The one word I associated with this game was desperation. After my replay it will be - hilarious.
Resident Evil 5 is a coop-game through and through. Just don’t even try to play it alone!
I asked my old friend Nick, with whom I finished this game more than 10 years ago in sheer endless night sessions. And he agreed to be in for this adventure!
RE5 is a drama queen: Overacting voice actors, over-the-top, unrealistic action and head-shaking dialogue. It is loaded with what the fuck - moments and you can not stop to giggle and burst out laughing. But you just can not deny, that it is flawed to its core. And not only, because it is 15 years old, using outdated mechanics like rail-roaded level design, cannon fodder boss battles and stupid quick time events. No, it is simply frustrating and unfair, because it is hard to read and unpredictable: The hitboxes of the enemies vary and are always designed in your disadvantage. The placement of ammo drops is so unpredictable, as you are sometimes shit-loaded with shots and sometimes cornered with only a knife as your last chance for survival. The weapons are so badly balanced, that you always go for the grenade launcher and the shotgun. And it happens far more than once, that you feel stuck and stupid, as the solution to a puzzle or the weak spot of an enemy is so hidden, you just don’t get it.
That is why you need a coop-buddy: To cope this frustration-enducing and flawed design and turn it upside down by tag-team roundhouse kicking the shit out of a chainsaw-swinging zombie. Or solving puzzles in an indiana jones-like crypt filled with mutated naked mole rats. Resident Evil 5 is packed with moments like this, where you can goof around and escape just a breath away from the next Game Over.
What I was surprised of, was the difficulty, because in our first playthrough, we were frequently rage-quitting and now, we were stunned, whenever a battle-winning cut-scene was triggered earlier than expected. I can not pinpoint it, if this is based on a noticeable re-work of the controls in the remastered version, we played. The growth of skill in the last ten years of both our gaming careers. Or the sheer growth patience based on adulthood and trained frustration tolerance. Likely a mixture of all of this factors, which ultimately result in the updated conclusion: hilarious!
It is for sure, that if Resident Evil 5 would launch today, it would be crushed by fans and press alike and simply vanish. But this game was released a while ago now and still holds a rare and memorable coop-campaign within a c-movie zombie/virus-scenario. It is a hybrid that is hilariously bad and good at the same time.
RE5 is a drama queen: Overacting voice actors, over-the-top, unrealistic action and head-shaking dialogue. It is loaded with what the fuck - moments and you can not stop to giggle and burst out laughing. But you just can not deny, that it is flawed to its core. And not only, because it is 15 years old, using outdated mechanics like rail-roaded level design, cannon fodder boss battles and stupid quick time events. No, it is simply frustrating and unfair, because it is hard to read and unpredictable: The hitboxes of the enemies vary and are always designed in your disadvantage. The placement of ammo drops is so unpredictable, as you are sometimes shit-loaded with shots and sometimes cornered with only a knife as your last chance for survival. The weapons are so badly balanced, that you always go for the grenade launcher and the shotgun. And it happens far more than once, that you feel stuck and stupid, as the solution to a puzzle or the weak spot of an enemy is so hidden, you just don’t get it.
That is why you need a coop-buddy: To cope this frustration-enducing and flawed design and turn it upside down by tag-team roundhouse kicking the shit out of a chainsaw-swinging zombie. Or solving puzzles in an indiana jones-like crypt filled with mutated naked mole rats. Resident Evil 5 is packed with moments like this, where you can goof around and escape just a breath away from the next Game Over.
What I was surprised of, was the difficulty, because in our first playthrough, we were frequently rage-quitting and now, we were stunned, whenever a battle-winning cut-scene was triggered earlier than expected. I can not pinpoint it, if this is based on a noticeable re-work of the controls in the remastered version, we played. The growth of skill in the last ten years of both our gaming careers. Or the sheer growth patience based on adulthood and trained frustration tolerance. Likely a mixture of all of this factors, which ultimately result in the updated conclusion: hilarious!
It is for sure, that if Resident Evil 5 would launch today, it would be crushed by fans and press alike and simply vanish. But this game was released a while ago now and still holds a rare and memorable coop-campaign within a c-movie zombie/virus-scenario. It is a hybrid that is hilariously bad and good at the same time.