A scrawny single PC CD-Rom; a guy with a bemused look on the title cover, and a horde of zombies was where Resident Evil’s first installment was born. Damn, those were the good ol’ days, just like grandpa used to exclaim. What happened to the arsenal of horror survival game? Is it safe to say that Resident Evil is still going to be a household name?

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t was 1996 when the first Resident Evil installment held its head high in public. Mountain bikes were hot, tube TVs were the craze and bulky monitors were where this game laid its foundation for the survival horror genre. People from all walks of life just loved this game way too much – so much so that it became a popular norm.

Within a time span of 16 years, Resident Evil vicariously crafted itself among its loyalist community as a benchmark. All thanks to the loyalists, it is still the same title that isn’t being hailed as much. Why? Some of those so-called loyalists believe that now the game has become more about making money, milking the long established brand name and vice versa.

 Resident Evil 6 Trailer | Courtesy – Vimeo

Resident Evil 6 – Where Art Thou?

Guess what, Resident Evil 6 was just released in Black Edition on Xbox recently. Like always, despite of knowing that this is just going to be another title to ditch our expectations, we still downloaded and played the game. Yes, we all did and it wasn’t such a great experience after all.

Let us rewind our gears a little bit. About 78% of the loyalist community believes that it was Resident Evil 4 (Release Year 2005), the groundhog classic which was the pinnacle of perfection. From then on, CAPCOM witnessed a significant increase in the proportion of overall RE game likes.

But ever since then, perhaps it was called a lets-not-try-to-create-a-masterpiece again day, the developers haven’t really dabbled in creating anything better. We have our graphic cards, we have the best game creation engines but what we lack is a restoration of good old faith in popular games.

Compared to RE4 and RE5, Resident Evil 6 is no good either. In fact, if anything, this particular game stems from lousy direction and further distancing from the classic genre gameplay elements. On the upside, what we do have is three different campaigns, all combined together to form one major title in this series.

Leon, Chris and Wesker’s very own son are playable characters. All of them have got unique HUD, different abilities and personalities that some of us either like or hate to the guts. On the contrary, having three different campaign versions also kind of disturbs that much needed sense of uniformity.

Take Leon’s campaign in Resident Evil 6 as an example of survival horror emulation. Chris has somehow become more of a badass character who shoots first and asks questions later. Same goes for Jake, Wesker’s “child” who has a collection of a virulent viral arsenal, ready to be disposed off at a moment’s notice.

Resident Evil 6 | Three Campaigns Make Up for an Imbalanced Gameplay:

As for the strong elements of the Resident Evil 6 campaign triathlon,, you can say:

• Players can link in co-op modes
• Tandem of different playable characters other than the main ones
• Dependency and likeness towards one character
• Refined control AT the cost of old gameplay style

You see, the above attributes don’t really define what I could personally call a good game. For argument’s sake, take the graphics away, take away all the glitz and glam around RE6, you will see that there’s nothing to it. All they did was enable player nudging, camera mode adjustments and some other perks that a true loyalist will denounce anytime.

What most RE loyalists love is how they can identify their sentiments with Leon’s campaign and that’s it. If it is about making the price worth the admission, the other two characters are just a diverse insight into something unusual.

Would George Romero Toss in His Grave?

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eorge Romero was, and still is, one of the founding fathers of horror genre. By his standards, where does RE6 lie? I’d say that when we are trying to judge the game from the perspective of a true horror classic, Resident Evil 6 lacks a lot. True horror is about transgressions of boundaries, while yet remaining within a limit.

True horror is about making use of classic elements that most developers from today’s day and age don’t have anymore. Having said that, I know that I have pissed off a lot of modern gamers. The younger generation that drools over graphics and wanks off to gory details will find this game as another good piece of entertainment.

To us fellas, who have spent 20 years growing up, careering and creating memories, RE6 is just another big fat flop. Cmon’ CAPCOM, when you are saying that the developers are giving it their “all” to bring a creative overhaul to the audience, we really expect it from you. Stop selling yourself so short! Run and Gun shooters? Sigh… gimme a break please.