Transcript
Speaker: Hello Pandalorians and welcome to the best of Season 6. Hard to believe we've reached this milestone already. Kicking things off, we have our most listened to episode of the season with 675 plays as of recording. Join Luke from the Howdy Beans podcast and I as we discuss the remakes of Resident Evil 2 and 3 for Resident Evil Month.
Speaker: But the real question is, did they hold up? Well, only one way to find out. Without any further ado, hope you enjoy.
Speaker: After what went down at the Spencer Podcasting House, I decided to return to good old Red Panda City, unaware of what new horrors would emerge. I thought things would have settled down by now, but turns out the Brawley Corporation had other plans.
Speaker: Howdy, Satsu. Nice night for a monologue, isn't it?
Speaker: I was about to agree with Luke when... I mean, yeah, totally. Anyway, what are you doing out and about? Well, I was bored. I decided I'll go get a milkshake, but then a horde of zombies decided to burn down the shop. So I had to go buy one at a supermarket for about £10. That's terrible! I know! These prices are getting ridiculous. No, not that. Although, yeah, that is bad, but... ah The situation is far worse than I thought. We have to head over to the RPD as soon as possible. Surely you don't mean the Red Panda Department? I'm afraid so. The Brawley Corporation have infected the entire city. If we can get the pod pack together, we can stop this threat once and for all. Which reminds me, where is everybody? I think they all ran out of town when the big muscle zombies started hunting them down. Oh, that makes sense. Big zombie what now?
Speaker: AHH!
Speaker: Oh well. What can you do?
Speaker: Welcome to Resident Evil Munch, everybody.
Speaker: Hello everybody and welcome to the second episode of... Resident Evil Month. My name's Satunami, and joining me is none other than the one and only star, or should I say stars, of the pod back is Luke from the Howdy Beans podcast. Luke, welcome back. It's an absolute pleasure. And by the way, that was an incredible pun. I don't care what anybody says. That was great. I am a star. I'm stars. Stars. Stars. Then again, Nemesis in Resident Evil 3 Remake is just not as menacing as his voice. He's more of an annoyance, really. He's more like, Stars, hi. Hey, guys. Hi, guys. I'm Stars. I'm part of the pack. Hi. Don't make fun of me. I'm wearing trash. Don't worry about that. Oh, we'll get to him. Don't you worry. So today we are going to be tackling quite possibly one of the hardest games to talk about in this series. And not because it was difficult by any means. I mean, parts of it was, but again, we'll get to that. But because one of these games we're going to be talking about today is so beloved by the fandom, and the other one is... Oh, no! so much yeah it's very ridiculed for obvious reasons but of course before we dive into this game these games are definitely worth talking about in depth but i'm going to turn it on to you first luke oh joey What is your experience, say, with the franchise as a whole? Before we get into the remakes, of course, did you play the originals? Did you know about them growing up? What was your experience? Well, no, I never played them, to be honest. No, I was a big girl's blouse because I love horror. But when it comes to actually playing a horror game, a survival horror game, I was never brave enough, to be honest. And it wasn't until Dead Space, which was a third person game where I could see around me and it wasn't first person that I actually got a bit more confidence in playing them. So Resident Evil was something that I... always wanted to play an experience but was never brave enough to do and it wasn't till the Resident Evil 2 remake came out and it was over the shoulder it was third person where I was like you know what I think I can do this I was still terrified going in to be completely honest I didn't know what to expect and it's known for being a very scary sort of franchise so going into it it was a scary experience but manageable one and especially how the game gives you the option of standard or assisted and me being me I was like well first time going in I'm a rough I'm going to go in complete assist mode and just make it really, really easy. And then once I went for my second playthrough as Claire, I was a bit more cocky, to be honest, a bit braver. So I went as standard and got my ass handed to me by Mr. X, to be honest. But yeah, Resident Evil has always been around. I always loved the movies, even though they get a bit cheesy as they went on. I've always been a big fan. So it was a franchise and series I always wanted to get into. But it wasn't until recently with the newer remakes and being able to play them over the shoulder is what got me into it. them like i still haven't played really resident evil 7 or village because they're first person now i know you can play village in third person now through the update but for the longest time you couldn't so i was just like no i'm interested but no because it's too scary first person is any horror games is just too scary for me even if i'm playing during the day i just can't do it i can watch horror movies all day every day but you put me in a first person video game i'm like i can't do it if you ever play daily in isolation you know how bad it can be so not for me but yeah i am a huge fan of resident evil now i've played resident evil 2 remake free remake and I've got Resident Evil 4 on the burner it's ready to go I bought the gold edition of all the DLC so I'm looking forward to carrying on Leon's story there I'm excited for the new Resident Evil which you can play that in both first person and third person I'm looking forward to that so I am slowly getting braver with this franchise and wanting to experience the older games and Code Veronica I'm really fascinated in that one so I hope that that's the next remake and we can go into that one so yeah I've got a lot of things that I love and enjoy about the series but yeah when it comes to first person nah I can't do it. I mean, I don't know what you're talking about. Resident Evil 7 isn't scary. No, it isn't. Well, no, that one isn't. But I've heard it's more fun to play with friends instead of on your own because it gets a bit boring and annoying. Well, yeah, it's the feel -good game of the decade. Yeah, century, decade. whatever just play it you need to bring a friend with you to get through it i mean i didn't and i regret it so does my backlog of trousers but that's another matter to talk about but yeah i see what you mean and it's interesting to see how so many people have gotten into the franchise because of the remakes because for me and this is something you'll probably hear throughout resident evil month that i got into the series because i played the remake of the fourth game one of my friends gave me a thought okay, I guess I'll play it. You know, got nothing better to do because I think I was coming off the back of, maybe it was Mass Effect 1. I think it was, yeah. I do remember you talking, but I've just started playing it. I'm like, it's really good. And I'm like, I know. And I thought, okay, I'll play it. And I fell in love with it. I thought, this is amazing. I really want to talk about it. And then I thought, you know what? I might as well try the other games, much to my dismay, I want to say, because for some reason, I had bought the Humble Bundle way back when, of all the Resident Evil. games i could i don't know why i bought them i'm gonna be honest i am very similar to you look in the sense that i've only just started getting into certain horror games on twitch i have played games like little nightmares outlast i say i like little nightmares i can handle that because it's not in your face like you zoomed out enough where you can see what's coming outlast on the other hand terrifying i had to play that with my cousin when we were younger it was absolutely hilarious watching us get terrified but no we'd never complete it no it's terrifying to complete it but it is terrifying same with condemned criminal origins great game but the one where you're in the abandoned mall and get the mannequins that come alive yeah i still have nightmares about that yeah where you just walk up to and he just nonchalantly walks away and i was like i don't like this game i'm gonna be honest yeah so i've played games like that and then i reviewed dead space the remake with the one and only dan from casting slash gaming views love that game terrifying but still loved it And, you know, there's a certain element, I suppose, that I want to have between horror and being able to defend myself in a horror game, if that makes sense. Yeah. For example, years and years ago, and that means probably over a decade ago, but my very good friend Adam and I, we had a horror game night for, it was near Halloween, and we played through a lot of different horror games like Amnesia, which is a very slow burner, so we don't really get scared that much. We played Emily Wants to Play. That was terrifying. Do not hide in the closet. Adam, you know what I mean. I tried hiding. It did not work. We played Five Nights at Freddy's, which is scary initially, but the more and more repetition you get, the more you're like, oh, right, okay. Yeah, as the franchise went on, you knew what was coming, so they got less and less scary. Yeah, but not even that. When you're playing the same game and you're getting jump scared over and over, you're like, oh, right, okay. Here comes the jump scare. Oh, look, it's Freddy. Hey. All the FNAF. hands sharpening the pitchforks in the background what'd you say as you know sharpening the pitchforks don't worry next month is five nights at freddy's no i'm only joking that's not so resident evil was a game that my brother had for the playstation one and again i've still got the case and everything in the game and i never played it because i was too young at the time i wasn't really interested until i played the fourth remake and then i went back i played through the series and i did it in a very benjamin button way i played four then I went to 2, 3, 7, 8, 5, 6, and then I played the first remake. I was hopping all over the place. I do want to play 5. 5 does fascinate me. But again, if I was to play 5, I'd want to play it in co -op. I wouldn't want to play it on my own because I've heard it's a lot of fun in co -op. Oh, yeah, absolutely. 5 and 6 are definitely made for co -op. 6 is a great game, and we'll be talking about that in about two weeks from now. But 5 and 6 are over the top, bombastic, goofy. But yeah, they're interesting games. But again, during the original run in 1996 through to the 2000s, I never really played Resident Evil. I knew what a Resident Evil game was, which sounds really weird. But what I mean by that is you saw the aesthetic of Resident Evil. You saw the zombie dogs. You saw the stumbling zombies. You saw the stars uniform. You knew it was a Resident Evil game. You knew it wasn't just another run -of -the -mill copycat zombie game. And I think that... even Capcom at the time were really surprised that this game took off it was really popular and then in 1998 they decided you know what we are going to make the second Resident Evil game and that is so fascinating to see the development of this game because there is a colloquially known within the fan base as Resident Evil 1 .5 which I don't know if you've heard much about this but there were some developers that wanted to separate the first game from the second game they wanted it to still be in the same universe, but not share anything with the first game, which was really weird. So you had Leon Kennedy, who was the rookie cop, and don't worry, we will talk about him very, very soon. And then you had Eliza Walker, who was a motorcycle enthusiast and who would eventually become Claire Redfield. That's why in the remake, you get the biker jumpsuit as DLC. I think it's DLC, but yeah, that's why she's wearing this big red jumpsuit, you're thinking. why she would not but yeah it's very interesting to see how they went from that and then it went to the board and they were like no that's dumb really again not the ideas but just trying to separate the two because you know you think of stars you think of the t virus and things and it's hard to separate one from two so they went back to the drawing board they said right we're going to rework this so that's why we've got claire redfield that's why we've got leon kennedy we've got the t virus we've got coming back in full force instead of focusing more on an action game. It was action horror. It was absolutely fascinating. And the same with the third game. The third game was, at the time, developed side by side with Code Veronica, but they wanted to keep the numbered entries on the PlayStation, I think. So that's why Code Veronica, and trust me, this is a very contentious topic within the fandom that a lot of people... say that oh Code Veronica is the true successor it's the true RE3 and everything and because it was developed side by side and there's a lot of interviews and things to both support and draw questions about that you know it's a very contentious issue and obviously we're not going to be talking about Code Veronica today but for RE3 that was definitely expanding on what they brought in with RE2 but the difference was instead of having the A and B scenario where if you picked up a certain item in your first playthrough, then in your second playthrough, you wouldn't be able to get that item. So that was something that was very unique at the time. And you had two discs, would you believe, to actually play this game? So archaic. Isn't it? Bring back two discs. No, seriously, don't. Please don't. But yeah, so for example, if you played through as Leon Kennedy and you went, oh, a red herb. Oh, a green herb. And then once you played through the same game again. as Claire Redfield, then, yeah, you wouldn't be getting those red herbs and green herbs. You would just be getting a fistful of, well, Mr. X, let's face it, in the face, and it was not a good time. Yeah, that's, again, something that we will be talking about in relation to the remake. But do you think how interesting that is, though? If you went into those games not knowing that as a concept, and you played your first playthrough as Leon, you completely took everything and picked everything up because you didn't know any better. Like, oh, I'll have that, I'll have that, I'll storage that, I'll use that. the game oh okay i'll play as claire now and then play as claire and realize i'm screwed there is nothing left i've got no ammo what am i going to fight anything with so i think that's actually ingenious and i know they did it with the remake but i would love more games to have a system like that don't just play it once play it again but this time it'll be different or i think it just adds to the idea of wanting to replay a game because nowadays i recently played the new mafia and it's great but i have no reason to go back now and i just feel like i missed the days where you had an option of oh you've played it once we'll play it again but it's so i appreciate resident evil for that because it's so different and so unique but it's very much still very resident evil because nobody else does it because i mean that's what they did for the third game as well they completely expanded on that idea or maybe not so much than the ab scenario but they made it more of an action rpg horror game oh god yeah you got into situations that said oh what do you want to do jump out the window or face nemesis and you had to choose at that moment and that was so interesting to see them try a completely different thing. Whereas from what I've played of Code Veronica, and again, I won't get into too many details because I've only played a smidgen and I got my butt kicked by zombies. But from what I've played of that, that seems very much more like the traditional Resident Evil. Back to basics. Yeah, it's still the same principle. It's the fixed camera angles and it's similar characters where he plays Claire Redfield instead of anybody else. But yeah, in the third one, you play as Jill Valentine, who's still suffering from the aftermath of the first game, which is very interesting to see they continued that. And because of that, we had the introduction of characters like Nemesis, who was the stalking enemy slash zombie who would pop out of nowhere, jump through windows and jump through walls, much like Mr. X. You know, it was fascinating to see how they managed to get away with that back then. And these games are utterly beloved. I'm talking about the OGs here. They are utterly beloved and you can see why. You can see how they basically pioneered this survival horror action genre. Every game in that bubble wanted to be like Resident Evil to mesh these wonderful concepts together. Resident Evil really changed the game in terms of survival horror because before survival horror was just like what you get in the first Resident Evil was you'd go around, you've got limited resources and you've got to make your way to the end. end whereas resident evil the added in story again i know it's a joke now but you had the cheesy dialogue as well as the puzzles and the backtracking and the save system like it was iconic for the time and then when you got to resident evil 2 same sort of thing but this time new characters new setting as the series went on granted i know i haven't played many of the old ones but i haven't played co veronica and i know we don't want to talk about it because that's another thing for another day but that's the reason why i haven't played resident evil 4 yet the remake is because i really want to play because i'm a stickler for canon So I'm like, I really want to play Code Veronica then 4. So even though I've got it, I'm not going to play it yet. But I've got my fingers crossed that maybe next year we'll get Code Veronica remake. Who knows? Anyway, the point I was trying to make is the fact of the games kept changing. They always try something different, but they always had that DNA of Resident Evil. And it wasn't until I feel like they got to Resident Evil 4 when it was Leon and it was more action. And again, he was more capable because he was trained. So he did a lot of kickflips and stuff like that, where I think from there, the game sort of went, well, this is what we're looking for. This was really popular. We're going to carry on doing this. and it went the action route they kind of went from survival horror into action which for some fans love some fans didn't and again i can only really speak from my experience with remake of two and three but even in there you can feel the difference in the remakes whereas two is very much survival horror with a lot of puzzles and the different paths and you've got to play at least three four times to get the full gist of everything which i love whereas free remake is more just the fact of everything you've just done and learned in two forget that just run and gun and shoot and you've got a guy chasing you that is meant to be terrifying he isn't he's more annoying and then it depends how good you are at resident evil you can get it done within four hours probably less if you're really really good and yeah it's not a good change but at the same stage it was an interesting one it really differentiates from how different the genre is and how the games change with each series so love it or hate it i think it was an interesting choice i know we'll talk about when we get to resident evil 3 but obviously like i said i had no experience with resident evil 3 so all the things that they added and took away with the remake because i had no prior experience with My experience with Resident Evil was a lot different to a hardcore fan's, and I'm sure it's probably the same with you, Chatsu, as well. Even though it's not as good as 2, I still enjoy it for what it is, even though I understand why people don't like it. I'm going to put my cards on the table here and definitely co -sign what you just said there, that when I played the fourth remake and then I went back to Resident Evil 2 and 3 remake, I hadn't played the originals. Again, I knew of them, I knew of the concepts that they embodied, but I did not. play them when i was younger so i was coming into it from the perspective of remake only as it were so that may be total heresy there's resident evil fans just yelling go and forest it no i'm joking trust me when you get to resident evil 4 you'll laugh at that reference yeah i really enjoyed the second one it terrified me oh sam there is so much in this game to love the third one no it's so much to love there was bits to love but at the same time, I feel as if we need to work through our relationship issues. It's not you, it's me. Yeah, and I thought, yeah, sure, it's mediocre, but it's not the worst game I've ever played. Oh, no, not at all. Trust me, the way some people were talking, they were talking as if this was the worst game ever. And it wasn't until I did some digging into what made the original Resident Evil 3 that good that I realised, oh my God, they really cut a lot out of this and there was a lot of areas that felt a bit rough. and slapdash together. So see you without any further ado while we put on our Mr. X stomping boots and see the good, the bad and the downright bizarre of these two games. Oh, definitely. I'm looking forward to it. And of course, we will be right back after A, we patch up this wall behind us and B, after these messages. Welcome to Chatsanami, a Scottish variety podcast that discusses topics from gaming and films to anime in general interest. Join me, your host, Satsunami, as well as the rest of our Chatsunami team for our takes on these very important pop culture topics. Sir, it's clearly a trap. I accept your page! That happens three times in the film. Every time that general goes, don't do this one thing, he goes... Do you know what I'ma do? A zigzag. No! He does as well. She had the pointy teeth. What was that about? She looked like Bilbo when he wants the ring back. She turned into... I just want the lightsaber one more time. Parasite says, no, you will get back into your office and work. No, says the man in Zoom. Trousers are for the working man. You're bursting into your hotel room. Honey, we need to go.
Speaker: Leave the kids. You can milk an oddish. Oh!
Speaker: That's the worst thing you've ever said on any of the episodes. If that sounds like your cup of tea, then you can check us out at our website, chattsanami .com, as well as all good podcast apps. As always, stay safe, stay awesome, and most importantly, stay hydrated. Stay classy and have a good afternoon. This has been Chattsanami. I'm sorry.
Speaker: Howdy, I'm Luke from the Howdy Beans podcast, a variety podcast where I look into topics each week into the world of pop culture, like...
Speaker: book reviews, where I delve deep into the expanded universe of Doctor Who, or a movie review on the 1998 cult classic, The Mummy. Well, if you're very lucky, I might take a peek under the hood of video games, both new and old. So what are you waiting for? Check out the Howdy Beans podcast now on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and anywhere else that you may find your podcasts. And I'll see you very soon. and we are back so let's start with resident evil 2 and i've got a bit of a confession to make look something that you brought up earlier about being scared about horror games ages ago and this is probably a story you'll hear throughout resident evil month as well but ages ago i was sitting with my very good friend adam on a xbox live call and we're all playing different games you know i think i was playing call of duty or something and my friend adam kept screaming constantly you know but he kept screaming at different intervals. And they kept yelling about this person called Mr. X. And I was like, Adam, what are you playing? And he would tell me, oh, I'm playing Resident Evil 2 Remake. And I thought, okay, but why did he keep screaming? I didn't know it at the time, but that planted a seed in my mind that actually made me terrified. And I think I messaged you at the time. I was terrified to play this game. Oh, no, I was as well. I was Googling, who is Mr. X? Does he appear very often? and how do you trigger them to appear? I was terrified and I felt the same, of course, with Resident Evil 7, but don't worry, that is Dan's job and... a couple of weeks to talk about that. But I was terrified. I genuinely thought, I don't know if I'm going to be able to cope with this. This is going to be a terrifying experience. But I went into it after several hyperventilations. I thought, you know what, I'm going to do it. And yeah, I have to say, out of the two of these games, this was by far one of my favourites. And I know that there is some slight controversy with some cut content that there was supposed to be fixed camera angles at some point. There is actually... mod that you can play this game in that reintroduces the fixed camera angles and things which i think is so cool of the community to add those things in but yeah out of curiosity what was your experience with this particular remake How did you find it going on? Well, relatively the same as you, to be honest. I was really scared going in. I did a review on Resident Evil 2 and I remember I did the introduction before I played the game at all. And I was trying to do the introduction as long as possible because the longer I do it, the more I didn't have to play the game. I was terrified. I was like, I've had so many rumors. Everybody said it's terrifying. You go into it, Mr. X is always there and it's dark. And I was like, oh God, okay, nightmare fuel. But I thought, you know what? Okay, be brave, bite the bullet, play it. And when the game starts and you're in that petrol station, fuel gas station. whatever the americans call it i ended up using almost all my ammo trying to get out of there to be honest so by the time i got to raccoon city and got into the police station i used all my ammo i was like oh god i'm screwed but what i love about rest evil 2 remakes is the fact of it's very clever but it also depends on what difficulty you play on i played it on assisted first because again for me i needed to know what was coming and how the game worked before i went into standard mode when i played as claire as i played to the game i realized how clever it was i realized that actually it had a lot of of things in it that were terrifying it was scary and the zombies wouldn't always go down with two shots like you shot a zombie in the head didn't mean it stopped it also sometimes you had to shoot them in the leg which i learned halfway through the game if you shot them in the leg they would go down you can run around them again the idea with boards and you can board up windows i felt really smart because as i would go through i'd be like oh so i'm going to spend a lot of time in the raccoon city police department and before mr x shows up i'm going to go open every door i'm going to go to every room i'm going to plan a route round i'm going to get to know the surroundings. So I spent majority of my time running around like a madman. Like if there's cameras in there and recording, you've just got Leon going from room to room, just carrying loads of stuff, dumping it into a box, coming back, dumping more. I was literally like a pack horse. I was just hoarding everything just because I needed it. So I got used to how it all worked. I boarded up all of the left -hand side of the police station because I knew how to get around there. And I knew that if I boarded that up, because I'm one of those people that does their research where they play games like this. I'm like, okay, so what do I need to know? What are the tips and tricks? I watch YouTube videos and that. So I planned out my route of escape. So by the time that Mr. X turned up, he was still terrifying. Don't get me wrong. When you hear the thump, thump, thump, thump, thump, the banging noises, it was still, my heart was going. And how many times I'd run back to a safe room and be like, okay, I know he's outside the door and he could come in, but he won't. So I'm like, okay, I can breathe. And it was just those moments of like, oh God, my heart's going 10 to a dozen. And then he'd leave. Before he'd leave, I'd be like, okay, quickly save. All right, so where am I? Look at the map. All right, I've got to go. I've got to get the detonator over here. So I've now got to quickly run this way, this way. So I felt smart. I felt clever. could say i got cocky because i went through the sewer level and all the other levels and you go into the hive and secret base and all that so by the time i completed the game as leon i didn't feel like a rookie anymore i felt capable i felt brave i felt strong i went in playing as claire with being cocky thinking oh okay you know i know what i'm doing it's going to be exactly the same things are going to be different but it's going to be the same and then playing as claire and realizing the game was like no you're playing in standard difficulty now mate the game literally just threw everything at me it threw liquors at me straight away mr x was already in the building he was in the safe area in the main big court area he was already running around in there when i first got there so it was just terrifying and it really caught me on my toes of like okay i'm gonna die quicker now so i've got to run around i've got to hide i've got to find keys as well as all solve the puzzles while i'm being chased so it just added an extra bit of tension to me so running around the second time of the police station i'm glad i spent so much time as leon figuring my way out before mr x turned up because if he was already there i think i would just would have been like i can't do this and then would have turned it off so i think it's just a very smart and clever game and obviously the difference between Leon's campaign and Claire's and to get the true ending and all that. I absolutely loved and adored that. And I just think it's really great. Like you just don't get games like this anymore where you play it once as one character, you play it again. Yes, you might go to the same places, but you'll meet different characters. For my experience with Resident Evil 2 remake, it was just one with being absolutely terrified, but feeling accomplished. It's like when you solve a puzzle for the first time, like the mixture puzzle, where you've got to get the right mixture of the solutions to kill the plants. When I first did that without any help, I felt so capable. I felt like, oh, I can take it. on the world and learning the code so I can drop the ladder. So I can bypass going up and down the stairs all the time. So I'm not always attacked and ambushed by the plant triffid things. I felt clever because I looked around. I learned to examine things in my inventory and I learned as I went on, I just felt like Leon. I felt going from being a rookie of having no experience with any Resident Evil game at all to by the end of it, just feel like a very capable survival horror fan. And from there, I want to play the new Alone in the Dark remake and I want to play more survival horror sort of games. So if anything, it's led me to feel more capable and be like you know you know i can play these games like yes i'm struggling with first person but if they're third person i can do it for me it sparked a new love and joy of wanting to play survival horror games now because it's a genre i've always wanted to get into because i love the horror genre but i just never felt brave enough so to be able to have that from resident evil and the likes of dead space and all that i love it absolutely adore and i really appreciate it for sparking that joy in me yeah no 100 because i remember when they remade the first game in 2002 it was quite a faithful adaptation in a lot of regards but they added some bits and they took away as I discussed last week of course but with this one I think they were to and fro about whether or not to have a faithful adaptation but I am so glad in some ways that they decided to make this a lot more modern and go that route because it is something that I think the remakes have decided to go with that they're implementing more modern control schemes that is that over the shoulder element but it is something that will get new players engaged myself especially because going to the old games is quite difficult i'm not gonna lie well that's one of the things that put me off a lot of the old games because even though i'd always wanted to play them it's the tank controls it's the way that the camera is and because i'm so used to how games are now i just feel like my enjoyment would be hindered because of the way those games again not to say they were bad games it's just that's the technology they were limited to the technology. So that's what they had to do for those games. But that's what puts me off wanting to play them. So I'd much rather watch somebody else play them through a playthrough than experiencing myself. But if they decide to do a remake of Resident Evil 0 or Resident Evil 1, but like they did with Resident Evil 2, I'd be all for it. But I think from what I've heard from a lot of the fandom of Resident Evil, a lot of them said like, you don't need to remake Resident Evil 1. The GameCube version was the best remaster and that's it. And from what I've seen, yeah, it looks pretty good. So if that's what the Resident Evil fandom is saying, I'll go with that. But if they wanted to, I'd definitely play it. If they decided to remaster it like Resident Evil 2, I'd definitely play Resident Evil 1 and Resident Evil 0. Because I mean, not to brag, but of course, last week I reviewed the first remake and they remastered it in 2015, which you can play it with the old tank controls, but you can also play it with the analog stick. So you don't have to depend solely on, oh, you have to turn, move forward, turn, move forward, you know. And I grew up with that system. so i just want to point that out but it has been so long i did as well with tomb raider to be honest but i don't know there was just something different about tomb raider you're adventuring you're not always worried that a zombie's going to eat your flesh you know so you don't have to panic but at the same time it's been so long since i've had to play a game with those types of controls well other than code veronica but again time and place If you play Resident Evil 1 and even Zero, both of them have the analogue control, which I have to say makes it a lot more bearable to move around. It's definitely different than these games for sure, but they're both apples and oranges. The first one is such a good remake. You know, it makes the old game accessible to new players while not sacrificing what made the original game so good in the first place. Whereas I've seen a lot of criticisms for the second one. second game and again these are more to do with that they're not as faithful to the original that they cut out certain enemies like the spiders the moths which thank god i didn't have to fight them oh i would have been terrified but at the same time i can see why they went in that direction for the second game and don't get me wrong this game looks absolutely gorgeous the second remake is absolutely breathtaking and they definitely went for a more and i use this phrase really loosely, realistic style. Claire looks great. Leon looks fantastic. All of the other supporting characters, and Ada, of course, all of them look absolutely brilliant. I thought they did a great job on the design. Mr. X looks delightfully terrifying. And that's the thing as well, although it's not first person, it doesn't have to be to instill that fear because, and this is probably a good point to talk about the story, you basically Basically play as either Leon Kennedy, who is a rookie cop who slept in for his first day on the job. Probably the best time to sleep in on the job because when he arrives, yeah, everything's falling to chaos. They are in this grand police station that has been renovated from a former museum. That's the excuse they use so that you can solve all these puzzles. It's grand, it's opulent, it's so damn good. It's such a great design, it's so iconic. It's probably... just as iconic as Suspensa Mansion. Well, maybe nearly as iconic, but still really iconic. And you have to explore that as Leon or Claire. Claire's looking for her brother, Chris Redfield, aka Boulder Puncher, which don't get me wrong. Two weeks, we will be talking about him. Leon's just trying to survive, essentially. And more or less, the game follows a lot of similar beats. The only difference being that you're seeing it from different perspectives. And the only downside of it is a lot of people... have criticized it for being a bit more simplistic with the a and b scenario for example if you pick up a green herb and the a scenario with claire who i played first and then leon's still gonna find that green herb so there's no consequences for it there wasn't with any of the codes that you could open lockers and if you knew the codes for your first playthrough they were exactly the same as the second one which i saved them all which i like that don't be wrong it makes it easier when i was running around like headless chicken is claire trying to get all the things while i'm being chased it makes it easier less stressful but part of me would have also respected the idea of like oh no no no it's different codes you've got to do it all over again in the moment it would have been annoying because i'm being chased and i'm terrified but like i said i would have respected it you know what it makes this second playthrough a bit more fresher than it already was you know a bit more sort of like oh actually i have to put the work and i can't just again be cocky i can't just like i already know the codes this is fact of no no it's going to be different this time but either way i liked that the amb scenario but like because there are certain times where you could have given the option of you want to play it as well, you get both the same amount of resources in both options, or we can do the old -fashioned way where it's like, if you have it in A, you won't have it in B. Because I know they do that with the keys, because certain keys Claire can open and certain keys Leon can open and stuff like that. But it would have been nice if they did that with a few more things as well, just to kind of add more of the survival horror aspect of itself into it. No, I'm totally with you there. There are enough differences to make it more replayable. For example, with Leon, where it differentiates is when you get to the parking garage and you see a dog try to attack you and you get saved by the one and only femme fatale ada wong she is mysterious she's saying oh look at me the only woman that can wear shades in the dark and pull it off and a trench coat of course she's going for that teenage mutant ninja turtles vibe so then you've got every so often leon teaming up with ada and then talking to a reporter who unfortunately gets his face And meanwhile, in the other scenario, you play as Claire and by the time you get to the parking garage, you don't so much find Ada. Instead, you find the very corrupt Chief Irons who kidnapped... Oh, I hated him. Oh, he's awful. He kidnaps a little girl called Sherry and you have to basically try and hunt him down. The bit I didn't like in her story is when you have to play as Sherry Birkin. Oh, the puzzle. Oh, God, the nightmare. That was horrible. Not even the... I mean, the puzzle was terrible. I'll give you that. Having to run around as her because that's one of my least favourite tropes in the horror game where it's like, oh, you know that badass you've been playing and you've been barely surviving with? Yeah, let's go for a child. How would you feel about playing as a child? I was like, I don't want to play as a child. Yeah, and then you do sneaking puzzles. I'm like, I don't want to sneak around. It actually reminds me of, and we will probably talk about this later on in the month, but with Resident Evil, I think it was Revelations 2 where you play as a child character. and you're like, I don't want to play as a child. and shoot back i was like i don't want to play please but you know they force you to and it's hiding from chief irons oh that terrified me because it gave me flashbacks to outlast and i know that's such a basic you know what fear to have to be like oh i'm afraid of getting chased but genuinely you're helpless you're a child you've got the keys to get out the door it is terrifying any chase sequence like that i was terrified and you know i had to look up the walkthrough to be like okay I don't want to get spooked here. You know, I was still terrified. But at the same time, you know, it adds to that tension and things. And I thought the way they built the atmosphere in this game was great. Again, this is... probably the perfect place to touch on before we talk about the ending of this game of course the one and only mr x which i did not realize until i looked up a video you know the guy who he goes into video games and he basically breaks them by going oh yeah he goes out of bounds yeah he goes out of bounds and he shows you how the game works and everything how it loads certain characters and puts them in other places so they're not generating it is so fascinating definitely look it up on youtube But the thing that really terrified me was the fact that when you're walking along the station, there are certain areas that will load because you're near them. At Mr. X, for the most part, you would think, oh yeah, it's just the game throws them at you at random intervals. But no, no, no, no, no. He actively tries to hunt for you. He's always there.
Speaker: He genuinely is always there. And that is terrifying because nothing scared me more than thinking, and I'm doing a puzzle. And then two seconds later, you had the thump, thump, thump. And I thought, I'm going to get my cheeks clapped right now. I cocked the shotgun. I'm like, there is no way he's coming through this door. You start looking for exits and you're like, where do I go? ah I can't go out the window. Where do I go? Like, he's so close. The worst one for me was, see that bloody library puzzle where it's like, oh no, you could jump over that. And it's like, no. oh no, you have to find this specific Kool -Aid thing to slam the bookcase as loud as possible. And I remember I moved them and I was like, okay, and I lined up. I ran up the stairs. I'm like, okay, hop, hop. And then two seconds later, he literally walked in and I was like, I hate this game. I love it, but I hate it. That's what I love because it's so clever as well because there are times where you do a puzzle like that and he will appear. And then your second run through, if he kills you, you do it again and he doesn't appear. And it's just the fact of this game is deliberate. deliberately mocking me because I know any moment he'll appear, but he didn't appear this time, even though he did last time. And I'm like, where is he? Why isn't he not around? And then I remember when you had to go get the detonators in the loft and I thought, okay, it's it's all right, it's safe. You know, I can't hear the thumping. As soon as I pick up the detonator, thump, thump, thump, turn around, there he is just coming for the door. And you remember the loft, it's tiny. It's like, there's nowhere to run. And then the door's locked, so you've got to move that thing out the way. And I was just like, move. I couldn't jam the button enough. I was like, move, move, move, move, move. And then you go for the door and he just, this is the thing about Mr. X, he doesn't run he walks but because he walks it makes it worse because i don't know there's just something about it's like the whole reason why we're scared of jason and from friday the 13th is the fact if he doesn't run he walks but the idea of him walking is so much more terrifying than running because while you're running out of breath panicking making mistakes he's just an ever looming presence and how many times i ran to safe rooms and i heard him right outside the door and i would have a little peek and he would turn around and but okay he's not he's not there he's still there and i'm just like okay it makes no sense like he could break down the door you know really he would but i'm just like okay i'm i'm gonna sit here for a bit i can't and then the fun thing would go and what and then that's where i'd get the map out but i've got a plan i gotta know where i've got to go obviously when you play as leon he's ever present he's always there you know when you're in the umbrella base underneath raccoon city and then you finally put the code in and you kill all the plants right when you're playing as leon mr x jumps for the glass and then he chases you and my heart went and i was expecting that to happen when i'm playing as claire so i'm like okay i'm ready i've planned my escape i'm done as soon as you put the spray in to kill all the plants i'm ready okay here we go comes he never comes through and I'm like oh oh that's all right okay and then all of a sudden Birkin appears out of nowhere oh god I wasn't now expecting you out of nowhere my heart was just like fo fon from I did not get that Resident Evil 3 but Resident Evil 2 was like I played it through twice both times it was just like my heart was just going do them
Speaker: Oh, that is terrifying. I mean, we're not calling Mr. X the next Joe Hendry, but he is pretty much Joe Hendry. He just appears out of nowhere. Well, that's the thing, because when you're playing as Claire, because the story's different, you've got Mr. X for the bit and you're like, oh God, okay, so he's going to chase me everywhere. And then you get the bit where he's at the lift and he's opening up the lift and he's right there in your face and all of a sudden he just gets sliced in two. And you're thinking, what could destroy Mr. X? I couldn't do it. It took me forever as Leon to kill him. What could do it? And then Birkin comes out of nowhere and you're like, that's even worse. See, that is one of my minor criticisms of the game. I like the idea of there's always a bigger fish, don't get me wrong, especially when the bigger fish saves me. So I was all happy for that. He's like, oh, I'm saved. Oh, wait, no. It's like, you know that scene in Megamind? I wouldn't say saved, just under new management. It's like, oh no. It sounds so weird to say this, but I've got different triggers for being horrified. Let's just say, I think the thing about Mr. X that terrifies me the most... Again, it's the anticipation that this game has, it's the build -up, it's the hearing the stomping boots. And I've said this before to friends, but as someone who is over six feet and probably stomps like Mr. X, maybe I'm doing these things unconsciously, like boom, boom, boom. But seeing this humanoid figure stomping towards you, stalking you throughout the entire place, and one thing I think is excellent is the fact you've got all the safe rooms, that you have the typewriters, you can see... save whenever you want and again that's a very interesting thing that they did away with that you can just save whenever you want rather than in the originals you have to have a ink ribbon and use them to save again that makes the game somewhat easier so you have to manage that yourself as it were but what i love is in the reception area and there's something you touched on earlier in the reception area there's a typewriter so you immediately associate typewriter with safe zone oh yeah oh no No, no, no, no, no. When he first appears there, you're like, what are you doing here? You're not meant to be here. There's a typewriter, can't you see it? I've heard of horror stories of people saving at the typewriter being like, ah, it's okay, it'll despawn them. And then getting them immediately punched in the back of the head once they reload it. And it's like, no, no, no, no. There's no point in wasting ammo on him because it does nothing. Yeah, apart from just like shoot his hat off. That's it, really. So this is why alien isolation and things like that is a fact of you can't fight back. So you feel helpless. You generally feel like. Like, all I can do is run. I think that's what makes it more terrifying. If you could turn around and you could put a few rounds into Mr. X and it puts him down for a bit, kind of like Nemesis, then it somewhat softens the blow. But just knowing that you can't do anything until later on in the game, you've just got to run. And hopefully, wherever you're running to, you've not just got hordes and hordes of zombies in the halls. Otherwise, you're not getting through without being punched in the back at the end by Mr. X. That's terrifying. But it's also exhilarating because, like I said, he could get you, kill you. So you restart wherever you saved. Do the same thing again. he might not appear and the game messes with you but it's a good thing I know it sounds strange to say but you're happy with being messed about because you're like oh okay I'm safe now but I might not be safe later and then the game throws a curveball at you when he throws you out of nowhere you're like For me, it just made me feel like the game was learning. When I was, like I said, being cocky as Claire, the game knew that. The game knew that I was going to go in, be cocky, and then just threw him straight at me, straight away, right at the gate with hardly any ammo. And I panicked. And it took me a while to, OK, I've got to relearn. I've got to be smart again. I've got to go back to how I was when I first started playing as Leon. And eventually, because I knew where everything was, it was easier. But still, it was one of those where it's like the game just feels so smart in a way that I've never felt in a video game before, where the game's against me, but it's also willing to work with me if I'm willing. to work with it. If you get what I'm trying to say. Oh, no, absolutely. Once you manage to conquer that fear, it becomes a somewhat annoyance. You know, you're trying to do a puzzle and oh, it's Mr. X saying, how are you doing, son? And it's like, get away. I'm trying to solve this. Would you like to talk about your umbrella corporation? No, I wouldn't. Put your flowers away. I'm not interested. Speaking of the umbrella corporation, something I think is quite cool is there's a control chip on his head. So see if you zoom in, it's got the umbrella logo and everything, which is. really cool i love the attention to detail that would have been cool if you could sneak up behind him shoot it and it puts him out like a little bit of detail that sort of thing no i think it just makes him angrier to be honest you shoot his hat off and he just chases you more and you're like oh i don't like this my special hat but going back to what i was saying there i love that conceptualization of the slow stalking villain exactly like a slasher film where he's just there he stomps he knows that he doesn't need to chase after you very fast he doesn't need to do the whole star son you know he is just an absolute unit he will kill anybody in his way and that is the most terrifying he doesn't have to say a word now what i was saying before about why i wasn't a big fan of william birkin who it turns out later on in the story as a researcher who created something called the g virus which is infinitely worse in some regards and he is slowly being mutated into this horrible creature it's where i draw the line for horror is when they get a bit too fantastical in design you know don't get me wrong he's horrifying and it's horrible to see this big eyeball looking at you going oh i'm gonna get you but that to me isn't as scary because it feels more gamified if that makes sense look at the big eyeball oh you should yeah shoot the big pustule sort of thing yeah whereas mr x and again when mr x transforms into his dragon ball references aside his final form i was like Like, oh, okay, he's a tyrant. Things that I thought he was less terrifying when he transformed. Yeah. You know what I mean? Because when he transforms, I know I can shoot him now. I can do damage and kill him. The fear went. Whereas when he was Mr. X and you couldn't do any damage, that was more terrifying to me. It adds to that sense of helplessness that you're seeing this person just stomp towards you and you're like, I don't want to play this game anymore. The only thing that I have to say took that away, and I just want to say this for the record, Your Honour, but I... played this game normally through to begin with but later on to race through the game i downloaded the dlc to unlock and i know this is terrible and normally i wouldn't do this but out of curiosity i got the dlc where you could get the unlimited ammo weapons oh fair enough and i wanted to see what the game would be like with the unlimited ammo i'm gonna be honest do not play this game with unlimited ammo unless you just want to blast through the game because literally it takes away all of the tension. It takes away all of the horror survival. There is nothing worse than seeing Mr. X for the first time and being like, oh yeah, rocket launcher, bam. That absolutely destroyed it. But again, I didn't play the game like that. I played it with the limited ammo, with the limited resources, and that is a way to play this game for sure. I've seen a lot of people do runs this game, because again, one of the things about the Resi games that I love, which I would never do because I'm not that much of a hardcore player of these games, but there's people that do challenges of like, oh, complete the game in a certain amount of steps, complete the game without saving, complete the game without using the resource box. Because obviously at the end of the game, you get a score, you get a ranking for how well you did, how long it took you and that sort of thing. And I've seen people do run -throughs of this game with unlimited ammo, with the rocket launcher, just destroying everything and getting S plus rank. And it looks a lot of fun, but I feel like it is fun for them. But it's one of those where I'm the same as you. I feel like it would ruin the experience because then it just gamifies it. It's no longer terrifying because I know that anybody that comes at me, rocket launcher, dead, keep going. You know, and that's that. But that's exactly it, though. You go into a corridor of lickers and then you're like, oh, what a shame. Blah. And that's it. You got a problem over here? Pow! You ain't got a problem now. My favourite one was that there was a zombie at the window knocking and then he smashed through the window and went, argh! And then he saw the rocket launcher and then he went, you know that scene out of Spider -Man at the very end where he's like, Godspeed, Spider -Man. And then he just sees the glider and there's that one second where he goes, oh. And it's just the rocket launcher going to his face and then... I went, oh, and then he just exploded. I was like, yeah, do not play the game like this because it just, it takes away the tension completely. But it's obviously a bonus, you know, it's not something that you would have anyway in the outset. That is interesting to see. Speaking of challenge runs though, there was a guy on YouTube, I can't remember his name, but if anybody knows, please feel free to comment under this episode. But there was a guy who played the original Resident Evil 2 and his challenge was that he couldn't move. So he... had to position himself and shoot so that the recoil would move him through the map. It was baffling. He actually did it, surprisingly. At the very end, I think he got stuck because there's a time limit and everything. But I mean, this was, of course, the original. This wasn't the remake. But it was so funny the way he did it. And they actually succeeded. It is a great video. If you find it on YouTube, please go and watch it. It is incredible. The dedication that guy had to do it is amazing. But for this one, there is definitely... definitely a different vibe to this if you look at the old game and again this is something people criticize it's not as campy it's a lot more gritty and realistic which i like personally but i can see why people don't like that in a way especially and again this is something we'll talk about next week with joey from the game club pod with re4 but there was a difference between the campy nature of re4 versus the remake that is still campy but it has more gritty and serious elements do it i feel as if and obviously before we go into re3 i feel as if my major problem with it is more the ending to it i don't know how you feel about this but as you said you go into the lab and you meet these creatures that are part plant and everything and oh look they're plant zombies oh yeah and you have to do the puzzle and whatnot and then once you complete that again it's the weakest part of any resident evil game you go down to the lab and you're like okay know what's gonna happen the only bit that did terrify me was when mr eggs popped up and i'm like no no no no no i don't like this but yeah then you have to fight william birkin i have to admit that both made me laugh and cry when i was playing through as i think it must have been clear in the first playthrough and i thought okay i'm nearly done run to the train and then the game's like well done satsu have a minigun game why are you giving me a minigun game why is there all this ammo game game why are you giving me this just just walk down the back Back of the train. Keep going. That whole boss fight, that really annoys me. That was annoying. The puzzle for the chess pieces, that irritated the hell out of me. I hated that. There was just a lot of minor things in this game. It wasn't as difficult as the Sherry puzzle. That was the worst one. I almost quit the game. Really? That was that bad. I generally almost put the game down. I wouldn't come back for it. It wasn't until I managed to, on a fluke, I still don't know to this day how I managed to do it. Somehow I managed to pass it and I was like, okay, that's it. I'm never, because there's an achievement. getting out of that room in 60 seconds. How you do it, I don't know because it's different for everybody. I'm just imagining Chief Irons coming back being like, how you doing, Sherry? And it's just you going, in a minute, I am busy. I am working on it. The puzzle was just a nightmare. And I thought, oh, I can cheat. I can go online, find the company. No, no, it's different for everybody who plays it. So it's just like, I've had a brilliant experience so far. And then you make me do a puzzle that is not impossible, but not fair at the same time. So it's like, that for me was my biggest draw. But like I said, I feel like it was worth it. Because again, the whole thing with irons. And then again, the idea that Claire, she deals with Birkin, whereas Leon, which is funny with Leon, because you deal with Birkin, then you deal with Mr. X. But he's just like, oh, I've got to end this. Well, no, you don't. and walk away. You've got the virus. No, no, I've got to end it. So he goes outside, beats him, goes back up the lift, goes to Mr. X. I think the only thing that really bothered me that confused me was the fact of when you're playing as Leon, Ada falls, well, presumably to her death and dies, right? But then you're fighting Mr. X and all of a sudden the camera changes and then somebody kicks down a rocket launcher and I'm thinking, that's not Claire who's just kicked down a rocket launcher. Was it Ada? I think it's meant to be Ada. I don't know, kind of wise. That kind of bothered me, but I liked the ending. Again, it was a bit silly how, oh, here you go, here's a minigun, just shoot the hell out of this big mass and then that's it. I think that was sort of, the games being like oh well you know what you've played the game twice you've struggled here's loads of ammo have a bit of fun that's how i took it was just like look you've gone through it all it's a bit fun but as i said and as i've mentioned a couple times i just really appreciate that this game allows you to not just play it once but it encourages you to play it more than once and encourages you to do more and then once you've done that then you get the true ending whether it be good or bad you get the true ending and i like that i really do i just feel like more games should do that because you just don't get that nowadays you don't get the replayability as you used to as soldier though you're completely right because you escape the umbrella lab and you're watching these two characters that you've gone through hell and back to. basically get out of this situation just literally walking into the sunset with sherry it is just such a great moment because if you're playing as claire you're fighting to save sherry's life and later on you meet her mother who is very interesting let's just say she is one of the umbrella scientists but she has a very particular views on the world let's just say and at one point you also get to play as ada which is such a cool mission up until you nearly get barbecued by Saint, the mother of Sherry, and you have to run away from Mr. X, which, again, my soul left my body when I heard the footsteps. I was like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. And then you have to do it. It is so satisfying. It was something that I loved in the 4 remake, where after you complete it and you sit down, you watch the credits and the song Bullet or the Blade plays, which is... By the way, I can't wait for you to get to that. But in this game, it is Saw Daddy, I think, which is such a great song, honestly. And you just feel so satisfied after being through this situation. As you said, you know, you've conquered your fear. You're like, I can't believe it. I've fought Mr. X twice and I won. I didn't die. It is fantastic. And admittedly, there are sloggy elements. Before we move on to three, there are... sloggy elements you know there is the sewer level which some parts are good and then other parts it's kind of similar to what they do in the third remake where they have a specific area but you can get poisoned in that being the sewer and these weird amphibian creatures that come up and try to bite you and eat you it's horrible i remember the part in the sewer level playing as leon and you have to go through this maze along these little mounds of crap that you've got to get through yeah to get this unique weapon at the back but while you go through that you've got these creatures around you that poison you so you need a special herb to cure the poison but you've got no sort of space to dodge and maneuver from these creatures and i remember doing that twice going back and forth and being like do i really need this weapon and to be honest tell you the truth i think it was a flamethrower i never properly really used it i only really used it against the plant people but like i said once i realized i could get the code to drop the ladders which bypasses the whole stairs and go all the way around to get back to where i needed to go i didn't use it i ended up putting back in my storage and using something else so i kind of sat there like was it worth it really having to waste all those resources just to get it where it was a bit useful but then it wasn't so there are certain moments in the game where you sit there and go was it worth doing that or what did i just do it for the completion for my second run i know you get different weapons as claire but when i got to my second run i was just like if that part comes up i'm not doing it again and luckily it didn't because the game's different but i did think of like yeah i wouldn't waste any resources doing that again so if i was to play as leon again in like a fourth playthrough i would probably do things differently but that's what i like about the game the game basically gives you the option like you don't need to go there if you don't want to it's up to you actually i think you do have to go there to do something but otherwise the point is you don't have to do certain things like you can decide or get this there and get this there whatever so yeah i just like how the game leaves open to you because that is something that i feel was f is absolutely
Speaker: really well handled in this one but again as I said we'll get on to three in a minute where the characterisation is done extremely well you've got Leon who is this rookie cop and he's very cocky and oh look I can handle Mr X until you know he actually sees Mr X and he goes Jesus Christ and he goes from this naive but well -meaning police officer to this very jaded doesn't know what is going on kind of thing especially with the trail between him and Ada and seeing what this world has turned into because one of the scenes that really breaks my heart is when you go into Kendall's gun shop for the first time with Leon and he sees Kendall who is very protective of his daughter because his daughter has been bitten and Ada just does not hesitate she points a gun says oh she's infected he's like how dare you say that about my daughter you have this very bittersweet moment where he takes his daughter behind a closed door and you
Speaker: can kind of infer what happens with the gunshots. That changes Leon's viewpoint completely of the situation. And it is so interesting to see that versus Claire's journey of being a protector, being just like a brother in that regard, minus the boulder punching. But again, we'll get to that. And trying to bring down irons, which is something that would eventually... I know the remake came after a lot of the games and the films, but it's something that Claire Redfield has always been. She's been someone who... who stands up against certain villains, whether it's Umbrella, whether it's any of the offshoots, choose one, because she does it in Revelations 2, she does it in the animated films, where she's more of a journalist. She works for an organisation called TerraSave, but again, this isn't for 2 Remake, it's more for what will become of her in the future. So it's cool to see the origins and the seeds being planted in her character there. Honestly, I think it's why this game is so memorable. You've got fantastic characters. You've got fantastic voice actors. You've got the music, which is great. You've got the atmosphere. You've got the build -up. And again, as I say, it sags in certain places, whether that's the sewer, the questionable puzzles, whether the bombastic action lands or not. But again, I love it. I think it is, other than the fourth remake, of course, one of the best Resident Evil games of the remakes that you'll play. Oh, yeah, definitely. The trifecta for me is definitely, maybe that's unfair, but if you're playing a Resident Evil... game to get the full experience one two and four remake they are some of the best games you'll ever play in your life genuinely go play it which is not something i can say about the next game no no no i was lightly disappointed yeah so this game unlike the previous game which came out in 2019 this one of course came out in 2020 covid years unfortunately i don't think you can really blame can't no you can try but you can't because it was still in development before covid you know this one could have been so good and there's a very interesting opening where we have fan favorite returning jill valentine who is a well i think at this point maybe x stars member she's looking to leave raccoon city she's literally counting down the days we get this really cool first person perspective where we wake up from bed we're looking at all the evidence that we've gathered which is linked to the very first game that is so cool because they're very much leaning into what they did in 2017 with resident evil biohazard really really cool i'm not gonna lie it is such a cool idea the only thing though that sullies it is you have this sequence where it's like oh spooky she's turning into a zombie and that could have been so cool to delve into the idea that was terrifying that could have been a great moment to delve into the idea of Jill is suffering from PTSD and everything from the Spencer Mansion incident, and that's something I love about the first game, whether it's the original or remake, that they react like normal human beings to these situations. Even Chris Redfield, he's not exempt from this, but everyone, they see zombies, they see these creatures, and obviously by the end, they're fighting the Naked Tyrant, which is, of course, the name of my metal band, but that's another thing. Buy tickets here. I'm only kidding. But you have that, and you think, oh, this could be really interesting. and we're diving into how this has affected Jill Valentine. I wonder how... Oh, look, there's the wall. There's the wall crashing down. Oh, look, there's a big zombie going stars. And oh, as soon as that happened, I was like, okay, this game is just going to be full on bombastic. And definitely the moment that ruined it for me was that a lot of people had built up Nemesis, you know, they had said, Nemesis is going to be this big, hulking, stalker villain. And I was really... Excited because I thought, well, Mr. X was fantastic and this guy looks creepy as hell. He needs a bit of dental work, but he looks creepy as hell. What is he going to do? Is he going to stalk us, appear at random intervals? And I don't know about you, but the bit that killed it for me immediately was when you meet him for the first time in the streets and you have to navigate through Raccoon City as it's collapsing and, you know, everyone's getting infected. I like the concept, but it was as soon as you saw him and I started shooting at him thinking, oh, right, okay. that's fine i'm gonna shoot at him and i'll be able to stall him like mr rex now as soon as a chest popped out and it was like a gacha game a loot box that killed it for me i'm gonna be honest i was like yeah this isn't like mystery at all it's not like biohazard it just there was no fear there i was like all right this is a game enemy oh great but flipping it back onto you what were your impressions see the first part of the game the intro and whatnot and then meeting nemesis were you disappointed by it or well i was disappointed to be honest because like what you said everybody had told me that nemesis is the big bad he's really really scary terrifying he's going to be a stalker even the developers remember them saying he was like mr x but on steroids so i'm like okay here we go i know it's a bit sacrilege to say but resident evil 2 apocalypse the movie is my favorite movie of all the franchise particularly because it's got nemesis in it and i love the nemesis in that movie and how he hunts down and kills the stars members and the story or like i might get into it because that's gonna be different but it's my favorite film of them all because of nemesis so From that and from my experience with Resident Evil 2 Remake, I went into it being, again, terrified. Being like, oh God, you know, this is going to be 10 times worse than Mr. X. But I'm excited because I'm capable because I did it already. I go into Resident Evil 3. I do exactly the same as I did for Resident Evil 2. Before he appeared, I did everything I could. I unlocked all the doors, you know, the pick locks, broke chains, blah, blah, blah. All the resources. Because I played Assisted again at first because this is what I do for Resident Evil games. I always play Assisted and then Standard for my second playthrough just so I know they're out of the land. And then, like you, Nemesis. showed up as oh my god there he is finally oh loot crate that's a bit strange but okay don't worry about it and as the game goes on you realize he's just annoying he's just there he's just like go away and then what you quickly realize it wasn't the loot box that bothered me even though that's not great what bothered me was the fact of when i quickly realized that nemesis was just a deus machina he was just a mcguffin he was just a thing to move on the story whereas like oh nemesis showed up you've got to get nicolai and all that they're going on the train so carlos is going to save you some time so you've got to run away so you run away from him and the next thing you know he's chasing you and then you're running through a burning building and then you run him over with a car and he's just a set piece to get from one piece to the next and if for me it was just the fact of oh well that's kind of taking the wind out the sails of him because i don't want to shoot him because yes i know i'm going to get some get out of it but i don't want to waste ammo on him so i'm going to run away and then he's just there just as a boss but he's not a hard boss he's more of just like a hindrance and annoyance he's standing there menacingly basically staring at me, but he's not doing anything terrifying. He's just there. And then when I played as standard difficulty, no one told me this mother... could jump, right? Pardon my language. Oh, yeah. When your player's assisted, he doesn't jump. He doesn't do any of that. He doesn't disappear out of nowhere. He just walks like Miss Rex. When the player's standard, he was jumping everywhere. He was appearing. He didn't make it scary. He made it more annoying because when you first meet him and you're running away, I come out of the shop and he's there in a little square and I want to go up the stairs to go run towards the train station. I managed to hit the electric box. It electrocutes him so I couldn't run upstairs. I'm running, running, running. Before I could even get to the gate to open it, he jumps in front of me. There was like a two -inch gap between... me in the gate, but somehow he managed to fit inside it and push me down. And then he picks me up, throws me away, and then just decides to repeatedly stomp on me. It was horrible. It wasn't even horrible as that is cool or that is scary. It was like, that's unfair. That's really annoying. And it just took the wind out of my sails. I was like, this is not what I expected Nemesis to be like. I expected Nemesis to be like Mr. Rekt, to always be there, but with guns. And I could run away, but he can shoot me with a rocket launcher out. So I have to be clever. I have to evade him. I'm going to have to hide. in buildings, run around, learn the lay of the land really. But it didn't matter because even if I was clever and I ran away, he wouldn't follow me. He would just jump over a building like Hulk and land in front of me. And I'm like, that's not fair because then what's the point of me learning the layout? What's the point of me learning where to go and what to do if he's just going to jump like Hulk in a pier? And yeah, he just became annoying. And it was just, by the end of it, I was just like, I want to play this game again to play standard. But part of me is also the fact of, do I want to have to go through all that again when I know it's basically just the same, but a little bit harder. I did because, you know, I wanted to experience what it was like playing it like that. But when he started jumping around, it was like, it went from fun to just like, oh God, okay, this is what it is. And it hurt me. It did because I just had such a great time with Resident Evil 2 Remake that I was just hoping for so much more from the next one. And again, like I said, I never played the original, so I can't miss anything I didn't experience, like the expending levels, the clock tower, the park, and just giant spiders and all these other things that were cut out the original for the remake. I have no experience with that, so I can't say, you know, I miss them and I would. they were in there but knowing what this game is and how short it is i don't know why they took those out i don't know it would have been nice to have those extended levels those moments when the options of do i jump over this ledge or do i jump out the window and give me more reason to replay whereas resident evil 3 remake in all honesty if you've played it once you don't need to play for again unless you really want to because you get points at the end of it once you complete for the first time and you can use those points to unlock like a special knife or more ammo space or jill's original outfit which i love that i thought that was great and if you a completionist. That's brilliant. But for me, it was just like, oh, well, you know, I've got a few points. I unlocked Jill's original outfit. I unlocked the hip pouch because it just gives me more resources. So when I played the second time around, what made it more fun for me was just seeing Jill run around in her original outfit from Resident Evil 1. I appreciate that. I loved that because it made it feel a bit more continual, if that makes sense. Apart from that, yeah, Nemesis just, I hate to say it, but just ruined it for me, which was like...
Speaker: I don't want to go back and play this game now. Like I've done it once or about twice technically, but I don't really want to have to go through this story again. Which is ironic because if you think about Resident Evil 2 and one of the most scary parts of that game was, as we talked about in length, was Mr. X. Yet he is not the title character of that game. He's not really, I can't remember if he's on the promotional art, but you know, he's not the main focus. It's not called Resident Evil 2 Mr. X, which would be very weird. and they would have to sell a CD of the X going to give it to you soundtrack. which That does nothing but fill me with fear. I know there's mods for it. See, now that should be the DLC. I'd pay for that DLC. Like if the Capcom got the rights, every time we appeared, you got X going, give it to you. I'm like, yes, he will. I'm running away, X. And I'm singing as I'm running. There is mods for that, I have to say. It's amazing. It's terrifying. And that's the thing. People use that mod to mitigate the fear factor. See, if anything... There's nothing more terrifying than hearing those boots the they seat and then hearing, I'm going to give it to you. he we No, no, no, no, no. Please, please don't give it to me. Whereas for this one, you're completely right. Resident Evil 3 has always focused around two core factors. It's focused around Jill Valentine and it's focused around Nemesis. I mean, for God's sake, when you load up the game, it is Nemesis' face at the beginning. He's like, yes. and stars and you're like oh no maybe this is the musical brain in me that kept thinking this I don't know if you thought this at any point but every time he said stars I just thought of him like you know Javert out of Les Mis oh yeah and I was expecting them to break out in song like yeah Out in the darkness. And I'm like, please, put down the rocket launcher. Let's talk about this. A fugitive running. I'm like, no, no, Nemesis, please, for the love of God. He just, as you said, oh God, that voice really takes out of you, by the way. He just, as you said, he just really irritated me. He popped up. He was like, oh, look at me. And I could see why people were annoyed at the clock tower being taken out. And from what I've seen all of the original game, Nemesis just appears. out of nowhere there is one terrifying one when it's like you're walking down the corridor and then two seconds later he is bolting after you he is running for your ass and you're like oh my god people pause it at that moment to get their breath back they're like I don't want to play this and no wonder because he is a force of nature he is like Mr X but the only difference is unlike the original second game where he just stomps towards you and you just keep shooting him until he dies he doesn't have that same menace to him he is just another obstacle he's just another boss that you have to overcome and it's such a shame because i genuinely think up until he crashes through your front door he looks really good like i know he's wearing trash or looks like he's wearing trash bags but the model looks really good it's just the fact of yeah you know what i mean the character's not so it's like doesn't matter if he looks good he's wearing trash and he is trash and it's like oh it's like a walking part of turd really he's just chasing you and that's not terrifying can i admit something for a second here speaking of the death of a franchise here.
Speaker: So there's a character in this. I cannot remember. Can you remember his name? The helicopter pilot? Oh, Brad. Is it Brad, Bill? Brad. That's it. Brad. Yeah. So I remember when I was playing this and in the original and in this one, he gets killed by, I think in the original he gets killed by Nemesis, but in this one he gets killed by the zombies coming through. When I first played that, I remember I was so confused when I played Revelation. 2 because in Resident Evil Revelations 2 there's a scene where you play as Barry Burton and I remember playing as him and I was like hold on a second you're dead She died in Resident Evil 3 because I thought that Barry and Brad were the same person. And then when I went back, I'm like, oh, his name is Brad. Oh, no. Yeah, so that was my guilty confession of the night there. Speaking of, again, deaths of characters, and I'm going to keep using that segue, sue me for legal reasons, please don't sue me. But can we talk about Jill for a second? Oh, definitely. I have a bit of an issue with her character and it might not be what you think. because there was a lot of people going with the asinine argument of, oh, she's a girl boss, she's a Mary Sue, she's this, oh, she's badass. She is badass, don't get me wrong, but she seems to fall into this archetype of a character that, on the one hand, she is badass and everything, she manages to hold her own, which is great, you know, go queen. We support a strong queen in Ragged City. But on the other hand, we have this moment where she also gets absolutely physically wrecked in this. scheme and there's a lot of weird things it's like trying to make her badass by also just traumatizing her constantly and one of the scenes that i think you'll know where i'm going with this that really threw me off and it threw off a lot of people because it never happens again and the poison status i don't think appears very often again after this is the scene where you have to fix the generator for the subway oh yeah yeah and you go in there's these slime spider creatures and they basically rust into her throat and they put a parasite in and they say, oh, you have to eat a green herb to fix yourself and heal yourself. That mechanic never really comes back into the game. Thank God, but it never comes back. And again, it actually reminds me of the way they characterised Lara Croft. The way they did that, and you know the 2016 reboot onwards, where it's like, oh, she's a badass, she's capable, but also let's put her through the most physical trauma possible. Oh, yeah. Let's literally put her through so much sort of trauma like PTSD that really any normal person wouldn't be standing at the end of it. But she's powerful. She can do it. I'm like, no. It is funny you mention that because Jill in this one, there's just something about tongues and things wanting to touch her with the tongue and licking her. Like she gets picked up by a neck, by a big tongue from Nemesis tentacle thing. You've got those tentacle monsters that Nemesis sends after you. And again, I'm not saying it is, but there's so many suggestive things where I'm like, OK, that's a bit much. Do we need that? Oh, right. With Jill, she's badass and she's really, really cool. But I think what I liked about Claire was that Claire was humanized. Whereas the fact of the reason she's in Raccoon City is because she's only there to look for her brother, Chris. Right. She gets there, she meets Leon and she's stuck. But then she meets Sherry and then she's like, OK, well, that's my new focus. Chris is gone. I'm stuck in it, but I can help somebody while I'm here. And with her character, you relate with her. You wanted to see her help Sherry and save the day. And it's lovely. You know, you get a bit of character exploration into her. And so by the end of it, you feel, oh, you know what? She is a college student. She's not really badass. She's probably taught by her brother how to shoot. That's probably as much as she's good. But she survived. She's capable. She saved the day. Great. Whereas with Jill, again, I haven't played Resident Evil 1, so I had no real experience with her character. But you assume that she's a S .T .A .R .S. member. She's highly trained. She's a soldier. She knows what she's doing. She's highly capable. For me, there was no real moments where I could connect with her character at all. Well, I did care for her, but caring the much of like, oh, if Claire or Sherry got her, I might put her down. You know what I mean? Like back away from her, you bitch. You know, proper alien style. Whereas with Jill, I was just like, well, you know, it was just the fact of she wants to get out because she wants to prove Umbrella are corrupt, which is fine. She's running away from Nemesis while she's also being stalked by the other Umbrella Corporation soldier bloke. I think she's great as a character, but I feel like what would have been better and you summed it up great. beginning when we saw Resident Evil 3 was when she's in the mirror at the beginning of the game and she's looking into it and it goes grey and she can see herself turning into a zombie if they had kept that PTSD storyline I know it might have not upset old fans but it would have been great in terms of because I know that they want to change the continuity a bit for the newer games they've changed things around it would have been great with the remake for newer players to be like as you're playing for Resident Evil 3 she starts hallucinating or she gets flashbacks or the screen goes black and white and I'm not saying she turns into a zombie, but she experiences these moments where she feels like she's turning or something's wrong with her. And you could feel sorry for her then because when she talks to Nikolai and Carlos and the other survivors, they're like, are you okay? And she's like, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm fine. He's like, you sure? You know, your nose is running with blood. You blacked out there for a bit. Again, I'm making this all up on the top of my head, but it would have been great for that extra bit of character development of the PTSD or some sort of like, just to make it feel like, oh, she really did go through a lot. It's really taken a toll on her and she shouldn't be here. She should be in a hospital recovering. she's not she's having to relive this nightmare all over again in raccoon city where she should be safe while she's also being hunted by a giant tyrant how does that affect her how does that affect her mentality and by the end of the game how is she as a character has she changed is she more capable or is she more broken those sort of things would be so when carlos comes along and helps and saves her you're like yeah you know she needs it good for you carlos sort of thing not but oh it's carlos there he is he's got a big gun it's great he's got loads of ammo that's great yes give me action but also Also give me story, give me character, give me a reason to have these characters. So when the action kicks in, I feel badass. I feel capable. But also I actually want to protect Jill because I know that she's dealing with a lot. So I want to make sure she's safe. So I want to make sure she's got all the resources she needs to get through this struggle. And that's how I want to feel. I felt like that with Leon and Claire. I was like, I care about them. So I want to keep them safe. My job as the player is to make sure they don't die. But with Jill, it's like I want her to live, but I have no reason other than to play the game to keep her alive, if that makes sense. Yeah, I think that pinpoints my major gripe with this game, that it feels like a game. And I know that sounds like such a weird thing to say about a video game. Yeah, but you're right. Yeah, it feels very gamified. You've got the dodge mechanic, which I think was in the original as well, or something similar was in the original. But you've got this dodge mechanic, and you can see why they added it. Because compared to Leon and Claire, they are very much normal human beings. Whereas, don't get me wrong, Jell is a normal human being, but she has been trained by stars who are, you know, they're the people you call when the experts can't deal with the situation. They're the last resort. They are so cool. But so you can see why she's capable. Her qualifications in the matter aren't up for debate, but it's more the fact that you sit there and you see yourself go through these particular scenarios. And it's just the same thing over again. It's like, all right, okay, here's Nemesis. oh you get to go to the RPD again as Carlos which I think in the original you go to the RPD as Jill which yeah that is a bit of a downgrade but again I liked it but the whole thing just felt like and again we don't really get these anymore but it felt more like an expansion pack yeah of the second game it didn't feel like its own standalone thing I mean you can play it as its own standalone thing I thought that it was still a fun experience it was serviceable you have your big, bombastic moments of, oh, look, it's Nemesis, but he's a blob monster now. Oh! Whereas when I think of 2, I think of the chases with Mr Dex. I think of Claire's plight with Sherry and trying to stop Chief Irons with the relationship between Ada and Leon and them trauma bonding, essentially. Because it is cute, some of the scenes they have together where he just tries to protect her. And, you know, maybe that's part infatuation and part that he is just a good guy deep down. Whereas in this game, other than the chemistry between... And I use that loosely because the chemistry between Jill and Carlos is... all right but again i can't really remember many moments other than oh yeah here's the umbrella core cleanup crew but one of them's evil i think that's nikolai yeah nikolai comes across and i can't speak for the original but he comes across very twiddly thumbs as well twiddly fingers like excellent oh my plan is coming together yeah i'm gonna get rich over this it's like take it from fallout If the world is gone.
Speaker: He can't survive with money. Honestly, it's just, it's a silly concept. But, you know, he's serviceable. But again, when you've got him running around laughing in the background while you've got Nemesis as the big blob chasing you. And again, there's so many moments where you have to run away from Nemesis. And it is just so so tiring. And I've heard Inferno mode is just a nightmare, which I have no intention of playing. but Yeah, it's not the best introduction to the series, I would say. And again, it's like between the representation of Jill, between the Nemesis reputation building as it were, it just comes across as like a big dumb action game. Other than Nemesis, you know, if Nemesis was taken out of this game, would you feel as if this was a Resident Evil game? Yes, I would. But I feel like with Resident Evil, you need that drive. You need that other big bad chasing you. You need, again, like with Resident Evil 4, you need... that driver i need to save the day whereas i feel like if it was just jill trying to escape raccoon city before it was nuked it was like okay that's interesting but then add more things to it so like if it was the game as it is now where it was like no nemesis just you go from one section to the next i'm like oh that's a bit boring but if they decided then to add in the water treatment plant the park and the clock tower and all the things they took out and had you facing hunters oh god in the hospital they were a nightmare oh yeah the hunters i remember i told the story where you've got to go get, I think it's a tape or something like that in one of the rooms. And there's two hunters in the room. And I remember, again, when I played as assisted, I remember I ran in terrified. I screamed as I went in the room. I was like, ah, you know, quickly grabbed the tape, ran out, fine. And then when I played as standard, I ran in the room and they just beelined for me, both of them, and just ripped me to shreds. So I remember before I went in the room, I had to quickly scavenge around for like a grenade and a flashbang. I threw a flashbang in the room. It went off, threw a grenade in. It killed one of them, but it killed the one closest towards me. But luckily... the one was still stunned brandon got the tape ran out as oh that's terrifying but more moments like that if they added in more of the hunters which were terrifying in themselves they were really scary when they got you because they were quick and they would kill you really quickly more of those added in the giant spiders added in more mutated zombies or mutated creatures from the sewers we didn't mention it but one of the things i felt funny in rest evil 2 was when leon first goes to the sewers he runs away from the giant crocodile oh yeah you do kill it but you don't get to fight it you just run away from it and then it it dies but something like that like a giant crocodile or like a giant creature or something in the sewer like a giant rat zombie rat or something like that would be great because one of the things that i love one of the bits of lore that i love about resident evil 3 remake which i don't know if you found this if you went around reading all the notes but mr x is made from i think it's a t virus or the g virus whereas nemesis he's made from the parasite that's why he can do what he does that's why he changes because he's a parasite and in the note i think it was william birkin who wrote the note it was one of the doctors basically said i'm paraphrasing but it's unstable to you use a parasite because a parasite is uncontrollable you can't control it it evolves and changes constantly whereas the t virus or g virus whatever one was used to make mr x can be controlled you can control that and how that you should stop developing with the parasite virus because it doesn't work in terms of making tyrants is like parasite it's not good for that so don't you do it and there was a back and forth and i really like that as an idea so to have more maybe again it links in resident evil 4 last plug us parasitic zombies running around and jill be like okay where's it from this is not tvrs i don't recognize this and then a no to a villain or bad guy saying oh yeah they were experimenting and it got loose or we just decided when the zombies hit we ran away forgot to turn off any of the systems and they got loose or something like that long story short under your question if they added things like that and tied it in resident evil 4 and made it a bit more of a survival horror as you're trying to make your way through it then i feel like it would feel like a resident evil game it would feel newer it feel fresher and it would follow on from resident evil 2 and even if you had moments of like you're going through this where you could hear Leon shout or you hear somebody screaming and shouting near the police station thinking, oh, little bits like that. good Oh, I know what's happening there because Leon's there or Claire's there, you know, or you see a drop pod and you're thinking, oh, that's possibly Mr. X being dropped out of a plane. and Now he's stalking around on the other side of the city. Little things like that would have been great. But as the game is now, if they decided to take Mr. X out and just give you what's out, I'd feel like, oh, this game's not very fun. It is just literally a run and gun. Like Left 4 Dead, kill zombies, shoot things, get to the end. That's it. Left 4 Dead's good, but I'm playing Resident Evil. I want a Resident Evil experience. And with Nemesis in it, the way he is now, luck he's just an annoyance. If anything, it makes the game feel longer because he's just there annoying. Whereas if he wasn't there, the game would be over really quick. Yeah, and that's just such a shame because I could definitely feel the bit betrayal of the fans of the original where they played this, there was 10 -hour video essays on it being like, oh, Jill's not supposed to act like this, or oh, the rude nemesis. Every time I watched a video like that, I could totally see the point because we had a game that was revolutionary in the 90s and we went from that. Now we have a game that is very half -baked in terms of presentation. Well, I mean, presentation. wise i do think the graphics still look good to anybody saying oh this game doesn't look good i would strongly disagree that's one of its few things that has going for it the very beginning the opening cut scene everything it just looks gorgeous it looks great for what it is but again it cannot shake off the fact that this just feels like an expansion to re2 it definitely feels like you're expanding on what you had before there's a lot of good additions there's some maybe not great editions And as I said, it's just taking Jill Valentine, putting her in these horrible situations, not really delving into that more. They could have delved into it more, but they just decided not to. I don't know why. But again, you know, I'm not a game developer. I'm not as much a writer for games, so I can't 100 % be like, ooh, they should have done this. Because hindsight is a wonderful, wonderful thing. They should have, could have, would have this whole game. But at the same time, there's some clear moments where... Although I loved Carlos, I loved his relationship with Jill and everything, it wasn't enough to pull me back and say, this is a game that I think everybody should be trying. Oh, Nemesis is so cool. Again, Nemesis reminds me a bit of, and I don't know if you've come across this trope before in video games, where you've got a character who they say, oh, this is an amazing character. They've done all these feats of... heroicness and whatnot and you go, oh cool, I can't wait to see them. And then when you actually see them, they're a bit of a loser. Oh, completely. What a pushover. If Mr. X came out of nowhere and was like, leave this human alone and then decided to beat him up, I'd feel like Mr. X would win. As soon as he knocked off his fedora, I'd be like, that's it, it's on. And then just destroy him and then carry on chasing after me. Have you seen Freddy vs. Jason? Yeah. There's a moment in that movie where Freddy appears and he's like, you go, this one's mine. And then Freddy takes Jason on and it's like, brilliant. That's what I'd feel like it would be, but it would just be Mr. x puts his fedora down below you've made me take my half it's on and he just destroys because that's how nemesis feels nemesis doesn't feel terrifying he's more just the fact of i wouldn't even run i would stand and watch i'm like get him get him mr x get him it actually reminds me of i don't know if you've seen the second silent hill film and spoilers for anyone who wants to watch the second silent hill film you'll skip a couple of seconds ahead but you know the scene at the end where it's like pyramid head comes out of nowhere and he starts fighting the big bad and that that's what it feels like it's just complete over the top just nonsensical fan service but you're like you know what it's cool i love it mr x has definitely set a high standard for the stalking enemy because even before that we had jack baker who don't worry he's a lovely gentleman he will feed you and his lovely louisiana by you trust me and nothing bad will happen but and that for resident evil 7 biohazard you have jack baker who stalks you throughout the house and everything and that's really creepy because it's just a guy. And he's just like, oh, gee, I can't wait to... You know, it doesn't sound like that, but he's like, oh, I can't wait to basically impale you in whatever horrors you end up coming across. But you have the building blocks for something really, really interesting. And again, I completely understand why maybe they thought, okay, let's cut out the RPG elements, which granted would have made it more interesting, but cut out those elements, cut out fixed camera angles, let's make it more like the second game. But, you know, you've got... moments where it's like oh let's have jill ram a car into nemesis oh nemesis is a fish monster now running across the literal clock tower that you're not allowed in oh now he's a blob and again the worst part of a resident evil game underground in the laboratory yeah once you end the game i remember sitting at the end of four just put down my steam deck listen to the credits it was so good just so satisfying same with the second game. I put down the Steam Deck and it was just, it was so amazing to experience that game. For the third one, I didn't feel that. I just felt, again, there's something you said there, that obligation to say, oh, I have completed it for Resident Evil Month, but I'm not super happy about it. I'm not upset that I played it. I still think it's a good enough game on its own, but if you compare it to the game that it's based on, it's terrible. If you compare it to even the second game, it's not as fleshed out. And I don't know whether that's because of time restrictions, resources, budget. Because, I mean, they were working on things like Resident Evil Village, which would come out the year after. So, and the fact that it was bundled with the Resident Evil Resistance probably didn't help. Oh, God. I forgot I had that until they announced that they were shooting it down. I was like, oh, I've got that. And then it was like, oh, there's no point playing it because no one's online. Well, exactly. That's how I felt. I was like, Resident Evil wo and i had to look at my stimuliber and i was like is that malware what? Why have I got that? Yeah.
Speaker: Genuinely. I was like, well done. You've got a free game. I don't want this game. I'm sorry. It's like Capcom knew that they wasn't giving you enough with the base game. So it's like, oh, we're just going to give you this extra thing for free. It's like, well, I don't want it. Are you going to have it? It's a bit like, you know, when you go out and you get this very nicely presented meal and things. Only in this case, there's a few things. Maybe the potatoes are missing. They're in the clock tower, let's say. So, you know, you've got your meat and everything, but you're missing a few things. And then they're like, yes, so sorry. we don't have the potatoes for this game. Anyway, here's some mystery slop and then they just splat it on top of your meat and you go, I don't want this. I really don't want this. Please take this away. No, no, no. You have to finish it. Oh God, just like I've seen it in Matilda. Eat, eat, eat. This is what it feels like. It just feels, again, I wouldn't say overly unfinished. I would say unfinished in a conceptual basis in terms of storyline and areas that you can explore. Gameplay wise, This is one of the things people moan about. It used to be good in the original and whatnot, but I'm going to be honest. See, gameplay -wise, I think this game is solid. Oh yeah, gameplay works. Again, I feel as if the areas are a bit half -baked. I feel as if the plot, which, granted, they're taken from the original game, it's not the best. Because, again, you could have had several different endings with the original because of the RPG elements. You could decide to run away or stand your ground and fight. Whereas this one, it's like... oh, you shoot Nikolai in the head, and then that's it. You save Carlos, you get out of Raccoon City, and you watch as it gets absolutely nuked, which I'm sure we'll see plenty of in Resident Evil 9 Requiem. Cannot wait for that game. But in my closing point for both of these games, what I love about the second game overall, other than, as I said, the characters, the gameplay, etc., is the fact that not only did it do a great job of modernising the original game, but it also put a new spin on it. it and it made it accessible to modern audiences because the first game i genuinely think is a perfect remake 10 out of 10 but i can see why people would be put off by it because there's a lot of things like limited resources that you can't run and gun there's the fixed camera angles and i think as i said last week it adds to the experience and it's great to experience the first game like that but in terms of doing that going forward i think something had to change and i'm glad we've got modders that can bring that original vision to the limelight as we said you've got the fixed camera angle mod you've got the x gonna give it to you mod which i'm sure was meant to be in the original but unfortunately it feels as if the third one is just more of the same but less compelling it's almost like the separate ways dlc but and again you'll get to that in re4 you're gonna love it whereas that expands the story you get to play as a Ada spoilers and go through that. It's absolutely fantastic. This one just feels, yeah, again, I know that's a scientific term. It's not bad, but it's not great. It's not great. It's just kind of there. And it's such a shame. And I feel so sorry for fans of Nemesis because as we said, he is such an iconic character to take him, make him a gacha machine. It is just not that great. You know, I only did that once. Literally, I only did it once. when he first gets taken down, I think by Carlos, and then you get the first thing. I never bothered doing that again. So I only really used him once because it just felt like a waste of resources of pumping loads of ammo into him just for a piece of gear that might upgrade me, might not. I just found it easier just to flashbang him or to electrocute him or something and then just run away than use him as a gacha machine. So me personally, I never got any benefit out of that whole concept. And I don't know why you would, because like I said, it's a waste of resources. I'd rather... spend it getting through and getting to the next part of the game then just shooting the hell out of him getting apart then running away honestly i think that just summarizes this game that they basically gamified resident evil and again i know that sounds stupid to say oh well resident evil is a survival horror game but when you're in resident evil 1 when you're in resident evil 2 even resident evil 7 or even resident evil 4 again there's so many examples you get sucked into this world all heroes versus this ominous umbrella corporation. You're thinking, how am I going to survive this next couple of hours? Oh, I'm running out of ammo. What are those footsteps? And so on and so forth. You forget that you're playing the game until you get to a very egregious puzzle. But again, you know our thoughts on that. And there is, of course, a lot of very simplistic puzzles in this one, which people have complained about in the third one. But when you're playing it, you definitely feel as if, oh, it's a video game you can dodge you can shoot them oh you have to do this scripted sequence and it just doesn't land and i agree with you i hated those hunters they were probably the only few times i died because i think for the most part i didn't really die very much except for the hunters yeah because i keep forgetting how lethal they are at close range when they throw them at you you are in like small corridors or small rooms where you can't really run anywhere it does feel a bit unfair like i get why they're there but it still is very fair that they're there i would have loved to see a hunter go up against nemesis when nemesis comes into the hospital and they attack him and then he attacks them and you know that could cause damage to him and i can run away or something like that again just to add a bit more concept to the world one thing i will say though about resident evil 3 in a positive note is that it left me wanting more of resident evil 2 and it meant wanting more of that and looking to get it with resident evil 4 and that's what's got me excited to play resident evil 4 is the fact of yes it is leon's door and yes it is a bit more more actiony. But from all the things I've heard, they've gone back to what was so good about Resident Evil 2 remake. So I'm looking forward to that. But also, even though I think Jill's a wonderful character, I actually was thinking, well, I really miss Claire. And I know we keep mentioning it, but that's why I want a Code Veronica remake is because I want to carry on Claire's story. I want to see where she comes in and what she did next after the events of Resident Evil 2, which I really enjoy. Where does she go next? What's she looking for above her? Or did she decide to do something else? And same with Carlos. I did a bit of research. I don't think Carlos ever appears. ever again which is a shame because I really liked Carlos and I'm like I want to play him again I want to see more of him so if anything it left me wanting more of what I didn't get which is more of characters that I loved and more of a game that I loved that I was hoping to get but didn't but knowing that I will get it eventually Resident Evil 4 has got me excited so there are positives there it's just a shame that it wasn't the game that we'd all hoped it would be or it was hyped up to be and yeah bouncing off that positivity something I will say as well is at least it has turned people towards the original game and being able to say okay the remake isn't that great but look at the amazingness of the original because i think on the playstation store you can buy the originals personally for me i well first of all i don't have a playstation so argument over but even that aside i don't know how well i would be able to cope with the game but at the same time you know i'd happily try it but i think with the tank controls it would just be a bit much but that means that Even though I might not do it, it doesn't mean that other people aren't going to try and explore what made Toon 3 such iconic games to begin with. And honestly, if you've played the Toon 3 remake and you think, you know what, I really want to try the originals, go for it if you can. Don't spend ridiculous amounts of money because, as I said, you can buy it on GOG .com if you want to play on the PC or you can also play it on, I think... the playstation store i don't think xbox has it but one day we'll probably add it to game pass let's face it no jokes aside definitely go try it if you want to but on that note i would say if you're toing and froing about whether or not you want to play the second one or you want to play the third one i would still say play them the third one might not be as good as the second one or maybe you won't like the second one but you'll love the third one definitely go and try them out because usually the second one's on game pass i don't know if it's still on game pass but i mean it's a great game you're gonna get plenty of content you're gonna get lots of replayability definitely check these games out for better or for worse if you hear it feel free to reach out and send us your medical bills yeah our chat tsunami therapist is fully booked for the year All joking aside, that would be my final point. Definitely go check these games out because they are fantastic. But before we wrap up, is there any other final points you want to make, Luke? No, I think you've wrapped it up perfectly there. I just was going to reinstate what you just said. Give it a go. Definitely give Resident Evil 2 Remake a go. That should be on any gamer's bucket list of giving it a go, even if you're not very good with survival horror. Trust me, if we can play it, you can. But when it comes to Resident Evil 3 Remake, I know we make fun of it and we are a bit deflated. I would still say... experience it it's one of them games where you just shoot your brain off where it's like you play in assisted mode play in standard shoot your brain off shoot zombies have fun it's very quick you get it done within four five hours depends how good you are still give it a go like i said you still got a lot of content there and just don't go in with the high hopes of expecting what you got for resident evil 2 with mr x just go in for action expect action you'll get action and you won't be disappointed because if you go in looking for horror a little bit disappointed and i mean that's ironic just one last point there that both of these games end relatively similar where I mean don't get me wrong Claire and Leon don't hold a big super weapon in their hands whereas Jill has the big badass moment where she's holding the real gun and she blasts Nemesis to the end pretty much destroys the I think it's the NE alpha parasite whatever it's called you know she has her again that Ripley moment of get away from her you bitch and just well there's no one around to see that do is you just blast them to oblivion that is a cool moment but it's very Resident Evil bombastic moment considering a lot of the games end in very similar ways just without the big giant rail gun at her hip Because I mean, the second one literally ends with the cousin of Thomas the Tank Engine getting burned alive as Mr. X crawls through it and you have to gun him down as he's crawling on the carriage. I mean, it's still terrifying, but yeah, again, that's pretty much a common thing amongst Resident Evil games. So yeah, go check it out, honestly. And all Resident Evil games that we're going to be talking about this month, you're going to get the highs, you're going to get the lows, you're going to get the very questionable moments, but definitely go check these out because they are absolutely... fantastic and speaking on fantastic on that note look thank you so so much for being a fantastic guest tonight and yeah joining me to talk about these two very iconic games oh it's been an absolute pleasure i like to be a very positive person i like to be full of beans but yeah with resident evil 3 it was a difficult one but like i said i'd still recommend people give it a go if you're looking for action just don't expect as good as what you got resident evil 2 remake and you'll be all right and definitely don't watch those videos that are like, top 10 things wrong with Resident Evil 3. Number one, Jill. Number two, Jill. Number three, and you know, you get the joke. Yeah, definitely. Go do your research, play it, go do you. But before we wrap up, where can the amazing Pandalorians at home find your content? So you can find me here and everywhere, really. I'm on all podcasting platforms. I'm on Spotify, I'm on Apple. I'm also on YouTube. So if you just type in the Howdy Beans podcast, you'll find me there. and elsewhere but more so now on TikTok which I feel like an old man being on there even though I'm still young I feel old being there but if you want to follow me on TikTok you can find me there and yeah that's about it really I'm coming up close to about 140 followers on Spotify so I could do with a few more followers on there but yeah you can find me here and everywhere just type in Howdy Beans podcast and then you'll be able to listen to my show definitely go check out the Howdy Beans podcast it's an absolutely fantastic podcast and well if you want more resident evil content especially so right inside you reviewed the second game yeah oh god it had been a year or two ago now i think it was two years i reviewed resident evil 2 remake and i reviewed resident evil 3 remake as you can imagine from this review my review of resident evil 2 was a lot more positive but again it has been a while like i didn't replay resident evil 3 for doing this review i actually went back and reinstalled resident evil 2 and ran through a bit as leon just to kind of get the gist and refresh my memory but it does say a lot where i could have play both but I was like no I'm going to play two and I play a majority of two leading up to doing this so if that doesn't give you a reason as to why you should play two I don't know what will. Once you're done with the Howdy Beans podcast if you want to listen to the rest of Resident Evil month as well as other collaborations from ourselves which we have plenty of don't you worry then you can indeed check us out at our website chatsanami .com as well as all good podcast apps. I also want to thank an amazing Pandalorian patrons Robotic Battle Toaster. Ghost Day Encryptic 1991. Thank you all so, so much for supporting the show. It honestly means the world to us. And if you would like access to exclusive episodes, early access to episodes, commentary tracks, as well as look and eyes live stream of us playing Resident Evil 7 for legal reasons, that last one's a joke. Then, of course, you can check us out on our Patreon page, patreon .com over slash chat tsunami. This podcast is, of course, a proud member of the Podpack Collective. For more information... check us out at our twitter slash x page at podpack collect but as always thank you all so so much for listening to this episode next week we'll be joined by the one and only joy from the game club pod where we'll be discussing resident evil 4 remake so definitely check that out except for you luke go play it and then come back and listen to it i will you've still got time well let's see how quick they can get a code veronica remake out that's the only thing that's stopping me yep speed running up come on let's go as always thank you all so so much for listening stay safe stay awesome and most importantly stay hydrated
