#oneaday Day 854: Resident. EEEVIL. FILM!

Today on my holidays, I rode the bus and I went to the cinema and I saw Resident Evil. It was nice and it was fun. I enjoyed the popcorn and the weird drink I had never heard of but which was quite nice.

Switching off the "seven year old writing about their holidays" mode, yes, I did indeed go to see Resident Evil at the cinema today. I had been promising myself this as something to do during my week off, and had always been intending to go while Andie was away, as I seriously doubted (correctly) that Andie would want to go and see it. I treated myself to a seat right at the front of the "nice" seats (the ones that recline!), a bucket of popcorn and a big drink. And it was a good time!

The movie itself is endearingly stupid. If I were to get analytical and critic-y about it, I would say that it is a sequence of largely unrelated vignettes featuring dialogue that primarily consists of the word "fuck", which are all quite entertaining in themselves, and which eventually build to a slightly unsatisfying conclusion. But this is not a movie intended to be taken seriously. It is a movie about spectacle, and wilfully observing that horror and comedy are, more often than not, very much adjacent to one another. It was a genuinely amusing movie — and it's clear that this was entirely intentional, too.

For the unfamiliar, the 2026 Resident Evil movie follows the misadventures of Bryan, a medical courier tasked with delivering a top-priority package to Raccoon City General Hospital. Along the way, his drive through the snowy night is interrupted by him hitting what he believes is a regular human being, but which becomes clear almost immediately is an infected person. He flees into a nearby spooky house after his "victim" causes a passing police officer to crash, and finds himself confronted with a variety of other monsters. The movie then charts his gradual journey towards his eventual destination, with a kind of half-hearted side plot about his fear of becoming a parent with his partner.

Resident Evil is not particularly "good" from a narrative perspective, then. It's largely a sequence of Things Happening, and Bryan's characterisation primarily consists of him saying "fuck" a lot and occasionally exhibiting half-arsed anguish over the fact he left his girlfriend hanging over a conversation about her apparently being pregnant.

But where it does shine is in its wilful adoption of the conventions of survival horror video games. The "everyman" protagonist who is barely competent at the things they end up forced to do as a result of the horrifying situation in which they find themselves. The inexplicable prevalence of locked doors that cannot be opened just by shooting the locks off them. The fact that incidental characters more often than not end up dead just a few minutes after they have been introduced. The gradual escalation of stakes in rough parallel with the level of firepower the protagonist has. And the way that, after not very long at all, you are almost desensitised to the sight of blood and gore, because there has just been so much of it.

In short, the film is primarily entertaining because of its overall vibes, rather than anything especially clever or noteworthy that it is doing with narrative, themes and characterisation. That's no bad thing, mind; if there's one thing Resident Evil as a video game series has never been strong on, it's narrative, themes and characterisation. The series knows that it is dumb and has always been dumb, and prides itself on its predictability in many ways — but that doesn't, in any way, stop it from being enjoyable. In fact, for many people, it is this "switch your brain off and just enjoy the absurdity" mentality that keeps them coming back for more Resident Evil games; the series is a deliberate and stark contrast to Silent Hill in this regard, and it means that the two can happily coexist, despite the original Silent Hill being initially regarded as Konami's response to Capcom's series back on its original release.

So I enjoyed the Resident Evil movie, then, and I'm glad I went to see it at the cinema. The big screen and the general environment added to the experience a great deal; the fact seeing a movie at the cinema is something you cannot help but enjoy in the moment, without external distractions (hopefully — turn your fuckin' phone off!) really helped, too.

I'm not going to be in any rush to see it again or pick it up on Blu-Ray or anything, but I am glad I went, I am glad I experienced it — and I agree with many people that, while it has many shortcomings taken as a movie on its own merits, as an adaptation of its source material and an homage to video games in general, it does a fantastic job.

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#oneaday Day 644: Resident EEEEEVIL... SIX

I'm playing Resident Evil 6 right now, in my ongoing attempts to Finally Catch Up on the series as a whole. I had been led to believe that this one was Not Very Good, but I've been enjoying it so far. It's definitely leaning hard on the action angle rather than feeling like "traditional" survival horror, and it's very setpiece-led and linear, but it's been enjoyable so far. It's definitely the most "big budget action movie" the series has been up until this point, and I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing; we are, after all, talking about a series that has always involved rocket launchers, cartoonishly evil villains and giant slobbering monsters.

I'm intrigued to see how the other characters' campaigns play. I am currently on the last chapter of Leon's campaign, and that has definitely been quite action-focused. Supposedly the other campaigns each have their own distinct gameplay focus, so I am intrigued to find out what that really means — or if, as I suspect, it is just marketing waffle that doesn't really mean anything.

The game clearly being designed for co-op play isn't nearly as bothersome as it was in Resident Evil 5, as your computer-controlled partner when playing solo isn't a complete idiot, and you don't have to worry about managing their inventory, health and ammunition. Plus the overall way the game controls feels much more up-to-date than Resident Evil 5's cumbersome control method did; Resident Evil 6 pretty much uses the conventions of modern third-person shooters, with the only real concession to survival horror tradition being the necessity to hold a button to draw your weapon and aim, rather than being able to fire "from the hip".

There have been some spectacular moments so far, and a few mildly annoying bits, but on the whole it's been a worthwhile journey so far, and I'm glad I've taken the time to play through all the games in the series up until this point. It's a series that has a thoroughly interesting history — and the recent remakes are rare examples of remakes making things significantly better than their predecessors. The PlayStation originals of the first three will always be special to me, mind, as I was playing them during what was probably the happiest period of my life.

I wonder if Code Veronica will ever get the remake treatment? It's certainly a prime candidate for it, but it also sometimes feels like an entry in the series Capcom would rather we all forgot about. It's the only entry in the series that there's no easy way to play on modern platforms today (either in "original" or "remake" form) and that's a bit of a shame; it was a significant moment for the series, being its first shift into full 3D, although my one enduring memory of it is not picking up enough grenade launcher ammunition to be able to beat the boss on the plane at the end of Claire's first section!

Anyway, Resident Evil 6 is fun. Some may well argue that it's not very "Resident Evil", but honestly, having played a big chunk of the series now, like many long-running series, it is not, and never has been, one simple thing. Resident Evil 6 is just an example of it going in one particular direction — and, from what I understand, the seventh goes a very different way after that, too. No bad thing! I'm looking forward to finally getting on to the most recent ones, as I've heard lots of good things about them, though have managed to remain mostly unspoiled on them, too.

There's four campaigns of gloriously silly action movie nonsense to survive first, though, so I better get on with it!

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#oneaday Day 635: Revelated

I finished Resident Evil Revelations 2 this evening. I've got what I think will be an interesting article in the tank for some point in the not too distant future, so I want to save that for MoeGamer. I do want to talk a bit about the game, though, so here I am!

I say "finished" — I've beaten the four main episodes and seen both the "bad" and "good" endings. I haven't yet done the two extra episodes; it's getting late tonight, so I will likely save those for tomorrow.

I was initially dismayed that getting the "bad" ending is the result of making a choice halfway through the third episode that would seem to make narrative sense at the time, and a bit annoyed that correcting this "mistake" would involve having to replay half of the third episode and the finale half of the fourth episode — about 3 hours' gameplay in total. But then I figured that I was already invested in this story and game, so I might as well do it.

So I did it this evening — and I enjoyed it! It helped that for the finale chapter, I had unlocked one of the bonus weapons with infinite ammo, so this all but eliminated any worries over not having enough ammo for the final boss. You can only get a "C" rank for a chapter if you use a bonus weapon, but I was primarily in it for the story, so I wasn't particularly interested in getting a high rank. The additional "stuff" in the "good ending" was definitely worth the effort required.

For the unfamiliar, Resident Evil Revelations 2 determines which ending you will get based on which of the two playable characters finishes off a boss. This isn't a matter of simply fighting as the "correct" character, since there's a narrative consideration: throughout the relevant part of the game in question, only the "lead" character, recurring series heroine Claire Redfield, is able to use firearms, and her companion, Moira Burton, is traumatised from a past event and unable to even contemplate picking up a gun. During the sequence in question, Claire ends up pinned by the boss monster in its death throes, and you have the choice between either making her use her willpower to reach her dropped gun, or switching to Moira and giving her a nudge in the direction of overcoming her trauma.

Okay, yes, it's unrealistic and probably disrespectful to anyone suffering similar trauma, but it does make narrative sense for the more "dramatic" option — Moira overcoming her fear and blasting the shit out of the monster to save Claire — to be the "correct" choice that leads to the "good" ending. My initial frustration was down to the fact that I also felt it made sense for Claire to be the one to make the kill; as a generally nice human being, Claire would have respect for Moira's trauma and thus wouldn't want to make her pick up a gun if she didn't absolutely have to.

But part of Resident Evil Revelations 2's narrative concerns our responses to fear and trauma — the game's virus affects people differently according to how much fear they feel — and thus the concept of someone becoming stronger as a direct result of overcoming their fear, which is what is implied happens to Moira to allow her to survive being buried under a bunch of rubble, does make sense, in retrospect. And having to replay those two half-episodes didn't take that long altogether.

Anyway, I enjoyed Resident Evil Revelations 2 a whole lot! I think it's a very good Resident Evil game, and one I suspect often gets overlooked due to technically being a "spinoff". Its original release as a downloadable episodic game (remember that brief trend?) probably didn't help it either, but these days you can just buy the whole thing (including what used to be DLC) on a disc and enjoy it all in one go. And I recommend you do that, because it's a really great take on the series that strikes a good balance between the more action-oriented nature of post-4 Resident Evil games, and the traditional "survival horror" feel of the earlier titles.

Intrigued to try the extra episodes tomorrow, and then move on to Resident Evil 6. I understand people don't like Resident Evil 6 all that much, but as regular readers will know, I often take "people don't like this" as a challenge and do my best to find the good in it. Will I manage that with Resident Evil 6? I have no idea at this point — but if not, I can at least take solace from the fact that some of the series' most well-regarded recent entries await on the other side.

For now though, bed, and doubtless a few dreams about slobbering monsters.

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#oneaday Day 634: Revelations... too

With all the talk over Resident Evil Requiem recently, I thought it about time I resumed my efforts to catch up on the series. When I last left off, I had played all of the mainline games (in the form of their most recent incarnations/remakes) up to and including the first "episode" of Resident Evil Revelations 2, which means after that I still have Resident Evil 6, 7, Village and now Requiem still to go also.

I forget why I pressed pause on Revelations 2, because returning to it now, I'm enjoying it a lot. I remember when Resident Evil 4 was first announced, I was skeptical about the series' apparent shift towards being more action-oriented, but the two Revelations games are underappreciated examples of this working really well, having shed the clunkiness from the original incarnations of Resident Evil 4 and 5 to behave a bit more like how we today understand a conventional third-person shooter to play.

That said, Revelations 2 doesn't feel like a relentless third-person shooter; it's nicely paced, with a nice ebb and flow between moments of quiet menace and dread, and moments of all-out action. It's still got enough "survival horror" in its DNA to make it so that if a zillion enemies are coming your way, the best thing to do is, in fact, to run rather than attempt to fight them all off, since standing your ground will almost certainly result in you running out of ammunition.

The two story threads, visiting many of the same locations six months apart, work well and are intriguing enough to keep things interesting, but the game never lets its narrative aspect overwhelm the gameplay side of things; this is a game where it feels like playing the game is the important bit, and a snippet of story is your reward for succeeding. Over the years, I've had changing thoughts about the relationship between story and narrative, and I'm still not sure I have one, single coherent position — it generally depends what mood I'm in — but at the moment, I'm very much enjoying the fact that in Resident Evil Revelations 2, you spend the majority of your time actually doing stuff.

Also the game fully embraces the cheese factor. One of the first lines in the game features an admirably excruciating pun about terrorism that part of me can't quite believe made it into the final script, and frequently throughout the rest of the game, characters reference some of the most notorious moments in the early games' terrible dialogue sequences. Yes, that includes "master of unlocking" and "Jill sandwich" — albeit it's "Claire sandwich" here.

Another nice thing about Resident Evil Revelations 2 is that, much like earlier entries in the series, the whole thing has no shame whatsoever about being a video game. Finish an episode and you unlock special "Countdown" and "Invisible" modes, challenging you to make it through the same scenarios with special conditions. The real long-term appeal comes from the "Raid" mode, though, which is a development of something introduced in the first Revelations. Here, you take control of a character in a series of completely narrative-free, arcade-style challenges and battle for high scores, power-ups and goodies. You can play it multiplayer, too, and I bet it's a ton of fun to do so — maybe one day I might actually get to try it with someone, although nailing anyone down for a multiplayer session of something these days is, much like anything else involving social interaction, like pulling teeth.

Anyway, regardless, I'm having a lot of fun with Revelations 2 right now. I'm just about to start the fourth and final episode this evening, then after that I'll have to decide if I want to fiddle around with some of the extra modes, or move right on to Resident Evil 6. I know people don't like Resident Evil 6 very much, but I am curious to play it — and if I'm doing the whole series, I might as well give the less popular entries a chance. (For the record, so far my least favourite by far has been Resident Evil 5, which does not surprise me, given its less than stellar reputation. But I was at least open to trying it, and I didn't hate it by any means.)

On that note, then, it's time to go… back to the mansion! Wait, no, that's something else.

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