For Your Consideration - Resident Evil Village: Village Demo

In life and death, we give glory

Oh boy, Resident Evil just doesn't stop now, does it? After the revitalization of the series from Resident Evil 7 a few years ago, Capcom has been pumping out good titles one after the other. Like the new RE2 and RE3 remake. These games have since proven to be a staple for triple-A horror games thanks to their unique and brilliant storytelling, intense atmosphere, brilliant voice cast, and engaging gameplay.

This demo seems to be no different from any of that as it takes place somewhere in some remote Eastern European village with connections to Umbrella of course. But creating a complete new story branch separate from the mainline RE series as Capcom expects this to be a trilogy for that storyline. A lot of things familiar to RE4 and RE7, but also creating this densely unsettling atmosphere will send chills down your spine as you look around, explore its world.

As the demo starts, you are greeted by this creepy yet interestingly funny old lady. I don't know why, but some weird sadistic part of me laughs with her every time she says something, the voice-over accentuates her so well that she becomes something entirely different. It's like part of me knows the good stuff is coming whenever she's present. Like in a somewhat devil's advocate kind of way.

Now of course, this is a 30-minute demo, so I didn't have time to look at much. But of course, there's reason to replay this as this demo has tons of clues and hidden tropes waiting to be uncovered. But even beyond that, there's so much to look around you on the village. The immaculate attention to detail, I couldn't avert my eyes for once. But it gets better. Remember, all of this is played from the PS4, everything looks amazing for a 7-year-old gaming console. Power of the RE Engine.

As you can see from the demo, am getting my butt handed by these Lycan beings. Having a hard time discerning where they are, I am trembling from this encounter. That's sheer terror just like the old games except right infront of you. Also, Ethan is a terrible shot, can't hold against any recoil at all. I've lost all ammo, and so I wasted two of my health vials while attacking the other one left with a knife and here's where I start to see some issues the game has. The camera movement is a little too finicky and moves faster than it should. So I went to options and dialed down the acceleration a bit, that fixed the awkward camera sensitivity.

Later on, a cutscene occurs with this high quality mocap and voice acting going on, heck even the writing is pretty good. Why can't Hollywood make horror movies like this anymore? Anyways, so the demo is halfway done once I've entered the house of which the gate was barred from the inside. From there, you meet new people, survivor of whatever onslaught is going on led by Lady Dimitrescu and a revelation of another party involved, Mother Miranda, a figurehead of sorts who was supposedly the village protector. Afterwards in true Resident Evil fashion, things get out of hand and everyone dies, while Ethan sobs about his bad luck spreading to people around him.

You know, this one guy nagging reminds me of someone from Resident Evil 3: Nemesis.

Moving on. The game recreates the unsettling atmosphere thanks to the ambience of distracting noises, wooden creaks, knocks from above floors, lightbulb snapping off and on, rustling of leaves on fields, so on. There are ones that are really subtle and ones that are prominent. You can't hear music all the time, but that doesn't always mean there isn't any. The sound you hear of the blizzard feels damp and heavy yet really subdued. Creating the ominous and tense atmosphere unlike most games thanks to the technology of the gaming engine they've used.

This game plays exactly like Resident Evil 7, while Capcom did state that in some ways it'll be different, this demo hasn't shown much of that so most of the gameplay including puzzle solving, item fetching and combat is very much similar to RE7. But the most important introduction is the inventory, it's seemingly bigger than the last game, so you're pretty much going to be carrying a bulk of equipment for some serious action. Provided of course the aiming issue is fixed on the final product which is more than a month away.

So this demo didn't make much of an impression, but I believe that was because the first demo already made so much appeal thanks to the giant vampire lady, that this one offers an insight into what happens elsewhere. A nice good insight and information as to what the game will be like. But Capcom isn't done teasing people yet. As of now, the demo I've played is no longer around and Capcom is going to put out another one 6 days later. This scheduling has pissed people off obviously since people have time to do better things like new jobs or education or doing errands, and so. Then again, this complaint is probably falling on deaf years since the coverage has given enough.

This might suck to hear, but keep updates on the next demo if you really want to experience what the game is going to be like. In my opinion, yeah this will be a sure hit just like RE 7. Heck it could be a lot better since after RE2 and RE3 remake, the creative team expanded can only do so much, it will be a better sequel that's for sure. But be wary about some retconnings that might happen soon, because the story in its entirety is heading towards a different direction of what the prior games have done.