izigame.me

Decent game with some highs and some frankly poor/inconsistent feeling parts. It does not compare to how good/consistent/enjoyable Resident Evil 2/4 Remakes were. I've only left a not recommended since Steam does not have an option for mixed feelings.

I have not played the original, so I went into it fully blind and played on Hardcore difficulty.

I'd say the first half of the game is quite inconsistent and the weakest part. The city parts look just ok visually and nothing really in there stands out. The hub gameplay wise is ok but it's let down by parts that feel unsatisfyingly short/disassociated to the rest of the game such as the insect part and also let down by the disappointing Nemesis moments. Frankly even though it's a hub it just plays in a very linear/directed manner and the Nemesis chases are quite straightforward as well and do not carry any real impact in terms of presence or danger. Revisiting a certain location as Carlos also felt just meh.

Hospital onwards, I'd say is where the game starts to be a bit more consistent and I was enjoying it much more. Even though the area itself is quite small, it was nice to explore and go back and forth in it, killing the challenging enemies present there. Same could be said for the part that follows after the hospital. Plus visually, the hospital theme helps in terms of being interesting to explore. The boss fights here onwards were also pretty fun to figure out and execute. On hardcore, the lack of ammo gave me a lot of tense moments and I had to be strategic and try to run/dodge past most enemies to conserve it for the harder enemies.

Overall, you can tell this game was either rushed or had a lower priority given to it by the devs. There is a certain jank to it present all across, be it the QTEs, the scripted chases or the gunplay feeling mediocre.

Story, I'd say is okish. It plays along but feels rushed especially in the first half, and certain moments do not really hit hard. The biggest let down is easily Nikolai. His character is a bad bad guy. His voice acting sounds like it's very poorly mixed on top of just not having any presence. I always felt actively disappointed whenever he would do things for the story. I was hoping for more of a shade of grey perhaps like Ada or just a more charismatic presence.
In terms of Nemesis, I feel they overused him a bit, even though gameplay wise he is decent in the second half of the game. Other than that, it's a standard affair, just a different tale present in Raccoon City.

Visually, as detailed above the game looks just ok and I've already touched on the levels themselves above. Jill's model is easily the best one and the others do not really stand out as much. I feel like RE2/4 remake, even the side characters had good presence both in cutscenes and their ingame models.

Soundtrack is.. well present. Can't say I recall any great parts. I did not complain much either about it to be fair.

The length of the game is also quite short. So that is something to be kept in mind when purchasing it. My ingame timer at the end was 5 hours 30ish minutes and that's a first playthrough on Hardcore difficulty.

So I'd only really recommend it to people who want to experience everything Resident Evil and want to go through this entry. Others can probably safely skip or be prepared to enjoy a lesser experience in comparison to the excellent RE2/4 remakes.