Hey, I discovered Resident Evil too! About 4 months ago, after watching someone’s RE: Requiem playthrough. Unfortunately, that spoiled me for the whole game, but not the whole series! Going in to this franchise almost completely blind has been so so fun, and I’m working on it just as you are. It’s very nice to see other people on the same journey. I’ll share my thoughts on the games, as I’ve played my fair share by now.
My absolute favorite out of all of them, but also probably the worst. Let me explain: In short, it really tests your limits. I wanted to play all of the RE games in chronological order, starting from the beginning, which would make this one my first game. Which it was! …technically. I got so frustrated with the controls, and how the game expects you to know certain things and to mindlessly explore, that I had to quit out. I then proceeded to play the entirety of RE2R before returning and settling down. (One of the things that kept me going was my friend I was streaming to, with the constant moral support.) One play through took me roughly 31 hours, spanning over 10 days, (I played everyday for those 10 days). It takes incredible patience to not succumb to gamer rage. I was also really stingy with my saves and ammo, which made it worse because I kept dying and went back so far, so I guess I made it harder for myself. Honestly, glad I played this one (kinda) first, because it really sets you up for the rest of the games. Meaning, everything after this was a cake walk. The story is phenomenal, making it my favorite, but the gameplay is so brutal I don’t think I could replay it anytime soon. It’s definitely a ‘one-and-done’ game for me. All that being said, you should definitely get it and play it!! It’s so fucking worth it.
TL;DR: games really good but very challenging and time consuming, be patient with yourself
I played this one after zero, and something tragic happened. Usually I like to play games on the standard difficulty, which is typically the “Normal” option. At the beginning of a save file, there are three options for difficulty, which I assumed were “Easy”, “Normal”, then “Hard”. But no! It was actually “Very Easy”, “Easy”, and “Normal”. So I picked the middle option, expecting to get the normal difficulty, and ending up playing both Jill and Chris’ run on easy mode. This unfortunately means I cannot give a good review, because throughout the game all I could think was “man this is such light work”. Because it was!!! All that being said, the game was really fun. I’m a huge fan of puzzles and exploration, and this scratched that itch very nicely. Was it annoying at times? Yes. Some of those puzzles were genuinely so dumb that I’m surprised any 12 year old in the 90s-2000s would be able to figure it out. Was it worth it? Absolutely. I would play again.
My actual first completed Resident Evil game! I have yet to go back and do the B runs, but I’ve done both Claire and Leon’s A runs. I won’t say much about it because you’ve already played it, but it was basically a big introduction to the whole RE universe.
This game had a really good feel to it and amazing graphics, but it was just a little underwhelming. It gets clowned on a lot, which isn’t completely justified, but I can see where they’re coming from. Not only was the game development rushed so they could move on to RE4R, but I also personally rushed the game in order to play RE 4. Kind of ironic, huh? I did really love how both game timelines (2 and 3) lined up and showed the outbreak from both perspectives. I’ve heard that the remake cut out a bunch of stuff from the OG, so if you can I highly recommend you go play it! (I would myself, but I’m an xbox player 😔)
Resident Evil: Code Veronica
I can’t say much about the game since I haven’t played it, but I’ve bought it and absolutely intend on doing so. As I’ve heard, it’s not for the weak, and is probably one of if not the hardest RE games. If you play it, go in with an open mind!
Fun fact: I was all fine and dandy, and ready to play RE4R, until I got to the store page and saw that the game wasn’t playable on my device. Damn you original Xbox One, for being incompatible with new technology! (/silly) But, you know what was compatible? The OG game! So I bought the bundle of 4, 5, and 6, and got to see the classic RE 4 experience. In my tier list so far, this game is definitely top three, because wow it is just amazing. It’s honestly a little camp, with everyone one-liner Leon spit out I was giggling and backing him up from the other side of the screen. I have yet to play the remake, and probably won’t be able to for the near future, but I definitely recommend going back and playing the original at some point!
Resident Evil: Revelations
Same with Code Veronica, I own it but never played it, but intend to do so. I recommend you play it in order to get the full picture with Chris and Jill.
This is where the series starts delving further from “survival horror” to “survival action shooter”. There are still some scary moments, but definitely more tense than actually spooky. I have kind of a funny story with this game: So, my friend that I mentioned earlier that gave me moral support also happens to be a big RE fan. It’s actually the reason why we’ve bonded so close, and the reasons why she’s been willing to watch me play the games. She’s been with me near every step of the way, with the exception of my first RE2R run with Claire. When I first loaded up RE5, I was expecting to play with the bot Sheva, and y’know. It kinda sucks. But! I ended up turning on the “yeah anyone can join me” button, and ended up with this random ass guy that I played with up until like, the middle of chapter 3. I could tell he’s at least played the game before, and to my knowledge, a seasoned vet. Dude knew where all the spawns were, immediately took down enemies before I got a chance to help, and knew where all the goodies and emblems were. It was really fun, and also comical to watch them know exactly what to do and me just run around following Sheva like a lost puppy, which my friend had to watch for a good 4 hours. That being said, they were really nice, and could tell I was a new player. It was interesting to communicate strictly with the command button, yet we understood each other pretty clearly. After I logged off I felt a little bad I couldn’t said goodbye, but I ended up going to the “recently played with” tab and sending them a friend request, which they excepted! This wouldn’t be a big deal, but I usually don’t play with randoms, especially in a game I’ve never played before.
(spoiler for enemy name if you care) The next day, my friend got the game and we played out the rest of the chapters together! It made it much more enjoyable to play with a human being. The way I played was I had a sub machine gun, a shotgun, and a rifle. Sheva had her handgun, a grenade launcher, and a magnum. Sheva also primarily carried the heals for both of us, and I the grenades and other offensive items. I’m known as the sniper out of the two of us; I love taking out enemies that are miles away and them not knowing what hit ‘em! The game was extremely fun, but also a little grueling. The constant bombardment of enemies had us pulling teeth, especially with those damn gatling gun Majinis and the reapers. All in all, a good game, that I would maybe replay and do all of the extra stuff.
Resident Evil: Revelations 2
Now, this one is heavily hated across the fandom. Which I will say is absolutely undeserved. Me and my friend (same friend) just finished Chris’ campaign like, two days ago, and Leon’s campaign about a week ago, and are gonna start on Jake’s on Monday. So far, it has been absolutely amazing.
I feel like all of the hate derives from how far they strived from the original games, with this installment being very much action-based shooter style. Like RE5, it completely abandons typewriters, and has a chapter live save system. It’s kinda hard to tell when each chapter’s subsection ends, so if I were you I’d probably just play until the end of each chapter. Which isn’t too hard to do, they range from like 1-2 hours.
My only advice is to not listen to the hate and PLEEAAAASE don’t spoil yourself!!! Unless you already have—but, this game is pretty story driven, especially because of the timeline, so I highly recommend going in completely blind. Me and my friend had to go through an entire campaign knowing the ending and just waiting for it to happen, it kinda sucked.
GENUINELY PEAK CINEMA OH MY GOSH. I will say very little about the actual gameplay and story because learning about it as you go is the best part of the experience. But basically, this game is known as “the revival the RE”, returning to its survival horror roots. Let me tell you a little story about when I played this game.
So, after I finished RE3R, naturally, I was going to move onto RE4R. My friend had offered to let me use his account in order to play it, because he owned it and I didn’t. (If you don’t know. on Xbox you technically own the games of all accounts on that certain console, just not your account. If that makes sense. I don’t have nor have never owned a PS so I don’t know if it has something similar.) But after my debacle of figuring out I could play it on my device, I was kind of at a loss. Me and my friend came up with a few solutions. First of all, I have Xbox Game Pass, which is how I’ve been able to play 2 and 3 so far. Our options were: Pause our nightly streams and wait for me to save up enough money to buy the 4, 5, and 6 bundle, so we could play all of them in a row. (When I say we, I mean she watches (except the coop games)). Or, I could go ahead and play 7 and 8 because they’re on game pass, while we wait for my funds to collect. Seeing that Biohazard is her all time favorite game, the choice was obvious.
Let me just say, I was scared SHITLESS through the ENTIRE GAME. Mostly in the beginning as I was adjusting to the scare factor, but y’know. Biohazard was my first, fully fledged horror game I had ever played, which made it 10x scarier.
That being said, 10/10 that I probably wouldn’t play again in the near future, but absolutely amazing in and of itself. The protagonist from this game is my absolute favorite (as well as 0’s), and his story is so so good.
I’m waiting until I finish all of the other games before I go to Village, because I feel like it would be a drag to go from first-person cinematic masterpiece to like, Code Veronica. I’m definitely the most excited to play this one, and because my Xbox can’t handle newer games, it would be the last one I could play before either getting an upgraded console or a PC. So I might as well end it off with a bang!
Again, I don’t own this one and won’t be able to play it for the foreseeable future, but I have watched a playthrough of it. Trying to minimize my contact with the game’s content so I don’t spoil myself further, but from what I do know, it’s amazing and definitely worth it! If you’re worried about the price, then in the time it takes you to get through all the other games, spinoffs, and movies, maybe when it goes on sale it’ll drop by 50% /silly. But seriously, prime time to buy it is on sales; I’ve seen up to 30% off, which is really good for a new triple A game.
There are other games such as the Darkside Chronicles, and the Umbrella Chronicles, and Outbreak, but those are the mainline games that I would absolutely recommend.
My order playing the games so far has been: RE2R, RE0, RE1R, RE3R, RE7, RE4, RE5, and I’m now finishing RE6.
If you’ve made it this far, thank you for reading my reply! Not only did I get to relate this to you, but I also got to just nerd out about my favorite series and share my experiences with it so far. I’m so happy to see other people in the same progress as I am, and I wish you happy REing!
