Honestly I just came off beating this game in one sitting, fourteen hours and all. What does that mean? Well a few things.
To start off with the good: Resident Evil 5 is more of the same when it comes to the more modern (post RE3) gameplay loop. The third person hold to aim & run around aimless looting is still alive and well, and it's shamelessly fun. Shooting feels even better in RE5 than it did in RE4 and you get a LOT more ammo to do so.
It's also campy as all heck (see Chris punching the ever living schnozz out of the boulder meme) which gives it a ton of charm. Chris Redfield is almost impossible to take seriously, and Albert Weskers voice is so perfect for the nerdy villain that he is that I caught myself cracking up quite a bit. In that same vein, the lore of this game was absolutely phenomenal. Without heading to spoiler territory, I strongly urge players to get deep in the documents of this game and reel in all the plot and story that they can. This is one of the highlights of the Resident Evil series that I've found keeps me interested every time.
Then we get to the bad, and uh, the bad shows up quite a bit. Firstly is that some enemies are simply bullet sponges, special B.O.W.'s later into the game will require your whole arsenal, even if you are playing well. Sometimes they'll throw multiple enemies at you that have the ability to OHKO and all you can do is waste time and run around hoping that you'll hit the last shot to kill them. In that same vein, the entire last chapter feels like a slog but I will not divulge due to spoilers. Certain bosses have indicators you are supposed to know to end the fight, however these are not shown and might take a very, very long game of trial and error.
Then there's the largest glairing issue, Sheva. It's not her character that's explicitly bad, it's just alright, however its the existence of her AI that creates some MAJOR headaches throughout the game. The biggest thing about the second character is that she uses all of the resources you do. If she finds an herb before you and you don't want to use it yet? Boom you're healed. Want to hold all the types of guns you did like you had in RE1-4? Nope, she'll probably have to take one because of slotting issues and she'll use the ammo there. Not only was the glorified backpack AI a resource thief, she also used said resources in the worst ways. Instead of using the sniper in long range engagements, she would burst with the SMG, instead of shooting at enemy weakpoints, she would shoot at the inpenetrable armor. This was aggrivating throughout most of the game. Later on when enemies become harder and harder to kill, she would also run out of ammo and watch Chris as enemies run up and hit him because she had no way of adding to the fight.
RE5 could have been really awesome, and the gameplay kept it interesting enough, however issues bound to AI and enemy power creep really tarnished a mostly fun experience.
To start off with the good: Resident Evil 5 is more of the same when it comes to the more modern (post RE3) gameplay loop. The third person hold to aim & run around aimless looting is still alive and well, and it's shamelessly fun. Shooting feels even better in RE5 than it did in RE4 and you get a LOT more ammo to do so.
It's also campy as all heck (see Chris punching the ever living schnozz out of the boulder meme) which gives it a ton of charm. Chris Redfield is almost impossible to take seriously, and Albert Weskers voice is so perfect for the nerdy villain that he is that I caught myself cracking up quite a bit. In that same vein, the lore of this game was absolutely phenomenal. Without heading to spoiler territory, I strongly urge players to get deep in the documents of this game and reel in all the plot and story that they can. This is one of the highlights of the Resident Evil series that I've found keeps me interested every time.
Then we get to the bad, and uh, the bad shows up quite a bit. Firstly is that some enemies are simply bullet sponges, special B.O.W.'s later into the game will require your whole arsenal, even if you are playing well. Sometimes they'll throw multiple enemies at you that have the ability to OHKO and all you can do is waste time and run around hoping that you'll hit the last shot to kill them. In that same vein, the entire last chapter feels like a slog but I will not divulge due to spoilers. Certain bosses have indicators you are supposed to know to end the fight, however these are not shown and might take a very, very long game of trial and error.
Then there's the largest glairing issue, Sheva. It's not her character that's explicitly bad, it's just alright, however its the existence of her AI that creates some MAJOR headaches throughout the game. The biggest thing about the second character is that she uses all of the resources you do. If she finds an herb before you and you don't want to use it yet? Boom you're healed. Want to hold all the types of guns you did like you had in RE1-4? Nope, she'll probably have to take one because of slotting issues and she'll use the ammo there. Not only was the glorified backpack AI a resource thief, she also used said resources in the worst ways. Instead of using the sniper in long range engagements, she would burst with the SMG, instead of shooting at enemy weakpoints, she would shoot at the inpenetrable armor. This was aggrivating throughout most of the game. Later on when enemies become harder and harder to kill, she would also run out of ammo and watch Chris as enemies run up and hit him because she had no way of adding to the fight.
RE5 could have been really awesome, and the gameplay kept it interesting enough, however issues bound to AI and enemy power creep really tarnished a mostly fun experience.