Resident Evil 5 Review

This review contains no spoilers

Now let me start this with saying that I have never played a full Resident Evil game before. I played RE2 a couple times on Playstation and I have tried my hand at RE4 on the Wii. I have no history with Resident Evil so I was going into it as pretty much a noob to the whole history behind it. I first played the demo for RE5 and found myself extremely frustrated as only a big fan of shooters could be. A friend of mine who shares an interest in games played it and loved it. I told him that I would most likely not be getting the game. But who was I kidding? A possible game of the year that looked as beautiful as RE5 did, how could I not get it. So I played the demo a couple of times and got the hang of how the game plays and was ready to play the full game.

At first the controls were extremely frustrating. I had a hard time wrapping my head around why you couldn't move and shoot or move and reload. But it became perfectly clear early in the game that without this type of restraint on the action in the game it would be a totally different game with little to no strategy. Being able to only shoot while stationary made picking which weapon to use and who to shoot at more important than it would be if you were running and gunning all the infected. After getting the hang of the controls it all feels like second nature. And getting headshots was even more satisfying.

I think it is obvious for everyone that the look of the game is better than anything out there right now. I have yet to see such detailed environments and terrifyingly real atmospheres in a game that I have seen in RE5. The run down towns of Africa seems hot and humid and the caves seem dank and claustrophobic. The enemies in the game look frighteningly real and their motions are also very realistic. Sure the infected will run towards you only to slow down giving you an opportunity to try for a headshot, but without this the game may be impossible to beat. However later in the game the enemies get harder (no surprise) and run for longer.



There are a fair amount of weapons in the game with tons of upgrades for each. Upgrading your weaponry will use up most of the money you acquire in the game. Either by gold or by treasures, some easily found and others hiding on ceilings and on walls and in other inconspicuous spots. It is a good idea to check around you a lot for treasures and boxes to break. You can not buy ammo at the shop, which you can only access out of the game rather than walking to the merchant like in RE4. Every time you die or beat a part of a chapter you will be able to organize your inventory and buy and sell and upgrade. Not being able to buy ammo got me mad a couple of times, but again it just makes the game more challenging and forces you to stratagize more. However if you upgrade the weapons carrying capacity your gun will automatically fill up with the amount of ammo that you can carry. My favorite gun to use in the game was the Dragunov sniper rifle. Once upgraded it would normally take two shots to the body or one skillfully placed shot to the head and the enemy went down. While aiming with the gun the scope bobbles a bit because holding a gun steady in real life is hard while standing, this makes hitting far away targets difficult but feels very rewarding once an infected's head blows apart. Overall I found the gun selection to be very vast. However I found that the first pistol, the first shotgun, and the Dragunov sniper rifle to be my weapons of choice.

Re5 is strictly a cooperative game. You are constantly playing with a partner, whether that partner be controlled by the computer or a friend. There are a lot of instances where both players have to open a door, pull a lever, or go into an elevator. There are also instances where one will boost another to a spot unreachable by ones self. The co-op game play really shines if you are playing with a friend and not the computer. Although the computer is fairly smart it's still not as smart as playing with another human. I beat the game with a friend and although our schedules didn't always coincide, when we both could sit down and play it was a blast. Talking about what we needed and what we had in our inventory and thinking of strategies and what to do differently if we died. It was the most fun I've had playing a game with someone else cooperatively. I suggest everyone who gets the game to play it with a friend.

All in all it was a great game with plenty of replay value. After beating it on veteran we unlocked a mercenaries mode which is a timed game where you try to kill as many infected as possible. Also there is so much stuff to find in the game that you will want to play it over again to try and find everything. Also after beating it on veteran you unlock professional mode which is a harder difficulty.

I would suggest anyone who enjoys games, or zombies, or cool boss battles, or amazing graphics, or any of the combination to buy this game. I traded in 2 games at Gamestop towards RE5 and only paid 21 cents! Pick up this game now!

5/5