| Platform | OVERALL |
|---|---|
| Wii | 8.10 |
| Overall | 8.10 |
|
- Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles should be a mess of a game. It is practically glued to together from pieces of other Resident Evil games and transformed into a linear shooting game that makes use of the wiimote to replace the standard light gun. Early previews were not very positive; it looked like it was going to be a cash in, a rush job. Well somehow Capcom pulled it off, surprisingly UC is a quality game and one of the best RE side games. Umbrella Chronicles takes you through events of previous games in the series as well as one new story, which finally shows the fall of Umbrella. Each chapter corresponds to a RE game, for instance the first chapter is based on RE0; RE and RE3 are the other two covered, with the last level being original. These chapters are then broken down into stages starring the main characters of each game. Some are extra chapters, which allow you to play as Wesker or other characters such as Ada to see their point of view of the events. In total there are over 20 stages to play through, each lasting close to or over 10 minutes of play depending on your skill level. The stages are presented in the classic style of light gun games; it’s on rails with all sorts of enemies popping up on the screen trying to get you. You use your wiimote to aim at the screen, it is no replacement for a true light gun; remember the wiimote is more like a cursor than a laser that points at the screen, but it still works very well. In no time you will be blasting zombies all over the screen with ease, simple movements of the wrist is all that is needed. To be honest this game would not work as well if it remained a standard light gun game experience, the wiimote is fun to use but you lose a bit from that true aiming and shooting gameplay of a gun. It seems like Capcom realized this and built a game with many gameplay elements to support the main act of shooting. With the analog stick you may look around the environment, its limited movement but it may let you shoot an object that was not in view before, or let you discover a new path to take. The guns you use are a very important aspect to the gameplay. Every character has the standard infinite rounds pistol, but you may have secondary weapons, with ammo, that will become absolutely necessary to use against the bigger monsters. All the classic RE weapons are present from shotguns to rifles and the rocket launcher of course. More and more weapons are slowly added to the game as you progress, each with its own upgradeable stats. All secondary guns may be upgraded with star points (points you get when you score well at the end of a level) these will increase power or give you more ammo capacity. It adds a whole layer of customization to a style of game that normally has none. Eventually you will get enough points to upgrade everything to the max but as you first play it does become important to upgrade the right weapons, the game can become very difficult as it goes on if you don't have good secondary weapons. Switching weapons in game works with a simple press of a button, sadly though the weapons switch in a certain order. Lets say your character has a shotgun, rocket launcher, and SMG, as you switch you will scroll through those weapons in that order even if they are out of ammo. In tight spots this can lead you to quickly choosing a weapon you did not want, it’s a minor inconvenience but you will notice it. There are also grenades and knife attacks you may perform by holding the A button and either the trigger for a grenade or waving the wiimote for knife attack. Knife attacks work great when small enemies jump at your screen, and if you can time it right it can get a zombie off of you. During specific segments in the stage a cutscene will pop up and you will have to input the right button to avoid being hurt, a la RE4. These random button presses also occur during boss fights, which are required to dodge certain attacks. When all these game mechanics are thrown together in action during these intense linear levels the beauty of the game comes through. You have to use strategy to get by; you need to conserve the ammo of your secondary guns. The enemies in this game are varied, they are all classic RE enemies, and practically no new ones appear in this game. These monsters like to get up close and personal, so they will charge the screen and you better be ready. Hunters are big and fast its best to have a shotgun ready to blast them back. Eliminators are fast but small and they usually come in large numbers so having a rifle is the best form of attack. Zombies can be dispatched with a critical hit from a pistol, this can be hard to perform, it has to be at a very specific spot on the head. But if there are too many zombies on the screen it may be safer to use a more powerful weapon to push them back rather than try for the critical hits. These are all choices you will have to make quickly and on the fly as you play this game, I feel it elevates this game from just a mindless shooting game to something with a bit of depth to it. The stages themselves can be blown to pieces by your weapons; there are tons of destructible items in the game ranging from lights to paintings to statues, almost everything. So on top of fighting off hordes of mutant flesh eating monsters you need to be aware of your environment cause useful items are hidden in these breakable objects. Health items, new weapons and hidden files can all be found by breaking everything you can. The game encourages you to do this cause how many objects you break is a stat used to determine your overall score, the amount of hidden files you find is also a stat. So as you can see there is plenty going on in these levels, there is practically no downtime and you will need to come up with strategies if you want that precious S rank in every level. A lot of the fun from this game is the actual trip through the stages themselves. It's always great to revisit the mansion or the RPD, this game really brings them alive like never before. The stages are action packed, many times zombies will burst through walls, monsters will pop out of your screen when your character turns around, to put it simply things stay interesting. Some levels are flat out better than others though. The RE0 levels are almost training levels to get you started; if you just play those levels you would probably be thinking the game is mediocre and that I am bit crazy for liking this game so much. Be patient the best stuff comes later, with the RE3 levels (actually Outbreak levels with Jill) being the best in my opinion. Almost all the levels culminate in an epic boss fight; these battles are what pushes this game over the edge. The boss fights are epic; they will test your skills to the max and your strategies. You better have the right secondary weapon with enough ammo or it can get very ugly. The bosses all have their own scripted patterns, it does tend repeat over and over for most bosses but I did not mind it cause it's when this game is at its best. Many shooters are very short and lack content, not this game. The 20 hours length is greatly exaggerated when looking at it as just one play through. To play through all the levels, including the unlockable ones, can take you about 10 hours depending on how many times you die or replay levels for a high rank. Now if you try to find all files, get S rank in all levels, and play the game in hard mode then this game can easily give you 20 hours plus of quality gameplay. The amount of content is staggering for this style of game. Also you may play this game with a friend in co-op mode, I didn’t get to try it out much but it works well and makes it a game that you may end up playing over and over with others. The storytelling elements are one of the weak points of this game. Those looking for a good summary of the events of prior RE games will not get it here. Many of plotlines have been altered and shrunk down to fit this type of game. The new story content is decent, but it’s not as good as other RE games and that’s saying a lot cause RE is not really known for its great storytelling. I am mostly satisfied cause they did a great job with the Wesker segments. The Wesker missions do stand out as some of the best in the game and it provides the best new content, it even hints at possible plot points for RE5. If you were expecting the long awaited epic finale of Umbrella you may be disappointed, it does fill in the gaps just not as well as many would have hoped. Also of note there are files in the game, some are new and provide some interesting info like Wesker's version of the virus, but many are just old files from previous games. Graphically UC is above average. As I stated before this game is pieced together from previous RE games. The same character models you saw in REmake and RE0 are the same ones you see here. The RE3 scenario is actually stages from Outbreak, at least they managed to make these levels look just as good as the others. I wish there was a little bit more color; it seems washed out at points. It’s not bad; it’s just nothing new, not to the level of RE4. The music is overall decent, it’s at its best when its remixing old RE tunes. For me in some parts of the game it seems like the music did not match what was happening on screen, but to be honest many times you won’t even notice cause it can get lost over the sound effects. The voice acting is as bad as ever, that’s a good thing. I am very surprised that this game turned out to be as good as it is. This is not the RE fan in me talking, it seriously is a quality shooting game. Games like this is what the Wii is all about, here is a quality game in a genre that is practically dead that is brought to life again cause of the unique nature of the wiimote. The game is lazy in certain aspects, it could use more polish, and the wiimote is not exactly as good as a light gun but Capcom added plenty of gameplay elements to make the overall game a great experience. If you have any interest in this style of game just pick it up, it is worth owning and you won't be disappointed. |
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Posted by Dvader Sun, 22 Jun 2008 06:48:53
Tue, 24 Jun 2008 15:44:55
Sweet, nice review format here. Need a database of review though.
Tue, 24 Jun 2008 20:00:20
I hated this game, the regular enemies were way too easy, the bosses were just bullet sponges. I just felt like I had more fun playing Maximum Force over a decade ago. I couldn't give this game a pass just because of its ties to RE.
Fri, 08 Aug 2008 19:57:43
WOW, strong words. I think it was quite fun. It was like a slow paced light gun game that managed to keep me playing for hours and I even had some great multiplayer fun with it too. It's not up to RE4 quality or anything but it ended up as a much better game than I expected at first.
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