:B: - Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles

Been playing Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles on and off for a week or so. It tells the story of Resident Evil 0, REmake, and 3, as well as having an extra scenario at the end to explain how Umbrella fell; and does so in the format of a rail-shooter as opposed to survival horror.

It's difficulty is a little erratic. I've been playing it on Easy and still have been having difficulty with some of the levels, especially in the 'Umbrella's End' chapter, and with some of the bosses. The bosses are especially hard if you don't conserve your ammo properly and end up having to use the handgun (which sucks for anything other than zombies, dogs, birds, bats and baboons). Which is a nice touch, actually, given the main thing with the original games was having to conserve your ammo for greater beasties.

The game is also a fair bit larger than I originally thought. I finished all the main missions at 6 hours, as well as some sub-missions, but I feel like I've barely scratched the surface. There are still several sub-missions left to unlock, and I have only B or C ranks on most of the levels - and ranks don't carry over between difficulties. You have to to get high ranks on the higher difficulties to get some of the files. And I haven't even found all the weapons yet never mind upgraded them! There is a lot of gameplay still left.

I just have one minor annoyance to place right at the end of this post - Quick Time Events. Umbrella Chronicles is filled with them! While it does indicate one is coming up by flashing the screen white briefly, they're still something I could do without. The penalty for failing them ranges from injuring you to make it harder to get to the end of the level, to just outright killing you. Which isn't fair, not even remotely. It isn't always the same button, and sometimes you even have to shake the Wii Remote! I think developers who put Quick Time Events in games that aren't based around them (Dragon's Lair et. al) should be forced to play unforgiving QTEs over and over again until they get the point that they aren't fun.

Anyway, sidetrack over, I'm going to give Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles 5/5 stars. It's really fun, has a great story for RE fans, and I'm still really enjoying it 6 hours in, which is pretty impressive given the genre. I'm going to continue playing it on and off until it has a :C:, because I think this game deserves it.