Resident Evil 4

The following review is an excerpt from my piece on both Resident Evil 4s. This excerpt covers my full thoughts on the 2023 remake.

This year’s remake of Resident Evil 4 is, by all means, a brand new game. It retains most of the original game’s set pieces, the same story scenario and characters, similar level design, and the over-the-shoulder third-person camera. However, nearly every one of those elements has been changed in some substantial way. Set pieces are often expanded or explored from different angles. While the basic story structure is the same, the story beats are in a new order, characters who previously did not share screen time interact, and the characterization and plot details are updated the be more intricate and interesting. While the game is still a third-person shooter, the combat has been altered so drastically that the clunky but tense survival horror action of the 2005 version has been entirely stripped away. Because of these changes, I think of Resident Evil 4 (2023) as less of a remake and more of a remix.

I would compare the more traditional 1-to-1 remakes of video games to covers of songs. A different artist or group of artists works to recreate someone else’s work. The voices singing may be different, and the instrumentation might change, but the song that the group performs is the same. Most video game remakes are the same way. They’re made by different teams at different points in time; those aspects are apparent. However, the game’s identity is ultimately bound to that original game. Resident Evil 4 (2023) is a remix, not a cover. The Capcom of 2023 is sampling the work of Shinji Mikami’s team in 2005, but like an artist remixes a song, these samples are just building blocks for a new piece of music. The song’s structure changes as the remixer adds in their beats and records new instrumentals to add to the song. The identity of the song, or in this case, the game, fundamentally changes.

In 2023, these changes are welcome. As much fun as the original Resident Evil 4's combat is, it would feel notably out of place in the gaming landscape in 2023. Games like Gears of War, Dead Space, The Last of Us, and even Resident Evil 4's follow-ups have built upon the third-person shooter groundwork it laid. These modernizations have made their way into Resident Evil 4 (2023). Leon now has standard analog movement, he can move and shoot simultaneously, and his knife is bound to a single button. The game feels great; it’s super fluid and easy to play. However, this is supposed to be a horror game. Part of what made the original Resident Evil 4 so fun was that it wasn’t easy to play, causing constant tension that elevated the action-horror experience. Despite these changes, Resident Evil 4 (2023) can maintain this level of tension by making another fundamental change. The enemies in this game are faster, they’re smarter, they’re stronger, they’re more aggressive, and there are more of them. So while the tension causing clunkiness of the game’s 2005 release is missing, it has been replaced by the reworked enemy AI paired with the resource management left virtually untouched from the original 2005 release.

Resident Evil 4’s (2023) level design mostly takes the set pieces of the original game but alters them to fit with the new enemy AI. Some encounters are almost identical; some are reworked, some are expanded, and some have been removed and replaced by new ones. My two favorite level changes are the village’s lake and the castle’s mine. The lake was simply a battleground for a boss fight in the original game. Now it’s a fully explorable area with multiple puzzles, enemy encounters, and even optional sites to explore and find new equipment. The mine has been completely expanded with a reworked minecart section that adds a fast-paced shooting challenge. Luis now accompanies Leon in this level, which is a nice change of pace as he is much more helpful than Ashley is in combat.

Speaking of Ashley, Resident Evil 4’s characters have all undergone quite a bit of change to fit more in line with the remake’s tone and address some criticisms of the original game. Leon is more or less the same, he’s still dropping cheesy one-liners, but it’s clear that the events of Resident Evil 2’s Raccoon City outbreak have taken a toll on his mental state. Ashley is the character I believe underwent the most positive changes. While I enjoyed Ashley’s presence in Resident Evil 4 (2005), she did seem like a somewhat underdeveloped damsel in distress. Ashley is college-aged but acts more like a prim teenager than a young woman, all while having the voice of Sandy Cheeks from Spongebob Squarepants. Despite these criticisms, I enjoyed Ashley’s presence and escort missions in Resident Evil 4 (2005) as they kept the game from feeling too lonely. Resident Evil 4 (2023) emphasized everything I liked about Ashley. A friendship between her and Leon was present in the original game, but the remake has multiple instances where they act as a team. After Leon’s boss fights with Bitores Méndez in the burning building, Ashley ensures Leon makes it out unharmed. When Leon fights plagas-infected knights in the castle, Ashley throws lanterns at them from the balcony, allowing Leon to land a clean shot. Leon is still there to rescue her, but Ashley takes more agency toward her own survival in the remake. She cares about Leon past the fact that he is her ticket out of captivity.

Other supporting characters have been changed as well. Luis has a more supporting role in the story and is present for more of the game's runtime. I mentioned this earlier, but there is a chapter where he acts as your partner almost the entire time. Ada Wong is mostly the same but slightly more subdued than her appearance in Resident Evil 4 (2005). She places an almost identical role in the story, and it’s clear Capcom is probably waiting to expand on her character until the Separate Ways scenario is remade as DLC. The villains are mostly the same except for Ramón Salazar, who took a notable downgrade. Why did Capcom get rid of his funny hat? It was the best part of his design.

Along with the villains’ characterization, their boss fights have also changed. Most of them, including Ramón Salazar, have been completely reworked. For example, in Resident Evil 4 (2005), Leon fought Salazar from an elevated platform surrounded by a lower floor of resources and enemies. The player would have to land shots on Salzar’s eyes to open up his weak point and deal substantial damage while dodging Salazar’s attacks. This fight was one of my favorites in the original game and was made tense due to how limited the space a player could safely inhabit was. Resident Evil 4 (2023) completely upends this boss fight. Leon now encounters Salazar in a hall of staircases to fit the new run-and-gun control scheme. The player must run up and down these staircases avoiding being swallowed whole by Salazar, getting shots in on him, and maintaining their health and ammo. It plays completely differently. While Salzar is the boss that underwent the most changes, most other bosses underwent similar changes, completely changing their identity and how the player needs to adapt to encounters with them.

While Resident Evil 4’s (2023) gameplay loop, characterization, and boss fights have all been substantially changed from the original game, the story, at least from a structural perspective, is essentially the same. A few events happened out of order, but other than that, I did not notice any significant differences. The biggest changes come in the number of details and tone of the story’s presentation. Resident Evil 4 (2023) is still silly, but as a AAA game released in 2023, it has to exist in the hyper-cinematic gaming landscape dominated by Sony’s similar third-person shooters. The game feels darker. Characters make slightly fewer jokes. There is a lot more lore to be found in documents sitting around to more strongly connect it to the other Resident Evil games, but at the end of the day, it is still Resident Evil 4. I can see these changes irritating purists, but for the kind of remake Capcom was going for, I think most of the story and tone changes work well.

Overall, I loved Resident Evil 4 (2023). It’s one of the best action games I’ve ever played. However, my enjoyment of it did not come from the fact that it’s a remake of Resident Evil 4 (2005). I enjoyed it because it was just a great game. This game did not replace my enjoyment of the original game for one moment. Even though I enjoyed it about the same as the original game, I wouldn’t call it Resident Evil 4, but better; I’d call it Resident Evil 4 but different.

Another great game in Resident Evil's post-2017 catalog. I've never cared that much about the original, but it's hard to deny the remake's quality.