Why I Hated Resident Evil 4

[bug_of_war]

How much of an expert on the game were you when it came out? I notice you were ten at the time, according to your bio.

The problem is, at the time (and for a good chunk of time before), the two franchises were frequently lumped together. It wasn't simply an instance of "they're both survival horror," it's that they would be uttered in the same breath. You could find comparisons even with 4.

Which brings me to....

You checked my bio? Weird but whatever.

Anyways, dude I played the game when I was like 14 so yeah...I don't actually see your point here if there was supposed to be one. Was there?

As for the franchises being lumped together that still doesn't excuse going into the game thinking it would be of the same feel. Alien and Predator are constantly lumped together, and the first 2 films are completely different. Like I said, if someone told him that it was exactly like Silent Hill then he should smack them across the head, if they just mentioned the games in passing because people were talking about video games then maybe ask, "is it like silent hill in the psychological horror way?". I know I ask my friends for more detail and even go and look at other trailers before I go and purchase a game.

When looking for critical comparisons, I found quite a few reviews that said you didn't have to know anything about the RE series to enjoy this. Even if he went by reviews, it seems quite likely he would feel justified in jumping in. People claimed this game was accessible.

Beyond that, it's not like we have the now-ubiquitous YouTube in its current state, where one could find gameplay vids and reviews (assuming they hadn't been DMCAd).

I mean, seriously, it seems like people are approaching this with a 2014 perspective.

And those review would be right, RE4 taps ever so lightly into the lore of the previous games and it only ever makes a nod in their direction in the service to the fans. I didn't know who Wesker or Ada were, but the game does a pretty good job of showing the history between Leon and Ada, and Wesker is mentioned a hell of a lot more than he is actually shown. So to complain about 2 characters (one being completely sidelined as a cameo pretty much, and the other being a side character) Just seems like complaining for the sake of making a complaint.

I'm not approaching this from a 2014 perspective, I'm approaching it as a superfluous article that really is just here because an article had to be made. Wow, he hated a game that he was bad at!? WELL COLOUR ME FUCKING SURPRISED!

(I'm not saying the game is faultless and must be liked by everyone just to be clear)

 

[008Zulu_v1legacy]

I only played RE 1, 2 and 3. Didn't like 1, the fmv was very campy and sad. 2 was definitely my favourite. Got 3 for the PC, controls took a little getting used to, but I loved it all the same. I'm glad I got out before the series took it's downward spiral.

 

[Something Amyss]

You checked my bio? Weird but whatever.

How is it weird that I like to know what I'm talking about?

Anyways, dude I played the game when I was like 14 so yeah...

So even you played it four years after the fact, but feel fit to talk to the contemporary users as though they should have known better.

I don't actually see your point here if there was supposed to be one. Was there?

Do you mean aside from:

The problem is, at the time (and for a good chunk of time before), the two franchises were frequently lumped together. It wasn't simply an instance of "they're both survival horror," it's that they would be uttered in the same breath. You could find comparisons even with 4.

I mean, that was kind of the point. You even quoted it, so you must be aware of it. Oh, and you addressed it. So....Why are you saying you didn't see a point again?

Unless you mean the point to your age, but you literally made my point. Even assuming you played the game four years after the fact, that's a large difference.

Like I said, if someone told him that it was exactly like Silent Hill then he should smack them across the head

Not someone, and not just. A large body of someones, which you can even find in reviews of the time, and like (as opposed to just like, where you're now playing word games). But again, as I've already said these things in a message you quoted, I have to assume you're at least somewhat aware.

I know I ask my friends for more detail and even go and look at other trailers before I go and purchase a game.

Look at other trailers? On what, the YouTube that barely existed at the point this game came out? I made that point already, too. That's where the 2014 thinking comes in. There weren't exactly a lot of common places to snag video, even in 2005. And hell, I just watched what few videos that were published at the time (and funny enough, several of those were published a year after the game released[footnote]Using the PS2 release date, no less[/footnote]), and they don't really tell much. Again, you were ten at the time. You could be forgiven for not particularly having this dataset, but don't go telling those of us that did have the data that we should have magically had other data to work with. You might as well say "Shamus, why didn't you watch a LP?" or "Shamus, you could have watched the game livestreamed on Twitch!"

And those review would be right, RE4 taps ever so lightly into the lore of the previous games and it only ever makes a nod in their direction in the service to the fans.

But you were just arguing the exact opposite, finding flaw in Shamus for thinking that he could just jump in. My point being, he was likely explicitly told that. And you're now saying that they would be right to do so.

Wow, he hated a game that he was bad at!? WELL COLOUR ME FUCKING SURPRISED!

Except, you know, that's just making excuses.

Also, I'm not sure Shamus "had" to make an article. Have you ever looked at his release schedule? This is a guy who would sometimes go months between his Stolen Pixels comics, and I'm not sure Experienced Points has ever had a regular schedule.

Again, you're making accusations to work backward from a conclusion, rather than compiling evidence and following where the conclusion leads.

"You just suck at the game" is a cop-out in general, and here it only addresses some of the issues. And keep in mind, this was leveled as much at the criticism of the game (or lack of critical analysis) as it was at the game itself. A good chunk of the point was that he got the wrong game. The point about criticism, and the point I'm making, is that the resources at the time were such that even an attempt to be informed would have likely led him there.

When reviewers are comparing this to the SH franchise, when they're saying it's noob friendly, When there's not exactly a plethora of video footage to work with, when even a lot of the trailers didn't go live with the game....I mean, was he supposed to have ESP?

 

[Coruptin]

Yes, thank you
The all or nothing mentality is also just as frustrating to me. Everyone needs to be hyperbolic, all games are either the worst crime in human history or the second coming Christ.If you like something you must show your support by never criticising anything about it ever. If you don't like something you must foam at the mouth and never respect anything about it.

 

[Steve the Pocket]

This is why games that expect you to have played the previous games in the series, and the fans who recommend them, need to make this clear. Which is difficult to do, admittedly, because sometimes the previous games weren't very good and slogging through a mediocre game (or worse, several) to get to the one good one because it's supposedly the Holy Grail is something that people aren't going to want to do, and even then, a lot of the enjoyment tends to hinge on whether you thought the predecessors were merely decent (which anyone who liked them enough to keep going pretty much had to think) or steaming piles of ass.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

I have to say, this article rather bothers me, not because I love resident evil 4 or anything (I've never even played it though I've seen some lets plays) but because I'm a gamer, and treat gaming the way I would any other media format.

Take the following lines from the article for example:

So you might think I'd have to ignore the story and just focus on the awesome gameplay. Except, the gameplay was miserable for me. See, I'd never seen a quicktime event before in my life. I was crushed by a boulder several times before I guessed what the game wanted from me. And even then I wasn't sure. Should I hold the buttons? Press them once? Press them fast? While most of the young kids had been using this controller layout since the mid-90's, it was all new to me. I was having enough trouble just getting the basics down, and I couldn't recognize the symbol-based prompts fast enough to succeed. That kind of instantaneous reaction takes a long time to develop. It's one thing if you get it slowly over the course of five or ten years. It's another when you have to learn it all at once just to survive one stupid cutscene.

I don't find this to be a valid complaint in any game, not should any reviewers ever have to address this. The fact that you're not adept with using a controller might be frustrating to you, but no reviewer should ever have to write a review for a game based on whether or not it'll be playable to someone who has never used a particular type of controller before or who isn't used to a specific controller. That's like demanding that book critics review books in a way that illiterate people would know whether or not the book is right for them.

The game is almost actively hostile to newcomers. It assumes you know something about the Resident Evil lore and it expects you to know who the major characters are.

Again, not a valid complaint. The game clearly is clearly called Resident Evil 4, as in the fourth game in a series of games. You wouldn't go into a movie series you've never watched and expect to know who all the characters are and what they're doing there. Would you consider a review of Return of the Jedi or The Wrath of Khan that complained about not knowing the characters and lore to be a valid review of the material? Of course not. It's an absolutely brain-dead complaint.

These things are not problems with the game, nor is the goofy tone of the game. These were problems with YOU, the player, Shamus Young. It was your problem that you didn't do any research about the tone of the game, it was your problem that you weren't competent enough at using a controller to play the game, and it was your problem that you didn't know the back-story. A critic should speak from a position of authority. If you're a literary critic you should be well read, if you're a comic book critic you should have a vast knowledge of comic books and their writers, and if you're a game critic you should know how to use a damn controller. The fact that no critic talked about the game being difficult to control means that the game controlled perfectly fine for its time, and the fact that you had trouble getting around the controls was not the game's fault, nor something that reviewers should have actively warned you about.

 

[Altorin]

I had a similar sort of experience with resident evil 5.

I never played RE4 (still haven't really), but I absolutely loved Dead Space. and when Deadspace came out, everyone balked that it was "just RE4 in space"... I ate it up like candy.. but then RE5 came out, and everyone balked that it was basically just "RE4 in Africa"

So I got RE5.... and... I couldn't stand it. I managed to beat the first big stompy asshole who crashes through your hiding spot with an axe, and with that, I was done. It just didn't jibe with me at all. I really don't know what it is. That axemonster killed all of the tiny amount of fun that I might have been having. I tried to fight him more times then I should admit.

Now, I wouldn't claim to be able to review RE5. I literally got through what a person who was versed in the game would call "the very fucking beginning", but it didn't matter. I couldn't play it anymore.

Sometimes, a game just doesn't feel right.

come to think of it, I played RE4 about the same length of time, to precise moment. The first chainsaw guy, all those people chasing you. I died about 4 times, handed the controller to a friend and just never played it again.

So I played RE5 a tiny bit more

 

[TaboriHK]

I hated RE4 because it wasn't fun and got progressively and aggressively dumber as the plot when on. I tapped out a couple hours in.

 

[bug_of_war]

How is it weird that I like to know what I'm talking about?

I just never thought people actually bothered to check the bio...

So even you played it four years after the fact, but feel fit to talk to the contemporary users as though they should have known better.

I play video games don't I? This is a discussion about video games isn't it? This is an opinionated article that has been put up for scrutiny isn't it? So yes, even though I played the game 4 years after the release I feel as though I'm quite capable of formulating an opinion on a subject. The writer stated that he played the game as an adult, I played it as a teenager, yet for some reason I had the genius idea to maybe find out a small amount of what the game was like before playing it. Before I'd played RE4 I thought the franchise was just a movie series, after talking to a mate who had played it and asking him what it was like in terms of gameplay and genre I decided to give it a go.

So yeah...I feel as though the writer shot himself in the foot going into the game.

Do you mean aside from:

I mean, that was kind of the point. You even quoted it, so you must be aware of it. Oh, and you addressed it. So....Why are you saying you didn't see a point again?

Unless you mean the point to your age, but you literally made my point. Even assuming you played the game four years after the fact, that's a large difference.

I don't see the point about what my age had to do with anything other than me being a more competent thinker at a younger age than the writer. Also, how is playing the game 4 years after it's initial release a large difference?

Not someone, and not just. A large body of someones, which you can even find in reviews of the time, and like (as opposed to just like, where you're now playing word games). But again, as I've already said these things in a message you quoted, I have to assume you're at least somewhat aware.

So you're telling me that reviews said that RE4 was a psychological horror?

Look at other trailers? On what, the YouTube that barely existed at the point this game came out? I made that point already, too. That's where the 2014 thinking comes in. There weren't exactly a lot of common places to snag video, even in 2005. And hell, I just watched what few videos that were published at the time (and funny enough, several of those were published a year after the game released[footnote]Using the PS2 release date, no less[/footnote]), and they don't really tell much. Again, you were ten at the time. You could be forgiven for not particularly having this dataset, but don't go telling those of us that did have the data that we should have magically had other data to work with. You might as well say "Shamus, why didn't you watch a LP?" or "Shamus, you could have watched the game livestreamed on Twitch!"

I'm not asking the dude to use Youtube, I'm asking him to actually ask people about a game. From what all the "older" gamers seem to say on this website and others is that back years ago finding out gaming information mostly came from word of mouth and reading gaming magazines. So why didn't he do that? And even then, whilst Youtube wasn't giant (or I think it actually didn't exist) there were websites that played videos.

But you were just arguing the exact opposite, finding flaw in Shamus for thinking that he could just jump in. My point being, he was likely explicitly told that. And you're now saying that they would be right to do so.

My argument was this. He made the conscious knowledge of going into a 4th game of a series, therefore he should not get hippity when they do a throwback/fan service for the fans. Oh boo hoo, they spent 3 seconds to give a nudge to people who actually followed the series, how dare they do that with out then spending 5 minutes to tell me who that character whom literally is just a cameo and has little to no relation to the current story. I played RE4 knowing absolutely nothing about the series other than there were movies, and even in those movies I was paying less attention to the plot and more attention to the action. So yeah, I feel as though my point still stands.

Except, you know, that's just making excuses.

Also, I'm not sure Shamus "had" to make an article. Have you ever looked at his release schedule? This is a guy who would sometimes go months between his Stolen Pixels comics, and I'm not sure Experienced Points has ever had a regular schedule.

Again, you're making accusations to work backward from a conclusion, rather than compiling evidence and following where the conclusion leads.

"You just suck at the game" is a cop-out in general, and here it only addresses some of the issues. And keep in mind, this was leveled as much at the criticism of the game (or lack of critical analysis) as it was at the game itself. A good chunk of the point was that he got the wrong game. The point about criticism, and the point I'm making, is that the resources at the time were such that even an attempt to be informed would have likely led him there.

When reviewers are comparing this to the SH franchise, when they're saying it's noob friendly, When there's not exactly a plethora of video footage to work with, when even a lot of the trailers didn't go live with the game....I mean, was he supposed to have ESP?

No he shouldn't have ESP, but he should have common sense to go and find out if a game will be what he likes. And you prove my point by typing, "he got the wrong game". Yes, he did, he is allowed to hate RE4, never said he wasn't, I'm saying some of the points he is making are of no fault but his own. When it comes down to it you should be careful in what you put your money towards, it's his own fault for expecting a survival horror game, it's his own fault for starting a game at the 4th incarnation of the franchise and not knowing who some minor characters are.

As for why the article is superfluous, it's because it is literally summed up with, "I was expecting something different, and I was bad at the game, therefore I hate it". Well no shit you hate it, water is wet, blood is red, shit stinks. It's an article that was made because why not make one and to me it seems to be wasted. I hate math, yet I don't tell my work that and explain, "I don't like it cause I'm bad at it" because they'll just look at me and say, "well no shit".

 

[bug_of_war]

double post because Captcha is annoying and shit...

 

[Mangue Surfer]

Wee need better reviews, everybody knows... Everybody except the 1%. The more excited, the early adopters, the first in line, the hype riders, the opinazi. Problem is, the reviews ARE made for these people. How we solve this? Honestly, I don't know.

 

[Coruptin]

You guys know that the point of the article has nothing to do with the quality of resident evil 4 right? This is about the nature of reviews as subjective opinions and how increasingly people are reading reviews to fuel their biases instead of looking for the opinions of the reviewer to see how their experiences might compare to their own in order to conclude whether or not they themselves would find a game enjoyable. Though I suppose the comments here just further prove the point.

 

[Darkmantle]

You guys know that the point of the article has nothing to do with the quality of resident evil 4 right? This is about the nature of reviews as subjective opinions and how increasingly people are reading reviews to fuel their biases instead of looking for the opinions of the reviewer to see how their experiences might compare to their own in order to conclude whether or not they themselves would find a game enjoyable. Though I suppose the comments here just further prove the point.

Really? Because to me it reads like some reviewers want to not have their opinions disagreed with. If people don't think your review is good, I have little issue with them voicing that opposition. If you do not want to hear dissenting opinions, shut down or ignore the comment section.

Of course I come from this after being told by fans of a certain reviewer that I'm a piece of shit for disagreeing, or more specifically voicing my disagreement, with his reasoning and ultimately his verdict.

 

[katsabas]

RE 4 on the PS2 launched in an era where online information about a game was abundant. Same could be said about magazines concerning gaming. If you dive head first in, without info and as soon as it launches, you are basically asking for trouble and you should not be surprised when trouble finds you.

I mean, the game first launched on the GC and it was critically acclaimed. That by itself warrants attention. So one should ask himself 'why do people consider it the best thing since sliced bread, why is revolutionary, what makes it differ from previous entries in the franchise'. I have always made it a point to never buy a game without info so the feeling I get from Shamus is that he saw RE on the cover of the game and said 'awesome, bought day 1'. Never bothered himself with info.

No franchise, ANY franchise, should get your money on day 1. That is a horrible mistake and it's what led to such ridiculous notions like early access, pre-order bonuses and collector's editions on games whose worth hasn't even been proved yet (Watch Dogs).