The Day That ALMOST Killed Resident Evil
I like video games; there is no hiding it. In fact, I have been quite invested in several franchises over the years; Legend of Zelda, Halo, Dark Souls, The Elder Scrolls, and now Elden Ring. But, I always return to what is probably one of my most favorite franchises: Resident Evil.
You know the story; evil corporation (Umbrela) creates t-virus, boom zombies and crazy over-powered mutants show up, battle them all and take down the bad guy at the top who started all the events, rinse and repeat; that is until RE7 (probably one of my most beloved of the series right next the RE2). Today however we “celebrate” what was, in my opinion the beginning of the slight down fall of the series.
Released on this day (6/28) in 2016 was Resident Evil 5. No more survival horror, and not near as much item management; our beloved horror franchise became a “run-and-gun.” This game was a great action game, don’t get me wrong, but it did NOT fill the necessary requirements for true fans of the genre and series. They killed the “scary”, gave you a bunch of guns, and then threw ridiculous monstrosities at you.
In addition, this game led to THE monstrosity that was RE6. YUCK. No other word to describe it. RE6 was more a “generic-shooter” than a distinctive survival horror game. Not until RE7: Biohazard did the series finally return to its “roots,” so to say, with the Baker family. I’d also recommend Resident Evil 8 Village as a great end to the Ethan Winters chapters; especially with new DLC, Shadow of Rose, coming out that follows his daughter (the main plot device of village) years after the original events. So the Resident Evil series continues to be my favorite and go to gaming series when they come out (I would highly recommend the RE2 remake; it's great). And hey if gaming isn’t your style, maybe the new Resident Evil series coming to Netflix on July 14th, is right up your alley.