A Late Arrival in Africa — Resident Evil 5

After playing through Resident Evil 5 nearly three years late to the party, I realized that the benefactors of playing a game well after everyone else has. Sure there are some downsides — good luck finding someone to play with after most people you know refer to it as “old news,” if they were interested in it at all — but there’s one swell aspect of it: the ability to adjust expectations accordingly. I consider its predecessor, Resident Evil 4, one of the best games I’ve ever played, and my second favorite game from the last generation of consoles (behind Metal Gear Solid 3), but I knew that I should lower my expectations for its sequel.

And it worked! Probably. It’s definitely not as consistently good as RE4, but RE5 is an enjoyable game despite having some sections that could have been designed better. I also began realizing that anyone who said it was a legitimately bad game inherited the internet’s ability to only deal in extreme absolutes. There are much worse games than RE5, but its reaction from some fans represents the pitfall of being way too psyched for a game after glancing at too much media disseminated from the developers and glowing previews.

They’re undoubtedly looking down at some of that body horror.

One of the biggest complaints about the game was its protagonist, Chris Redfield, having a partner always tagging along with him throughout Africa, Sheva Alomar. Her story-based reasons for travelling with him are fine, a quest to find out what’s happening to the people on the continent, and stop the T-Virus from spreading any further. Her existence, though, was considered a problem for the game’s flow, regardless of whether she was being controlled by the AI or a human. The AI, admittedly, sometimes doesn’t do things as well as a human would — attacking the enemy with melee attacks in lieu of wasting bullets is a lost concept to them — but they have some benefits too. There were times where I didn’t know enemies were present in the vicinity of certain areas, but AI Sheva knew to shoot them. They’re also capable of hitting targets from long distances with regular weaponry, ones a human would struggle with, especially early on.

The problem with having a partner tagging along for gamers, human or not, was that it ruined an atmosphere that could have been particularly horrifying while venturing through solo. While this is true, the environment not being as harrowing as it could be is entirely because they just weren’t designed that way. The disappointment had to do with Capcom making this a survival/action title rather than the survival/horror experience some wanted. There’s plenty of body horror present, which looks all the more realistic because of its HD graphic sheen. But there are plenty of daytime areas, which don’t invoke as much fear as they could if they were enshrouded in darkness.

Though things can get a little creepy within more claustrophobic areas.

RE4 definitely took more of an action-esque approach than the older games, and RE5 is the logical extension to that. The focus is less on fearfully keeping the enemy back while conserving ammo and more on shooting bad dudes. The problem is that the tank-style controls don’t really lend themselves to an action game well at all times, which can lead to some unfortunate mistakes from the player. This isn’t a very common problem, though, since most of the game is designed around not being able to run and gun.

But this can be especially jarring when you’re fighting someone like Wesker, who’s definitely fast enough to zoom up and break the necks of both of your characters before they could make a move. This is a problem Capcom realized too; it’s the reason why they added the ability to move and shoot simultaneously starting with the more recent crop of titles. It’s slightly less jarring when characters are capable of techniques you can’t do on your own in cut scenes, but that’s a typical video game issue.

If you even the least bit familiar with RE5, you probably remember all of the racial connotations the game supposedly had, along with the back and forth arguments between two parties that never came to a real conclusion. That cooled down significantly shortly after the game’s release, but it’s risen again in the wake of Resident Evil 6’s announcement…for some unknown reason. As an African American, I don’t see this game as racist, but there are stacks upon stacks of unfortunate implications in a few areas. The idea of a beefy (perhaps from steroid abuse, considering Chris’ appearance in previous RE games) Caucasian shooting up a bunch of Africans does not look good, but it’s not racist.

But this can be especially jarring when you’re fighting someone like Wesker, who’s definitely fast enough to zoom up and break the necks of both of your characters before they could make a move. This is a problem Capcom realized too; it’s the reason why they added the ability to move and shoot simultaneously starting with the more recent crop of titles. It’s slightly less jarring when characters are capable of techniques you can’t do on your own in cut scenes, but that’s a typical video game issue.

If you even the least bit familiar with RE5, you probably remember all of the racial connotations the game supposedly had, along with the back and forth arguments between two parties that never came to a real conclusion. That cooled down significantly shortly after the game’s release, but it’s risen again in the wake of Resident Evil 6’s announcement…for some unknown reason. As an African American, I don’t see this game as racist, but there are stacks upon stacks of unfortunate implications in a few areas. The idea of a beefy (perhaps from steroid abuse, considering Chris’ appearance in previous RE games) Caucasian shooting up a bunch of Africans does not look good, but it’s not racist.

When things get action packed, they push it up to eleven.

But some of the enemies later in the game generated some legitimate tension, and not the kind that’s usually expected from an RE game. They’re dressed in wild African garb, and seemingly shout gibberish and assorted noises while attacking the protagonists. They’re reminiscent of enemies seen out of an episode from an old Hanna-Barbera cartoon, the kind that may have been conspicuously absent from syndication because it might be seen as a little insensitive. Some of those enemies were not good choices.

But this didn’t get me too upset, honestly. It was nowhere near as infuriating as the inventory system, which remained limited for the entirety of the game. Upon starting it, my assumption was that it would begin with not having much room for a plethora of items, which is adequate when starting the game. However, there are no options to expand it a la RE4, meaning it was eventually tough to store all the items I need for a given chapters. The fact that every weapon and item couldn’t be mapped to the quick select functions is also a problem.

See? Who said this game doesn’t have any horrifying parts!?

Some of the side modes are also very enjoyable, especially The Mercenaries. I didn’t think it would be that appealing initially, but playing each level more to unlock more characters, stages, and obtain a higher grade became addictive very quickly. Playing some obviously broken characters like any Wesker iteration and some of Sheva’s was also fun, along with playing characters that aren’t playable in any of the single-player modes.  Unfortunately, Capcom realized how much people enjoyed it when they decided to release The Mercenaries 3D for 3DS, a standalone package for full price.

While RE5 isn’t quite as good as RE4, it’s still a well done game. Hopefully the areas the development team didn’t get quite right will be polished for RE6, a game that’s definitely going further in the survival/action direction for some parts. Of course, if you don’t like that, there’s a classic-style survival/horror experience in Resident Evil: Revelations for 3DS.