Currently replaying this as my weekend game and yeah it's still RE4 and still kino.

Because of that Imma use this replay to talk about how wonderful the RE4 HD Project is and my hopes for RE4make(TLDR: Excited and incredibly optimistic).

The RE4 HD Project is one of the finest fan made mods and makes me appreciate the labour of love this games community has had to essentially remake the game in 4K! Looks absolutely fucking gorgeous and shows just how well RE4 has aged (only real issues is some engine quirks Imma guess with lighting). 10/10 can't recommend it enough.

Having just played through Resi Village and absolutely loving it, my hopes for RE4make are absolutely high! From watching the trailer I am glad they're using RE2makes Leon since he was extremely well cast in that one. Definitely looks a lot more moody with the lighting which is also another interesting thing (wonder how it'll handle Ashley mainly). If REmake 2 (and 3 begrudgingly) are any note this game will have some of the best controls in the series which will automatically make it up there with best Resi games. I don't necessarily think this will surpass the original but still I am optimistic.

So basically RE4 is a masterpiece but I think REmake is the better overall Resi game so just play both of them and the whole series (besides 6).

I started over three times, and only on the third time did I trigger the huge battle in the first village area with the chainsaw dude (maybe it only happens on normal difficulty?). Holy shit what a great intro.

It's a complete reinvention of the series. The combat is often frustrating, but there’s a great tactical depth to it. It’s really satisfying when you manage to stay calm under pressure and outwit a big group of enemies by kicking down ladders, jumping through windows, shooting out oil lamps to set things ablaze, and switching to the right weapon at the right time. This is where the game really shines.

The over-the-shoulder cam is a nice change of pace, but the controls are still tanky and awkward in their own way, and don't feel modern at all. There’s no strafing at all, only turning, so even something as simple as peeking around a corner is a hassle. The camera has a narrow FOV and is positioned right behind Leon, so your vision is limited, and Leon’s own body sometimes prevents you from seeing straight ahead. Whenever you ready your weapon, you are rendered completely immobile. You can’t even back up. Rather than having a fixed crosshair in the center of the screen, you have to aim with a fiddly, wobbly laser pointer. Even with a mouse, aiming is a chore.

It’s also much more difficult than the earlier games. There’s a hell of a lot more combat for one thing, but there are also many 1-hit death risks, like the chainsaw dudes and the headcrab (headipede?) thingies.

There are also a number of outrageous bosses typical of a Japanese action game, and they all have some kind of invincibility and a trick or weakness that allows you to defeat them. What this basically means is that you have to fight the boss once to figure out the trick, then die or reload to start the boss fight over so you don’t waste all your ammo and recovery items.

This being a survival horror game, ammo is limited. There’s a goofy, implausible merchant who sells you weapons, but no ammo (even though the graphics show stacked boxes of ammo at the merchant locations). You also have to collect money and treasures to upgrade your weapons over the course of the game, which I don’t really like in a game like this. The item boxes are gone, so if your inventory fills up, you have to sell your unused weapon back to the merchant, and then re-buy it (and re-upgrade it) again. There are also a higher tier pistol, shotgun, and rifle, rendering the old upgrades obsolete. Collecting gold drops from enemies to spend on incremental weapon upgrades just feels like artificial busywork that’s out of place.

There are also a few a lot of instafail QTEs, too, and they are infuriating. This is made worse by the barebones PC port, which locks the QTE controls to X and C or the mouse buttons, regardless of how you rebind the keys. Some of the QTEs are just plain mean, and failing them means restarting an entire section of the game all over (like the minecart battle). It’s an obnoxious kind of trial and error gameplay.

It's a seriously brown game, a perfect example of that mid-2000s Brown Age of videogames. On the other hand, the atmosphere is terrific. The semi-sentient Spanish zombies are also a neat and creepy variation from the traditional Romero shamblers. This game feels scary in a way the original games never did.

At one point there’s a funny little “jump through the sweeping lasers” bit that’s straight out of the Resident Evil movie from 2002, which predates this game by 3 years. It’s interesting how Hollywood movies inspire the games, which are successful enough to spawn their own movies, the scenes from which are then reflected back into the games.

I must admit though, I miss the nonlinear exploration and puzzle solving of the original games. This one is much more linear and action oriented, and the puzzles are a joke. Biohazard 1 through Veronica had these wonderful intricate interlocking environments that had to be learned and navigated, criss-crossing your way back and forth across the map to unlock new paths and areas, almost like a Metroidvania. In contrast, Biohazard 4 is extremely linear, and you almost never revisit a prior area. Key items are mostly found one at a time, and always used in the same area they are found in. There’s almost no adventure-game thinking involved, just relentless combat after combat.

The localization sucks. The dialogue and writing is awkward (“Where’s your location?” “I hate to break it out to you.” “return my appreciation”), the quotations marks are fucked up, and they misuse fancy words like inhumane and disillusion. Storywise, the villains are too cheesy, and Leon talks like a wannabe 80s action hero. Not that the old games were paragons of dramatic narrative (“Jill sandwich!”), but there’s no improvement.

Overall, it’s an action-packed rollercoaster of a game with some neat set pieces (like the big statue of the evil dwarf/kid), but with all the cheap deaths I just didn’t enjoy it that much.

After you beat the main game with Leon, you can play a 2-hour sequence that recaps the game from Ada Wong’s perspective. That’s kinda cool, but it would have been better if they had integrated the Ada sequences into the main game for variety.

RE4 is a massive change of pace from the original trilogy and Code Veronica. I might have enjoyed it better if I hadn’t played it right after Veronica.

Review #6 - 2022

https://www.re4hd.com/?page_id=9303

This is the peak Resident Evil experience when it comes to the main series (at least pre-RE7). It has an engaging, action-packed story that takes a now tenured Leon S. Kennedy far from Racoon City, and into a remote location in Spain, where the virus that's plaguing the world by storm is continuing to be innovated on by more power hungry zealots.

This is the PC version I'm writing on of course, so I'll save my thoughts on the game as a whole for another day. More specifically though, I played the RE4 HD Project, which mods the not so great PC port, and makes it much better. It even plays great on my Ultra Wide screen, but I did notice screen tearing while in water locations (the boat segment for example). All and all, it's a pretty decent upgrade, and makes my favorite game even more immersive. I just can't get enough of the action, the horror, and that sweet, sweet treasure hunting too. It's nice to be able to revisit this game with ease on my PC!

Played this game for the first time and it holds up so well over 15 years after the original release. Special shoutout to the great work of the RE4 HD Project for the work they did on the graphics.

Its not particularly scary like some other RE games since its more action focused but that action is awesome and this just right level of cheesy that it works. Dare anyone to say suplexing or roundhouse kicking cultists isn't dope.

The game also keeps managing to throw new cool setpieces at you until the end of the game wheras in many other games I may only come away feeling only a handful are memorable.

Puzzles are a bit easy but in this case I think thats good as it serves to keep things moving in an entry where you want to get back to the action.

Definitely a few places that could have been better, the way characters are introduces/used and a few parts toward the end could be shorter or cut, but overall I see why this is one of the most well regarded Resident Evil games and I'll be looking forward to how the upcoming remake handles those issues.

This is like my 5th or 6th run of this game, and I've played it so much because Resident Evil 4 is just one of those games that feel unimaginably amazing to play, and that's honestly the best thing I can say about it. The tank controls, fairly weird-by-modern-standards aiming and awkward QTEs might have been off-putting at first, but once you get into the rythm it all just feels like touching the finest or silks of squeezing some really, really nice tits.

It's a good thing too that the enemy designs, the weapons, the pacing and not the bosses are incredible and still tower over most third-person-shooters released over (almost) two decades since this games' release. In that sense, RE4 is the prime example for me, personally, of how games don't just exist in terms of console specs and graphical and rendering limitations, but are in a complicated, viciously demanding art-form that takes inginuity and all the luck one can get to truly create a masterpiece. For this game, the stars have mostly aligned, the creators were genius, and a masterpiece it is, indeed. And just like there may never be a crime drama better than Breaking Bad and a pair of tits better than ma wife's, it's possible that RE4 is just about the best action-horror TPS we'll ever see. That remake is looking good doe ngl


P.S.
The bosses do suck a lot IMO