I anticipated this game coming out, and having received it and played it voraciously since, I was not disappointed one bit. RE6 is split up into three campaigns that tell three different aspects of the same overarching story. We have Leon, Chris and Jake, with their respective partners.
Leon's campaign is designed to hail back to 'classic' RE stylings, featuring mostly pistol play, shuffling zombies, urban settings, super creep factor and popout scares aplenty. I was thrilled with this campaign, having tons of fun with the whole thing and eating up every bit of content related to it. It was highly polished, did everything it set out to do quite well, and aside from insane purists wanting tank controls and inventory chests, I can't think of a classic RE fan that wouldn't at the very least enjoy playing through it.
Chris' campaign is more akin to military shooters put through an RE lens, and speaking as someone who doesn't like military shooters, I actually liked it. And the reason why, I pieced together as I was playing his campaign- the world is at war. Bioterrorism as a scheme has been shown through the 'secret agent, underground base' formula as much as has ever been humanly possible by Resident Evil 3, so showing the military aspect of said terrorism was a very necessary step in order to make the world believable. If they didn't include this, it would have come off as incredibly phony, having us just assume that all those J'avo are just "out there somewhere" as previous Resident Evils cornily expected us to believe. Instead, we're given the front-line treatment: Chris and Piers are given big weapons, lots of firepower, and plenty of opportunity to fight the brunt of this force head-on, all while telling a story between characters that was entertaining enough. Especially given that Chris continues to be a big, laughable roided-out meat monster, and his fellow soldier Piers shouldered all of the 'personality' duty. A greatly different look at the world of Resident Evil, and a not-unwelcome one.
Jake's campaign, much like Chris's, is necessary to make the world believable. Why? Because it answers the question that character development nuts like me have been asking forever: what the hell ever happened to the kids of all these weird cracked-out mutants from the story? Jake Muller is Wesker's son, and along with his blood, apparently absorbed his super-strength kung fu and outrageous acrobatics. Sherry Birkin is, well, Sherry Birkin, from Resident Evil 2, and seeing her made me not feel quite so bad for her... and then made me feel really awful for her. It's complicated. Jake has unique mechanics in that his hand-to-hand can be used the same as any other weapon, and it's fleshed out a lot more. Sherry's healing abilities don't manifest in gameplay form unless I missed something collossal- which feels like a mistake, but I can understand the balance issues involved. A lot is made of the idea of 'Original Sin' in this story mode, but to a degree that isn't bashed over the player's head and generally gets another favorable mark from me.
Other little touches like references to older games in the dozens, stylish camera shots in homage to the same, and plenty of lore sit prettily to satisfy longtime fans, but where RE6 really shines to me are the gameplay decisions they made. Quick shots, independently executable melee, ducking, rolling, dodging and well-balanced combat make the game a joy to play, removing the frustrations inherent in previous titles while still presenting a challenge. Easy Mode works great for your first time through, giving you plenty of room to breathe in the damage department, slowing down the clock for quicktime events and simplifying them greatly (it doesn't say so, but I found out that as long as you press any button, it'll take it, which feels like the game cutting me a break under the table and actually makes me feel good), while penalizing you in absolutely no way and allowing you to rack up skill points... which you can then use to more delicately adjust the difficulty of the game in various ways, depending on what kind of player you are. Even the occasional chase scenes or the like that have you do a different kind of control scheme are dumbed down enough to be accessible without it feeling like you can't fail. All of these were magnificent choices that I would want to stay, should there be any more installments in the series.
Finally, the presentation of the the game overall is just top-notch to me. Cutscenes are actiony, ridiculous and over-the-top, the characters often lampshade how preposterous their situations are, and the whole thing feels like I'm playing a movie. And that's the thing that I feel has been lost on a lot of fans over the years: Resident Evil is a semi-serious spoof of movies. The first ones parodied horror and sci-fi, the fourth made it a little more actiony, the fifth experimented with some more exotic and military themes, and this installment marries all of them together in a package that I adore, while putting a modern movie spin on all of it and directing it wonderfully.
Now, I understand that Capcom is evil and all that- Megaman was one of my favorite series bar none, and there's plenty of bile I have for them... but to put that anger onto RE6 is weird and misguided- especially considering that the people who make such decisions had next to nothing to do with the game.
It's worth at least a rent.
