Text/Teacher Zhimu
When it comes to experts in fried cold rice in the game industry, Capcom is definitely well deserved, and it is also one of the few "chefs" who can double the aroma of fried cold rice.
After 18 years, "Resident Evil 4", a masterpiece, has finally met players again as a remake. After the first quick trial playthrough, I will first tell you my personal conclusion directly - if the full score is 100 points, then the original Resident Evil 4 of that year can give a high score of 95, and this remake is also a 95-point masterpiece. As for why you say that? In this issue, we will have a good chat about "Resident Evil 4 Remake".
The main story is paired with side lines, and the level design has evolved again
First of all, let's understand the question, why the original Resident Evil 4 won TGA's 2005 Game of the Year, and even became one of the most ported games, what is the main reason behind it? Perhaps we think of its development of the shoulder perspective, the successful change of the gameplay of the Resident Evil series, and the exciting and easy-to-play combat system. But there is only one core factor, that is, the exquisite level design level of the main creator Mr. Shinji Mikami.
Times have changed, villages have changed, but the man has not changed, Li Sanguang he is back
Many players say that the most unsatisfactory part of the original Biochemical 4 is that the script is too plain water, and the story flow is very visual of "Super Mario": the warrior went all the way to save the princess, the princess was quickly captured again, the warrior continued to move forward and saved the princess again, and then the princess was captured again...
But few people can think of the fact that both games are typical of winning with excellent level design.
No matter what era I Mario is that script, but it doesn't stop me from relying on level design to become a masterpiece
Take the original Biochemical 4, which is also a miscellaneous battle with the castle believers, in the Holy Water Hall, in the gallery, in the main tower, the feeling of the three battles is very different. Although the enemy classes are not much different, the formation is completely different, and the available terrain and tactical space given to the player are also different; Also the battle with the blind man with iron claws, this small boss is double high in attack and defense but blind, in the dungeon in the iron cage trap in the corridor aisle, the surrounding environment of the three duels is completely different, players need to take local response ideas to pass the level safely.
The design that can be crammed into a game is always very limited, how to build more unique levels with a small number of designs, so that players can play a large amount of water, without feeling bored because of the long process, this is the most fundamental factor reflecting the level of the producer, and it is also the most successful place of the original Biochemical 4.
Also facing the siege of the congregation, the experience of fighting the main tower is very different from other places
Well, let's get back to the point, does this Resident Evil 4 remake inherit the outstanding level design level of the original?
The scheme given by Capcom is: add as a whole and subtract locally.
Although Shinji Mikami, who has been cut off dozens of heads, has long been away from Capcom for many years, the main creator of this remake is the original biochemical 4 deputy director Yoshiaki Hirabayashi, who fought side by side with Mikami that year, and his rich experience is of course the best guarantee for the quality of the remake. The map design of the original Biochemical 4 is good enough, and this time in the remake, many classic battlefields such as village squares, holy water halls, and garden mazes have been retained, with only a few finishing changes to the terrain, combined with the excellent graphics of the RE engine, reuniting with players in a familiar and unfamiliar look.
I've been to this castle before, and this time I came back and it was renovated
Although this map gives players a sense of intimacy back to their renovated hometown, it does not mean that you can easily kill a bloody path with past experience.
Take the opening village siege battle, you want to sneak into the hut to loot a little supplies like the original, and it turns out that the uncle is actually hidden in the cabinet to give you a surprise; You think that you can work on the second floor as long as you block the doors and windows on the first floor in the two-story attic, but in less than a minute, Brother Chainsaw forcibly breaks the door and makes you suffer enemies on three sides; You think that you can run to the hut opposite the attic, but as soon as you enter the door, you find that there is an aunt in ambush waiting for your arrival; You think that if you run to the top of the tower, the villagers will be stupid and will not come up, but in less than ten seconds you will fall because the roof collapses...
This feeling is present in almost every classic battle that has been recreated in the remake, with more enemies in each place, new difficulties and terrain changes, and this overall approach of keeping the original flavor and adding new embellishments perfectly carries forward the essence of the original Biochemical 4 level design.
The same encirclement, the same chainsaw, but the sense of oppression is stronger than before
The main story of the original Biochemical 4 has a total of 20 chapters, and the remastered version has 16 chapters, and most of the streamlined parts are redundant miscellaneous battle processes. Although it seems that the chapters are reduced, the actual process is not shorter than the original. Because the weapon merchant we are familiar with brings a side bounty system, which includes a variety of ridiculous tasks, such as hitting a few mice, catching a few snakes, destroying someone's portrait, etc., as well as more difficult challenges such as finding blue cards and destroying side bosses.
Side quests are rewarded with spinels, and the original spinels, which can only be used to sell money, have been remastered into credentials for rare items, including many powerful props such as the ultimate transformation license of weapons, encouraging players to spend time exploring the map back and forth to find surprises, and further strengthening the collection gameplay of Biochemical 4.
If you can't collect the gem you want, you can exchange it with a merchant through spinel
Enemies upgrade their abilities and use strategy to fight flexibly
And in terms of enemy design, the remastered version did not disappoint either.
From miscellaneous soldiers to big and small bosses, all have new moves or features. Uncle Li, the first to meet Leon at the beginning, showed the player the crooked neck form that only lives in the plot CG in the original version, which is actually borrowed from the violent zombie setting in the Resident Evil 1 remake, and the villagers have a certain chance of mutation after being knocked down, unless you mend the knife in time to execute, otherwise you will be raided again by the faster and more ruthless crooked neck villagers. Even if I am lucky that the enemy does not mutate, the attack speed and pinch consciousness of the miscellaneous soldiers are higher than the original, and when I first entered the village, I was directly forked out by the steel fork aunt who led the charge many times, so that I, a player who cleared the original dozens of times, never dared to despise this battle again.
The encounter plot with Uncle Li in the opening scene is several times stronger than the original
The original biochemical 4's most proud boss battle design, the remake version is also full of surprises, stronger defense and more difficult to play a hard and straight chainsaw brother, Salazar who has a new image and attack method, Klausa who can use explosive crossbow arrows and both hands have turned into chicken wings, and the final boss Sadler, whose ability is greatly improved compared to the original, has brought players a serious challenge that cannot copy the tactics of the original.
The only confusing thing is that the original Biochemical 4 impressive boss synthetic monster U3 has accidentally disappeared in the remake, perhaps we can only expect that this is Capcom's plot adjustment, U3 will be transferred to the subsequent Ida's DLC chapter to reappear, otherwise this "remote knowledge brother ascended, all over the dogwood one less" fly in the ointment, will really make old players regret for life.
The classic double giant battle, because of Louis to help, the tactics have changed a lot
Now that the levels and enemy designs have delivered satisfactory answers, Capcom will naturally bring new highlights in terms of operation. Although the combat system of the original Biochemical 4 is already very good, there is room for further improvement, such as the mobile shooting that many old players want, which was finally realized in the remastered version.
In the face of more abundant attack methods of enemies, players can use their reflexes, and avoid most attacks by crouching to dodge and swing their knives. The action of crouching can be used for stealth assassination to solve part of the enemy, thereby saving ammunition. In addition, when players pick up items and change weapons, in most cases there is no need to automatically pause and switch the interface like the original, and the emergency QTE of the original story animation no longer exists, making the pace of the game smoother.
The physical technique that used to be very useful, this game has become very careful to use
It can be said that for the average player, the remake of Biochemical 4 is slightly more difficult than the original, but for action game masters, the remake has a higher ceiling and more room for show operation technology.
Because of the more possibilities in terms of operation, Capcom added some limiting elements for the sake of balance in battle.
The main point is the adjustment of interaction, the original Lyon will have plenty of invincible time when performing physical skills or jumping out of windows and climbing stairs. However, in the remastered version, the interactive invincibility time and physical attack judgment have been weakened, and the original scene of kicking a group of enemies to easily solve the siege, or jumping back and forth to the window enemies can only dry stare, is now difficult to appear. And this has a great collateral effect on Ashley, the remake of Ashley no longer has a health bar setting, which may make you mistakenly think that she is no longer the original Ashley, in fact, Ashley in this game is still very obstructive, she may be directly knocked to the ground at any time, you have to be helped up as soon as possible to continue moving, otherwise you will die if you eat another attack.
Because of the reduction of interactive invincibility time, this kind of scene often occurs when Leon lifts Ashley: Leon says are you okay, Ashley says it's okay I'm fine, but as soon as Ashley's words fall, the enemy's attack has come to the front, Leon can't dodge a life, and the player's blood pressure soars.
Tactics are colorful, clever changes in weapon systems
The original Biochemical 4 has already had an excellent weapon system, and it has been fully evolved in the remastered version, mainly in four aspects:
The first is the adjustment of the knife, the original biochemical 4 knife, because of the change in damage coefficient for different enemies, so it is called one of the strongest knives in the history of biochemistry. Although the remade version of the knife has powerful functions such as rapid stabbing combo, assassination execution, and flash defense, it has also added the setting of durability values, and various actions will consume durability points, especially if you are caught by the enemy and choose to use the knife to solve the trap, the durability consumption is very large, although you can strengthen the performance of the knife through transformation, but for masters who like to challenge the limit with a single knife, it is necessary to consider more than when it was in the original.
As a swordsman, it's the principle that the knife doesn't leave your body, but why increase the damn durability!
The second is the change of the item box, you may be surprised how the item box has also become a weapon.
That's right, the Item Crate is no longer just a menu of items, but a booster weapon that can bring bonuses. Different item boxes can increase the chance of various items dropped, and item box wearing pendants can bring BUFF effects such as improved herbal healing and increased number of synthetic ammo to Leon, and the taste of RPG cultivation becomes heavier. If you want to collect all kinds of item boxes and pendants, you need to actively do side quests and spend more time participating in merchant simulation shooting competitions. In addition, this game has added a weapon storage box similar to the Resident Evil apocalypse, which can store weapons outside the item box at any time, so that players can try and upgrade the weapons they want.
Different colored suitcases increase the chance of different items being dropped
The third is the prop synthesis system, which was originally born from the gunpowder system of Biochemical 3, which is very suitable for Biochemical 4, which eats heavy combat ingredients.
In addition to collecting randomly dropped ammo in the remake, players can often pick up gunpowder and supplies, which can be used to synthesize the type of ammunition they want. When the original Biochemical 4 launched the PC HD version with increased resolution, the bug of high sniper bullet drop rate was criticized by many players, but in this remake, even if you are unlucky and can't pick up the ammunition you want, you can freely choose your favorite weapons and tactics through gunpowder synthesis.
The original merchant did not sell bullets, but now the merchants sell materials, which is equivalent to selling bullets indirectly
The fourth is the new weapon crossbow, which can fire silent crossbow arrows to achieve assassination, and can also be accompanied by bombs on crossbow arrows for surprise bombing, and the crossbow arrows shot out have the possibility of recovery. Although some similar games have a similar design, the addition of this weapon is obviously a tribute to another work of Shinji Mikami - "Evil Possession", which is known as the sequel to the spirit of Biochemical 4.
On the other hand, because the expert difficulty of this remake is much more difficult than the original, in this environment of extremely expensive ammunition, the crossbow that can recover crossbow arrows and maintain stealth has become a vital weapon, and it can be said that the expert difficulty without crossbows is almost two different games.
Long-range crossbow assassinations are effective before the enemy has discovered you
Old bottles brew new wine, and the plot interpretation is reborn
As we have said earlier, the biggest regret of the original Biochemical 4 is that the plot performance is too dull, making the plot party players not happy enough. And Capcom obviously understands this, so in the remake, although the plot context has basically not changed, the scenes of all the characters have increased significantly, and the characters have become more three-dimensional. Ashley is stronger and braver than the original, and has repeatedly wanted to take the initiative to fight her life to help Leon; There is more interaction between Ida and Lyon, and the subtle affection revealed from the details perfectly docks the plot of the biochemical 2 remake, which satisfies the LA party; Louis, who only had four soy sauce scenes in the original version, explained his identity background early this time, and the emotional interpretation between him and Leon from doubts to tribulations and tribulations was finally more moving; Wesker has been lurking behind the scenes, and you can't understand what his purpose is in the original plot, and this time he showed his madness to the fullest, directly echoing the plot of Biochemical 5, and also laying the groundwork for the possibility of Biochemical 5 remake.
The thrilling roller coaster became even more volatile because of Louis's addition
When it comes to the most surprising character in the plot of this work, it is definitely Claussa.
In fact, the character of Clausa could have been regarded as an oolong in the biochemical series, and the original version explained very little about him, making players wonder when Leon met such a person. In fact, his first appearance in the biochemical timeline was in "Dark Chronicles", which was released five years after the original biochemical 4, but the plot time point was two years before the biochemical 4, he and Leon had a cooperation at that time, and it was this experience that planted the fuse for his later blackening. The remake lays the groundwork for Klausa's appearance from the opening CG, and his identity is adjusted to the instructor who once guided Leon, which not only adds dialogue echoing the Dark Chronicles, but also clearly defines the reason for his blackening - his brother-like comrades were deliberately sacrificed for political reasons, and the disappointment and anger at the US government set Klausa on the road of unscrupulous pursuit of biochemical power.
Capcom has put a lot of thought into the shaping of Klausa this time, portraying the complex emotions between him and Leon, who are also friends and enemies, and also make the classic duel between the two more tragic.
The original boring Klausa QTE fighting knife is now a direct-operated knife fight
Refresh the remake cap, incalculable industry impact
Introduced here, I want to go back to the conclusion at the beginning of this article, the original Resident Evil 4, with its extremely high quality and excellent design, has become a palace-level masterpiece that is enough to remain famous in the annals of the game, and the full score of 100 can be given at least 95 points, and the deducted points are only because of the lack of plot ointment. The Resident Evil 4 remake, compared with the original, it perfectly inherits and further develops the essence of its predecessors, compared to the previous Biochemical 2+3 remake also made with the RE engine, its completion is much higher, and it can even be said that it refreshes the upper limit of the remake game again.
After the first playthrough, this year's TGA Game of the Year is over in my mind
From another point of view, such a game is actually terrifying, not because it is likely to hit the TGA Game of the Year crown again, but because it is actually a far-reaching and even outrageous work for the game industry.
Imagine that with such pearls as the Biochemical 4 Remake, those manufacturers who dare to sell cold rice in the name of the remake by adding a filter to increase the resolution, and even those production teams that really want to remake the old work but can't get the essentials, how can they not feel ashamed of themselves in front of the player group whose appetite has been pulled up again by Capcom? How do future remastered game plans go? So here, I also gave Resident Evil 4 Remake a high score of 95, and after the scheduled mercenary mode and Ida chapter are launched, I am even willing to increase it to 99 if the quality remains at the current level.
The cap on the remastered game has been refreshed again, Capcom you make other manufacturers embarrassed
What the? Where is the point deducted, you ask? Alas! I deliberately gave one less point, afraid that Capcom would be complacent and not give me a good "Veronica Remake"!
Game name: Resident Evil 4 Remake
Login platform: XSX| S PS5 PS4 PC
Release date: 2023.3.24
Overall rating: 9.5/10
Recommended group: Biochemical series fans, players who like Li Sanguang
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