Village follows the same formula of RE7 and it's totally understandable. That game was a great return to form for the series. Does it work a second time though?
Village is not really scary like RE7. But that's by design, it's a more visceral type of horror. The game recalls RE4 a lot. You have an opening village level where you are surrounded by enemies until a bell saves your ass. There's a medieval castle you have to explore and there's even a merchant that sells you weapons and ammunition. He also upgrades your gear. I didn't care much for the cooking mechanic though.
Village executes all these idea in its own unique way. I'd say I loved most of the locations of the game. Some more than others (the fish guy level was a bit meh). The part where you play as a different character was incredibly cathartic this time and enjoyable unlike RE7.
The only part I didn't enjoy was the ending. It felt kinda confusing and forced and I kinda wished it didn't go the direction it did.
Overall, great game even if it doesn't live up to either RE7's cohesiveness or RE4's ability to juggle many weird ideas effortlessly.

I understand why this game was met with dissapointment back in the day. People were used to these open ended levels in 3D Mario and the feeling of exploration was half the fun. Then this game comes along and dives in the opposite direction. It opts for linear levels where the objective is to just get to the end of the level. But just because something is different than what you expected doesn't mean it's bad. 3D world is traditional Mario feeling and but its structure allows for a barrage of interesting ideas stacked in level after level as the devs didn't have to worry about building cohesive worlds. I do feel like the green stars are unnecessary. Seems they were just the arbitrary collectible for this game. Some of the stars in the later worlds were a nightmare to get. This made me glad I went for all the stars I could get earlier in the game. The game looks wonderful if a little safe in its choice of art direction. The music though. Whoever decided to go the route of a Jazz band style deserves a promotion. The last boss battle with Bowser's was disappointing though. Overall, glad I played this one. Onto Galaxy.