REMAKE RESIDENT EVIL 3 REMAKE
When fans wish to have a game remade, the aim of the developers should be to take all of the best elements of the original game, find ways to adapt it to the current gen’s capabilities, enhance the experience, thereby making the game realize the potential it could not achieve previously.
Yeah, that’s not what happened with Resident Evil 3 Remake.
Sure. This game is not without its improvements. The humanized dialogue feel real as opposed to its laughably campy predecessor (though, that was appreciated in a backwards kind of way). Jill’s Perfect Dodge and Carlos’ Falcon Punch reaction functions were fitting and fun, for sure! The new character designs along with the set designs were *chef’s kiss*. Overall, the game carried such a cinematic quality that was fully enjoyable to watch. Also, death animations, welcome back.
But this remake rides on the coattails of the source material and is completely saturated with nostalgia bait, easter eggs, and aesthetics that Capcom believes would revive it back from the dead in full force, but you just end up with… well, a zombie. Maybe Capcom was not confident with RE3R or they had planned to couple it with Resident Evil Resistance from the start. Regardless, what we got were watered-down, lukewarm products for both games.
Note: I haven’t played RE: Resistance, but reviews are not beaming with praise. You’d think they’d have learned from Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City… oof.
Also, Spoilers ahead.
The Bad: Aesthetics > Substance
RE3R was essentially made in tandem of RE2R, but it’s tough for players to be sated as it was with its previous installment. It feels like the game was glossed over for the sake of “looking cool” instead of “fully realizing the cool” it could have been.
Story Bridges
Nemesis is designed to hunt and kill all STARS members, but fails in the most incompetent ways in killing Jill. Many a times, he literally has Jill’s cranium in his grasp, and instead of crushing it or unleashing his flesh whip the way he did to Brad’s face hole in the original, he safely tosses her onto the ground so that he can aim his flame thrower at her… menacingly. …Because it looks cool?
…Maybe he just grabs people’s faces as a form of greeting.
Nemesis has no problem quickly killing Tyrell, though. The only Black character that just happened to be a bystander when it all went down. Nemesis doesn’t give two shits about who Tyrell is (racist), but he’ll target him first nonetheless (violent racist). It was a prime opportunity for Nemesis to KILL JILL as she is preoccupied with SUPPORTING AN ENTIRE HUMAN BODY, but ohh, that plot armor deflected the kill onto Tyrell. …Because it looks cool?
Nicholai’s involvement was a complete farce as the stereotypical Russian baddie. In fact, his motives don’t add up – much like the money he thinks he’s getting. A self-proclaimed opportunist with the aim to rake in the green – makes some of the most egregious “villain” mistakes in cinematic history – monologuing while leaving your distraction chip alive for a useless face off INSTEAD OF flying away on a perfectly good helicopter with zombie vaccine in hand before the nuke is dropped on the city? Amateur hour… because it looks–
Hawwright. We get it.
The game makes a lot of changes already, the least they can do is bridge some of the story logic gaps. Like if Jill’s brain cradle is palmed, the least she can do is dig her gun directly into Nemesis’ hand/arm and go ballistic to break free (similar to the first time they met). Maybe Tyrell sees Nemesis and shoves her aside at the last second to save her. Maybe… Nicholai takes a villain course first – they had Skillshare back then, right?
Where’s the beef?
Story points aside, the gameplay is the most notable in its lacking of a meaty center. RE3R is the Cliff’s Notes of RE3 and that game was already short as it was. Many sections of the game were omitted (like the gas station, the clock tower) if not changed (the Nemesis battle takes place on ground level around a traffic circle with the clock tower teasing you in the background).
The worst offense was leaving out the bread and butter of survival horror: they cut out most of the puzzles or relegated them to side achievements.
Why?
What made Resident Evil so great was how much of a virtual escape room it was by using its limitations in creative ways. Resource management, lateral thinking, overwhelming odds, those times where you would have to double back to a location and switch out items because you were limited in inventory space while having to pick the lesser of two evil routes – these things were the good stuff. It’s supposed to be a survival horror game with action elements, not the other way around. (Did we not learn why Resident Evil 2 Remake was great?)
But Capcom’s obsession with making things look cool as opposed to being cool is what kills it. As they try to appeal to the masses, it makes it seem like they don’t know what kind of game they want it to be. (Did we not learn why Resident Evil 6 was awful?)
Having an in-game store adds insult to injury. It’s just a cheap add-on where it could’ve been fully integrated as with previous games. Yeah, it was in RE2R, but this feels more pronounced because the game felt pretty cheap. It’s like instead of a burger, they threw mustard and ketchup packets at you and said, “order up!”
You have to complete “challenges” that seem unfitting to the game to get points. Challenges like “Kill 200 enemies using a handgun.” If you get enough points, you can buy Jill’s OG outfit, or buy a sweet flaming knife, or “defensive coins”.
No.
This cheap shoe-in to garner some sort of impetus to play the game again. Do what the games originally did – put items in the game as achievables. In OG RE2, there was a locker for you to pick an outfit after you beat the game. New game+ would be have been welcomed as an even better option to play the game again because your achievements would be celebrated. However, New Game+ would make better sense if it had some changes to the game.
Changes: Three RE3R Improvements
Complaining about a game is about as futile as making suggestions for changes, but I’m going to do it anyway. It’s a three-pronged suggestion that meshes like a triple venn diagram. So, strap in.
First things first, bring back the puzzles and resource management.
Part 1: Revive the Puzzles + Resource Management
I can’t stress enough how much of a core component it is to Resident Evil or any survival horror games. The meticulous nature of having to combat your lizard brain with cognitive gymnastics is part of what makes beating the game that much more gratifying. Like a scavenger hunt throughout the city for key items to get the subway up and running. A multilayered, interdependent action puzzle as the core mission to escape Raccoon City would just be blissful.
It’s like most games nowadays where you have a core mission that is broken up into sub-missions each replete with their own detour missions. Speaking of detours, here’s one for this article:
The fact that the subway is the designated escape route out of the city is dumb.
(A) Subway stations would be the one of the first places to be flooded with people, so also… zombies, and
(B) they’re for intercity travel, but whatever.
A quick possible fix would be to argue that there is a line that takes you to the airport, and thus out of the city. Developers wouldn’t have to actually make an airport – the derailing of the train could still happen. They changed a lot from the original, so why not this?
Part 2: Revive the Multiple Choices + Multiple Endings
Let’s assume that RE3R was true to form with having an intricate puzzle with its little puzzle babies as the main objective. Mixing this with multiple choices that spawn different tangents would call for the replayability that Capcom wants – and would be revered for. Completing a certain amount of objectives would call for different types of endings. Would it not strike your curiosity to see how the other endings came to be?
For example: You need to clear subway tracks, move the train that everyone is taking refuge in onto a functioning track, gather supplies, open gates, do a rescue mission, etc. So, the tasks would not just be of puzzles, but with interactions. If you can gather pieces A, B, C, and make events X, Y, Z happen, you will have endings 1, 2, or 3. If you can save X from being shot by Nicholai or if you can direct survivors to somewhere safe without anyone dying… etc., etc., etc., In the end, they would all die, but not from your lack of trying.
The first puzzle could be a “gimme” which would at least guarantee you enough to move the story. Each puzzle piece or event has variations that make the game easier/harder or provide upgrades to equipment or additional challenges. If you were able to complete all the puzzles and events, you can have the best ending sequence. If you complete most of them, you get the okay ending. If you have a morbid curiosity, you can aim for the worst ending.
If you only complete part of the challenges, the game derails the subway sooner or makes you lose certain items, or whatever ramification that is fairly fitting. The third prong is the coup de grace:
Part 3: Revise the Nemesis System With Environmental Factors.
RE2R was arguably perfect with the newly introduced Mr. X system which added the unsettling tension and fear as he lurked in pursuit of you as you try to escape the police station. In this game, Nemesis was relegated to a couple of scripted events and only pursued in a locked environment. Surely, unfitting for a character with his name on the title.
If Nemesis was made to be more of a presence like Mr. X, he would now be an active antagonist to everything you do. He’s already strictly pursuing Jill, so there’s that similarity to RE2, but Nemesis can appear at random times and affect the environment now. After the first time you escape him, he will adapt to your play style. Taking him down will already be difficult with limited resources, but you can use the environmental factors as support in bringing him down at the potential cost of altering the ending. You can still pick up dropped loot if you can take him down, but it can also be to your detriment.
If Nemesis finds you in one of the puzzle locations or interactions, he will wreak havoc. He can destroy the area, prevent you from retrieving that necessary component, from getting that upgrade, from saving that person… thus prevent you from fully achieving the best ending. He can completely ruin the area so it cannot be revisited, consequently forcing you to choose an alternate path. You can mitigate the event, but you would have to choose wisely or take him down as quickly as possible.
When you combine all three factors, it would extend the game’s length, intensify challenges, and increase replayability because it would be fresh in a rogue-like game fashion, and add layers that a Resident Evil game should have.
End Game
If that hasn’t wowed your socks off, you may think, “Ted. You’re just being hypercritical of the game. Games don’t have to be amazing or logical, they just have to be enjoyable.” I would concede to the last part because the lore to Doom Eternal is all over the place but the game is fun as hell (haha, punnns).
However, this is a remake, thereby operating on a different standard. If this game were made like this as a stand alone game, it would have been eaten alive. But because a predecessor exists, the reviews are more like… gummy gnawings to the flesh.
This game doesn’t really hit any of its marks. If you want a comparison, compare it to The Last of Us. Same premise, tighter story with heavier emotional destruction. It knew what kind of game it wanted to be. Resident Evil dabbles between survival horror + high-intensity action and it can combine the two, but loses its cool factor when it tries to look cool instead of just being cool.
P.S. – Optional Change
This is something that is out of left-field, but it would be a curious road to take.
In the beginning, Jill is suggested to be suffering from PTSD. This
would be a real-game changer element as she would have to deal with outside enemies, along with herself. Surviving the nightmare at the Arklay Mountains mansion doesn’t happen without some scars.
It would just be more interesting as a new angle to revamp the series by further exploring that PTSD factor for a game where people get eaten alive. She did have a bunch of pill bottles on her end table. Perhaps along her journey out of the city, she has to take meds to straighten her out.
The PTSD could affect game controls – shaky aiming, inverted controls, questionable flashbacks. This can also affect her decision-making function and add another layer. Though, it might be too much for the gameplay elements and it might make Jill into a junkie.
