Resident Evil 5 Demo: you should follow me down. there's no color and no sound in a black and white town

Capcom has come a long way from their original survival horror zombie thriller Resident Evil. Taking place in a fictional midwestern place called Raccoon City, members of STARS (Special Tactics and Rescue Service) were sent in to investigate murders involving cannibalism that had occurred there. After searching for lost Bravo team members shortly after the investigation started, Alpha team finds themselves surviving for their lives within what was first thought to be an abandoned mansion. From there Capcom had a franchise on their hands stemming sequels, movies, books, other types of games such as Umbrella Chronicles (played much like the House of the Dead style light-gun shooters) and also inspiring many other similar series such as Silent Hill. To truly pay tribute to all these zombie games, a proper ten second silence must be given to the NES great Zombies Ate My Neighbors.

In 2005 the last major release in the series, RE4, was by far one of the best games available for the gamecube console. RE4 had one of the best control styles fully utilizing the fisher price controller with a now copycatted 3rd person, over the shoulder, laser-sighted aiming system. The game also brought back the black cat crossing your path paranoia and piddle in your pants fear that made the original a classic. The storyline flowed very well with actual gameplay and had additional challenges after the game was completed. To this day I still reflect on the many days spent playing RE4 after a few too many cold ones at 3am while listening to Brian Eno records and wondering how I wasn't placed in a mental institution for how scared I was of Las Plagas and moving silhouettes. Thankfully things like the Wiggles can help save anyone's sanity.

Capcom's next installment, Resident Evil 5, is due out early in March 2009. A demo of this game is available on Xboxlive (Gold members initially) after some many impressive trailers tickled our fancies for the last few months.

The first thing that this demo shows off, besides RE4 flashbacks of zombies dying face down in the muck, is that they have not steered away from what works.  Great controls, beautiful graphics, and lots and lots of zombie head popping action.  2 levels are included (1 more than the previous japanese demo) both of which allow for the opportunity to try out the newest addition to the game: a 2nd player.  Even if you don't have a friend to play with in co-op mode(over xboxlive if not split screen), the game controls an additional player that you have to share guns, ammo, and herbs to survive together.  You both look out for one another and like all other great male/female duos of all time such as lucy and ricky, fred and ginger, sonny and cher, ace and gary, etc, you have to lean on one another to be successful.  

After playing through the 2 levels many times, I realized, after the emptiness of finishing Fallout 3, I had something to look forward to once again.  Hopefully you will say the same thing and maybe even want to fight along side of me as a scantily clad chesty female.  Kind of like the tactical support of Fiona from my new favorite show with the voice of Sam?