This is what is known as peak videogaming. I don't have a whole lot of nostalgia for the original Resident Evil 4 (I never actually beat it!) but this game is fantastic. It has some of the best third person shooter combat in any game ever. Weapons are satisfying to use with fantastic gunplay, there's a parry system, and each encounter feels meticulously designed to be unique and different from each other. There's some light survival horror elements at play as well with resource management being a key factor throughout the game. In traditional resident evil fashion there's puzzles strewn about the game that are uh... ok? They work, and they are not overly frustrating, but I'm not sure how much they add to the overall game experience. There's a few cool setpiece moments as well that are both bombastic and fun to playthrough, in addition to some fun boss fights. This is a fairly meaty game as well, with a main story that's probably around 15-20 hours, depending on how much you explore - but the game is very, very replayable and it is designed in a way to encourage multiple playthroughs. There's tons of unlockables, higher difficulties and stuff like high ranks to achieve that'll make you want to play the game through multiple times - not to mention just how fun the game is to play.
The story is well, it's Resident Evil. The overall storytelling is slightly more serious than what I remember from the original game, but it's still full of silly one-liners and things of that nature. It's not a particularly great story, but there's some fun moments and it's overall inoffensive.
I do have a few complaints though. I mentioned the puzzles earlier as a minor one. I also think that there's maybe a few too many points of no return, making certain things a little frustrating when trying to get collectibles. And my last complaint is that Capcom released some pretty blatant and obvious pay2win dlc weeks after the game launched. Is the game designed around this dlc? Absolutely not, but if you want to shell out some money you'd definitely save some time in going for 100%, and honestly, it's just the principle of the thing.

Reviewed on Apr 14, 2023


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