the point of 1920s-style caricature.

But it's RE4 with co-op.

The pacing is all over the place, leading to sections that feel overly dramatic for no reason and a short length that you really notice.

But it's RE4 with co-op.

The plot has too many infodumps that, while interesting to the worldbuilding, lead to even more pacing issues to have you stop in your tracks and read a file on a computer somewhere.

But it's RE4 with co-op.

Sheva is a terribly underutilized character with a lot of squandered potential, and in her finished state, really only heightens the accusations of stereotyping.

But it's RE4 with co-op.

The inventory system is a massive stepdown from the previous iterations in every way, feeling overly strict a la the classic games without having the tension of said strictness, nor the satisfaction of creating an arsenal of weapons by rearranging your inventory spaces.

But it's RE4 with co-op.

The bosses range from boring to actively infuriating with their lengths, most being conceptually great but suffering from being overly long and tedious, with some being so mechanically strict that you'll find yourself getting hit through no real fault of your own.

But it's RE4 with co-op.

Also, there's Wesker.