Well I have opinions.
The game is as much a remake as it is a remix. It doesn't just retool combat and movement, it also plays around with your expectations by moving around items, traps, enemies, mini-bosses, story beats, etc. Broadly speaking it's more or less the same, but deceptively so; for me anyway I keep getting lulled into a sense of security until the game suddenly decides to do something radically different.
Leon feels somewhat slower, maybe to balance the fact that he can move and shoot now, though I never had a problem holding my ground while shooting before. The game is kinda built around picking a spot and playing tower defense at intervals anyway.
I got decimated several times during the village attack. When I finally ran the clock successfully I didn't even get to kill any of the Salvadors. Either it's way harder now or I'm rusty as hell.
The sidequests are kinda 'gamey' (kill 3 rats, kill 3 snakes) and usually involve you just plodding around the area you just traversed. You cash them in for spinels, which work as premium currency against pesetas. I'm generally loaded with herbs and handgun bullets but short as hell on cash. The ammo crafting I don't really need, but I keep doing it to make room in the case.
I think my biggest gripe is the knife. The knife breaks after a while and has to be mended for cash at the Merchant's; you also happen to keep collecting MORE knives which break even faster (like two QTE uses or so). More often than not I'm running around with a bunch of broken knives. This sucks because you can't even use them on mantraps or locks or glass cases until you repair at least one.
Insta-death QTEs have been removed and replaced either with enemy ambushes or cutscenes without the Press X To Not Die. Fair enough.
There's Evil Within style tripwire disarming, but don't get anything from it, except making the world a safer place.
Second biggest gripe: you don't get a free refill when you upgrade ammo capacity anymore. What a bummer. At least I don't have to worry about reloading an empty gun before upgrading it anymore, but it was a fun game to play on top of the game to never reload the shotgun or the rifle except at the Merchant's.
For story, it's just RE4 but with less personality. I miss the Sam Raimi energy. And weird nitpick but the cutscenes are very dully blocked. When Leon's looking outside the cabin during the village attack we get a dull wide shot of zombies approaching, followed by a closeup of Salvador's chainsaw revving up. You already see Salvador and his chainsaw in the wide shot, so the closeup adds nothing. In the original this is instead a POV shot that's nervously looking outside the cabin before landing and zooming in on the chainsaw. The escalation and reveal work way better.
