I’m sorry about the title of this post, but I only know trite, mimetic clichés from the first and third Resident Evil games. Resident Evil 2 is well outside the realm of my personal experience, but that’s OK, because it was Jeremy Signor (and not me) who wrote about it. So that’s cool.
It’s an eventful weekend for me, but I am waiting for my phone to sync with my computer and figured I’d use the downtime to update the site. Please enjoy this fine article.
I also hosted this week’s Games, Dammit as part of an ongoing initiative. If you’ve ever wanted to hear a games podcast whose host didn’t have time to prepare notes or a plan for the show… well, there’s probably lots of those on iTunes. The majority, I’d guess. But only this one had me for a host this week.
After two generations of hardware upgrades and having played REmake and Resident Evil 4, I don’t really find Resident Evil 2 all that scary any more. The dated “funny-shaped box parts pasted together” 3D modeling standard of the era certainly doesn’t help, and neither does trying to make them look like actual humans. That inanimate dead lady in the screencap looks better than the police chief.
Also, revisiting RE2 after RE4 kept me thinking about how Secret Service Leon would solve the Raccoon City incident in no time flat. What does First Day Leon do? He gets hickeys from slow, shambling zombies, uses doors to enter and exit rooms with nice bustable windows handy, and uses escape ladders and stairs to descend buildings. Bo-oring!
I still appreciate the whole split scenario, though. Even with some oddities, it was neat how Leon and Claire would cross paths with one another, and would both get to cover different grounds depending on which order you played them in. The closest thing I can think of to it is the linked game changes with Oracle of Seasons/Ages, give or take. I would’ve loved for RE2 get a remake of its own instead of direct ports or an abridged light gun game.
I was the odd kid out that ended up playing Resident Evil 3 prior to 2, so while most people found 2 to be awesome and 3 a bit tired, the situation was a bit reversed for me. Which, I’m glad, because it gave me a good background for equally respecting both games years later.