"Now lets all just stay calm and hopefully we can take care of this 'Zombie' problem in a civilized manner"
Who knew a pregnant woman who barely plays video games with a hardcore gamer would both squirm with anticipation of getting through a normal work day to be rewarded with a zombie-blasting-fun-shotgun-reloading-handholding-good-old-time? For all your marriage needs Resident Evil 5 for PS3 and Xbox360 from Capcom is there fulfilling all that marital bliss people talked about you having after exchanging vows about sickness and genetic altering viruses and boy, was everyone right on about it all being worth it.
Without saying all the same stuff again about the love of zombie in all of its forms (Previous Review of RE5 Demo) I'm going to just stick to my reaction of RE5 after finishing the game with my diamond in the rough on a par 4.
A quick synopsis for this game will remind you of any RE typical virus problem creating zombies that must be dealt with. After zombie after zombie are destroyed you take arms up against the person in charge of distributing the virus. This RE takes place in a fictional African country as this makes for a great 'test' site for the newly created virus without the fear of a military superpower intervening. Instead, you and your partner are a part of a small group that investigates biological terrorism around the world and is assigned to this lovely country after rumors start of people making meals of other people.
RE5 is everything I'd hoped for with a little extra gravy on the side. It makes for a very hard decision when comparing to its predecessor, RE4, on which is better. The shock value on what a huge step forward RE4 was made for a high bar to live up to but with the addition of the Co-op mode, the beauty of this generation of consoles, and sticking with all that worked previously, RE5 has at least matched RE4 in greatness.
The solo play is quality as the AI of your uncontrolled partner has the aim of a true champ and avoids death fairly well. Your AI companion however, does not understand what it means to conserve ammo and will blow through just about every bullet you hand them. For anyone who's played any of the RE games, you know that ammo is scarce and is one of the things that will make or break your survival as zombies attempt to chomp on your pooper and neck alike. In some instances your AI buddy will be such a good shot that it almost feels like cheating. This makes the game a bit easier than I prefer but others may appreciate all the help they can get.
The Co-op mode is one of the best 2 person Co-ops I have ever seen. The overall game is so fun that even someone that is typically not enthralled with gaming can start to play RE5 and notice smiles appearing on their face. After completing the game with my wife I realized that this game's development was actually centered around the idea of you playing with someone and making the experience of two people better than just one. Many of the fights in the game are meant for you to coordinate times to reload, when to take shots, exchanging of equipment, and covering one another from all directions which is best done with a real partner and not a skynetty one. The controls are easy enough for anyone to pick up and quickly learn as they are identical to RE4's 3rd person over the shoulder shooting controls.
Hopping right into playing with a partner isn't the fastest thing to do as RE will save all of your progress no matter who's game you are joining and no matter where they are in the story. What is nice about this is all the extra unlockables that are bought with a how-smooth-was-success based point system is saved to your account and not just the person's story you are playing.
The cutscenes and storyline are solid and mesh very well to make the experience a complete one. There is still some of the extra unnecessary unusualness that RE/Capcom likes to have such as extreme physical attributes (punching through a person) and over the top characters. Even with this strangeness, the voice acting is done very well and the music and sounds of the game also make for a seamless movie played out as a game or game played out as a movie depending on your half full/hall empty outlook. Different pistols sound like their real counterpart and the ooga-booga zombie sounds still have the same old scariness that comes from when you know damn well it's in the shadows somewhere.
Completing the game just like RE4 unlocks some extra modes of play but not as many as RE4. RE4 had a very difficult extra storyline that could be played after the game was completed and RE5 is missing something like that. I'm going to guess that since the new trend of games now is to have to purchase extra expansions, they will probably release something like this at a later date.
Lots of head disintegrating action, smooth transitioning cutscenes, fun gameplay, and an opportunity to make a real life partnership even stronger make Resident Evil 5 a game everyone should take the time to find a partner to play it with. Yeah, it being RE5, I think...
Rating: 9.0 {on a scale of -10 to 10, 5 being a must play}
Fela Kuti and the Afrika 70 - Zombie (video is only 10 min of the full 12+ min song)
1 comment:
how come i didn't get my "pooper chomped" when we played?
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