Resident Evil VII: Biohazard
PlayStation 4
I have been a giant fan of the Resident Evil series from the very beginning. Sure, if you go back and look at the original game now it doesn’t seem like much. But back in the day, there was nothing, NOTHING more terrifying than the first Resident Evil. The creepy mansion, the unsettling music, the fact that you had a very limited supply of ammunition and health items. If you ran out of those items, you were toast. And then of course there were the jump scares. It is an iconic moment early in the game when those two dogs come crashing through the windows, and for good reason. I never thought a video game would genuinely be able to scare me more than any movie ever could. But this game did. Its follow up, Resident Evil 2, had some scary moments, but it was never anywhere near as scary to me as the first one. Over the years the games have gotten progressively less and less scary. In fact, the last few entries in the series (I’m looking at you, RE5 and 6!) have not been scary at all. They are more geared to shooting and action and destruction than to actual horror. I guess they are not terrible games (debatable), but to me they just aren’t what Resident Evil is all about.
When I heard that Resident Evil 7 was returning the series to its survival horror roots, I couldn’t have been more happy. I wasn’t sure how I felt about the shift to the first person perspective, but I knew that as long as the game was scary and wasn’t just mindless shooting and death I would be okay with it. I looked at it as a much needed change. Change can be good sometimes. Just like Resident Evil 4 changed the formula back in 2005, Resident Evil 7 would change it once again.
I came into this game relatively blind. I didn’t know much at all about the game’s plot or its setting. I didn’t even read any detailed reviews. All I knew was that the game was supposed to be good. I was optimistic I would like it. And like it I did!
For maximum immersion effect I waited until dark to pop this game in. Sure enough, Resident Evil 7 pulled me right into its clutches. The opening segment of the game reminded me a bit of Resident Evil 4 when Leon is exploring out in the woods all by himself. But this game is a lot more unsettling. There is a certain feeling in the air. You can just tell something isn’t right. That good ‘ol “omg I am totally creeped out!!!” feeling that I got in the original Resident Evil and Silent Hill games worked its way back into my brain. It was only five minutes into the game and I was already more scared and unsettled by this than I had been by any game in YEARS.
Before we go any further I should tell you a little bit about the story line of this game. You play as some random guy named Ethan. He gets a video tape from Mia, his wife who has been missing for several years. Despite her warning not to come looking for her, he comes looking for her. Wouldn’t be much of a game if he didn’t, right? The tape leads him to a remote area in the bayous of Louisiana. There is an old abandoned house here that people visit on haunted ghost tours. Your search initially takes you there. The first half hour or so of the game is you exploring the woods outside of this “haunted” house. The little details really add to the chilling atmosphere of the game. You encounter a parked van that looks like it has been there for quite some time. In it is a journal about how these guys are investigating haunted houses, and this one is next on the list.
You can see the house, but it is sectioned off by a gate. So you have to go traipsing around in the woods trying to find a way in. But the more you explore, the creepier things become. There’s some weird butchered animal corpses hanging around. You see an eerie man wandering the forest. You start to wonder about what exactly happened to the two guys who came here in the van. You eventually find a side house that you can explore, and it is filled with gross nasty stuff like decaying furniture and pots filled with rotting food and insects. There is a dead bird in the microwave. The more I played the more I legitimately became freaked out. And I was happy to be freaked out. Even though this game was far different in tone than any Resident Evil I had played in the past, it had definitely brought the horror back to the series.
You find a videotape that you plug into a VCR that chronicles the events of the two journalists. Some of the stuff on the tape seemed like a clear homage to the Blair Witch Project. Again, very creepy. After this things start to go to hell. You discover a hidden passage that takes you into the wet, nasty bowels underneath the house. There you find Mia confined and you set her free. Something is clearly wrong with her, though. She goes all Evil Dead on you and all of a sudden you find yourself fighting for your life with the very person you came to rescue.
I will try not to spoil too much for you, but the game then takes a big turn. You are knocked out in the fight and when you come to, you find yourself seated at a gruesome dinner table with a family of unruly hillbillies. The Baker family, the people who had been keeping Mia captive. We’ve already seen the game pay homage to Evil Dead and the Blair Witch Project; this dinner scene seemed like a clear nod the The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Before things get too crazy, you manage to escape your bonds while the family is distracted. This is where the real game begins.
You have to sneak around this big mansion - exploring its many rooms, finding its mysterious items, and uncovering it secrets. All the while you are exploring you must avoid members of the family. If they find you, chances are they will kill you as you are not quite strong enough to take them on just yet. As if the mansion and the whole situation wasn’t scary enough, having to worry about these crazy bastards showing up and spotting you really adds to the game’s dramatic tension.
The more you play and the more you explore, the stronger you become. You’ll find upgrades, health items, and eventually the weapons you need to be able to put up a fight. The early part of the game is generally pretty freaking brilliant. It is pure, classic horror at its finest. If I had to offer one bit of criticism it is that you often end up wasting ammunition unnecessarily on fights that you don’t even need to take part in. Every once in a while you will encounter a pre-scripted event where you are attacked by one of the family. You can run and hide for most of these and eventually you will lose your attacker and they will just aimlessly wander the halls looking for you. You can then use stealth to avoid them while you explore. But the game doesn’t make this clear. I wound up shooting some of them and knocking them down. Doing this uses up a LOT of ammunition. Later on they end up getting back up and resuming their search for you, and you can end up tussling with them again. Seeing as how you can only stun them for a while and not kill them, it is a major waste of ammo. Ammo that you are going to need for later on in the game when you eventually start encountering enemies you CAN kill.
Outside of the Baker family, the game only offers a small handful of other enemies. Most of these are referred to as “molded.” They are creatures that appear to be covered in black tar. They are all pretty generic and standard looking. Some well-placed shots to the head usually will take them out. There are a variety of different types of the molded, but for the most part they all look the same. Outside of the molded, you occasionally will encounter some bug like creatures that can be dispatched with your knife. Don’t expect to see any classic Resident Evil enemies like zombies, lickers, or hunters make appearances here. What you really need you ammo for are the boss fights, which in true Resident Evil fashion can be quite intense and over the top.
While the game feels new and fresh and often not very Resident Evil-like, there are a few ties to the original series. The way you manage your inventory with the grid is very similar to Resident Evil 4. The “box” system returns where you can stash items in a large chest. Visit a different chest in a different location and you can retrieve the items you stashed. You’ll use green herbs and other items very similar to what you have used in Resident Evils past. Some of the sound effects are the same. In fact, there is this one sound effect I heard later on in the game that was an exact replica of the sound the game makes when you manage your inventory in Resident Evil 2. It brought some fun memories crashing back. As far as the story goes, the game doesn’t seem like it has much to do with classic Resident Evil until the very end, when ties are established and the *spoiler alert* Umbrella Corps come into play.
The pacing of the game seems a little strange. You will often see the same criticism of the game if you read other online reviews. This is because it is a valid criticism. While the first portion of the game is very tense and horror based, the speed of the game starts to pick up after a while. Things stop becoming scary. They become less survival horror and more of a shooter/fetch-the-item type game. The story line also goes weird places. I can’t say that I really like where it goes either. It feels rushed and uninspired. I wish it had just been kept simple. There were so many directions it could have gone, but instead of going somewhere smart and unsettling it decides to get a little whacky instead. I liked the game as a whole but I ended up being a little let down at the end.
A relatively weak ending isn’t enough to make me dislike the game though. It is true that if the entire game had been like the opening handful of chapters that this could have been an A+ title. But the ending doesn’t drag it down too far. I still left with a very favorable impression of the game. It could have been longer (the game is very short). It could have been more consistent in its tone. It could have tied in to the classic Resident Evil story line a bit more. But was this a really scary and fun game to play? Yes! I am thrilled to say that I have finally been scared by a game again after years and years of stagnation from the genre. Hopefully Resident Evil 7 is the return to form that the series needed, and we can expect to continue to be terrified by Resident Evil for years to come.
Overall:
B+
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