Wow, can you believe it?
Today, we’ve hit the Gundam Anime Corners 300
th Top 5
Wednesday…jeez.
300 random Top 5s (and
the occasional 10s) of random Anime facts, personal reflections and just
whatever really comes to mind week after week.
To be honest, I had no idea what to cover for this momentous
landmark.
Then Resident Evil: Village
came out on Friday and after beating it within a day or so, I really want to
talk about it since I had mentioned it before and talked a bit about Resident
Evil here on the blog.
The game is a bit
of a mixed bag for various reasons, so much I wasn’t sure whether to talk about
the good or the bad in greater detail…so screw it, we can do a special
variation for a special occasion.
Today,
Dear Readers, I give you the 300
th Top 5 Wednesday- Top 5 Best (and
Worst) Things about Resident Evil: Village.
(Note to self: Maybe do an actual Anime related list for T5W#400).
Also, I while I’ll try to keep this Top 5
Spoiler Free, there’s a chance I might delve into that territory, particularly
towards the end of the list.
I’ll place
a warning where needed.
#5 Worst-Not Digging Deep Enough into the Umbrella
Connections
Even before the game came out, eagle eyed analysts noted
a very familiar symbol being plastered across the titular Village.
It’s clear that this little town in Europe
has some sort of ties to the villainous Umbrella Corporation, aka the group
that started the entire mess that kicked off Resident Evil.
The symbol is pretty visible at key locations
and yet there’s no real deep dive into how the Village and Umbrella are truly
connected.
There might be hints on a
note here and there but nothing substantial.
Most of the games central story is focused on Ethan Winters’ hunt for
his kidnapped daughter and doesn’t really dedicate time to anything else (save
for one section we’ll get to later).
Seeing as how Village arrives during the 25
th Anniversary of
the franchise, you’d think there’d be an opportunity to do some origin tracking
with Umbrella.
Sadly, if it doesn’t have
to do with Ethan, it pretty much gets overlooked, leaving that infamous symbol
as more of an Easter Egg than anything else.
#5 Best-Visually as strong as Recent Entries
In the years since Resident Evil 6, Capcom has really
doubled down on the visual presentation of the Resident Evil franchise.
Resident Evil: Village runs on the same
engine used to make Resident Evil VII: Biohazard and the Remakes of Resident
Evil 2 and 3, the RE Engine.
This same
engine was also used to make Devil May Cry V as well.
So it’s no wonder that Village is a damn good
looking game, just as good as all the aforementioned games.
The Village and the surrounding locations
such as Castle Dimetrescu, the Swamps and the Ruins all look fantastically well
rendered and are so detailed you could spend hours exploring everything during
your first or second playthrough…provided you clear out all the enemies
first.
Whatever mixed feelings I have
about this title, Resident Evil: Village is a damn fine looking game and
hopefully all of the next Resident Evil titles can look just as good, if not
better.
#4 Worst-I Don’t Like Ethan
Ok, I get that Ethan is supposed to be a fresh face for
the RE franchise.
He’s not some combat
ready warrior like Chris Redfield or Leon S. Kennedy.
And he’s a desperate man looking for his
daughter in the worst place on Earth.
And yet I don’t like him, never warmed to him, hardly felt for his
plight.
Hell I think I felt for poor
baby Rose more than Ethan.
Even during
their first encounters with the undead back in Raccoon City or the Arklay
Mountain, Leon, Jill Valentine and Claire Redfield were more likeable and while
prone to appropriate freakouts, felt like they belonged right in their
situations, the unlikely perfect people for an unexpected job.
Ethan feels like he’s in the wrong game, more
befitting a Silent Hill protagonist than Resident Evil…and I’ll get back to
that point in a little bit.
Plus, after
spending so much time on the Remakes hanging out with Leon, Claire and Jill, I
missed them a lot.
Theyre the true faces
of this franchise and faceless Ethan just doesn’t belong with them.
To quote Chris, “Sorry Ethan.”
#4 Best-The Enemy Variety
While they are a far cry from the Walking Dead and Zombie
Dogs of Raccoon City, the enemies you face in Resident Evil: Village are some
of the toughest and most hard hitting to date.
The Lycans look fantastic and aren’t so easily dispatched unless you
have the right amount of ammo for the right gun.
While they are the main grunts of the game,
you also have to deal with the occasional undead corpse wielding a heavy melee
weapon, winged Gargoyles and even mechanical nightmares that give
Frankenstein’s monster a run for his money.
Plus, there are variants on all of these creatures as well.
These aren’t your average foes and you’ll
really have to strategize how to take them down swiftly and efficiently and
still have enough ammo for the next area.
All of these monsters felt like a breath of fresh air for the normally
Zombie infested outings of Resident Evil and I hope we especially see the
Lycans again down the line.
#3 Worst-The Overmarketing of Lady Dimetrescu
(SPOILERS)
I don’t think Capcom realized just how big of an impact
Lady Alcina Dimetrescu was going to make once she was revealed.
Since her appearance in the earliest REVIII
trailers, Lady D has been hyped to no end, inspiring fan art, cosplays and all
of Twitter revealing multiple kinky fantasies involving the Vampirice
giantess.
Yet for all of this fan
love…it might disappoint some to know that Lady Dimetrescu is only in the first
part of the game and is actually the first boss fight.
Yeah, in a game about 10-12 hours long,
depending on your level of perfectionism, the big lady is only in the first
couple of hours and is never seen again once dispatched.
And even then, most of her major scenes have
all been shown in the promotional trailers and the game demos.
There’s hardly anything surprising about Lady
D aside from her “Final Form” and the attempts to turn her into the next Mr. X
from Resident Evil 2 Remake don’t land as well as they do.
This was def the case of way too much hype
when it should have been clear that Dimetrescu wasn’t even high enough on the
food chain to be the endgame villainess of the game.
Which is a shame cause she is a more imposing
and memorable character than Mother Miranda ever is.
#3 Best-The Chris Section
Just like Lady Dimestrescu, the trailers for REVIII
spotlighted the supposed turn to darkness for long time RE hero Chris
Redfield.
While his role in the story is
revealed…and addmitedly doesn’t paint him in the best light, Chris’ involvement
does lead to one of the best segments of the entire game.
At one point, you do take a break from
playing Ethan in order to raid the Village in the role of the legendary Chris
himself.
Armed with stronger weapons and
a sense of “I do this for a living”, the Chris section of REVIII feels like a
spiritual crossover between Resident Evil and Call of Duty…and it is way more
awesome than it should be.
Having played
a few games as Chris, taking things to the FPS genre certainly is something and
I enjoyed playing the far more bad ass legacy character than Ethan at any point
in the game.
You do return to Ethan
eventually…and kind of wish you were still Chris (his poor decision making
aside).
If anything, this feels like a
better primer for the recently announced Resident Evil 4 VR Game and being able
to play as fellow RE legacy hero Leon S. Kennedy.
#2 Worst-Still feels like Silent Hill more than
Resident Evil
Despite my best hopes and wishes looking at the trailers,
I just cant get behind this new direction Resident Evil seems to be heading
in.
Ethan’s character and the atmosphere
of the setting (though very effective, we’ll get to that) feel less like a
Resident Evil game and more like a setup for Silent Hill.
There was one section of REVIII that felt
like it was an expanded version of the infamous PT Demo, aka the cancelled Silent
Hill project that would’ve seen Norman Reedus from The Walking Dead directed by
Hideo Kojima and Guillermo Del Toro.
While there is a scientific explanation for everything going on in this game,
Village never veers into it like any other RE game would.
Rather than adding science fiction to your
action horror game, Village feels like a supernatural, psychological thriller
with the foes you face feeling more and more ethereal than made from
science.
Is it better than watching
Chris Redfield punch a bolder?
Sure…but
this game still feels like Resident Evil is moving further away from Resident
Evil.
#2 Best-It’s Definitely Scary
Despite my gripes, the atmosphere of REVIII is top notch
and it did restore a level of terror I haven’t really felt playing a Resident
Game in a while.
That aforementioned section,
the House Section, contains one of the most nightmarish inducing sights I have
ever seen in a video game and im surprised it hasn’t haunted me in my
sleep.
One advantage to making Ethan less
capable than Leon or Chris means that the terror feels real and the enemies are
both vicious and unrelenting.
My heart
was racing and I almost felt a bit nauseous at one point (granted it could have
been something I ate but who knows).
Some
of the images in REVIII are gonna stay with me for a long time and presentation
wise, everything fits the gothic horror aesthetic it was going for from the get
go…this is a terrifying game at times.
#1 Worst-The Future of Resident Evil? (SPOILERS)
So, as promised, Resident Evil: Village concludes the
story of Ethan Winters.
However, a post
credits epilogue sees his grown up daughter, Rose, visiting his grave before being
collected by an agency both she and Chris apparently work for now.
Is this an indicator that we’re not done with
the Winters family yet?
I don’t know how
I feel about that possibility.
After two
games with Ethan, I’m sure many want the mainline Resident Evil games to return
to some familiar faces.
We did get to play
as Chris in one segment but what about Jill, Claire or Leon?
Also, depending on how well the game does, are
VII and VIII indicators of where the franchise will be going from here: veering
from scifi horror into more supernatural horrors with a scientific excuse that’s
never leaned into very hard?
I know
Resident Evil jumped the shark in Resident Evil 5 and nearly torpedoed the franchise
in Resident Evil 6.
Resident Evil VII: Biohazard
brought things back to basics with an added psychological horror element and a new
protagonist that proved the franchise has the guts to try new things and wanted
to fix the mistakes of the past.
But I don’t
know, two games of experimentation is one thing.
Moving away from the elements and characters
that made Resident Evil what it is…nope, I cant back that.
#1 Best-The Resident Evil 4 Influence is Everywhere
They kept saying it in all of the promo material and it
was the truest part of this entire game.
Resident Evil: Village overall might not be a worthy successor to
Resident Evil 4, aka the best game in the franchise hands down, but it does use
its influence very well.
Naturally,
there’s the Village itself which feels like a 5-10X bigger version of the one
from the very beginning of RE4.
The Duke
as the new merchant was entertaining and played a vital role in the stories
events.
The Dimetrescu Castle felt like
the Spencer Mansion crossed with the Los Illuminados Castle.
And we even had the RE4 Briefcase Inventory system
brought back into the mix.
From a new
breed of enemy to some very familiar boss fight scenarios, Resident Evil 4’s
fingerprints are all over this game and helped make Resident Evil: Village engaging
even when I wasn’t fully on board with it.
I do kind of wish you could round house kick Lycans like Leon could in
RE4 but Ethan isn’t nearly that much of a bad ass.
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