Resident Evil 5 Review

Story
Resident Evil 5, Capcom’s newest editions to it's survival horror series arrived in March of 2009. The story revolve’s around Chris Redfield and his new partner Sheva Alomar; the events take place in Africa. It seems that there is a bio-hazard threat there, the Las Plagas parasite from the fourth game makes a return.

Gameplay
They tweaked the control set up, you can edit it to be like it was in Resident Evil 4, but now it’s taken on a more traditional shooter control scheme, like Dead Space. Ready your gun with the left trigger, aim with the right thumbstick and shoot with right. You’re still stationary when you’re aiming though. It was really nice to be able to assign items and weapons to the D-pad, it made things a lot more streamlined. However, if there were any other items in your inventory that you wanted to use, you had to hit the Y button to select and use everything not designated by your D-pad. And this time though it doesn’t pause the game, you can still be attacked and killed. It was a little aggravating and takes some getting used to, you need to be kinda quick about it in combat situations. Just be sure to know what is where.

Co-op play is a huge part of this game, as you will always be accompanied throughout the game by Sheva(once you beat the game you can choose either Chris or Sheva). Your accomplice can be controlled by the A.I., which can hold it’s own for the most part. Forget about play with the computer though on the hardest difficulty, professional. It’s definitely preferred that you have another person play through with you, either through split-screen or online.

The multiplayer aspects of Resident Evil 5 could have been implemented a little better, joining a game means waiting for the host to die or otherwise starting over from the last check point. So you sit there wondering if the other person is ignoring you, or is just doing really well.

The market and upgrading has lost it’s personality as there isn’t a merchant to come across like in RE 4. It is convenient though that every time you start up you can select and swap your equipment, buy items and upgrade your weapons. This way you can go into each chapter fresh and ready. You can also give ammo to your teammate, but not weapons, unfortunately(unless they're playing on your gamer profile).

Replayability
There’s plenty of reasons to keep playing after you beat the game: achievements, unlimited ammo for your guns, mini action figure collection, alternate custumes and different difficulties.

Overall rating:9/10
Very solid game, fun to play with other people. Some online multiplayer aspects are annoying, but other than that, a highly recommended game.