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Ever since Resident Evil burst onto the scene back in the heady days of 1996, I was hooked on Capcoms survival horror series. The combination of puzzle solving, dodgy tongue-in-cheek voice acting, frantic gun battles and imaginative monsters was, for me, the ideal gaming formula. The original game received a welcome overhaul for the Gamecube a few years ago, and when a prequel was announced focussing on the ill-fated Bravo Team, I was intrigued.
But is it any good? Well, the answer is, kind of.
On the plus side, the graphics look as good as wed expect. Zero uses the same game engine as the Resident Evil remake. The pre-rendered backgrounds are detailed and imaginative, and the character models are well realized and expressive. The soundtrack is moody and evocative, and the voice acting, while not exactly oscar-winning, is at least competent enough to get by.
Set the day before the events of The Mansion Incident, Zero follows the adventures of STARS rookie Rebecca Chambers and her Bravo Team comrades after their helicopter inexplicably crash lands in Raccoon Forest. Moving off to investigate a nearby train, its not long before Rebecca encounters Billy Coen (no relation to Joel and Ethan); an escaped prisoner who shes reluctantly forced to team up with in order to survive. Together the pair delve deeper into the mysteries surrounding the T-virus outbreak, and the origins of the sinister Umbrella Corporation.
Initially Zero plays very much like any other Resident Evil game. You investigate new areas, solve puzzles, shoot zombies and other nasties, manage your limited stock of weapons and ammo, and generally advance the plot. All well and good, you may think. Then you meet Billy, and everything... pretty much stays the same.
Sooner or later, most game developers realize that they have to start experimenting with their series basic formula to take gamers out of their comfort zones, and Capcom are no exception. And while they have indeed experimented with Zero, the end result is to put gamers even deeper into their comfort zones than before.
The core of Resident Evils gameplay has always been that you, the player, are meant to be isolated and alone in a hostile environment surrounded by lurking monstrosities that want to kill you. It was scary because there was nobody there to watch your back, nobody to provide their reassuring presence when you had to venture into a darkened basement with only a knife to defend yourself.
By introducing the partner system, this feeling of isolation is completely removed. Billy or Rebecca are almost always there to carry extra items, provide extra firepower and just generally help out when things get tough. There is the odd stretch where the game arbitrarily separates you from your partner, and some of the old sense of urgency returns, but such moments are too few and far between.
In this way, Resi Zero becomes less of a survival horror game and more of a buddy movie, with both parties initially hostile and trading barbed insults but gradually growing closer through their shared experiences until they develop a real bond by the time the inevitable climactic battle rolls around.
Speaking of characters, Zero makes some questionable casting choices. Newcomer Billy Coen, an outwardly tough but inwardly sensitive ex-soldier accused of a crime he didnt commit, might as well have come from the Moody Troubled-Past Character Factory. And Rebecca, propelled into the limelight for this outing, seems to have grown a new set of balls from somewhere. Shes no longer the indecisive young woman she was in Resident Evil, but a tough and determined soldier ready to do her duty. Its a bizarre change, especially since Zero is set the day before Resident Evil. Lastly, James Marcus, the bad guy, isnt particularly interesting either. With his trenchcoat and long white hair, he looks more like a reject from a Final Fantasy cosplay convention than a genuine villain. Albert Wesker is also there pulling strings from behind the scenes, but his presence is more fan service than a genuine contribution to the plot.
Another questionable decision is the removal of the inventory chests, surely a stalwart of the Resident Evil series. Items are now simply dropped if you no longer have space to carry them. In theory this should make Zero a more realistic gaming experience and force you to make tough choices about what you should carry, but if gaming has taught us anything its that the relentless pursuit of realism isnt always a good thing. Would you really want to play a WW2 game where a single bullet would spell instant death? Anyway, my point is that in practice, the new system just means inventory management is even more of a pain in the arse than before. And nothing can quite compare to the feeling of horror when you realize youve left a vitally important item on the other side of the game map, and that youll have to venture back through a dozen zombie-infested corridors to retrieve it.
So what the hell am I trying to say here? Well, I guess my point is that you CAN have too much of a good thing. For fans of the series, Zero effectively provides more of what they like - its a solid and competent but ultimately underwhelming game thats probably forever destined to be overshadowed by its bigger brothers. It makes some effort to break new ground, but ultimately the things it does arent big enough or successful enough to separate it from the pack.
Enjoy it for what it is, but dont expect too much.
Reviewed by: Amazon Reviewer Rating:  Date Reviewed: 04Dec2008 | | | Before the infamous `mansion incident` Rebecca Chambers a rookie member of S.T.A.R.S. (Special Tactics And Rescue Services) mooches about on a train trying to locate fugitive Billy Coen eventually the two co-operate and stubmle upon an umbrella research centre filled with the undead. This games takes the player to new depths an exposes some of the never before told secrets of umbrella and Rebecca and Billy are about to discover them.
Resident evil zero introduces some new monsters along with the old monsters such as the zomies and the dogs. It has a new system where you can drop items on the floor anywhere you are, eliminating the old itembox system. Also there is a new partner zapping system which allows the player to switch between Rebecca and Billy as they need to, which along the way comes in very handy for solving some puzzles. The graphics are on the same high quality level as the resident evil remake. It also boasts a fantastic soundtrack.
There were many aspects of this game that I think are awesome. There are only a few things that I wasnt so keen on the first was only having a six item capacity (12 if your paired up with Billy) and the leech monster/ zombie things, I found them highly irritating. However these are minor and for me they dont spoil the game on a vast level. So from me resident evil zero gets a well deserved 5 stars.
Reviewed by: Amazon Reviewer Rating:  Date Reviewed: 02Jun2008 | | | To be brief - most aspects of this game are very good - excellent graphics (maybe even surpassing the RE1 remake).
A little slower moving than RE2, 3 or 4, and maybe not as scary, but for the most part a very good game.
One big flaw detracts a lot of enjoyment though - the new method of managing items.
In the previous games (RE4 excluded) you carried items, and dropped them off in an item box in the save rooms, and you could then go to any other nearby item box anywhere eles in the game and retrieve them - it wasnt exactly realistic, but it worked well, once youd popped potentially useful items into a box, you never had to go far to get them when needed.
In this one, there are no item boxes, instead you just drop an item on the floor wherever you are, and it stays there until you go back and collect it (and you still have very limited space to carry items around - 6 inventory spaces, and lots of items take up 2 spaces)
This may be more realistic, but it makes the game much more tedious if you are exploring it for yourself (and not following a walkthrough showing the most efficient route to take and which items to carry at particular times), because you will have to drop lots of items in order to carry enough ammo, keys, health etc. - just like in previous games - but unlike in previous games, when you later on come across a puzzle and realise you need an object you dropped half an hour earlier (which you regularly will), you have to painstakingly backtrack all the way to wherever you left it. The map helpfully marks the location of all items that you have dropped or examined so far, but its still very annoying to find a puzzle, check your map, and realise that the object you need is miles away, instead of just as far as the nearest item box in the previous games.
Reviewed by: Amazon Reviewer Rating: Date Reviewed: 14Jan2008 | | |
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