What are you currently playing? 4.0

[gunswordfist]

I finally got up to Mr. X on Streets Of Rage remake. I forgot that SOR2 is the easiest game in the series. I went to that path and ran through the levels without losing a continue. Then I lost a continue or two at Mr. X's place. Having to fight the wrestler on the elevator is just wrong. It was good to see Shiva with Mr. X again after all those damn times I played Streets Of Rage 3 and Bare Knuckle 3. I beat Shiva...then I accidently hit some keys that cut off the game. But of course the remake has autosaving so I restarted back at the elevator and I think I did a bit better. I beat Shiva's ass again and then I got worn down by Mr. X's machine gunning and zooming in off screen to beat my ass. That was the most fun I had ever had fighting him them. I'm thinking about bringing an AI partner for once, especially since apparently teammates hitting each other can be turned off.

[gunswordfist]

As of 9:02 PM today, I finally beat Streets Of Rage Remake. I had all my continues until the wrestler right before the elevator goes all the way up. Then I believe I had two continues left but Mr. X's cheap ass brought me down to 1 life before I killed him with a flying kick.

[talonmalon333]

Do you guys remember me mentioning problems I might have with Resident Evil 4, talking about how I'm not a big fan of it anymore?

To hell with that. RE4 is awesome, and one of the best games in the series. I'm tired of pretending.

Maybe not "pretending" is the right word. More like "lying to myself". I have a tendency to believe I like games more or less than I actually do (an example would be Donkey Kong 64, which I thought I liked and grew up to realize otherwise). I think my anti-RE4 faze was sparked by nostalgia for the older games, once the series began to become an action shooter with RE5... But really, RE4 is a masterpiece. I know it, and you guys know it. There's a reason it used to be in my top 10 (still not sure I'd put it that high now though, simply due to having played many other games since those days).

The thing about RE4 is that it still feels like Resident Evil. Yeah, it might have downgraded the solitude and mystery from the old games, but I think it made up for that by having the best atmosphere in the entire series. Some people want to complain about the controls, even saying that they are clunky and archaic? For a while I could understand this logic, and it might have contributed to my faze. But looking over the game again, does it feel archaic? No, it doesn't. And I think that might be because it's not just some typical shooter. It's still a horror game, so the controls kind of make sense.

I'm not letting RE5 off the hook though. When I replayed it months ago, it does feel clunky. It does feel slow. Is it a coincidence that RE5 also happens to be a typical third person action shooter? No. I firmly believe that the reason is because those controls simply have no place in the genre RE5 falls into. And the fact that RE6 (at least with Chris Redfield) supposedly plays much faster and with tighter controls nearly confirms this theory for me.

Another thing is that RE5's storyline is a mess. I mean, they have all the right material. It's meant to serve as a conclusion to the main RE story arc after all, so of course it has the potential for a good story... Problem is, it's told horribly. With these out-of-place, tacked on cliches that clearly weren't the original intention with RE1, and new lame plot elements that are treated as if they're long since established. It's just awful... On the other hand, RE4's story doesn't have a whole lot to do with the main story. But it's told wonderfully. You're actually interested in what's going to become of the parasite inside of Leon, what will become of Ashley, and the crazy villains.

And I know many will think I went through a similar faze with RE5, because I treated it like it was awesome back when it was first released in 2009. But I think that was more like a "just played" syndrome, where you immediately play a game and are still excited about it, only to think differently once that initial excitement wares off. Because I did get over RE5 quickly, probably a few months after it's release. I barely remembered anything from it, as I recall. And the computer AI makes single-player mode needlessly frustration and simply not worth it.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Putting cheesy writing and hammy voice-acting aside, I did like RE4's story. It was interesting enough for me to actually care about what was happening, and I did genuinely want to see what would happen next. I also appreciated that it was a stand-alone story so that people like me who know nothing else about the stories in any previous RE games could get into it.

As for the controls, they didn't feel clunky at all to me. Being used to most modern TPS games, I do have to admit that it was initially difficult for me to get used to aiming with only one stick instead of 2, but after I got over that the controls felt fine to me. Sure, it plays slow and its not easy to maneuver, but that's the point, its still technically a survival horror game and while its not necessarily heavy on the jump scares, it does feel incredibly intense to play in section in which you get swarmed by enemies, and if you were able to move and shoot at the same time it would just make thing too easy and suck all of the tension out of the gameplay, and IMO that was the best thing that the game had going for it.

[Foggle]

The cheesy writing was one of my favorite things about RE 4. And, honestly, the acting was pretty good... especially by Capcom's standards. Mercier, Cahill, and Ward were excellent.

The story, on the other hand, is a big point of contention for longtime fans of the series. Killing Umbrella - the main antagonist up until that point - off-screen after spending five games building up to an epic showdown against them was a really stupid move.

[Spark Of Spirit]

Wesker: Seven minutes. Seven minutes is all I can spare to play with you.

Wow, what a mood killer. Seriously, playing the original game, I would never have come across something like that which seems from a wrong genre. I mean, imagine this:

Samus: If I jump off it's head, I can reach the goal ring!

How one piece of dialogue just destroys the atmosphere of a series.

[Foggle]

How one piece of dialogue just destroys the atmosphere of a series.

Indeed. Resident Evil 5 has no atmosphere at all. It's still a fun game, but remove Chris, Wesker, and Jill, and it bears absolutely no resemblance to previous entries. Here's why:
A third of the game takes place during the day. In Africa. Bright environments and sunshine EVERYWHERE.
On-rails turret sequences, including one where you shoot guys on motorcycles while riding in the back of a jeep.
Forced co-op (and not like in 0).
Enemies with guns.
You punch a fucking boulder. Inside a volcano.

Granted, Lost In Nightmares is pure Resident Evil bliss, but it's also DLC made after the game was released.

Series purists may hate RE 4, but at least it looks, feels, and acts like part of the franchise. RE 6 seems like the most action-packed installment yet, but it looks far closer to the originals than 5 ever did. And Revelations is apparently a valiant return to form, as well.

[talonmalon333]

The story, on the other hand, is a big point of contention for longtime fans of the series. Killing Umbrella - the main antagonist up until that point - off-screen after spending five games building up to an epic showdown against them was a really stupid move.

To be honest though, an Umbrella showdown would've been just a big action shooter anyway, so I don't mind too much that they took Umbrella's fall down the realistic route.

RE 6 seems like the most action-packed installment yet, but it looks far closer to the originals than 5 ever did.

RE6, so far, seems like half horror and half action, which I guess is a good way to make all parts of the fanbase happy. And as I said before, the action segments play like an action game, unlike RE5 who's control scheme really didn't have any place in that game.

[Foggle]

I'm currently replaying the Resident Evil remake for the fifth time or so. I honestly consider this to be the pinnacle of exploration-based game design. Its excellent map layout, focus on micromanagement (without becoming tedious), and fun puzzle-solving mesh together perfectly. And the atmosphere is just phenomenal.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

I used to watch a friend play through the game, and I did get to see him play a huge chunk of gameplay overall (at leat 5 hours-worth), and then I decided to go check out some Youtube videos of the game to see how it holds up. Honestly, badly-written dialogue and cut-scenes aside, its still a really scary and really atmospheric game. In fact its far more scary than any modern horror games which just fail miserably at even providing a single scare, and its atmosphere is so genuinely creepy that few games can boast even being in the same league when it come to level design like that. I also don't mind too much that the camera is horrible for combat, because the game was clearly no designed to be a typical shooter where you kill every enemy. Many times you have to conserve ammo for tougher enemies or bosses, and can't afford to just shoot down every single zombie you see (but to be fair its not like there are a ton of them to begin with, a you rarely ever see more than 2 per room from what I remember of the game), so a lot of times you jut have to be good at dodging around them and if you can do that they are pretty easy to ignore given their slow speed (that is unless they turn into a crimson head, and those fuckers are REALLY fast and scary from what I remember).

I also find some of the story that's told through text that you find throughout the mansion to be really creepy and legitimately good story-telling in it own way. Though, of course there are those entries that you find that are still unintentionally cheesy and hilarious, like that "Itchy, tasty" diary entry that you find in one room, lol.

That said, I have to admit that the tank controls would probably stop me from getting any enjoyment out of actually playing the game. Its fine for what it is, and I understand that it makes the game scarier, but for me its also not really much fun to have to   control a character that way. That's why, to me, older RE games are more fun to watch than they are to play. Then again, maybe if I forced myself to get used to it I could eventually get over the controls, but I'll have to give it another shot some day to see if that turns out to be the case.

[Spark Of Spirit]

You know, I hate tank controls and all, but what prevents me from playing anything with them is when the camera angle is fixed. I can never move properly and I can never NOT fight the controls. It's why I haven't been able to play any of the old RE games for more than 5-10 minutes. I can't get used to the controls.

Seriously if they took those games, changed nothing about them, and used RE:Revelations controls;I would play them in a heartbeat.

It's the only thing stopping me from playing them. I never could and can never get used to that.

[Foggle]

I thought I would hate the tank controls at first, too, but they really aren't that bad once you get used to them. Spend 10-15 minutes with a classic Resident Evil and they'll start feeling good. After about an hour, controlling the character will come naturally to you.

Considering that the cutscenes are essentially rewrites of the utterly horrible ones from the original, they did a damn good job there. They are still a bit cheesy, but that's part of the series' charm.

In fact its far more scary than any modern horror games which just fail miserably at even providing a single scare

I'd argue that the Fatal Frame series, the Siren games, and Penumbra/Amnesia are actually scarier, but yeah, it's still near the top.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Does Revelations use the over-the-shoulder POV that most 3rd person games use these days, or does it use the old-style camera  angles except without tank controls?

If its the former, then it kind of impossible to change nothing about the old games as they would have to be completely redesigned from scratch to use that modern gameplay style, but if the fixed camera was left alone and the controls were just streamlined to work normally, then that would work (though people would probably complain that it makes the old games feel too easy, but honestly I wouldn't care too much because the atmosphere would still be brilliant, IMO).

[Foggle]

Revelations plays exactly like RE 4 but with a quick-knife button and a dodging ability.

[Dr. Ensatsu-ken]

Ah, then yeah, remaking the classic RE games to play more like RE4 would force them to have to be completely developed from scratch, seeing as how its impossible to have that angle in the older games being that they were all pre-rendered painted backgrounds (which is why the camera had to stay fixed at all times). The only exception to this rule among the older games is Code Veronica, if I'm not mistaken.