Resident Evil 0 Ranking: B
In the summer of 2007, I beat Resident Evil 4 and my friend told me to try the REmake of Resident Evil 1. It took me all of 10 minutes with the fixed camera angles to quit the hell out of that game. So you’re probably wondering why, in winter of 2018-2019, I decided to play this game.
Rebecca Chambers is my favorite Resident Evil character. Chris, Jill, and Leon all have some form of combat training. Rebecca’s a medic. STARS recruited her because of her “I graduated from college at the age of 18” intelligence, not because she has any sort of decorated combat record. Despite this, she survived 2 biohazard incidents back-to-back – she began investigating the train at the beginning of Resident Evil 0, survived the Umbrella Research Facility, killed the Queen Leech, went directly to the Spencer Mansion in Resident Evil 1, and survived that while saving Chris's life a few times. My second favorite character, Claire, also has no (formal) combat training, but didn’t pull as badass of a feat as ~48 straight hours of combat and survival. This is why, in my playthrough, I had Rebecca do the vast majority of all the fighting, despite most people using Billy as he can take way more hits. THIS IS BECKY’S GAME AND SHE’S CARRYING IT, DAMNIT. Err, I’m sorry, I mean this is OFFICER CHAMBERS’S GAME AND SHE’S CARRYING IT, DAMNIT.
In the summer of 2007, I beat Resident Evil 4 and my friend told me to try the REmake of Resident Evil 1. It took me all of 10 minutes with the fixed camera angles to quit the hell out of that game. So you’re probably wondering why, in winter of 2018-2019, I decided to play this game.
Rebecca Chambers is my favorite Resident Evil character. Chris, Jill, and Leon all have some form of combat training. Rebecca’s a medic. STARS recruited her because of her “I graduated from college at the age of 18” intelligence, not because she has any sort of decorated combat record. Despite this, she survived 2 biohazard incidents back-to-back – she began investigating the train at the beginning of Resident Evil 0, survived the Umbrella Research Facility, killed the Queen Leech, went directly to the Spencer Mansion in Resident Evil 1, and survived that while saving Chris's life a few times. My second favorite character, Claire, also has no (formal) combat training, but didn’t pull as badass of a feat as ~48 straight hours of combat and survival. This is why, in my playthrough, I had Rebecca do the vast majority of all the fighting, despite most people using Billy as he can take way more hits. THIS IS BECKY’S GAME AND SHE’S CARRYING IT, DAMNIT. Err, I’m sorry, I mean this is OFFICER CHAMBERS’S GAME AND SHE’S CARRYING IT, DAMNIT.
I also managed to beat the game without using any First-Aid Sprays. I wasn’t necessarily trying to – I just decided to use up herbs first and I actually ended up with a surplus of herbs, so I never had to go into my stock of First-Aid Sprays.
I knew what I was getting into from the outset – the price I was going to pay for playing the only game in the series to star Becky. Resident Evil 0, along with Code Veronica, are considered the most difficult in the mainline series. Let’s go through some of the frustrating features.
First, the camera angles. I hate fixed camera angles in these games and this game is no exception. 2 bosses in particular, the bat and Marcus, are incredibly difficult with the camera angles. The bat flies around and the camera means you can’t see it most of the time. The camera changes angles throughout the Marcus fight, which means not only can you not see the boss half the time, but also you’re constantly getting disoriented while he/she/it is slapping you with leech tentacles and grabbing you to exchange your bodily fluids with acid.
Another reason the camera sucks is the item system. Talk to people about this game and they’ll complain about the lack of item boxes. You instead just drop items on the ground. When you do so, the item just sort of lands somewhere near you, so if it lands in a place the camera can’t quite see, be prepared for a frustrating time trying to find it/pick it back up. If you drop an item near another item, be prepared for a frustrating time trying to pick up the correct item and not the one next to it.
On the topic of item management, there’s an arbitrary cap on the number of items a room can hold, which means if you try to designate a room for item storage, it’ll inexplicably “fill up” and you’ll need to try to find some other room and organize your items that way. It’s not like the room’s physically too small for these items, either. It smacks of artificial difficulty. Oh, and if you leave some items in a previous area and decide to go back and get them, the game will spawn enemies in your way. Also related to item management: the hookshot. The fucking hookshot. This thing takes 2 inventory spaces, a full third of the available inventory per character, and you need to carry it through most of the game. Everybody hates this thing and I’m no exception.
Finally, I hate the frogs. You’re just walking along when a frog jumps out of the water, grabs you with its tongue, and eats you. One shot. Dead. Done. WTF CAPCOM.
Besides these sorts of things, the game isn’t bad at all. It looks amazing graphically, the villain has the enjoyable over-the-top ham you’d come to expect from this series, and the gameplay is classic. If you like old-school Resident Evil fare, give it a whirl. You’ll have fun.
I usually talk about plot in Resident Evil games, so I guess I’ll make some comments here. The main thing I didn’t get is the mansion. Rebecca and Billy survive the train segment and the train crashes into the basement of the mansion. They then go into the mansion and their goal would be to leave. Once they unlock the front door to the mansion, shouldn’t they have just left through there? Why did they then collect the three tablets to go to the lab? They don’t even know what the three tablets will do – there’s just this thing in the observatory with 3 slots for the tablets. For all they know all that does is turn on the telescope or something.
Also, what was Leech-Marcus’s plan? He wants to take down Umbrella…by leaking the virus onto an Umbrella-owned train and into some Umbrella-owned facilities, all of which are in remote mountain areas where an Umbrella cover-up would be easy? Maybe I’m missing something, but his actions ultimately did nothing. The biggest event that led to Umbrella’s downfall was the infection of Raccoon City, which was the result of Umbrella trying to kill Birkin and steal his work, not any of the stuff Marcus pulled. At best, he indirectly gave Wesker the opportunity to leave and betray Umbrella, but that couldn’t possibly have been his plan. Wesker was one of the people who betrayed Marcus in the first place, not to mention there’s no way in hell Marcus could’ve predicted Wesker’s agenda.
Anyway, I’ll wrap this up. Unlike future games in the series, Resident Evil 0 grades you solely on how fast you clear the game, and (1) I take my time playing games and (2) I probably spent no less than 120% of my playtime managing my inventory and shuttling items from one room to another.
First, the camera angles. I hate fixed camera angles in these games and this game is no exception. 2 bosses in particular, the bat and Marcus, are incredibly difficult with the camera angles. The bat flies around and the camera means you can’t see it most of the time. The camera changes angles throughout the Marcus fight, which means not only can you not see the boss half the time, but also you’re constantly getting disoriented while he/she/it is slapping you with leech tentacles and grabbing you to exchange your bodily fluids with acid.
Another reason the camera sucks is the item system. Talk to people about this game and they’ll complain about the lack of item boxes. You instead just drop items on the ground. When you do so, the item just sort of lands somewhere near you, so if it lands in a place the camera can’t quite see, be prepared for a frustrating time trying to find it/pick it back up. If you drop an item near another item, be prepared for a frustrating time trying to pick up the correct item and not the one next to it.
On the topic of item management, there’s an arbitrary cap on the number of items a room can hold, which means if you try to designate a room for item storage, it’ll inexplicably “fill up” and you’ll need to try to find some other room and organize your items that way. It’s not like the room’s physically too small for these items, either. It smacks of artificial difficulty. Oh, and if you leave some items in a previous area and decide to go back and get them, the game will spawn enemies in your way. Also related to item management: the hookshot. The fucking hookshot. This thing takes 2 inventory spaces, a full third of the available inventory per character, and you need to carry it through most of the game. Everybody hates this thing and I’m no exception.
Finally, I hate the frogs. You’re just walking along when a frog jumps out of the water, grabs you with its tongue, and eats you. One shot. Dead. Done. WTF CAPCOM.
Besides these sorts of things, the game isn’t bad at all. It looks amazing graphically, the villain has the enjoyable over-the-top ham you’d come to expect from this series, and the gameplay is classic. If you like old-school Resident Evil fare, give it a whirl. You’ll have fun.
I usually talk about plot in Resident Evil games, so I guess I’ll make some comments here. The main thing I didn’t get is the mansion. Rebecca and Billy survive the train segment and the train crashes into the basement of the mansion. They then go into the mansion and their goal would be to leave. Once they unlock the front door to the mansion, shouldn’t they have just left through there? Why did they then collect the three tablets to go to the lab? They don’t even know what the three tablets will do – there’s just this thing in the observatory with 3 slots for the tablets. For all they know all that does is turn on the telescope or something.
Also, what was Leech-Marcus’s plan? He wants to take down Umbrella…by leaking the virus onto an Umbrella-owned train and into some Umbrella-owned facilities, all of which are in remote mountain areas where an Umbrella cover-up would be easy? Maybe I’m missing something, but his actions ultimately did nothing. The biggest event that led to Umbrella’s downfall was the infection of Raccoon City, which was the result of Umbrella trying to kill Birkin and steal his work, not any of the stuff Marcus pulled. At best, he indirectly gave Wesker the opportunity to leave and betray Umbrella, but that couldn’t possibly have been his plan. Wesker was one of the people who betrayed Marcus in the first place, not to mention there’s no way in hell Marcus could’ve predicted Wesker’s agenda.
Anyway, I’ll wrap this up. Unlike future games in the series, Resident Evil 0 grades you solely on how fast you clear the game, and (1) I take my time playing games and (2) I probably spent no less than 120% of my playtime managing my inventory and shuttling items from one room to another.
Forgive me, Becky. The best I can give you is…the D.