EUREKA!
A remake broad in its intentions; equal parts camp absurdity and intensely perturbed. Yet the sophistication is resoundingly clear. The original title's brilliant, groundbreaking acceleration of adventure game systems is copy/pasted here and matched against a far more esoteric, lively setting than the PS1 could ever allow. Spencer Mansion is a timeless icon of enigmatic storytelling in games, positing isolated madness at the hands of a quirky architect clearly obsessed with puzzles and enabled by a rich fortune.
The nonlinear progression correlates perfectly with the labyrinthine environs, where Barry and Rebecca are wont to show up out of the blue to promote narrative development. Sure as shit, they don't make 'em like they used to. Resident Evil revels in its apocalyptic vision, in an era where survival horror meant more than just point and shoot and jumpscare.
Some scenarios are a bit too ambitious for the sake of player understanding, maybe especially one involving a dreadful timer and a zombie shark. And the final encounter is an anticlimactic letdown. Nonetheless, the game is a hodgepodge of immediately memorable concurrences, each as unique as the numerous doors the player steps through on their way down the rabbit hole. From the classical architecture of the main mansion, to the backwoods area surrounding beyond, to the giant-spider infested halfway home, to the dreadful underground laboratory; a constant sense of desolation prevails, as though every possible sign of Life has suddenly disappeared off the face of the earth, replaced by the festering undead and a wondrously animated setting implicating lived-in space now abandoned.
Time has been entirely impeded. Spencer Mansion rests within a purgatorial realm which could only sincerely apply to the video game medium, moreso even than film, for progression lies entirely in the hands of the player. The ancient and the state-of-the-art collide in a fit of barren, somber eternity; the past and future forging an everlasting now.
The warm glow of the save room offers a false salvation, akin to the bonfires placed throughout Dark Souls. Lecherous monsters suggest malformed technological pursuits, leading the world into death and chaos. Subtle capitalistic criticisms edge their way into the underlying events, where corporations exploit their consumers and workers alike for the sake of experimentation and profit, and work with governments to cover up detrimental failures.
This is all to say that Resident Evil is an essential work, as influential on games as it is on media in general -- often one's first thought regarding pharmaceutical controversy recalls the Umbrella moniker. And this transformative remake is proof of the medium's capabilities in pushing forward the envelope, the more advanced the technology grows (how ironic).
Imposing darkness and menacingly funereal aesthetics, performing alongside a bevy of intimidating creatures -- particularly one of which literally evolves the dim-witted zombies into elemental threats to reign amidst the cavernous hallways. The fixed camera angles and tank controls will forever remain an essential component of these early entries' composition, proposing claustrophobic fear to humble the tactical postures of these mercenaries. Every aspect of Resident Evil's design, simply put, works. To instill dread, to promote cautionary movement, to harbor a sense of capability in spite of the looming unknown lying in wait.
A remake broad in its intentions; equal parts camp absurdity and intensely perturbed. Yet the sophistication is resoundingly clear. The original title's brilliant, groundbreaking acceleration of adventure game systems is copy/pasted here and matched against a far more esoteric, lively setting than the PS1 could ever allow. Spencer Mansion is a timeless icon of enigmatic storytelling in games, positing isolated madness at the hands of a quirky architect clearly obsessed with puzzles and enabled by a rich fortune.
The nonlinear progression correlates perfectly with the labyrinthine environs, where Barry and Rebecca are wont to show up out of the blue to promote narrative development. Sure as shit, they don't make 'em like they used to. Resident Evil revels in its apocalyptic vision, in an era where survival horror meant more than just point and shoot and jumpscare.
Some scenarios are a bit too ambitious for the sake of player understanding, maybe especially one involving a dreadful timer and a zombie shark. And the final encounter is an anticlimactic letdown. Nonetheless, the game is a hodgepodge of immediately memorable concurrences, each as unique as the numerous doors the player steps through on their way down the rabbit hole. From the classical architecture of the main mansion, to the backwoods area surrounding beyond, to the giant-spider infested halfway home, to the dreadful underground laboratory; a constant sense of desolation prevails, as though every possible sign of Life has suddenly disappeared off the face of the earth, replaced by the festering undead and a wondrously animated setting implicating lived-in space now abandoned.
Time has been entirely impeded. Spencer Mansion rests within a purgatorial realm which could only sincerely apply to the video game medium, moreso even than film, for progression lies entirely in the hands of the player. The ancient and the state-of-the-art collide in a fit of barren, somber eternity; the past and future forging an everlasting now.
The warm glow of the save room offers a false salvation, akin to the bonfires placed throughout Dark Souls. Lecherous monsters suggest malformed technological pursuits, leading the world into death and chaos. Subtle capitalistic criticisms edge their way into the underlying events, where corporations exploit their consumers and workers alike for the sake of experimentation and profit, and work with governments to cover up detrimental failures.
This is all to say that Resident Evil is an essential work, as influential on games as it is on media in general -- often one's first thought regarding pharmaceutical controversy recalls the Umbrella moniker. And this transformative remake is proof of the medium's capabilities in pushing forward the envelope, the more advanced the technology grows (how ironic).
Imposing darkness and menacingly funereal aesthetics, performing alongside a bevy of intimidating creatures -- particularly one of which literally evolves the dim-witted zombies into elemental threats to reign amidst the cavernous hallways. The fixed camera angles and tank controls will forever remain an essential component of these early entries' composition, proposing claustrophobic fear to humble the tactical postures of these mercenaries. Every aspect of Resident Evil's design, simply put, works. To instill dread, to promote cautionary movement, to harbor a sense of capability in spite of the looming unknown lying in wait.