Ben-DutkaSo Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City is a go and we have both a teaser trailer and the promise of a demo at E3 . And while I may not have my finger on the pulse of the horror nation, I get the feeling that some fans are none too happy with this new "squad-based shooter" approach. And neither am I.
From a personal standpoint, I just see this as another step in the "twitch" direction, and a way of assimilating the shooter craze that currently grips the industry. I sense a faster pace, I sense more gore rather than nicely designed fear, and I sense exactly what I consider to be a mainstream concession. Japanese developers have been trying for years to cater to the Western audiences and thus far, their only plan involves making games faster and dumber. I've played every RE iteration and I think anyone will tell you that part of the fear we experience came from being alone .
It's part of the reason why Silent Hill , or any fear-based entertainment product that features a lone individual, is so damn creepy. It's just one person against God knows what; I say "God knows what" because what scrapes and thuds in the dark is always ten times more frightening than the reality. It's how the human imagination works, and something the true masters of terror well understood. By bringing in a "squad," you immediately remove that crucial aspect; the part of our brain that harps on the inherent fear of being alone. Plus, based on the teaser trailer, it's not a difficult leap to surmise that action, not growing tension and anxiety, will be the name of the game.
That might turn out well, but it just ain't as scary. I'm sorry. This announcement has, however, increased one fear that resides within me: the fear that at some point, every single game available will be all about speed and reflexes, and the faster something is, the "better" it will be perceived to be. …at which point, I'll be done with gaming. …okay, that's a small exaggeration, I admit. 😉
I feel the same way Ben. I did play and loved RE5 but it was def a departure from what I had experienced with previous RE games. I really wish they would go back to a more "classic" RE formula.
I enjoyed RE5's gameplay, even though it wasn't as scary as previous iterations, it was still a fun action game.
Only thing that ruined it for me was the horrible computer controlled partner who kept getting in the way and that damn 9 slot limitation for items and ammo.
For me, Dead Space took over where Resident Evil left off, and Mass Effect has taken over where Final Fantasy should've been, king of RPG's this gen.
I miss turn-based RPG games.
Ya the ai could be extremely frustrating. I played quite a bit of it by myself but played a few times with friends and family and it was a much more enjoyable experience. I def agree with you about dead space it is a awesome series.
There's a lot of classic formulas I wish games would go back to.
That's what I've been trying to tell everyone. But I'll add, and I've said this before, the only way I think they could or should even try the squad thing is if the game is based on HUNK and his team. But even then it may even be a bit of a stretch.
Yeah this game won't be anywhere near the top of my list. I'd like to think that this is just a big cycle though and that twitching won't become the be all end all for games. Some day people will tire of it and demand thoughtful games become the epitome of quality.
Its a RE game so its at the top of my list. Unfortunately, my reasoning is why crap like this happens and games can sell on name alone. FML i guess.
True and true, I would never put this game on the same list as Infamous 2, Uncharted 3, Dark Souls, etc.
While this squad thing might be fun for a while it will never be as good in quality as a fully developed story-based RE.
What I wanna see is that we always get swarmed by craploads of zombies whenever we go into combat.
Since it's a squad-based shooter we can forget about horror but at least there's a lot of room for more thrills.
True. I sense a Left 4 Dead clone in the mist.
There had better be limited ammo and really dark corners making it hard to see what's coming at you, along with big environments allowing for your team to be split up or surrounded.
That just might, MIGHT bring back some of the fear factor. Here's hoping it happens.
I only give them a pass because it's a spinoff, but if it's still kind of messed up that they're actually basing a whole game on squad play…
They're really ruining everything that made RE…RE
These Japanese devs are killing their franchises:
-DmC
-RE
-FF
Wonder which is next
yeah at least it's a spinoff, but RE5 wasn't and it shoulda been.
Kingdom Hearts
Viewtiful Joe
Monster Hunter
Mega Man
Please Japan, just…. please, stop "Westernising" your games.
Make it for the Japanese fans, and slap English subtitles or voiceovers on it. It's why your old games were so adored.
Sadly, if FF XIII is anything to go by, their formula is working. Some CoD gamers are getting into the popular franchises, not knowing what they were once like and loving it. The old fans have been ignored, the fans who have stuck by them all this time.
If Square-Enix do make an FF VII remake, PLEEEEASE retain the Materia and turn-based battle system!!! Overhaul the graphics, style, presentation, gameplay elements, audio, music, and maybe some of the broken script in some places, just PLEASE leave the battle system alone!!!!
It's funny how horror can be such a slippery slope from scary to needless gory slaughter.
Look at The Hills Have Eyes, a pretty solid experience with lots of unseen tenseness, then THHE 2 was a squad based military infiltration and yeah it sucked.
Dead Space is the only title I know to mix both heavy shooter gore and unknown suspense perfectly. It truly deserves to be on top. Even RE creators admited they can't match Dead Space's quality!!
I played RE5, but I would rate it as mediocre so I'll stop there because this looks even worse. Honestly, I don't believe series like this that have departed from the original formula so much in recent installments will ever get even close to what they used to be.
They will lose some of us, but they'll, probably, gain a few people too. RE will survive but I lost interest after RE5.
The sad thing is RE5 was an okay game, it just should never have been an RE game.
I enjoyed RE5, but I agree that it wasn't a real RE game, it just wasn't scary.
RE4 was a great game but like RE5, it wasn't scary either
Thank God for those Wii remakes of RE 1 and Zero!!! At least some people got a taste of classic RE goodness.
If Sony could get their hands on HD remakes of the Wii/GCN trilogy version of RE Zero, 1, 2 and 3, THAT would be in my HD remake Collection wishlist just under ICO and SotC.
Though RE4 wasn't as scary as previous games it still had a lot more frightening moments than 5 did. I remember back tracking for the first time through the first part of the town after night fall. It was pretty creepy. There wasn't a single moment like that in RE5.
Well this is a spinoff, so hopefully when the hardcore fans of the series get really vocal (and most already have) they will make RE6 a real RE.
This shouldn't surprise you Ben. Capcom has been crap this entire generation. They are so out of ouch it's not even funny. I think they forgot how to make games in general. Their goal seems to be that of pleasing the Xbot. Ever since this gen started they have done nothing but try and appeal to the bot by making every game an action twitch fest while out sourcing all their franchise(well, most of their franchises) to western developers who's focus seems to be MS's console. Not to mention their stated goel at the beginning was to make Xbox exclusives so they could "get a strong foothold" in the western market. That was an utter failure. Even Capcom-Unity(which I used to be apart of but no longer) has turned into a haven for Xbots. There's nothing but hostilty towards anyone who doesn't praise the Xbox or agree with the direction Capcom has gone. They used to disappoint me greatly but no more. I say screw'em. They don't care about the fans who made them what they are so why care about them?
In the famous words of Eric J Hinton, "I f**kin' hate Microsoft.
So true. In fact it's well known that Capcom staff and Microsoft staff members have close contact with each other (A LOT).
It's obvious Microsoft flings money at them all the time.
I think MS bought up a huge share of their stock too if I'm not mistaken. Kinda how Sony owns a good portion of Square Enix. Too bad Square Enix isn't as loyal to their share holders as Capcom is to theirs.
I'm willing to try this out. I have low expectations, but I hope Capcom can redeem themselves from their evil ways.
And oh how I missed the PS2 days, I was 12 and I was playing RE4 for the first time. I remember seeing the chainsaw guy, having a freakout of out fear, shooting ever as if I had a spazm, I immediately turned off my PS2 XD
The best kind of horror in my eyes, is suspense, because as Ben said, nothing we see will ever be as scary as how we make ourselves feel, wondering what "it" is.
Granted we haven't seen much from this game, but I'm thinking it's going to be a zombified gore fest beyond anything else. Sad.
I always say I'm not a fan of horror, but the truth is that, if it's good I love it. It's just 90% of all "horror" movies and games are lacking in any kind of decent story. Movies are about blood, guts, and guns. Games are about blood, guns, and thinks jumping on your back and making you pound a button to wiggle them off.
I don't consider this "jump out" tactic horror or scary. It can startle you, but that just isn't the same as the feeling of dread you get when it's dark, you're alone, and you hear that noise. The slow scratch that tears your heart as easily as the metal that grinds in the shadow. Your mind racing, heart pounding, where is that coming from feeling.
That's what I want out of horror, a story and fear. Real fear. I want to have to stop playing because my heart is racing, palms and neck are sweaty, eyes dilated. They have the tech, where's the game?
Couldn't have said it better myself.
I'm an old school Bio Hazard gamer. There's alot of stuff I want to say but I will just get to the point. I just think BH/RE is taking a turn for the worse. Everytime they tried, they failed miserably, and this squad thing is just the kicker.
The series and Capcom for that matter has gone down hill ever since Shinji Mikami left.
Instead of trying to improve on what Mikami made in 2005, Capcom instead only did a few tweaks and call it a sequel that was Resident Evil 5.
"because what scrapes and thuds in the dark is always ten times more frightening than the reality."
EXACTLY!
thats the whole essence of horror games!
whats lurking in the shadows, what keeps making those scary noises, what keeps snatching people around you, is far more scary then if that thing actually came out and you could see it!
its our imagination, we imagine things much worse and scarier then what could actually be!
thats what made aliens so scary!
cant remember what the games called, i think its amnesia.
its on steam, and its about exactly that a guy wakes up in a haunted house, cant remember a thing and is slowly loosing his sanity!
your constantly walking around the house trying to find clues, and your constantly surrounded by the lurking darkness but you never see it.
thats what makes it so scary!
i wish we could go back to the 90s, people then really knew and appreciated horror!
i wish stephen king would do a game!
always loved his books, especially IT!
best horror story ever created!
as i said the other day RE is dead!
so is the survival horror genre!
🙁
R.I.P the best and shortest lived genre in history!
Last edited by ___________ on 4/2/2011 3:00:55 AM
Oh yeah, survival horror's dead. Except for Dead Space, Amnesia: The Dark Descent, possibly the new Silent Hill…
Btw, please don't respond with "Dead Space isn't scary." Screw you. You must have nerves of steel or are completely desensitized by a massive amount of survival horrors, because that's one of the scariest games I've ever played. So please, I don't want your BS, just don't reply with that.
i remember how awesome i thought it would be to return to racoon city when i heard of racoon city chronicles just be extremely dissapointed to get an on rails shooter.
hopefully this ends up better than that.
fully agree, i want a character, mercs are dull.
I love resident evil but I think they need to stop making the franchise I was not really all that impressed with RE5.
Now another Fatal Frame I would be really happy those games are so scary and so much fun.
i love resi…..resi 5 was ok…..but im still not sure about this game yet tho co op does sound fun
The co-op is the only part that could redeem this game. If that is done well I might, MIGHT give it a chance. Chances say otherwise though, they'll probably just add a bunch of Team Death Match, Capture the flag modes, etc. instead.
yeh same as me co op done well i may get it thats what has me interested
ditto ben….
This seems to be an evolution of Resident Evil Outbreak, which was also a spinoff, so I'm not exactly sure why all the tears are being shed.
And if people want to REALLY want to know why the trend is going that way look at your own best games of this gen lists. Uncharted 2 is a digestible, linear, heavily scripted shooter. Fantastic, but as the gal would say, it is what it is. And GoW 3,KZ2, and so forth and so on. Where's Valkyria Chronicles or Demon's Souls? Nah, we wait 3 years to buy that but buy KZ3 and Crysis 2 day one. Right. Way to show those hard working Japanese devs we appreciate games that take some thought. Also, this insutry was built on speed. Even Tetris required you to process the situation and act quickly. The reson why Square introduced ATB. Heck,even chess tournaments have chess clocks ( blitz chess, anyone?). When it comes to video games, if you need an exorbitant time to decide a course of action, eh, maybe scrapbooking or astronomy is more your 'speed'.
And to those who own a Wii and still trash Capcom, pick up Zack and Wiki or Monster Hunter Tri and still try to say Capcom is selling out. Oh wait. There are those pesky games that require thought again….
It's one thing for a series to do what it does and do it well, it's another for it to devolve and switch genres to appeal to a larger, more mainstream, fan base.
Your arrogance is astonishing as is your capacity for self delusion.
How is this anything like Outbreak?
Yeah. Demon's Souls and all RPGs aren't faster than the turn-based games of yesteryear. And this new RE won't be faster than any REs before it.
Yes. I'll just agree with inane ideas for the sake of avoiding argument.
I can see what Porkchop is saying. And yes, while I know not everyone will agree with what he says, it's hard to ignore what he is saying is happening. To deny it is to be delusional. This new Resident Evil is indeed another form of Outbreak (if anyone on here has actually played both of them). They were team based and slow, and since the PS2 didn't really have a great online interface, they were boring. I think putting you in the shoes of those who were playing clean up in Raccoon City is a pretty awesome idea. We've had the scares and the chills. That was Resident Evil 2/3. Now let's see what the military was doing. I mean we all know the City eventually gets nuked so I don't think everyone was fighting to survive. You had to have some force in there kick in' a$$.
Now that's just my two cents on this whole new Resident Evil. As far as Capcom being out of touch with gamers I think so totally, but what are we going to do really? Not buying their games doesn't really hurt them, because there are still millions of others out there who will. See what they did there?
The Scare factor of Resident Evil died when RE4 came out, that game was just totally opposite of scary it was awesome and action packed. Same with 5. I look forward to seeing what Slant Six does with the co-op story. Not so much the multi-player.
News like this make this make me wish that there's a remake of Fatal Frame II on the PS3. Now that game IS scary! I hope that Tecmo would make another Fatal Frame game, release it worldwide on the PS3 (Fatal Frame 4 was just on the Wii and was limited to Japan).
Fatal Frame needs to come out this gen. Thee scariest game I ever played. I dont jump @ horror movies or even all RE titles until I played fatal frame. I would try to sleep and I would hear the children and that song from the crimson butterfly. epic imo