I'm a Survivor!

Just finished RE5 with my brother this morning. Not sure if I'm up for a full-fledged review, but as a gamer fairly new to the Resident Evil franchise, I will say I was very pleased with the entire package - the game isn't perfect, but there's nothing really glaringly WRONG with the game, either. It's violent, it's gory, but not in the way the Modern Warfare 2 is; there is no moral relativism-masquerading-as-narrative "depth" here. In fact, without spoiling anything, I dare say the story's themes fit quite well into a well-formed Catholic worldview. I was genuinely surprised by the characterization, too; it's as much of an action game as a horror game, meaning there's equal parts Indiana Jones as there is...well, "Resident Evil" (the movie, of course ;P). Actually, it's better than quite a few movie storylines in the recent past...including the most recent Indiana Jones movie.

It's not a game for the youngsters, and I'm not sure if the game holds up if you go it solo. Without spoiling the more important narrative details, though, I will say this: Resident Evil is a very impressive game. It's visually and aurally outstanding; the narrative is more compelling than most movies from the past year (seriously!), and Capcom managed to synthesize the best elements of a "scare-your-pants-off" atmosphere with action-oriented gameplay (it's not so much a Halo-esque "shooter" as a Devil May Cry "action game") that thrives on cooperation between players rather than competition. It's a little on the short side, and there's nothing truly "innovative" about the actual gameplay itself beyond the cooperative aspect, but it does everything you'd expect - and some things you wouldn't expect - more than adequately. Easily the biggest and best "surprise hit" for 2009.

Readers, please feel free to comment, especially RE: the story in the combox below. I would love to talk about the narrative, characters, etc. in greater depth than this intentionally spoiler-free blog post indicates. Just be careful with spoilers!