So this year i’m planning to play as many classic survival horror games as i can. Of course i had to start with the founder –despite the very well known precursors- of the genre, Resident Evil.
As a kid, i’ve always been curious about the Resident Evil franchise and it’s lore, but for many reasons i never got to play the games –Except for RE3 Nemesis but that’s another story-, and by the time teenage came, i stopped being interested in video games in general. But still, i think one of the main reasons why i was attracted to Resident Evil and other survival horrors was actually it’s gameplay, which is probably the thing thatmany people consider to be one of those things that hasn’t aged well. To me, games like Resident Evil, Silent Hill and Dino Crisis, were essentially a 3D graphic adventure with the adition of action elements. It was a perfect combination at the time. Nobody complained about tank controls back then, we just sat and played instead of getting all picky about minor details. And just as it happens with point and click games, this was a great genre to play with someone else at your side: Not just for the story and the cinematic aspects, but also because it was nice to discuss how to solve the puzzles. And also it was really fun to share a couple scares.
So i finally sat down and played Resident Evil. I played with Jill which is not just “the easy way” but rather the proper way, in my opinion. I got the best ending and i have to say that i had a fantastic time while playing it. All those things that seem “dated” were just a fundamental part of the fun for me: i was surprised to see that tank controls weren’t a problem at all (yes, it takes a while to get around with them but sooner than later you just get used to them), i was also totally in love with the low-poly graphics, and also, i actually found that the infamous dialogue was a really funny way to have a certain relief from the tension, also providing some kind of Horror Comedy B-Movie vibe to it.
Resident Evil isn’t a game that could scare someone to death nowadays, but it definitely succeeds in creating an atmosphere full of tension and mistery. It’s curious to think how most of the precursors of the genre -Alone in the dark, Clock Tower, Sweet Home, even Maniac Mansion – they were all going for the haunted house trope. It’s also noteworthy, just like it happened with it’s precursors in the haunted mansion theme, how the story is overall pretty minimalistic here. In the case of Resident Evil though – This also happens somehow in Clock Tower – the most interesting pieces of actual story are not really shown on-screen, but rather in the various documents that you can find throughout the mansion, which serve as the basis of the whole RE lore. There is some criticism concernig the latter parts of the game, those were you’re kinda leaving the mansion and going into different environments. To me they were all fine. I have to admit i didn’t have the best time of my life during the segment of the mines, but mostly because that was the part with the biggest spider of the game. Spiders were the only thing that kinda creeped me out to be honest.
I’m not sure if it has been adressed how important Resident Evil was for the revival of the whole zombie culture. On one hand, it should be mentioned that incorporating the classical concept of the zombie designed by George Romero in Night Of The Living Dead was something that hasn’t been done at that time, and even less, with this degree of perfection: Zombies are slow, they have to be shot in the head, they can be left behind just by walking if the area is big enough, but they can corner you if the space is tight. This hasn’t been done in videogames at this time (Alone in the dark probably tried but without this level of results). Also, zombies were pretty much forgotten during mid and late 90’s, so Resident Evil pretty much held the torch of the zombie myth and pave the way for the big revival that happened during the 2000’s, with titles like 28 Days Later and The Walking Dead as the prime examples.
In conclussion, playing Resident Evil felt like an experience that holds up perfectly well nowadays, contrary to many opinions. I’d like to believe that this is not due to me being an old-fag, but rather because the game is inherently good. It’s not that certain mechanics are replaced because they are bad. Maybe they are replaced only because the industry says so, and maybe because other mechanics prove to sell better at a certain time. But honestly, with the proper mindset, any youngster should be able to play this game. This new wave of indie developers designing survival horrors in the style of the three classic Resident Evils serves as a proof of that. But being aware of the existence of all those games, i can’t help but feeling a little sad knowing that we might never see a game in the RE franchise going back to this particular style. Or something like the first remake, with it’s visual enhancements but with the gameplay almost intact.
As a kid, i’ve always been curious about the Resident Evil franchise and it’s lore, but for many reasons i never got to play the games –Except for RE3 Nemesis but that’s another story-, and by the time teenage came, i stopped being interested in video games in general. But still, i think one of the main reasons why i was attracted to Resident Evil and other survival horrors was actually it’s gameplay, which is probably the thing thatmany people consider to be one of those things that hasn’t aged well. To me, games like Resident Evil, Silent Hill and Dino Crisis, were essentially a 3D graphic adventure with the adition of action elements. It was a perfect combination at the time. Nobody complained about tank controls back then, we just sat and played instead of getting all picky about minor details. And just as it happens with point and click games, this was a great genre to play with someone else at your side: Not just for the story and the cinematic aspects, but also because it was nice to discuss how to solve the puzzles. And also it was really fun to share a couple scares.
So i finally sat down and played Resident Evil. I played with Jill which is not just “the easy way” but rather the proper way, in my opinion. I got the best ending and i have to say that i had a fantastic time while playing it. All those things that seem “dated” were just a fundamental part of the fun for me: i was surprised to see that tank controls weren’t a problem at all (yes, it takes a while to get around with them but sooner than later you just get used to them), i was also totally in love with the low-poly graphics, and also, i actually found that the infamous dialogue was a really funny way to have a certain relief from the tension, also providing some kind of Horror Comedy B-Movie vibe to it.
Resident Evil isn’t a game that could scare someone to death nowadays, but it definitely succeeds in creating an atmosphere full of tension and mistery. It’s curious to think how most of the precursors of the genre -Alone in the dark, Clock Tower, Sweet Home, even Maniac Mansion – they were all going for the haunted house trope. It’s also noteworthy, just like it happened with it’s precursors in the haunted mansion theme, how the story is overall pretty minimalistic here. In the case of Resident Evil though – This also happens somehow in Clock Tower – the most interesting pieces of actual story are not really shown on-screen, but rather in the various documents that you can find throughout the mansion, which serve as the basis of the whole RE lore. There is some criticism concernig the latter parts of the game, those were you’re kinda leaving the mansion and going into different environments. To me they were all fine. I have to admit i didn’t have the best time of my life during the segment of the mines, but mostly because that was the part with the biggest spider of the game. Spiders were the only thing that kinda creeped me out to be honest.
I’m not sure if it has been adressed how important Resident Evil was for the revival of the whole zombie culture. On one hand, it should be mentioned that incorporating the classical concept of the zombie designed by George Romero in Night Of The Living Dead was something that hasn’t been done at that time, and even less, with this degree of perfection: Zombies are slow, they have to be shot in the head, they can be left behind just by walking if the area is big enough, but they can corner you if the space is tight. This hasn’t been done in videogames at this time (Alone in the dark probably tried but without this level of results). Also, zombies were pretty much forgotten during mid and late 90’s, so Resident Evil pretty much held the torch of the zombie myth and pave the way for the big revival that happened during the 2000’s, with titles like 28 Days Later and The Walking Dead as the prime examples.
In conclussion, playing Resident Evil felt like an experience that holds up perfectly well nowadays, contrary to many opinions. I’d like to believe that this is not due to me being an old-fag, but rather because the game is inherently good. It’s not that certain mechanics are replaced because they are bad. Maybe they are replaced only because the industry says so, and maybe because other mechanics prove to sell better at a certain time. But honestly, with the proper mindset, any youngster should be able to play this game. This new wave of indie developers designing survival horrors in the style of the three classic Resident Evils serves as a proof of that. But being aware of the existence of all those games, i can’t help but feeling a little sad knowing that we might never see a game in the RE franchise going back to this particular style. Or something like the first remake, with it’s visual enhancements but with the gameplay almost intact.