EmigoiFinally done with Resident Evil 2. It quite nicely builds up on the first game while leaning more into the actiony side (or at least I think so? personal perception can be wild sometimes). It still maintains that exploration loop while also making it "friendlier" by just improving on the fluency of the core mechanics. For example, moving feels more precise while giving you more space and the combat is snappier even with the increase of the number of enemies. 1/5
The campy side is still there which provides the most needed relief from the constant tension that is present while you play. I think it is also interesting that even after making the story more prominent and removing a few friction points from the gameplay side (more cutscenes, more notes, more resources and they even give 2 save items right there at every save point) RE2 still maintains that edge from the first one. The main part I didn't vibe with is the Big Bad. 2/5
Without too many spoilers, the Big Bad mutates quite a bit and turns into a kind of "monstrosity"? And I just think that works less than just a "boring" slowly walking humanlike Tyrant. Though they do play with that in the 2nd Scenario but I would love to see even more done with it. Btw, there is 2 parallel scenarios (the standard one and a kind of new game+) that show what happened from 2 perspectives (Claire and Leon). 3/5
The 2 stories together don't make sense if taken at face value but I really like stories crafted around unreliable narrators and I would love to see games play around with that structure. If books can do that, games can also do that especially with how much harsher they can ground you in a particular character perspective. 4/5
In any case, Resident Evil 3 is next. I look forward to what they've done in that one. It also has a tagline - Nemesis, which, if they do lean into the horror part more, could result in what I wanted to see more (HUGE MAN walking) and depending on how hard they do that it could be really messed up... in a good way! 5/5