When I first played RE1 Remake it didn't do much for me. Maybe it was because it wasn't what I expected after RE4, maybe it's the fact that I was unknowingly playing it on easy mode which made the game not as tense as it should've been, but as a whole my first playthrough didn't leave much of an impression on me. But now that I played it with the OG RE1 still fresh in my mind, I think I love this game now.
For the most part, everything I liked about the OG, I like here even more. For starters, the game is more tense than ever thanks to the addition of the Crimson Heads. So, whereas in the original, when you cleared an area of zombies, you were completely safe to go through it, in this game, downed zombies stay there and if they weren't burned or headshotted, then they eventually come back as a Crimson Head. This addition alone makes this the scariest RE game I've played so far since the amount of tension it puts on the player as they walk past downed zombies, never knowing when they'll spring back up is really unnerving. It also adds another welcome layer of decision-making in having to decide which zombies are most worth burning with the finite amount of kerosene at your disposal.
The game changes a lot of things but for the most part, they're all good additions. The puzzles are slightly more interesting here, examining items plays a much bigger role here which is cool since it was underutilized in the OG and zombies can now burst through certain doors which really caught me off guard the first time it happened. Another new addition would be the defensive items like daggers or flash grenades that can help to avoid damage and offer another way of dealing with enemies if you want to conserve ammo. One nitpick I have with them though is that by the endgame, enemies like Crimson Heads and Hunters mostly just swipe at you, instead of grabbing you, so the items just become somewhat useless by the end. Getting them is also way too easy since areas that aren't fully explored are now marked as red on the map and by the endgame, I had about 9 of them saved up in total. My favourite change though, would be to the game's structure. In the OG, after you got the 4 Crests the game basically became a linear set of levels and the areas felt much more isolated. REmake rectifies that since after you clear the guardhouse, the second mansion visit is slightly more non-linear which makes going through it way more fun for me.
Visually the game looks stunning and holds up today, not just graphically, but the cinematography has also seen a big boost. For example, I love the use of canted angles when descending down a flight of stairs, or how in one hallway, you can see the shadows of zombies banging on the windows before they break in. It's minor stuff, but as a film nerd, I can't help but appreciate things like that. The voice-acting is also much better (not that it could've been worse), it's a little wooden and lacks the campy charm of the original but it doesn't murder the atmosphere like in the OG.
My only real problems with the game would be that the bosses still suck and feel unnecessary and I wish Chris' campaign didn't still feel like a worse version of Jill's. He has the lighter on by default now atleast but he still only has 6 item slots and has to use small keys to open drawers so playing as him can often feel tedious with the amount of backtracking that's required. With RE2, 3 and CV all giving characters 8 or more slots I think it would've been better if they did the same for Chris here. Neither of these issues are a huge deal though, the bosses are over in a few seconds and I can always just play as Jill instead of Chris.
But yeah, this is basically everything I could ever want out of a remake and out of a survival horror game and I'm glad it clicked with me on a second playthrough.
For the most part, everything I liked about the OG, I like here even more. For starters, the game is more tense than ever thanks to the addition of the Crimson Heads. So, whereas in the original, when you cleared an area of zombies, you were completely safe to go through it, in this game, downed zombies stay there and if they weren't burned or headshotted, then they eventually come back as a Crimson Head. This addition alone makes this the scariest RE game I've played so far since the amount of tension it puts on the player as they walk past downed zombies, never knowing when they'll spring back up is really unnerving. It also adds another welcome layer of decision-making in having to decide which zombies are most worth burning with the finite amount of kerosene at your disposal.
The game changes a lot of things but for the most part, they're all good additions. The puzzles are slightly more interesting here, examining items plays a much bigger role here which is cool since it was underutilized in the OG and zombies can now burst through certain doors which really caught me off guard the first time it happened. Another new addition would be the defensive items like daggers or flash grenades that can help to avoid damage and offer another way of dealing with enemies if you want to conserve ammo. One nitpick I have with them though is that by the endgame, enemies like Crimson Heads and Hunters mostly just swipe at you, instead of grabbing you, so the items just become somewhat useless by the end. Getting them is also way too easy since areas that aren't fully explored are now marked as red on the map and by the endgame, I had about 9 of them saved up in total. My favourite change though, would be to the game's structure. In the OG, after you got the 4 Crests the game basically became a linear set of levels and the areas felt much more isolated. REmake rectifies that since after you clear the guardhouse, the second mansion visit is slightly more non-linear which makes going through it way more fun for me.
Visually the game looks stunning and holds up today, not just graphically, but the cinematography has also seen a big boost. For example, I love the use of canted angles when descending down a flight of stairs, or how in one hallway, you can see the shadows of zombies banging on the windows before they break in. It's minor stuff, but as a film nerd, I can't help but appreciate things like that. The voice-acting is also much better (not that it could've been worse), it's a little wooden and lacks the campy charm of the original but it doesn't murder the atmosphere like in the OG.
My only real problems with the game would be that the bosses still suck and feel unnecessary and I wish Chris' campaign didn't still feel like a worse version of Jill's. He has the lighter on by default now atleast but he still only has 6 item slots and has to use small keys to open drawers so playing as him can often feel tedious with the amount of backtracking that's required. With RE2, 3 and CV all giving characters 8 or more slots I think it would've been better if they did the same for Chris here. Neither of these issues are a huge deal though, the bosses are over in a few seconds and I can always just play as Jill instead of Chris.
But yeah, this is basically everything I could ever want out of a remake and out of a survival horror game and I'm glad it clicked with me on a second playthrough.