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Be warned: There will be a ton of spoilers here)
So... Where do we go from here? I've read
ShadowLegend's review on the game and I don't think I've properly reviewed the game. A lot of things he writes register as true.
Having said that, I do think that the game is quite good, it's a game within 7/8 range, but there are flaws to which I will do in great detail.
There's a lot of questionable to plow through...
Resident Evil 6 in some ways, is better than Resident Evil 5, but that was what is expected from Capcom, but as flawed as RE Five was, the controls felt tighter, while they shoehorned some cover mechanics, got rid of puzzles, the physics and the physiology were still very much rooted into Capcom's ancient but tried-and-true formula. With this game in particular, they tried to move away from the old style and much closer to the modern action game. But it didn't quite make the transition properly and as such, it's a hybrid of sorts that tries too hard appeal to everybody.
The cover system? Not only is it poorly implemented, it is also worthless a good 80% of the time. At least in Resident Evil 5, it wasn't as much of an issue because you'd only use it in very specific situations and since the action mostly took place in tight spaces, you could afford to duck and shoot.
In here, you play often times in very wide areas and it's easy to get overwhelmed, this might result in several frustrations. The QTEs are for the most part the biggest stain, this is the only element in the game in which I have no excuse. To Hell to whoever designed and programmed the QTE sections and the QA people who should've said something about their input, failing to properly perform a QTE will likely lead to an instant death or worse perputal limbo.
One clear example is prominentely featured on Leon Kennedy's campaign where [spoiler] Elena and Leon attempting to climb a rope in order to help Ada fight Simmons. The onscreen indication don't help that much. In theory, it makes sense, you have to always have a hand gripping the rope at any given time, you are supossed to have at least one trigger locked in, then release the other one and lock the other, there's a sequence or rather a rhytm to it. But it's not clear, you also cannot die, which might be good or bad, depeding on how you look at it. As simple as that, when you start to reach a certain height, monster Simmons starts chasing you, you have to keep the sequence going and also be on the lookout when Simmons strike as he has the same QTE sequence that you have to press. The only thing he does is knock you down a few meters, but if you miss the rope climbing sequence, you pretty much fall back to the starting point. Your thumbs will be completely numb by that point.[/spoiler] That to me that was the absolute low-point, not only in the Leon campaign, but the entire game. PERIOD. There are a few major QTE sequences in the other campaigns too, but the ones on the Leon campaign are just too much. [spoiler] I've also said nothing about the minor QTE moments where Simmons goes back into human form and you have to punch him as hard as possible and as quick as possible, I kid you not, not even Resident Evil 4 had QTE sequences that were this painful.[/spoiler]
There are also a few noticable issues, it's true that it's the longest game in the series, but it's because of a multitude of "tricks" that artificially extend the playthrough:
- There are a few fetch quests in all of the campaigns in which you have to find three items in order to unlock a door and progress;
- You meet up with characters from different campaigns and for the most part you share the exact same moments [spoiler] Leon and Jake both fight Ustanak, Jake and Chris play the exact same section in Eastern Europe and Ada shares the same sections with Chris, Leon and Jake[/spoiler];
- The boss fights are particularly annoying, because they seem to drag and you end up fighting the same boss throughout the entire campaign;
The other massive issue that bothers me is the automatic save point system which in theory should account for everything, but apparentely their algorythm does not register mid-stage save point, which had me grunting when I booted the game up and discovered that I had to redo a tough fetch quest.
Finally, I get to the story, which had me thinkin' back to Sonic '06's plot and not in a good way. You have to play all the campaigns to completely understand what happened from each individual character's perspective, but even when you are given the complete picture, there's still so much that feels incomplete, much of it has to do [spoiler] the lack of a fully developed antagonist, Simmons, shows up in a cutscene briefly and you almost immediately figure out that he's the main villain. He's the primary antagonist in Leon's campaign, but there are other players in Simmon's operation (an ambigious "Family", Carla Ramades and the "Neo-Umbrella" terrorist group). But like I said before, they are underdeveloped because they sorta show up out of nowhere. This can be most likely attributed to the fact that in Resident Evil 5, Chris took down Albert Wesker and Spencer, they were the major antagonists from the very beggining, they had a history and were developed. So to just throw us this underwritten crew of antagonists make the story feel like a Michael Bay routine, where you have a lot of action, a lot of explosions, a lot of death and carnage, but it's all inconsequential. The "mission accomplished feel good" endings on every single campaign seems like an afterthough.
[/spoiler]
Leon, unfortunately, [spoiler] has the misfortune of having the most uninteresting and bland companion in the form of Helena and her painful one-note "Come with me and I will show you" during the early chapters, irked me. The same with Leon's odd leniency towards Helena's one-note personality. I wasn't too crazy over it. At least, Chris and Piers connect as far as jarheads go. Jake and Sherry also connect and how Jake and Chris have their unsettled dispute. Helena is basically Claire Redfield, but without any charm or chemistry, just calculated melodrama.
Jake, to me, was the most interesting character, but his origin story is a bit puzzling. He's someone in his late teens, but I'm confused over Wesker's brief love affair which took place about 6 years before the events in RE 1, so technically he still hadn't injected himself with T-virus before he got fatally mauled by the Tyrant which eventually gave him those insane super powers that he had onwards. So... I'm sorta confused...[/spoiler]
Finally, my one other gripe is the Skill system, you can slot three skill and change them on the fly during gameplay, but why only 3? Why make them into perks? I would've rather had these unlockable not be confined to only three choices, especially since I prefer to always have Increased Defense and Increased Firepower.
That's it folks.
