Resident Evil 2
Developed By: Capcom
Published By: Capcom
Genre: 3D Action/Adventure
Players: 1
Rating: M (ages 17+)
Analog Compatible: No
Memory Card: 1 Block
Everyone new it was coming, and we were all awaiting it's arrival, well it's here, and it ROCKS! Resident Evil 2 is the long awaited sequel to the record breaking Resident Evil. Everything has been improved since the last game, including the amount of times that it makes you jump out of your seat. Possesing the same engrossing gameplay as the original and packing more scare for your money than ever, Resident Evil 2 is well worth the hype.
Raccoon City has been overun with Zombies and it's your job to dispose of them and find out what is going on, sound framiliar? The game plays much like the original, making it a snap for Resident Evil pros to just jump right in. There is an Easy mode for the green-thumbs who have never even touched the first game. The game consists of two discs, one for Leon, a rookie cop, and one for Claire, Chris' sister. Capcom has added a new element of gaming to Resident Evil 2. The effect of it is when you complete the game as either Leon or Claire and save the game, you can play as the other character and things you did as the first character you played as will have an effect on your second time through. The game still consists of dispatching nasty enemies while solving semi-difficult puzzles to gain access to previously unreachable areas. The environment in which the game takes place is so huge it will leave you breathless. One more thing, expect the unexpected, I'm not going to ruin it for you by telling you what to expect though.
Pre-rendered backgrounds are once again used to great success in Resident Evil 2. The backgrounds look fantastic and even rival those of Final Fantasy VII. The wrecked police cruisers and gruesome dead bodies strewn about are pure eye candy. The characters themselves look very nice, they also blend in with the rendered backgrounds better than the original, making it seem like they really belong there. One thing that the developers added to this game's character animations is the ability to show damage. In the first game you didn't really know what your health situation was unless you checked the statistics screen often, leaving you prone to dying when you least expected it. But in Resident Evil 2 your character will show how much pain he is in, your character will grab his side in anguish, limp, and pathetically attempt to run, it looks really cool, but getting away from an enemy is real hard when you can't run. I'd say the visuals in Resident Evil 2 are some of the best I've seen on a console, any console. A visual aspect that has been improved from the original is the blood. In the first game the blood looked like a mass of pixels, but in Resident Evil 2 it really looks like some sort of liquid.
In a game like this, sound is really a key point in making the player feel like he is in the world of Resident Evil 2. The orchestrated music conveys a real sense of horror and only enhances the feel of the game. The sound effects really make you squimish. Semi-soft, creepy sounds usually are present during the calm moments, but they are soon replaced by harsh and loud sounds that will indefinetly get your heart rate going. The moaning and groaning of the Zombies are still intact, and there are also female Zombies now, never be it said that Capcom is sexist. The "Boom" of your gun makes you feel really good, especially when an enemy comes crashing down shortly thereafter. The footsteps effects on different types of ground re-appear in Resident Evil 2, but they are even more impresive as there are countless amounts of different types of terrain you can step on. One definite improvement over the original is the quality of the voice overs, they aren't going to win any Oscars, but they are far better than the corny voices in the original Resident Evil.
The control seems to be a little better than the original, but maybe it's because I'm now used to manuvering in 3D environments. You still must aim up and down to appropriately hit the enemy with your weapon. Most of the control setup in Resident Evil 2 is exactly like the control scheme of the original, which enables Resident Evil pros to jump right into this game. An added ability in Resident Evil 2 is the ability to jump on top of and over objects, such as a dumpster. A particularly helpful new feature is the auto-aim. When you raise your weapon you automaticaly aim towards the nearest monster, but your weapon doesn't point itself towards the enemy, which is kind of strange because you can have your gun at an angle and hit a Zombie infront of you.
No self respecting PlayStation gamer shouldn't have this game in his or her game collection. Resident Evil 2 doesn't just add a few extras to the original and call it a sequel, it completely overhauls the first game and creates a worthy sequel to one of the best games of this genre of all time. And guess what sickos, there is even more blood and gore than before! Capcom even added a warning when the game is booting up that it contains excessive amounts of blood and gore, something I haven't really seen done before in a PlayStation game, considering the system is really for more mature gamers. Don't worry about getting your hands on a copy of Resident Evil 2 if you didn't pre-order it, there seems to be no shortage of copies, seeing as though every store I've been to has an abundance of them. I live in a medium size city and I didn't even pre-order my copy, and there were plenty more where that came from at my local software dealer. So there is no excuse not to own this game, it is well worth the fifty-bucks for months of fear inducing good times.
This page hosted by
Get your
own Free Home
Page.