It's hard to say as it's literally not even been out a week (at the time of writing) but this might be the best work Capcom has ever done for this IP. In terms of enemy variety, boss design and overall storytelling nothing even comes close. Featuring Chris's best character writing since the series' inception and an emotionally investing story they've really outdone themselves. The music and level design are all top notch and the plot structure is finely executed with well realised twist to keep you on your toes.

On the gameplay side of things it's a perfect mesh of action and horror but since it's atmospherically in tune with the latter throughout it never feels jarring when it switches between the two. Everything I wanted from a remake of 4 is in here, bringing back the merchant and weapon upgrades gives the gameplay much needed heterogeneity that I felt was missing from previous installments. I really love the briefcase style inventory so I'm glad it made a comeback but with the added quick selection shortcut keys to make it feel more free-flowing.

Back to the level design. Every RE game has areas where you absolutely dread coming up. Think the facility in 5, or the ship section in 7 or literally anything after the village in 4 (it's been 15 years, I've earned the right to love to hate it.) This had none of that. Every new area feels fresh and well thought out, the castle and the factory specifically, and the enemy changes add something new at every corner forcing you to switch up your playing style and adapt to the situation. Contrasted with 7 which was just mold, crawling mold and fat mold, it makes me WANT to replay the game over and over whereas on 7 I was practically done the moment I got the platinum trophy. I was just relieved I didn't have to play it again.

I'm glad they addressed my biggest issue with 7, and I'm sure is everyone else's, which was unskippable cutscenes. Especially when they're as long as they are. It makes subsequent replays feel trite, which is not a good thing, especially when they're a requirement for the platinum trophy.

I'm not without my complaints but they're minor bordering on inconsequential. I felt the castle segment could have been a little longer since they marketed it so heavily but I do love the labyrinthian layout of the area (something that is quite frequent throughout other segments of the game.) The elevators on the game I feel are far too long and slow down the pacing. And the map can be difficult to navigate (I struggled to see exactly where I was at times) but just like with 2r, if you play it enough times you no longer need to look at the map.

Last but not least, I have to talk about Village of Shadows difficulty which I've developed a sort of love/hate relationship with. It makes you completely change your style of play (which I love) because even standard enemies can take as much as 4 shotgun shells to the head to finally kill them which means you have to play a lot of cat and mouse avoidance games with them, especially at the bookends of the game, most notably the opening Lycan attack. Which requires you to survive waves of Lycans for 4 minutes with only enough ammo to finish off yourself; and believe me, you want that ammo. The last thing you need is softlocking halfway through because you don't have enough bullets to kill the ridiculously tanky bosses (which I hate). That's to say none of this would be so bad if the area you have to navigate wasn't smaller than a room in The Binding of Isaac. It plays like it was purposely designed to be used with NG+ weapons which does play into what I loved about it which is the challenge. Its been a long time since I was actually challenged by a Resident Evil game so this ticked all the right boxes for me. For those who have played it, I've just beaten Moreau. Wish me luck.