Resident Evil 5
is a move for the franchise. Not a
drastic move, but a move
nonetheless. This time out in
Resident Evil 5, you're playing as
Chris Redfield again in a fictional
region in Africa called Kijuju.
You're a part of the Bioterrorism
Security Assessment Alliance that
helps clean up biological warfare
messes. In Kijuju, Redfield and his
partner Sheva have quite the mess to
pick up. Seems there's been an
outbreak of some kind, caused by a
virus made by the Umbrella
Corporation and that outbreak has
caused the residents of Kijuju to
become horrible mutated. They've got
tentacles, when they lose their
heads a mean looking bird/snake head
replaces it sometimes. Overall the
residents of Kijuju are in a bad
place and Redfield and Sheva are
there to clean up with a little bit
of an assist by the rest of the
Bioterrorism Security Assessment
Alliance.
Right when you
start the game you notice a few
differences between this version of
the game and previous installments.
In Resident Evil 5, the environments
are amazing and the character models
are equally visually astounding.
More than that though the movement
of your character is smoother than
it's ever been for the series. It's
still a little rough in spots, but
it doesn't have that weird turning
axis that other games have had where
the movement seems blocky and
jarred. The graphics and the feel of
the game are one thing but there are
also some major changes in gameplay.
The biggest change in gameplay is
ammunition, or the abundance of it.
Never in a Resident Evil game have
bullets been relatively easy to come
by, in this game they are and it
helps the series more than it hurts
it. With the old versions of the
game, the lack of ammo drew a lot of
people away. It was hard for
beginners to come into the game and
start playing without really getting
the point of the survival/horror
genre. There's not enough ammunition
around to really
eliminate
the fact that you have to conserve
it, but there's enough of it so you
almost... almost... have as much as
you need.
The other part of
gameplay that is different than
previous installments; co-op mode.
You can have a friend play with you
on-console with Resident Evil 5's
distinctive split screen mode. Or
you can play with a friend across
X-box live. Both coop modes are
amazing. It's awesome to play as
Redfield and equally as awesome to
play with the dynamic Sheva.
Resident Evil 5's
changes to the series are important
changes for the game to continue to
grow and change. There are still
some odes to the past with different
problem solving things and a small
amount of inventory and of course...
surviving for an amount of time
before you can get some help.
Resident Evil 5 is really the best
game that Capcom could have made for
this generation. It evolves and it
survives.
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