Resident Evil 6 (Video Game)
Amanda Dyar
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Available on Xbox 360 (reviewed) and PlayStation 3
Rated M for Mature
Published and developed by Capcom
Resident Evil 6 is Capcom’s next big sequel for the highly popular survival horror universe, and while players won’t be able to get their hands on the game until it launches worldwide on October 2, 2012, we have the low down on Resident Evil 6 and the ton of great new features it contains. The new game combines three intertwining storylines for the first time ever. Every campaign is fully cooperative with each pair of protagonists having their own horrors to face throughout the course of the game.
In the much awaited return of many survival horror elements, Raccoon City survivor turned federal agent Leon S. Kennedy is teamed up with newcomer Helena Harper during their portions of the game’s campaign. The two start the game in the small town of Tall Oaks where a recent bioterrorist attack has left the majority of the town a shambling mess of zombified corpses. If that wasn’t bad enough, the C-Virus outbreak caused Leon’s friend the President of The United States to become infected, and he regretfully had to be put down when he attacks Leon. Helena informs Leon that the outbreak is somehow her fault, but that they need to make it to the other side of the infested city to make things right. Leon and his new partner set off on their dangerous journey across the infected city and will eventually meet up with the game’s other protagonists in other parts of the world to fight the bioterrorist outbreaks on a global level.
Meanwhile, Resident Evil 5 star Chris Redfield is having tough times of his own in Lanshiang, China where a B.S.A.A. group that includes another new playable character named Piers Nivans is facing a different type of outbreak. B.O.W.s are lurking the streets in this foreign city, but these aren’t just zombies. Chris and squad will face off with some terrifying beasts including a giant serpent who can quickly strike and take out a team member before they realize what happened thanks to its ability to camouflage itself. And if the deadly situation itself wasn’t bad enough, Chris is still reeling from events that happened prior to the game that left the soldier a former shell of himself before Piers inspired him to keep up the fight against bioterrorism. The group will face many dangerous foes before meeting up with the game’s other characters; however most of them won’t live that long.
Resident Evil 6’s third campaign follows newcomer Jake Muller, who just happens to be the biological son of the notorious villain Albert Wesker, and his partner Sherry Birkin from Resident Evil 2. Sherry is now all grown up and is also a government agent who has traveled to the European city of Edonia to track down Jake, as his unique blood type may contain the DNA that could save the world. Jake is reluctant to accept this presumption, but he heads along with Sherry anyhow, and the two soon meet up with a frightening resistance of their own. One of the primary enemies the duo will be fighting, or in most cases running away from, is a massive creature known as the Ustanak. Eventually, the three groups will meet up, but just because they’re fighting for the same cause doesn’t mean there won’t be a whole lot of tension between these three alpha males!
Gameplay has been overhauled perhaps even more than the game’s storyline. Resident Evil 6 features faster, more efficient controls that allow players to shoot while on the move, duck into and out of cover, perform diving actions and lay on the ground while firing off shots. These new controls allow for a variety of advanced techniques that will add a depth of strategy never before seen in the Resident Evil series.
Resident Evil 6 producer Yoshiaki Hirabayashi recently spoke about the game’s redesigned control scheme in a recent interview stating that “The new control scheme is designed to be as smooth and seamless as possible. You can reload, change weapons and use herbs all without having to go into any menus. The intention is not to make the game all about action but rather to improve the gameplay and give players the freedom to focus on getting through the situation at hand intuitively rather than having to stop and think about how to control the character.”
Resident Evil 6 has also made many subtle changes to gameplay that have made a major impact. Herbs will now take the form of pills in your inventory and will be used without entering any menus like previously stated. The game’s controls have notably been changed, but the way you aim guns have changed as well needing a more precise aim with the exclusion of the red dot sight for all firearms. The game’s melee system has also been overhauled allowing players to pull off devastating physical attacks with ease when in close with a B.O.W. The highly popular Mercenaries game mode makes its return in Resident Evil 6, and you are allowed to play the mode without having to unlock it in-game.
One other huge difference is the return of zombies to the game. Still, these aren’t the zombies you’re accustomed to, as these will present a whole new challenge for players to overcome.
The storytelling is solid, and the new mechanics work well for the most part, but where this game really succeeds is the atmosphere. The expansive environments in the game are dripping with it, and the soundtrack is appropriately jarring when it needs to be. The increased polygon count for the character models definitely enhance the experience as enemies now take real-time damage instead of just randomly spraying blood or exploding when shot. The only hiccups come in terms of textures and colors which look at times blocky and strangely washed out. There’s also a couple of instances of the dreaded invisible wall syndrome that will end up being a real bummer for fans looking to really explore, but even these few shortcoming serve to snap you out of the action briefly and you’ll never be distracted for long. With everything going on you just simply wont have time to be.
Over all Resident Evil 6 is a phenomenal game, and now the exciting count down has come to an end. If you haven’t picked up the game then you need to get Resident Evil 6 today!
Game Features
4 out of 5
Categorized:Reviews
