HIGH Pranking monsters in hilariously lethal ways as the Trickster.

LOW Dropping below 30fps is borderline unacceptable at this point.

WTF Dragonsplague. Holy yikes.

The interesting thing about Dragon’s Dogma 2 is just how much like the original Dragon’s Dogma it is.

When crafting a follow-up to a cult classic like that one, there’s always the chance (and indeed, the fear) that a sequel will shed the things that made it unique in order to appeal to a wider audience. Hiring Hollywood screenwriters, shoehorning in online co-op, trying to tap into current political and pop culture climates… there are many ways for a unique identity to be lost along the way.

Dragon’s Dogma 2 makes none of these audience-grasping errors.

Instead of turning an eye towards whatever’s seen as the zeitgeist, DD2 basically ignores everything on the market and doubles down — hard — on what made its predecessor such a singular, endearing experience. Those who connected with it before can look forward to more faux-medieval fare such as a script full of aughts and naughts, an open and uncompromising world to get absorbed in, huge beasts to battle, astoundingly unpredictable encounters while traveling on the roads, and more. It’s the original Dragon’s Dogma spirit cranked up to eleven, and it’s excellent to see Capcom’s unbridled confidence in their previous work present in this sequel.

The story is boilerplate, but serviceable. In this third-person open world RPG adventure, the player takes on the role of the Arisen — a person who’s had the bad luck of fighting a Dragon and subsequently had their heart ripped out of their chest. This event marks them as a chosen warrior who can control supporting party members known as Pawns, and who will confront the Dragon once more to determine the fate of the world… only some other bastard’s sitting on the throne pretending to be the Arisen, while the real one’s stuck in a slave pit breaking rocks. Time to choose which kind of warrior they are and set things to rights!

It’s a classic setup, but an effective one. Players begin with little but the clothes on their back before setting out to reclaim their throne amidst a tale of skulduggery and opportunists, smacking down ferocious monsters along the way and having a rollicking good time finding treasure in secluded cul de sacs, clambering up massive mythical beasts to prise their eyeballs out, and getting yeeted off mountainsides by rampaging ogres. Living in this world with its breathtaking mountain ranges and dusty deserts is a treat for the senses, even when being knocked senseless by whatever nasties are trying to chow down on them.

This new world in Dragon’s Dogma 2 is well-suited to presenting the core theme of going on epic journeys. It’s approximately four times larger than the first’s land of Gransys, with gorgeous sprawling vistas, new weather mechanics and varied biomes to travel through.

The excellently-realized day/night cycle returns, meaning that a relatively safe jaunt into the wilderness can turn harrowing once the light dims and the undead start bursting out of the ground. While things are far from safe during daylight given the bandits and creatures, it’s always wise to pack for nightfall — but avoid it if possible. And if not avoidable, for God’s sake bring an adequately-fueled lantern. Attempting to survive a minotaur attack in pitch blackness with only a sputtering flame to see by is quite an experience.

The stakes of traveling are increased by the player now taking semi-permanent damage from bumps and scrapes along the way, which can only be recovered by resting at an inn or campsites in the wild. As someone who routinely takes on multiple tasks at once, I found it common to wind up staggering to safety with about ten percent of maximum life left while carrying an entire wagon’s worth of loot and upgrades. Just remember to keep a tent at hand if sleeping in the wild is likely and things will be fine. Survival in Dragon’s Dogma is stripped to its absolute basics, so metrics such as hunger and thirst aren’t going to intrude on the journey. A tent and a lantern is all anyone needs to become fighting fit once more.

Complementing this world full of peril and beauty, the options for choosing a class are just as developed. Fighters are well balanced, Mages are good at both healing allies and zapping foes, and Archers excel at making things dead from a distance. Sneaky players can zip around as a Thief, tripping enemies up and stabbing them as they writhe on the ground. Warriors smash massive weapons around and Sorcerers can blanket the field of battle with spells that blow enemies into the stratosphere.

So far, so familiar. However, there are also new vocations to unlock and play around with, including the Mystic Archer which does a fine job of inflicting status effects and tracking airborne enemies, the Warfarer which can swap between classes at will, and my favorite new addition, the Trickster. Initially seeming borderline useless due to its lack of direct damage, its strengths lie in buffing the party’s Pawns and redirecting enemy attacks towards summoned shadows. Bonus points if said shadow is placed over a cliff with an illusory floor underneath it, but the pawn buff alone is more than enough to decimate most opponents.

Of course, the online Pawn system from the previous game — one of its most notable features — returns. Each player creates a custom Pawn to keep them company in their world. It’s basically a supporting NPC who acts as their closest companion, yet they will also be available to other real players who may choose to recruit them for their own party. An Arisen can recruit up to two other Pawns besides their own, and these additions offer the accrued knowledge of tasks, locations and enemies they’ve absorbed from their owner’s campaigns. They’ll offer to help lead the player around the map toward objectives, or offer up pertinent information as they see fit.

Not sure where to go in a quest? They’ll run out in front, start waving like they’re hailing a taxi, then lead players to the destination. Did they find a treasure chest in another player’s world? They’ll mention it, then ask if their own Arisen fancies cracking it open. It’s a shared, interconnected discovery system where pawns grow and learn any time they’re off cavorting with someone else.

While this adventure is marvelous, at the moment there is one absolute letdown that can’t be overlooked. In a world where players are used to smooth 60fps framerates on console being the norm rather than the exception, it’s an eye opener to witness the depths Dragon’s Dogma 2’s performance can plumb to when pushed.

I initially thought this would be a dealbreaker for me, with first impressions being very, very skewed by borderline unacceptable performance for an action-adventure title in 2024. However, Dragon’s Dogma 2‘s brilliance in so many other key areas won me over completely long before the credits had rolled. It’s a game that’s far greater than the sum of its individual parts, coalescing into something very special indeed.

Out in the open world it’s normally a fairly solid 30fps. Head into a busy town and it noticeably dips below that with uneven, juddering movement. Get attacked by fifteen monsters at once (two of which are often the size of a small house) and it can go lower, affecting the controls. Grappling onto monsters to stab them in the face or timing a charged up swing can become fairly chonky during these moments (it’s a scientific term) and in a realtime game like this, the sudden lack of precision can be an issue.

At the time of this writing, Capcom had already started work on fixing the performance issues detailed here. In the meantime, turning off the (previously mandatory) raytracing option massively boosts performance, but the devs were clear in saying that overall performance fixes are on their radar.

While the framerate is my biggest issue, there are various other chinks in the armor that could be pointed out — things like Pawns and NPCs occasionally suffering pathfinding issues, Pawn dialogue being strange and stilted, a single save slot might not be enough for some players, quests can be ticking down on hidden timers, some have strange completion conditions for a good outcome, and more. The developers are also, maybe, just a little too content to have players retread certain stretches of ground they’ve already covered many times before, and there are still bloody stealth and escort quests present.

However, every sin here is insignificant when compared to the overall experience of finding the Arisen and their party of Pawns trapped inside a mine with a rampaging Gorechimera trying to rip out their eyeballs after an arduous expedition to reclaim some old books, or having a Griffin spot the oxcart I was hitching a ride on and viewing it as a tasty snack from above. I often found myself playing all night during the review period, with ‘just one more quest’ frequently becoming ‘wait, what time is it?’ instead.

When all’s said and done, Dragon’s Dogma 2 is an outstanding refinement and expansion of every good thing the original — now an undisputed cult classic — brought us, and this sequel is more than welcome, especially since its formula still manages to stand alone when it comes to RPGs.

Rating: 9 out of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Capcom. It is currently available on XBX/S/PS5 and PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the XBX. Approximately 105 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed with all achievements earned. There are no multiplayer modes, though there are online elements.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated M and contains Blood and Gore, Language, Sexual Themes and Violence. The official description reads: “This is an action role-playing game in which players assume the role of a former prisoner trying to recall their past and save the world from an evil dragon. From a third-person perspective, players explore open-world environments while completing quests and battling various enemies. Players use swords, spears, arrows, and magic spells to kill human and monsters in frenetic combat. Battles are highlighted by cries of pain and frequent blood-splatter effects. A handful of cutscenes depict gore: a monster decapitated in slow-motion (the head can be carried/used as a weapon); a dragon pulling out a human character’s heart. Players’ character can interact with sex workers, exchanging currency for services; a brief sequence depicts the player sitting on a bed with a prostitute (both wearing underwear), before the camera fades to black. One cutscene briefly depicts characters kissing and rolling around in bed (no nudity). Two monsters are shown with bare breasts, though with no discernible details (i.e., no nipples). The word “sh*t” appears in the game.“

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. The subtitles cannot be altered and/or resized, though the background opacity for them can be changed. Most of the game is playable without sound, but there are hidden Seeker Tokens littered around the game world that are incredibly hard to find. One vocation has an augment which plays a chiming sound when these are in the vicinity and without the ability to hear this it would be significantly more difficult to hunt them down, as there is no accompanying visual cue. This game is therefore not fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: Yes, this game offers fully remappable controls.

HIGH An amazing cast of colorful characters in one massive mystery.

LOW That this game did not get ported or remastered sooner!

WTF All the crazy plot twists.

Ghost Trick was originally developed for the Nintendo DS and directed by Shu Takumi, who also directed many entries in the Ace Attorney series. In Ghost Trick, players take control of a recently-deceased spirit by the name of Sissel. Players will use his supernatural powers to navigate the 2D world, solve puzzles, and uncover plenty of secrets along the way.

The game’s titular powers come from the two major aspects of play — to ‘ghost’ (players can possess an object by moving into it) and to ‘trick’ (players can manipulate the object they currently possess). These powers mean that Sissel is essentially a poltergeist, although not a powerful one.

In fact, he has a lot of limitations, including things like how far he can move between objects, or that each object has only one specific action — if any, at all. A lamp, for example, might only be able to switch on or off.

Learning how to use these powers while keeping their limits in mind is the challenge at hand, and this setup lends itself to many unique situations throughout the story. The situations also (usually) involve saving someone’s life via one of Sissel’s other abilities — going back four minutes before a person’s death and changing the past.

After saving a life, Sissel is able to communicate with these ‘former’ spirits, which leads to plenty of comical (or sometimes, gravely serious!) encounters with the large and colorful cast of characters. I always enjoyed seeing these interactions as the story went on, from the fiery young detective to her stern mentor, or some very off-putting foreign assassins. Many are flamboyant or over-the-top, but they all possess details that humanize them, and their individual stories coalesce into the greater mystery surrounding Sissel’s death.

Without spoiling anything, this story ties the entire experience together, and it’s so good that it stuck with me years after playing the original DS version. Being able to go through it again was just as enjoyable, and the many twists and turns in Sissel’s path make for a compelling narrative that many still rave about to this day.

The music also deserves a mention, with multiple tracks still playing in my head as I write this review. Not only does the remaster introduce new arrangements and one new song, but also includes the original renditions as options for those who prefer the digitized aesthetic. As a bonus, all of the artistic assets can be viewed or listened to in a gallery that becomes available after completing certain goals.

Ghost Trick is a game where every fantastic detail comes together to make something even greater than the sum of its parts — and those parts are plenty great on their own. This is an experience worth checking out for just about anyone, and with a modest price tag and a free demo, there’s absolutely no excuse to pass.

Rating: 9.5 / 10

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Capcom. This game is available on Switch, XBO/X/S, PS4/5 and PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PS4. Approximately 12 hours of play were devoted to the single player mode. There is no multiplayer mode.

Parents: This game was rated T for Teen by the ESRB due to mild language and mild violence. The official description reads: This is a puzzle-adventure game in which players “rewind” time and work to reverse murders by changing the course of events leading to each kill. Players manipulate objects such as wrecking balls and chandeliers to thwart murders’ plans. During the course of the game, characters are seen getting shot, crushed, and impaled to death. The storyline includes frequent references to murder. The words “damn” and “hell” appear in the dialogue.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. (See examples above.) Subtitles are not able to be resized or altered. Sound cues are not required for play. This title is fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: No, this game’s controls are not remappable. There is no control diagram. The game is mainly controlled via joystick and different selections are made using various buttons (generally displayed on-screen during gameplay).

HIGH Luke: 9 HP, 2HP, 214+PP, 214+HP, 236236+HK.

LOW The initial character roster’s extremely unambitious.

WTF Bring Crimson Viper back already, brigands.

Street Fighter V was an interesting one. Clearly the product of a company attempting to woo the competitive eSports crowd at the cost of casual players, there was a notable amount of backlash from casuals and hardcores alike that it felt unfinished at launch. Over time it clawed its way towards being a complete package, and now that it’s in a good place? It’s time to cast it aside and start anew with the sequel, Street Fighter 6!

That’s okay though. Street Fighter 6, at launch, is a significantly fresher and more exciting experience than Street Fighter V was, and the confidence in this entry is notable. From the character select screen where combatants swagger towards their bout with real panache, to the myriad graphical flourishes in each match that accompany important moves and match-deciding reversals, there’s been a lot of care and effort put into making sure that the experience is both solid and bombastic.

On the other hand, while it’s a little disappointing that over half the eighteen-strong character roster is lifted straight from Street Fighter II (more on that later) there are a few newcomers worthy of mention. My personal favourite is Marisa, a hulking female Spartan-style warrior who’s almost as big as Russian wrestler Zangief. Her attacks are powerful and can be charged by holding down each button to change their properties on the fly, and some of her specials grant super armor to absorb enemy hits without being knocked out of her move.

While I’m less interested in the other new faces, I did begin to warm to Manon, a French judo expert who treats the world as her fashion catwalk, practically dancing with her opponents as she hurls them around. With each command throw that she lands, her grappling damage increases, eventually hitting a peak where being caught does terrifying amounts of damage and it doesn’t decay between rounds.

The other characters are less my style. Jamie’s a drunken kung fu expect who powers up by drinking herbal juice, and cane-wielding gentleman JP’s a psycho power-infused zoning expert. Kimberly’s an ’80s enthusiast street artist with some decent ninja style combos up her ninja sleeves, and I find Lily too bland to even bother talking about… So I won’t.

Though the roster is ever so slightly dull at the moment, the visual overhaul is worthy of praise. There’s a notable step away from the cartoonish, exaggerated look of previous entries, though characters are still heavily stylized. It’s possible to see the bulge of Ryu’s biceps flexing as he unleashes his Shin Shoryuken during its execution cinematic, as well as the accumulation of sweat, dirt and minor bruises piling up as the match progresses. In short, it’s a great looking piece with attention spent on portraying each fighter in a cool and appealing manner.

Gameplay has also seen some fairly substantial additions. Beyond the combat being much improved with heavy, powerful blows and a style and pace that just feels ‘right’ for the genre, there’s some smart and interesting new features in play. First off is the Drive Gauge, which can be spent to power up special moves, perform parries or unleash guard-crushing Drive Impacts. Its importance can’t be overstated, as running out of Drive leaves characters vulnerable and limits their options while it slowly recharges. It’s so important, in fact, that there’s an entire visual effect dedicated to highlighting this temporary weakness.

The Drive Impact can also be a real game-changer. It absorbs up to two hits, and if it lands through an opponent’s attack, it will stagger them on the spot and leave them open for serious retribution. Moreover, if an enemy is bounced into the boundaries of the stage, they’ll rebound into a stunned state. It’s incredibly powerful in practice but vulnerable to throws, super attacks or even return Drive Impacts which mean that the person who threw it out first will be the one getting stunned when two of them clash head on.

Finally there’s a Drive Rush which allows players to cancel moves into quick dashes at the cost of some meter. I haven’t really come to grips with it during my time so far, but the players who had could whip out some truly outlandish combos that wouldn’t otherwise be possible. Certain moves also have new properties throughout a Drive Rush — for example, Luke’s overhead can suddenly be chained into other moves, leading to a massive damage potential that isn’t possible without triggering one first.

These additions are great, and lead to dynamic fights where fortunes can turn in the blink of an eye, and a well-read counter can lead to wild damage being doled out. On the flipside, spending meter carelessly can lead to dangerous situations. Emptying the Drive Gauge may have seemed worth it for the extra combo damage at the time, but hitting the burnout state and having drastically reduced defensive and offensive options can be a real shock when dealing with a counterattack.

There’s one other huge change I’d be remiss not to mention — the addition of a new ‘Modern’ control method which makes doing special moves and supers far simpler. Purists like myself might scoff at it, but it does make sense given that it trims away some buttons so that the combat system’s more suited for console controllers instead of fight sticks. I stuck with Classic and moaned about not having easy access to Medium Punch since I have it set to left trigger, but Modern perhaps makes more sense for casual players who don’t mind losing a bit of flexibility in return for ease and simplicity.

Returning players may remember that Street Fighter V launched with almost no singleplayer content whatsoever, leaving solo players out in the cold. Street Fighter 6 is massively improved in this regard with a plethora of arcade, practice and training modes, as well as a resurrected the World Tour mode. The result is a hugely modified and fully realized package at launch.

This World Tour mode initially welcomes players to Metro City, where sucker-punching an old lady in the back of the head with an uppercut is every bit as socially acceptable as saying ‘Hello’. Taking place in the form of a third-person adventure, players will create their own unique avatar and be set loose in the world to follow their dream of learning what strength truly means.

They’ll naturally accomplish this lofty, nebulous goal by kicking bins over, punching unruly thugs in the face, buying stat-altering items or clothes, and jawing with a collection of Street Fighter legends such as Luke and Ryu who are only too happy to take players under their wing and teach them how to pull off a Shoryuken or two. Luke in particular comes across as an awesome dude, doing his best for his students while also espousing the values of videogames and junk food.

It’s a cool mode that lasts upwards of thirty hours for players who want to do everything, though it does end in a strange way that left me wondering whether I’d seen the actual ending or if I’d missed something along the way.

The player’s World Tour avatar can also be brought into online lobbies which consist of large arcade-style hubs with plenty of cabinets dotted around to challenge other players, spectate fights or stand in a queue to take on the winner of a given match. It’s a slick setup, with optional rotated arcade games such as Final Fight or Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo available during downtime.

While this is all pretty great so far, one slight issue I have with Street Fighter 6 is admittedly a personal one — I find ‘zoning’ characters incredibly boring to fight against. Seeing a Guile or JP turtle up and spend their time on the opposite side of the stage salivating with delight at the prospect of ticking down the timer with a prolonged poke and projectile war is a harsh and immediate turn off. I’d forgotten how much I disliked zoning characters, and after a ton of great, fast-paced matches in a row, these moments were like a sudden dash of cold water in my face.

While the roster could use some spicing up, Street Fighter 6 is a total blast overall and has captured my attention in a way that other recent fighters haven’t. It’s a fantastic game straight out the gate for both for solo and competitive players, it features excellent netcode that provides smooth cross platform online play across decent connections, and there are a bunch of exciting new gameplay tools and tweaks to get to grips with. Capcom have essentially knocked this one out of the park, and Street Fighter just feels right again.

Rating: 8.5 out of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Capcom. It is currently available on XBX/S, PS4/5, and PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the XBX and S. Approximately 33 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. 7 hours of play were spent in multiplayer modes

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated T and contains Mild Blood, Mild Language, Suggestive Themes, Use of Alcohol and Tobacco and Violence. The official ESRB description reads as follows: This is a fighting game in which players assume the roles of international characters engaging in one-on-one fighting matches with other online players. Players use punches, kicks, and special attacks (e.g., fireballs, rising uppercuts, electric attacks) to drain opponents’ life meters. Combat is fast-paced and constant, highlighted by impact sounds, cries of pain, and bursts of light/paint streaks. A handful of bonus games (e.g., 2D side-scrolling games) depict small blood-splatter effects; other games depict blood on characters’ faces after losing matches. The game contains some suggestive material: female characters designed in revealing outfits (e.g., thongs, deep cleavage, partially exposed buttocks, chests covered by narrow bands.); some characters’ breasts jiggle during matches—camera angles sometimes highlight various body parts. One character fights in a Drunken Boxing style, which depicts him drinking alcohol from a gourd, stumbling and red faced; various moves/combos, badges/banners, and bio text reference alcohol (e.g., “Don’t Cry Over Spilled Booze”; “Intoxicated Assault”; “Immune to Hangovers”; “I Breakdance When I’m Tipsy“; “Swagger Step: Drink level 3 or higher”). A bonus game depicts enemy characters smoking cigarettes.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. The subtitles cannot be altered and/or resized, but the background opacity can be tweaked for easier reading. As a fighting game, most of the onscreen action should be easy enough to understand without access to sound. There are certain sound cues that could give some players an advantage though – for instance, when Luke charges and times his special Flash Knuckle correctly, he’ll shout ‘perfect’ to indicate that the move properties have changed. I found this aspect tougher to gauge without the accompanying voicework.

Remappable Controls: Yes, this game offers fully remappable controls as well as several wildly different control schemes to choose from.

HIGH Leon’s highly expanded moveset leads to tons of ways to approach each encounter

LOW It’s all so darn dour

WTF Am I the only one on Earth who actually likes well-done QTEs?

Darren, in his excellent review of the recent Resident Evil 4 Remake, labeled the game a “compliment” to the original release. I agree with his meaning, but disagree with that being a positive. Heads up, as this is a Second Opinion, readers looking for a thorough breakdown of the game’s nuts & bolts should click the link above and read our Main Review.

Successful remakes fall into two categories — games that make the original completely obsolete (IE: Mafia: Definitive Edition, Shadow of the Colossus, Yakuza: Kiwami 1 & 2), and remakes that completely reinvent the game, which may keep the original release relevant to those chasing nostalgia but are generally usurped by the newer, definitive version made available to a wide audience. Capcom is familiar with the latter approach, as they’ve done that successfully with the remakes of Resident Evil 1-3.

Resident Evil 4 (2023) does not accomplish either of these positions. The thing I kept thinking of while playing the RE4 remake was Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes. Both titles significantly improved graphical fidelity. Both added modern controls and mechanics. Both have worse music and voice acting. Both have strange shifts in tone that compare poorly to the original. Neither have the spark of the title it’s based on.

The biggest problem, though? The original RE4 is still awesome.

Sure, it’s not what anyone would call modern, but the 2005 release is still infinitely playable and doesn’t feel anywhere near as dated as, say, 1998’s Resident Evil 2 did compared to its remake. For an 18-year-old effort, the first Resident Evil 4 is still an outstanding thrill ride that anyone can pick up and have a good time with. It just didn’t need a remake in the same way Resident Evil 2 or 3 did, and we still haven’t gotten an update for Code Veronica. A remaster that enhanced resolution, cleaned up a few assets, and made a few necessary quality-of-life enhancements like the recent Metroid Prime: Remastered would have been a perfectly serviceable and well-regarded release.

To be fair, there are plenty of legitimate improvements here. The parrying mechanic is fantastic and helps make up for the nerfing of the roundhouse kick. It’s also legitimately inspiring how Capcom was able to take the knife-fight QTE cutscene with Krauser and seamlessly integrate it into actual gameplay.

Also, the graphics are tremendous. Capcom’s proprietary RE Engine has been an exceptional canvas for their developers, and it shows its versatility again here. The character models are outstanding, weather effects are well implemented, the lighting is sharp, and it’s an exceptionally good looking game.

On the other hand, there are changes that don’t enhance things.

Yes, it was frustrating that Leon couldn’t walk while shooting in the original release, but that was a mechanic that added so much tension. There were constant split-second decisions being made as the player was either going to stand their ground or stop shooting and regroup elsewhere. This lack of mobility also factored into the level design perfectly. Now Leon is a full-on action hero far more capable of acrobatics, and the devs made the enemies more annoying to compensate for this. There were multiple situations where I was stun-locked into oblivion, and there seems to be a significant increase of enemies sneaking up behind the player with no explanation as to how they got there. The original was a difficult title, but I was never as frustrated as I was here.

Other attempts at ‘improving’ from the original land with a thud.

For the record, I never found Ashley’s presence annoying in the original release. It’s easy to tell her to stay put or hide at the start of an area, then go wreck fools and call her back. Now she has two settings — stay right behind Leon or… just kinda meander around the vicinity? This is unpredictable and led to Ashley frequently getting captured because she was somewhere I didn’t want her to be. Otherwise, keeping her close means she’s often fodder for various explosives.

In regards to Ashely hiding, she can only take cover in a few lockers strewn about. This is hardly a mechanic, as I counted three lockers in the entire game. If I saw the locker, I knew to stuff her in there because I knew some jerk with a chainsaw was coming, and it took all tension out because it was so obviously telegraphed.

The one thing I legitimately hated about the new release was the removal of laser sights on the guns. This, to me, was such an integral part of the original and how it felt to play. Yes they do have a laser sight attachment that one can buy, but it’s both expensive and only available for a couple of the starting pistols (it does come standard on one of the late level magnums). I find this fairly antithetical to the idea of a faithful remaster to Resident Evil 4.

Much has been made of the cut content in this release. Certain setpieces (and even a boss!) have been removed, but they were supplanted with bombastic moments of their own and I never thought I was missing anything integral. The Mercenaries mode came soon enough so that its omission at launch wasn’t bothersome, but the inevitability of Ada’s campaign being paid DLC is disappointing.

With that said, there is one thing from the original I miss that nobody else on the internet might agree with, but I miss the Quick Time Events. QTEs are something I’ve never hated, and they can be a fine addition when implemented well. Resident Evil 4 had awesome QTEs, and while the previously-mentioned Krauser knife fight is now better from a gameplay perspective, it also makes deciphering its exposition dump significantly more difficult because players will be too busy parrying to pay attention to what’s being said.

It’s easy to see that QTEs were likely removed because they’re associated with the goofier parts of RE4, like untying Leon’s leg from Del Lago, backflipping through motion sensors, or running away from a giant mechanical Ramon statue.

Of course, removing these bits brings us to the issue of a more serious tone, which now lines up better with the remakes (as well as the modern Resident Evil games), but it just isn’t the slap-happy good time the original is.

Leon has gone from quippy action hero to brooding and overly serious. It sticks out like a sore thumb from the start — the developers kept the absurd “Where’s everybody going? Bingo?” line as a nod to the original, but it now comes off as very out-of-place. I also miss the bad guys hijacking the radio signal to start a smack-talk session with Leon on occasion. Some characters do improve on their original iterations, though. Ashley’s mannerisms and tone better match someone who has been held hostage by bug-infested, backwater Spaniards, and they’ve given Luis a bit more screen time to better flesh out his motivations while toning him down from being a total perv. He’s still a perv, but not a total perv. Progress, I guess?

I want to stress that I didn’t hate my time with Resident Evil 4 (2023). Quite the contrary, actually, as I had a good time re-experiencing a true classic with a modern sheen. However, I don’t find it as impressive as any of Capcom’s previous RE remakes. The revised versions of Resident Evil 1-3 all took big swings and weren’t concerned with how they compared to the original. However, it feels like the devs played it safe here, and that’s disappointing. It’s not so disappointing that I wouldn’t recommend it, but seeing so many people call it the best remake ever compelled me to write this.

At the end of the day, ten years from now when I’m feeding on memberberries and looking to replay Resident Evil 4, there’s a good chance I’ll choose the original. That, to me, makes this remake not as successful as it could have been.

RATING: 7.5 Out Of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Capcom. It is currently available on XBX/S, PS4/5 and PC. This copy of the game was obtained via purchase and reviewed on the PS5. Approximately 19 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated M and contains Blood and Gore, Intense Violence and Strong Language. The official description reads as follows: This is a survival-horror game in which players assume the role of a government agent (Leon Kennedy) sent to rescue a character from a religious cult. From a third-person perspective, players explore a rural environment while searching for clues and fighting zombies and mutated creatures. Players use pistols, machine guns, shotguns, and explosives to kill enemy creatures in frenetic combat. Some weapons/attacks result in decapitation and/or dismemberment of enemies, along with large splatters of blood. Enemy attacks (e.g., chainsaws, tentacles) can also result in Leon being decapitated, blown apart, or impaled. Eviscerated animals and mutilated corpses are depicted in some environments. The words “f**k” and “sh*t” appear in the game.

Colorblind Modes: Colorblind modes are present.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. The subtitles can be altered and/or resized. Furthermore, Capcom have gone above and beyond to make this game accessible to as many players as possible, with closed captioning often warning of nearby sounds such as beeping explosives, squeaking collectibles or the demented mutterings of nearby villagers. Excellent job, Capcom.

Remappable Controls: Yes, this game offers fully remappable controls. Well, at least on Keyboard and Mouse. Controller support has various presets available.

HIGH Leon’s new defensive knife skills are an inspired addition.

LOW Some of the craziest moments of the original campaign are no more.

WTF Leon evading a dual chainsaw attack in the most bizarre and dangerous way possible.

When Ashley Graham, the daughter of the President of the United States of all people, is kidnapped by a weird group of deranged cultists with a penchant for murder in a backwater European village, the USA responds in the only way it knows how — by sending a single floppy-haired agent to get her back, uncover the despicable plan behind her disappearance, and save the world in the process.

Fortunately, the agent in the awesome bomber jacket is no ordinary man — he’s Leon S. Kennedy, one of the few survivors of the devastating Raccoon City zombie outbreak six years earlier, and he’s not taking any nonsense from these villagers. When one of them tries to axe him in the face after he asks a few polite questions… well, from that point it’s freaking on and he’s bringing Ashley back, even if he has to depopulate all Europe in order to do so.

Despite all of this preamble, Resident Evil 4 doesn’t really need much of an introduction given that it’s popularly considered one of the best games of all time. However, almost twenty years after its original release, Capcom clearly felt it was time to spruce it up with modern graphics and an updated control scheme utilizing twin analog sticks in a sensible manner, and they’ve done a fantastic job of doing so.

The feel of Resident Evil 4 has changed quite a bit since the 2005 edition, with more of an emphasis on moment-to-moment atmosphere. Whether breaking out a torch in dark areas littered with the corpses of victims or slowly creeping through a forest full of slavering lunatics, it’s more of a traditional survival horror experience this time.  Thankfully, though, when the action breaks out, it’s a hell of a lot more chaotic, violent and downright awesome than the term “survival horror” might suggest and there’s a blessed lack of loathsome puzzles stinking things up. Puzzles still exist, of course, but they’re generally simple and don’t clutter Leon’s inventory with useless garbage.

Whether being swarmed by parasite-infested villagers with bladed tentacle heads or being accosted by a boggle-eyed madman wielding a chainsaw, Leon’s more than capable of holding his own in a fight thanks to an appropriate amount of guns, ammunition and assorted variables like hand grenades and healing items.

Speaking of, the guns in RE4 are an absolute joy to use, delivering destruction and bloodshed with incredibly punchy sound effects. A shotgun blast into a crowd will not only blow these ne’er-do-wells off their feet, but also shear huge chunks of their body off in the process. Even comparatively low-powered pistols sound like the crack of doom and pop heads like pumpkins, especially as Leon progresses through the story and tunes up or replaces his guns with ever-more-lethal instruments of carnage.

One new and highly appreciated addition to the formula is the ability to parry enemy attacks using Leon’s trusty knife. Traditionally little more than a last resort, the knife is now an invaluable defensive tool capable of parrying anything from pitchforks to chainsaws, breaking free of enemy holds, and of course, the more traditional use of repeatedly stabbing bad guys in the face when the chips are down.

This level of knife-based punishment doesn’t come without cost, however. Leon’s knife will degrade over time and eventually break, requiring periodic repairs from merchants dotted around the map. Parrying most attacks or using a new stealth kill mechanic doesn’t cost much durability, though blocking a whirring chainsaw with the knife edge is going to destroy it in short order. It’s therefore important to balance using it for general convenience against saving it for a desperate last resort as it nears its breaking point.

Leon himself seems much weightier than he did in the past, leading to a more grounded and slightly less nimble control scheme. The tradeoff is that enemies also have more heft to them, so roundhouse kicking them into a wall feels incredibly crunchy and satisfying. New animations sell the sensation of combat beautifully, resulting in deliciously insane encounters against all sorts of twisted grotesques throughout the fifteen- to twenty-hour runtime.

After retrieving Ashley and having to work together to escape from the village, other design changes make themselves known. She’s less useless now thanks to a couple of selectable behavior modes that will see her staying close to the action or keeping her distance, and she’s now also able to perform basic functions like descending ladders or helping players out in unexpected ways.

Sadly, some of the goofier moments of old got cut from this release, which is unfortunate since those were also some of the most memorable. From flame-spewing dragon statues in the lava caverns to the infamously insane laser-rigged hallway, some of the most unique setpieces of the original are simply gone — yet the catapult section in the castle’s opening sequence not only remains intact, but has been made infinitely more annoying thanks to fewer opportunities to neutralize threats and more chances to get blown up seemingly at random.

Other complaints are few and far between, so it feels like I’m scraping the bottom of the barrel when I say that there’s also a weird moment when the merchant unhelpfully warns Leon how he should attend to any unfinished business towards the end of the castle area before hitting a point of no return after he’s already passed it, so that could be a mildly annoying moment for completionists like myself.

Finally, as of release there’s no combat arena-style Mercenaries mode, nor the additional Separate Ways campaign equivalent featuring Ada Wong in her banging new pair of long boots. That said, Mercenaries is already confirmed to be on its way and even without Separate Ways, there’s more than enough content in Resident Evil 4 to justify the price given that it features a wealth of bonus content such as weapons, costumes and accessories to unlock after the credits roll for the first time.

Resident Evil 4 is a truly fantastic remake of an already-stellar title. Some of the omissions, tweaks and changes do mean that it’s a perfect complement to the original experience rather than a replacement, but this is about as fine an update to a classic as one could possibly hope for.

Roll on Resident Evil 5 — Sheva Alomar’s got some Majini throats that need slitting.

Rating: 9 out of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Capcom. It is currently available on XBX/S, PS4/5 and PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PC. Approximately 17 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated M and contains Blood and Gore, Intense Violence and Strong Language. The official description reads as follows: This is a survival-horror game in which players assume the role of a government agent (Leon Kennedy) sent to rescue a character from a religious cult. From a third-person perspective, players explore a rural environment while searching for clues and fighting zombies and mutated creatures. Players use pistols, machine guns, shotguns, and explosives to kill enemy creatures in frenetic combat. Some weapons/attacks result in decapitation and/or dismemberment of enemies, along with large splatters of blood. Enemy attacks (e.g., chainsaws, tentacles) can also result in Leon being decapitated, blown apart, or impaled. Eviscerated animals and mutilated corpses are depicted in some environments. The words “f**k” and “sh*t” appear in the game.

Colorblind Modes: Colorblind modes are present.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. The subtitles can be altered and/or resized. Furthermore, Capcom have gone above and beyond to make this game accessible to as many players as possible, with closed captioning often warning of nearby sounds such as beeping explosives, squeaking collectibles or the demented mutterings of nearby villagers. Excellent job, Capcom.

Remappable Controls: Yes, this game offers fully remappable controls. Well, at least on Keyboard and Mouse. Controller support has various presets available.

HIGH Those wirebugs are a phenomenal addition to the formula.

LOW The Rampage quests are really half-assed.

WTF Walking through someone’s front door in the middle of the day is considered ‘stealthy’?

Monster Hunter veterans will know the score by now.

With the release of Monster Hunter Rise on consoles, it’s time to create a new character in a new locale and defend humanity from the threat of vicious creatures. Rise introduces a feudal Japanese-themed ninja village named Kamura tucked away in the mountains as our new base of operations, filled with cheerful villagers and handy hunter amenities aplenty. It also features two hot twins who think that walking into the player’s house while they’re asleep isn’t weird in the slightest, and that’s just how things work there.

Well, whatever.  

It’s not all cookies, milk and twin home invaders, though — there’s a flood of monsters threatening to overwhelm the village due to a rare event they call the Rampage. Everyone in Kamura yearns to be free of this threat, a feeling I suspect many players of Monster Hunter Rise will also share by the game’s end. More on that later though.

For those unfamiliar with the series, Monster Hunter is a third-person hunting game in which players choose from a variety of melee and ranged weapons, such as a massive oversized hammer or a heavy bowgun, then accept quests at a nearby hub before heading out into the field to capture or kill the monster that’s been causing all the ruckus. There are variations on this (such as heading out to collect fruits and berries instead) but players will generally be facing something the size of a small building with a lot of pointy teeth trying to rip their face off.

Victory brings rewards, and upon returning to the village hub it’s possible to use the money and materials earned on the hunt to upgrade their equipment and buy new gear, such as traps and healing items. The village offers everything a hunter could possibly need, including a restaurant with potent food that buffs up stats before each hunt, a multiplayer hub to group up with others online, various training and trading grounds, and a blacksmith to create or upgrade weapons and armor from the parts collected from each monster.

This is all classic Monster Hunter, but Rise also introduces a bunch of new mechanics.

The addition of ninja-style wall-running and grappling hook inspired Wirebugs to the formula allows for vastly increased mobility while on the hunt. Riding the hunter’s freshly-introduced and ride-able Palamutes (basically, huge dogs) to speed across the hunting ground in search of prey is simple and effective. Between these two timesaving creations and many new shortcuts that offer fast paths between hunting areas, the additional freedom is very welcome indeed.

Rise isn’t just about adding elements, though. If previous instalment and worldwide hit Monster Hunter World was responsible for pulling the series into the present with an assortment of  modern functions that a general audience takes for granted, Rise takes another hard look and cuts away even more of the series’ legacy busywork. For instance, players have a cute pet owl that they automatically dispatch to highlight every monster on the map, meaning there’s no need to track or mark them now. Various hostile climates no longer need the use of items such as hot or cold drinks to operate effectively within them. Cutscenes can be skipped upon a first viewing, and there’s none of World’s absurdly tedious clues needed to track down threats before finally unlocking the matching quest.

It all equals a friendlier, faster approach to getting in there and walloping enemies, and it absolutely works in Rise’s favor. It’s dangerous to make so many things more approachable, though — at the rate Capcom’s dishing out these quality-of-life improvements, the next installment might automatically refresh the player’s loadout at the end of a hunt without having to go to the item box every time. Imagine such decadence!

Everything isn’t simply handed to players on a platter, though. Hunters will still have to down certain monsters numerous times while praying for a 3% drop rate to get the bits they need to make a spectacularly useful piece of armor. I had to hunt one monster about twenty times to get my hands on a Purple Magna Orb for a sweet pair of bracers, so it’s a good thing being out in the field hunting feels great.

The monsters themselves are a great mix of old favourites and fresh faces, and all have their own strengths, weaknesses and battlefield behaviors. During any given fight, these beasts will go into a fury status where they become more dangerous and hit harder, before eventually tiring out and tottering around the place at half their previous speed. Following this rhythm is important, so as not to get lasered by an enemy’s ultimate attack at inopportune moments. Players always have backup, though, with the possibility of either two AI helper pets while playing alone, or up to three human players online.

So far, so good… until we get to the part of Rise that absolutely sucks, the Rampage quests.

Rampage quests are essentially a Tower Defense minigame where players are tasked with protecting the  gate leading into Kamura from a stream of rampaging monsters led by an Apex predator. Predetermined spots around the map allow for installations such as autocannons, traps or manual gun emplacements to be set up to defend from the onslaught, and occasionally super-powerful ‘hero’ units will become available to assist hunters with massive damage and support buffs for brief periods.

Sound interesting? Perhaps, but the implementation leaves much to be desired. They’re stressful in the worst possible way, with villagers constantly screaming about how everything’s going to hell as the hunter gets pingponged across the battlefield by a barrage of monsters, fireballs and screen-filling lightning blasts they’ve almost no chance of seeing coming. These sequences aren’t even that difficult once players figure out a worthwhile strategy, but they’re very, very irritating in solo play and downright boring in multiplayer.

Thankfully, only a few of these quests are required in order to progress through the story, though players aiming for the best endgame gear will have to suffer for their gains.

The other mild annoyance is that the online functionality isn’t very user-friendly, making it tough to join groups battling specific monsters without getting granular on specific quests. Most players trying to join a hunt won’t care about the quest so much as the monster holding the parts they need, so it’s just a bit more fiddly than it should be to get matched with an appropriate hunt. Oh, and there’s no crossplay either. Bleh.

In short, Rise is a great iteration on the classic Monster Hunter formula, making things more approachable and getting rid of some of the series’ less desirable elements. They may have made sense in the past, but the removal of much busywork is a net positive in my eyes. It’s a shame that Capcom didn’t include the massive Sunbreak expansion with this release given that it’s already out on Switch and PC, but it’s not like this package is lacking in content or value. For hunters of any experience level, Rise is a great entry in a storied series.

Rating: 8.0 out of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Capcom. It is currently available on XBO/X/S, PS4/5, Switch and PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the XBX. Approximately 55 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed, including every postgame monster and completing my optimal armor set and build. 7 hours of play were spent in multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated T and contains Alcohol Reference, Blood and Violence. Their official description from the Switch version reads as follows: This is an action adventure game in which players assume the role of a hunter who must save a village from a monster invasion. Players traverse a fantasy world and hunt down and kill various dragons, wyverns, and giant spiders. Players use swords, hammers, bows, and axes to kill creatures in frenetic melee-style combat. Spurts of blood are often depicted when players and creatures are injured during combat. A handful of missions allow players to operate mounted turrets and cannons to shoot rampaging creatures. The game contains several references to alcohol in the dialogue (e.g., “Enjoy the occasional drink and you’ll never need a docto—*hic*”; “I had a couple of sips of alcohol…”; “Drinking alone ain’t the worst thing, but booze tastes better with company”; “Pops tells the story whenever he gets boozed up.”).

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. Some in-game battle callouts aren’t translated. They’re usually of minor value, though characters will yell when an enemy is about to unleash their strongest attacks, giving D/HH players a minor disadvantage. Still, these callouts weren’t in previous titles at all and watching the enemy’s movements carefully should reveal the same information. Despite the lack of bark captioning, I’d still class it as fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: Certain functions are remappable. There are a lot of contextual controls and every button is not only used, but also used in combination with others. The left stick moves the player, the right stick controls the camera, the face buttons interact with the environment, accept or cancel menu options or unleash attacks, and the shoulder buttons can sprint, charge up attacks, use projectiles or unleash other types of attacks. Holding down the left bumper can also access item shortcuts or scrolling windows. It’s complicated and can be a little fiddly, but it works.

HIGH Nightmarish imagery and enemies.

LOW A shortage of fantastical fungus powers.

WTF is the Winters motto.

In 2017, Resident Evil 7 reinvigorated a franchise that many thought was past its prime.

A refocusing on survival horror over action, a first-person perspective realizing the initial title’s original intent, a mystery plot mostly unburdened by series lore — much has been said about these things elsewhere, but one aspect I’d like to highlight is its new protagonist, Ethan Winters.

Ethan was an everyman caught up in fantastical circumstances with the simple goal of
rescuing his missing wife. Although mostly a blank slate for the player to imprint
themselves upon, he nonetheless approached events with an understandable incredulity and avoided the usual aloof, cool-as-a-cucumber energy common to leading men. The fact that he often says “WTF…” kind of sums him up.

In the Shadows of Rose campaign — the main course of the Winters’ DLC expansion for
Resident Evil Village — Ethan’s now-teenage daughter continues that legacy as a more
relatable protagonist than the mill of tough supercop-types that have saturated the
series. Although only three hours long, the content is a superb distillation of what made
Village such a treat, further elevated by artistic flourishes only possible through its unreal
setting.

Returning to a third-person perspective, Rose travels through a mindrealm imprinted on
a laboratory sample of the mutamycete (the magical black mold that causes the events of RE7
and Village) as she seeks a way to rid herself of the powers granted to her by thanks to her
unusual lineage.

Even moreso than its predecessor, Shadows flits between several gameplay types. It
starts as the rather familiar mansion exploration, blasting shuffling monsters with only
limited ammunition, before playing with escape room and stealth mechanics.

While each section of the campaign is solid (with the return to the doll house being a particular
highlight) there are some missed opportunities thanks to the half-baked implementation of
Rose’s powers. Players get charges of mold energy that can be used as a means to
open new areas or stun enemies and… that’s about it.

There is a final boss fight where a slew of new abilities are unlocked, all over-the-top and ultimately
some high notes to end the campaign on, but this bombast just demonstrates how much more could’ve been added throughout. However, implementing those wild powers from the finale would’ve required a much different game, however, and Winters’ is really just another visit to the village.

As such, Capcom gets away with remixing familiar locations and re-using assets because this is a dreamscape remembrance of those people and places. Its most interesting and terrifying setpieces are those unconstrained by the real — a display of mutilated Rose copies, murderous giant-sized dolls, and the scariest mannequins I’ve yet come across in the genre. It’s a dash of unexplained and ephemeral Silent Hill in a series that has typically taken painstaking efforts to explain itself through science fiction schlock.

They can’t help themselves, though. Similar to the base game’s campaign, it has a room towards the end filled with notes that explain some of the supernatural within the setting’s own internal logic. It’s weak storytelling that should’ve been revealed in dribs and drabs — but even then, why bother? Embrace the weird, Capcom.

Those explanations do not diminish the strong emotional core of the campaign, however. This DLC is Rose’s coming-of-age and ultimate acceptance of her powers while the mutamycete plays on her insecurities. When all is revealed, the script slows for a brief rest and the finale is as satisfying as it is tragic. No Resident Evil I’ve yet played has ever plucked at my heartstrings so effectively.

In terms of content apart from Rose’s journey, The DLC also includes the option to play the main Village campaign in third person.

There’s certainly an audience for this, capturing the essence of the Resident Evil 2 and 3
remake, but I found it mostly distracting. While that extra situational awareness can help prevent taking
unexpected damage from enemies outside the first-person sightline, this is still very clearly a game designed for its original vision. Object interactions can be janky, and cutscenes will jarringly go to first-person and back to third when gameplay starts up again.

The final piece of the DLC consists of additional characters for Mercenaries, a horde mode where
players fight through levels racking up points for killing enemies. The Winters’ Expansion
adds three new characters — famous boulder-puncher Chris Redfield and two of Village’s
antagonists, Heisenberg and the meme queen Lady Dimitrescu, who play decidedly
differently than the gun-toting protagonists.

Heisenberg wields his big hammer, has Magneto-like powers and can summon a
mechanical monstrosity. However, the big girl is the best addition, adding a “thrill” meter that
unlocks different attacks but must be kept up with kills. Lady Dimitrescu adds laughter to the
slaughter as she shreds enemies with her claws, and it gives the mode an infectiously gleeful energy.

While the Winters’ Expansion offers some neat new toys to play with, it’s the Shadows of Rose campaign that is its triumph. Despite a few blemishes and a short length, it once again proves that Resident Evil still has a lot to give. I just hope we get to see Rose again, perhaps with a few new powers under her belt.
The series’ original characters should all be pushing 50 by now, and she’s just the fresh
face to carry the series forward — out with the old, in with the mold.

— Stephen Cook

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Capcom. It is currently available on PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, XBO, and XBX. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PC. Approximately 10 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed.  There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated M and contains Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, and Strong Language. This is a survival-horror action game in which players assume the role of a girl (Rose Winters). From a third-person perspective, players explore environment sand use pistols and shotguns
to shoot and kill fantastical creatures. Some attacks result in decapitation of enemies; some areas depict bloodstains and corpses within the environment.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. (See example above.) The subtitles can be altered and/ or resized. Unfortunately there are no visual cues to help with growls or other monster sounds coming from offscreen. Players who have hearing issues should be ready to take a few hits after being caught by surprise. This game is not fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: No, this game’s controls are not remappable when using a controller. Keyboard and mouse bindings are remappable.

HIGH It’s a love letter to classic Resident Evil.

LOW Occasional difficulty spikes.

WTF That cameo from another classic horror franchise…

It’s impossible to discuss Checkmaty’s Nightmare of Decay without referencing longtime horror franchise Resident Evil — it’s obvious the game is a tongue-in-cheek love letter to the classic roots of Capcom’s iconic series. Although Capcom’s recent remakes of Resident Evil 2 and 3 remind players of where the series came from, they just don’t make them like they used to. So, Checkmaty is here to fill that void.

Nightmare of Decay plays like a brief first-person reimagining of the original Resident Evil. In fact, some of the design choices are so similar I’m a little worried that Capcom might ultimately take legal action or at least request changes.

However (for the time being) players are cast as an unnamed character suffering from nightmares. They awaken in the yard of a large manor with nothing but a talking cat (yes, really) to get them going, and even before even entering the manor’s front doors it’s not hard to tell something dicey is afoot.

Upon entry, zombies are found moaning and shambling in the halls. The player soon finds a small variety of weapons for offense — a knife, a pistol, a shotgun and a few others helpful in dispatching enemies. Small puzzles and keys are also sprinkled throughout.

Although Nightmare of Decay loses some classic flavor by not being a third-person fixed-camera game, the change in perspective modernizes the formula without sacrificing horror. When I entered a new hallway I would immediately look around and listen for the moans of zombies and do as much early threat assessment as possible. Sharp turns in the hallways with creatures hidden behind them capitalize on the first-person view to bring the dreadful sense that something is always lurking.

Nightmare of Decay doesn’t stop at zombies. I don’t want to spoil the other enemy types, but there are references to other Resident Evil games, as well as some original designs. In an interesting twist, a handful of enemies only exist in specific rooms — it keeps progression both fresh and unnerving.

In terms of difficulty, it makes perfect sense that the game skews old-school here as well. Although I only died a handful of times in this short adventure, there’s no autosave system. Players must manually save at designated rooms throughout the mansion, and if I died, it’s back to the title screen to reload. This was rarely irritating, as most of my failures were my own fault, though — much like it was back then, conserving ammo and fighting thoughtfully are keys to a smoother experience.

To be honest, I bought this game on a whim thinking its homage to classic survival-horror and deliberate Playstation 2-era graphics would coalesce into a somewhat janky indie experience with a lot of heart but little technical prowess. I’m happy to be proven wrong as Nightmare of Decay scratched that itch from horror games of my youth in a way that is just modern enough to feel good but not so updated that it loses its nostalgic flavor. It lacks the length of classic horror games as it only clocks in at about 3 hours, but it still feels complete. People looking for a quick and clever trip down survival-horror memory lane likely won’t be disappointed.

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Checkmaty. It is currently available on PC. This copy of the game was obtained via retail purchase and reviewed on the PC. Approximately 3 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: Nightmare of Decay has no official ESRB rating, but the Steam store page says “This game contains intense violence and gore which is not appropriate for all ages”. I agree, this game is for mature players. It features zombies and other monsters, guns, melee combat, blood, dismemberment and bodies that have been tortured. It is not suitable for young audiences.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind mode available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game does offers subtitle. There is spoken dialogue, but instead of characters speaking words, they make noises and subtitles show what the characters are meant to say. Nightmare of Decay features some noise cues that help identify enemies in some areas. For example, a flooded area has zombies lying under the water and when they emerge, they make noise and splash. Even with sound on one of these zombies surprised me from behind. The game will be more difficult for hard of hearing players due to these occasional sound cues, so it is not fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: This game’s controls are remappable for keyboard about mouse keybindings.

HIGH Still an incredible aural and visual experience ten years later.

LOW Repetitive hack-‘n-slash gameplay leads to fatigue.

WTF Having to find the cellphone guy to save the game.

Originally released in 2011 for Xbox 360 and PS3, El Shaddai was one of the weirdest experiences one could have at the time. It was a blend of simple platforming and fighting mechanics mechanically, but it featured an art style so unique that even today I struggle to think of anything that comes close.

El Shaddai, now a worldwide PC release, tells a complex story taken from the Book of Enoch, inspired by ancient religious texts. The player will inhabit the jeans and blond hairdo of Enoch himself, sent by God to seek out seven angels who are plotting to destroy mankind with a huge flood. While it may seem a simple story, the narrative will soon spiral out, anime-style, into a whole lot of characters with dubious motivations, subplots and obscure references. It might not make for great storytelling, its weird tone goes hand-in-hand in with the rest of the experience.

Mechanically, it’s a third-person action title, with a few very basic puzzles (push button to activate platforms to jump on) and a whole lot of fighting involved. Enoch can double jump right from the start (thank Heavens!) but has very few commands — attack, guard and steal weapon. The attacks can be chained together and, with the use of the guard button, a few additional specials can be performed. Weapons can be stolen from enemies, which is a mechanic that is mainly useful to shorten fights since they do tend to take a bit too much time and can’t be skipped.

The fighting is mostly… okay? That said, the repetitive nature, limited combo system, and enemies that take ages to defeat all contribute to fatigue.

At this early point, I’ve very nearly summed up the entire gameplay experience — jump from platform to platform, arrive at a platform where a fight will take place, defeat enemies, rinse and repeat. There are a few variations like one notable sequence where Enoch transforms into a motorcycle and runs throughout the level, but El Shaddai is a pretty barebones package.

Now on PC, El Shaddai has been upgraded to support higher resolutions, along with added video setting options so obtuse that I couldn’t make heads or tails of them. There are no other new graphical improvements otherwise — this is important to note since those interested in the title are probably drawn to its visuals, and this is amazing since El Shaddai is still a visual standout now, even as it was back then.

Each level carries a unique visual style, with the first having a sort of impressionistic vibe, the second an incredibly beautiful symbolistic/cubist neon approach, and it progresses from there. Each one brings something new to the table and it’s telling that despite El Shaddai being ten years old, I’d be hard-pressed to find something that looks as uniquely interesting as it does. That said, I was never entirely convinced by Sawaki Takeyasu’s character designs, which seem more Western-inspired than anything — after all, Enoch is a blonde-haired blue-eyed guy ricking a generic California surfer dude vibe.

Like the powerful visuals, the soundtrack is nothing to scoff at thanks to former Capcom composers Masato Kouda and Kento Hasegawa giving their all, from lush orchestral sweeps with a full-blast choir, to tribal percussion with mysterious voices, to the mandatory rippin’ hard rock during the boss fights. It’s a true pleasure for the eyes and ears, indeed.

Ten years later, the fact that El Shaddai remains so unique is a great testament to the vision of its creators, with interesting designs, tremendous avant-grade art style and a fabulous soundtrack. Despite its basic hack-‘n-slash mechanics not being terribly interesting in the long run, the off-the-wall narrative and luscious aesthetics are more than enough to warrant a recommendation.

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Crim. It is currently available on PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on PC. Approximately 5 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode and the game was not completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: The game is rated T by the ESRB for Animated Blood, Fantasy Violence and Mild Suggestive Themes. Despite not being very violent, I would recommend the game to a teen audience since the overall religious narrative is a tad too complicated. Apart from there being little blood and violence appropriate to a fighting title, there are some mild suggestive references to sexual intercourse that come up a couple of times.

Colorblind Modes: there are no colorblind modes.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: The game features subtitles for all spoken dialogue, and audio cues are not used to communicate enemies’ attacks. Text cannot be altered or resized. In my view, the game is fully accessible.

Remappable controls: The game does not support a keyboard and mouse — a controller is required to play. There is no control diagram. The main controls are mapped on the main buttons (X to attack, A to jump), with guard mapped to the right shoulder buttons. The triggers are not used. The controls are NOT remappable.

HIGH Metal Gear Garbage.

LOW An inexcusable plot contrivance.

WTF So… does everyone know about the boulder punching?

There is some debate as to which Resident Evil is the best since its developers gave up on static-angle cameras. Resident Evil 4 (action) and Resident Evil 7 (horror) both make compelling arguments for themselves, and since they’re so profoundly different in presentation and tone, it’s almost like comparing apples and oranges. However, Resident Evil Village exists to settle this dispute once and for all — it essentially splits the difference by taking RE4‘s mechanics and marries them to RE7‘s aesthetics. Offering elaborate plotting and over-the-top action with brutal intensity and strong character work leads to what just might be the ultimate Resident Evil to date.

As a direct sequel to RE7, Village picks up three and a half years after Ethan Winters’ escape from Louisiana. He and Mia now live in Eastern Europe with their newborn baby, with longtime series star Chris Redfield keeping an eye on them. After an unexpected attack, Ethan’s world is turned upside-down and he finds himself on the side of a snowy road with no options but to once again pick up a gun and face a series of increasingly-hideous monsters.

Ethan has received military training since RE7 and that’s reflected in the plentiful First-Person Shooter combat — it’s more polished and there are many intense battles against multiple foes at once, which was a thing RE7 almost never offered. Leaving the claustrophobic hallways and cluttered rooms of the Baker mansion, Village takes place in huge, sprawling areas such as the titular village, fields, swamps, ruins, and a castle. These places are so open, in fact, that it often makes sense to pack a sniper rifle.

Speaking of firearms, the inventory and crafting systems have been completely redesigned to mirror RE4‘s break away from item boxes. Ethan trudges around with a briefcase full of guns strapped to his back, and has to make hard choices about which guns to keep and which to sell to Duke, the inexplicably-omnipresent weapons dealer. This limitation lends a smart strategic element to resource management — the player can’t simply load up on every weapon they want, so they have to re-evaluate their tactical approach combat every time they find a new weapon. There’s a wide variety of handguns, shotguns, and rifles that can be modded and upgraded until they’re impressively deadly. Anyone should be able to find a loadout that satisfies their playstyle.

Village also impresses in how well it’s able to function as a loving homage to Resident Evil 4 without getting bogged down in fanservice for its own sake. Apart from the inventory and weapon management systems, a key thing it cribs is the story structure. Just like in Leon’s adventure, Ethan is introduced to the macro threat early on, and then travels to a series of different locations, each one dominated by a boss that becomes the focus of the game for the next hour (or more) as the player has to figure out how to navigate mazelike areas and defeat their current foe. The adventure goes from a village to a castle, then to ruins and an industrial setting. Village isn’t enormous the way RE4, 5, and 6 were, but it’s around twice the size of 7 and none of it feels like padding.

However, Village isn’t just action. Its running time is filled with a cast of fascinating characters. Much has already been written about Lady Dimitrescu, the tall vampire all over the game’s advertising. Her section of the campaign in which players sneak around a castle while being hunted by bloodsuckers is quite compelling. There are a number of other bosses skulking around, however, and each one is noteworthy in their own right. I won’t spoil any details, but they all find their hopes and fears brought to life with solid writing and great voice acting, with the exception of one weirdly off-putting performance.

Mercenaries mode is a great addition to the contents of the package, melding the combo-chasing of RE4, 5 and 6 with the ‘travel from point A-B’ goal of the original version from RE3. Players start each stage with a lump of cash and a handgun, and they’re free to spend the money upgrading their existing weapon or buy new ones before going out to battle a horde of foes. Each mission is broken up into 2-5 stages built around a themed location. Players can harvest money from fallen enemies and find ammo around the levels before doing more shopping between stages to prepare for the challenges to come.

I find precious little to complain about in Resident Evil Village. The visuals are great, the mechanics are polished, the map is loaded with secrets to be explored and there’s a huge amount of content that only unlocks after credits roll, making this one of the most replayable entries in the entire series. In fact, my only major annoyance is with a bit of a writing at the start which doesn’t seem problematic until the end — it’s one of those bad writing situations where the entire game wouldn’t have taken place if a certain character had said a single line of dialogue. It’s still a wonderful story, I just wish the writers had put a little more thought into how it should begin — having characters withhold information from each other solely to preserve a twist is a frustrating conceit.

Resident Evil Village proves that the developers at Capcom knows exactly what series fans want, and they’re happy to offer it, along with a lot more than anyone was expecting. Resident Evil 7 was a revolution for the series by framing the action in personal, intimate terms that intensified the scares and violence via the first-person perspective. Resident Evil Village proves that the same approach works just as well when removed from the small-scale, southern gothic setting and the action ramps up. Village really is the best of both worlds, and an amazing accomplishment for the series.

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by CAPCOM. It is currently available on PC,XBO/S/X, and PS4/5. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PS5. Approximately 11 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed.

Parents: This game was rated M by the ESRB and features Blood and Gore and Intense Violence. They are not kidding about the intense violence. Horrific injuries are shown in closeup, there’s also blood drinking and exploding heads. This is as violent as games get without being banned from sale in stores. There’s also some alcohol consumption and some topless female statues.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: I played some of the game without audio and encountered some difficulties. It has the normal issue found in most First-Person Shooters in that being surprised by an attack from behind can be crippling at anything but the lowest difficulty levels. There’s also a strange issue where no onscreen confirmation is given when the player picks an item up — just a sound effect — so it’s very easy to miss grabbing an item while moving. there are also audio events during the game which have no visual cues. All dialogue is subtitled and all vital info is provided via text. Text cannot be resized.

Remappable Controls: No, the game’s controls are not remappable.