What parents need to know
Resident Evil 4 Remake is a remastered version of the Resident Evil 4 game, a 3rd person shooter horror and action game developed and published by Capcom. The game, originally released for the Nintendo Gamecube in 2005, has since seen numerous releases and adaptations on other consoles, including the PlayStation 2 and 3, Wii, Xbox 360, Nintendo Switch, Oculus Quest virtual reality headsets , and PC, a testament to its undeniable popularity. Resident Evil 4 Remake is being released 18 years after the original Gamecube game.
In Resident Evil 4, the player takes on the role of Leon S. Kennedy, a special agent sent on a mission to a rural village in Spain to find Ashley Graham, the daughter of the President of the United States, who has been kidnapped by a mysterious cult. The player is confronted, as in the other games of the Resident Evil series, with a variety of enemies, including monsters, humanoids infected with a virus, cultists, mutant animals, and more. The game involves exploration, puzzle solving, and combat, all in a variety of hostile environments (village, castle, laboratory, island, quarry, chapel, and more).
What’s new in the Remake version
Among the new features planned in the remastered version of the game, players can expect an accentuated horror atmosphere compared to the original game. As in Resident Evil 4 VR and in the other games of the Resident Evil franchise released since 2006 such as Resident Evil Village, the player can move by aiming with his weapon, which was not possible in the game released in 2005. In addition to modernized gameplay and graphics worthy of the new consoles, the game welcomes surprises in its structure. Ashley Graham’s character has a less passive role and Leon, the main character, can use his knife to deflect blows and kill enemies stealthily. For the rest, it remains to be seen! One thing is for sure, the game is eagerly awaited by fans and looks extremely promising.
Article written with the contribution of Myriam Baulne.
Image and video credits: Capcom
Details
Level of experience required
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Extremely graphic violence with lots of blood and gore. Fear is omnipresent throughout the game. There are some adult themes.
All dialogue is dubbed, but some documents and clues must be read. Reading challenge is at an intermediate level.
Some characters use vulgar or suggestive language. Threats of violence.
It’s a horror game that has a happy ending, but hints at a sequel.
The difficulty can be changed during the game, especially if you die frequently, the game will offer you to switch to Assisted mode. Once the difficulty is lowered, it is no longer possible to remount it in the same save.
Normal difficulty setting offers significant challenges. It takes a lot of reflexes and dexterity to get out of it.
Intermediate dexterity is required to progress well in the game. It’s important to have a good grasp of the 3D camera movement and to be comfortable with the combat mechanics.
Just need to buy the game once. Exclusive upgrade tickets for weapons on sale for $2.99 each (microtransactions), purchase optional.
Microtransactions were added 2 weeks after the game’s release: exclusive weapon upgrade tickets can be purchased for $2.99 each and can be used at the merchant to unlock weapon upgrades faster. The player can progress without the purchase of these tickets and unlock the upgrades as they play, so these are easily avoidable and optional transactions.
Local game modes
There’s the traditional story/adventure mode.
And a Mercenaries mode that offers you to play as and unlock the different protagonists of the story and make the highest score by eliminating enemies in parts of the story levels.
You have to kill several enemies simultaneously, quickly, get the highest score, all in a limited time.
A very fun romp that has benefited from the addition of Ada Wong since the September 21, 2023 update.
Expansions/Add-ons (DLC)
An optional paid DLC is now available for purchase separately as of September 21, 2023.
This is Separate Ways, a mode that allows you to play a short version of the story (about 5 hours) as the spy Ada Wong:
If you’re really into the game, and you want to go through it again with Ada who has a grappling hook, it might be worth getting this expansion. Otherwise, the original story mode is more than enough. This will give you a different perspective on the events that took place and you will be able to understand another part of the scenario.
Our opinion
What more can we say after the game has been nominated for so many awards ceremonies and won so many awards?
Yes, the game is phenomenal. Yes, it’s a great job of rebuilding and updating the game released in 2005. The graphics are beautiful, it plays very well. The impacts of the blows and shots are well transcribed. It’s really fun to play. Everything is well calculated and you can now move while aiming.
There are a lot of things, enemies, details, environments that have changed since the original title. The Remake requires you to collect more valuable items, search for more secrets, and complete more side quests in order to be able to afford the weapons, upgrades, and armor needed to progress. Without it, it becomes difficult to get out of it. This leads to a lot of back and forth to retrieve this or that item that wasn’t accessible before, and the game feels a lot more like Metroidvania than before. Many exploration areas have also been added, and for much of the game, it is possible to go back to the starting area!
It also makes the game less “arcade” and less direct than the original, the lifespan is extended, but depending on your available time, this is not necessarily a good thing, if it’s to look for a blue piece to shoot hidden in the background.
I also don’t like the fact that you have to “craft” or craft your ammo, and collect a lot of resources and then decide what kind of ammo you need. There are many, many weapons and types of ammunition in the game, and this is the way Capcom has found to give us the ammunition for the weapons we use, by choosing ourselves. A simplification of this system, which is useless for my taste, would have been more than appreciated, though.
Nevertheless, I’m happy, I managed to quibble about a great game, and talk about something rarely mentioned.
If you like action games, dexterity games, horror games, or Resident Evil games you will be over the moon with this one.
To go further
In the original title and in the remake, Capcom implemented an adaptive difficulty. The game will adapt to the player’s performance and display more or fewer enemies depending on the number of deaths, the time it takes to get to a specific location or not. In the Remake, we see that it is the number of ammo that is given to the player, which is adapted to his performance. We very often find ourselves running out of ammunition, and most of the time, future crates, and barrels to break, contain plenty of ammunition to get by. Mark Brown from Game Maker’s Toolkit explains it very well in the video below.
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