“Who are you? What is this?!” Resident Evil 6 Review

Resident Evil 6, from development until release, your fans have been crying out. Some, excited for the direction you were taking, others demanding for the good old days of scares and tank controls. It’s time to decide who was right, and the answer is… they both were. Here’s our review.

There’s no denying that RE6 is ambitious. 3 campaigns are available from the beginning; Leon, Jake, and Chris. Each represents a different style and tonality to the game. Leon brings back the zombies and has a grimmer, “scarier” storyline. But in all honesty, this game isn’t scary. If you are expecting to be shaking in your bed at night, you bought the wrong game. That being said, I don’t think it takes away from the game; Resident Evil hasn’t been scary since code Veronica in my opinion. And actively stopped trying to be scary since 4. Chris is more of the middle ground; running, gunning, and using his arms to falcon punch everyone standing in his way. Newcomer Jake has lots of action but feels the most fresh. His melee attacks are pretty fun to use in a group and has a charmingly jerk personality. Both Chris and Jake fight J’avo, who can mutate when they take damage to different parts of there bodies. Did I also mention they shoot guns? Ya they shoot guns, making there gameplay more like Gears of War. Packed to the brim with action and set pieces, a bit, if a tiny bit, Resident Evil tries to make everyone happy. And there in lies the problem. By trying to please everyone, it becomes too muddled.

The storyline is a bit scatterbrained and generic. Honestly, I figured out who the bad guy was from the trailers, even though the game acts like it’s a secret. The traditional “Stop the ‘insert letter’-virus and who ever released it is back. It’s cool how stories from the different campaigns intersect and you get different perspectives on events. Yet the length of the individual stories are shorter than most games so you don’t get to know new characters very well. I’m surprised they were able to flush out Jake’s story enough to make him a hopefully recurring character, but the bad guy of this game is so generic. You don’t really get to know any of him until you have to fight him, very cookie cutter villainy here. Speaking of the bad guy, in Leon’s campaign you fight this guy 4 or 5 different times. Seriously, how many times do I have this kill this guy for him to stay dead? There are also a lot of cheap deaths in this game; if you lose all your health and your partner is recovering you, you better hope there are no enemies around in. Enemies can attack you right after you are saved when you don’t have any control over your character. And with zero health it means instant death.

Co-op is pretty fun… some of the time. It’s nice to not have to share your items with the A.I. or multiplayer partner, something Capcom actively wanted to fix from 5. This makes you’re A.I. less of a hindrance. Yet sometimes, it’ better to have the A.I. than an actual player. The A.I. can’t die or cause you a gameover, other players can. And if you’re unlucky, you get one of those players who tries their hardest to do absolutely nothing when you are waiting for them to come pull a lever with you to continue on. A new mode brought to the table is Agent Hunt, where you get to control a monster in someone else’s game and try to kill them. Thing with this is it’s hard to control and most times you will either try to kill them and fail or jump in a game 5 seconds before they leave the area ending your session. Mercenaries is back and just as fun, especially with a partner and with a few collectibles and the promise of DLC, even if the PS3 users get hosed in that department, provides a lot of replay value. And if you are trying to unlock all the skills, you will have to play A LOT! It’s insane how much xp you need to unlock most of the skills. So if that’s you, be prepared to grind.

Resident Evil 6 is by no means a bad game. It might not be the Resident Evil that some fans wanted but that doesn’t make it bad. It has a ton of action and is a lot of fun, especially with your friends. It does have its problems and hopefully the next game will be more focused and able to flesh out the story and iron out the problems presented here. Resident Evil 6 gets a 3 out of 5.