Onimusha: Warlords Remastered

I consumed everything about the PS1, but once the PS2 dropped, I knew I wouldn't be able to afford it for a while. I got my first job, saved up a few paychecks, and the day the Resident Evil DVD dropped, I went to Babbages and bought both Resident Evil and a PS2. 

Two years of games had come out at the point and I was completely out of the magazine game by then. So I really had no idea what was out, what was good, what was not. 

Final Fight

I recently got the Capcom beat-em-up collection for the Switch, which is such an interesting look into where games were heading in the late 80s and early 90s. 

Games like Double Dragon and River City Ransom took the world by storm and it seemed like as long as games were on a 2D plain, beat-em-ups were going to have a place in the world. 

I returned to Final Fight for the first time in probably 20 years at this point, and I got thoughts.

Resident Evil 3

There's something to say about brevity. A game that knows how long it should stick around. Resident Evil 3 does that perfectly. You can beat the game in 6 hours if you sort of tool around or 2 hours if you try to do a speedrun. 

I was very excited when the Resident Evil 3 remake was announced. Capcom did us well with the Resident Evil 2 remake, so I had every expectation that running through the streets of Racoon City with new controls and updated graphics, would be a satisfying experience.

Spoopy Games: The Early Capcom Horror Games

Capcom went to the survival horror cash cow as often as they could after their success with Resident Evil 1. They were known for their beautiful pre-rendered backgrounds, stiff controls, 3-6 hour games, and campy voice acting.

There was a time where you could argue they were better at horror than fighting, something inconceivable in recent years.

And this, this is where my obsession started. The games weren't enough. I started buying Resident Evil comics (they are all terrible), Resident Evil action figures (really awesome), and even jackets with the Umbrella logo on them.

Resident Evil VII Teaser

I usually stray away from demos and teasers. This is partially because of the very limited hard drive space I have on my PS4 and Sony's complete mismanagement of their download list.

The only other teaser I've downloaded this generation was PT.

I obviously have a soft spot for horror games, so it makes sense, but this is also because unlike a demo, teasers tend to be very different than the end product. It's a part of game history that in 10 years, someone is going to make an off hand comment about Resident Evil VII Remastered and I will tell them about this strange little teaser.

Resident Evil 0

Played on: Playstation 4
Release Date: January 19, 2016 (November 12, 2002 original)

Resident Evil 0 was always this weird outlyer for me. Resident Evil games sold me on gaming platforms, but as someone going off to college in 2003, I couldn't really afford to have both a Playstation 2 and Gamecube. I chose Playstation.

Much like Code Veronica, I stared at the box art and thumbed through the strategy guides, trying to complete the Resident Evil story in my mind. It wasn't until 2006 when a used game store started selling Gamecubes for $35 a piece that I finally got to play Resident Evil 0.

Most times when I booted up RE 0, I would inevitably stop after 30 minutes and go back to RE-make.

It's been exciting playing, almost like getting a throwback Resident Evil game in 2014.

Editorial: The Things Resident Evil Got Wrong

Resident Evil has a storied history of making people scratch their heads at decisions made. Most of their legacy is seen in the positive, but of course there is the insane fall from grace with Resident Evil 6. Here are some of Resident Evil's questionable decisions.

1. Resident Evil 2 - The Moth
   You've fought your way through the police station, slugged knee deep through poopy-water, and battled William Birkin away multiple times. There's a giant metal blast door staring you down. You ready your customized shotgun, not knowing what creature awaits you. And.... moth. Giant, fluttering moth. In a way it was somewhat creepy and I have to applaud that someone had to design and program the moth for this one room. But once you do research, you find out that unless you are a giant flower, this moth is mostly harmless.
   
   
2. Resident Evil 0 - Opera Singing Leech Doctor
   
   Leeches creep me out. So it should have been one hell of a scary edition. Unfortunately, from the moment I saw Dr. Marcus singing opera on a mountain top to call the leeches, I realized this is when the series was going to lose some of it's luster. And it did.
3. Resident Evil Survivor
   
   Underneath all the terrible design decisions, Resident Evil Survivor has a pretty OK story. There's no way to save, you couldn't use a light gun in the North American version, and when you died, there were no checkpoints. The rage I felt when I died during the last tyrant battle and saw the title scream cannot be described. New curse words would need to be invented.
   
4. Call of Duty: Resident Evil 6
   
   There were several issues with Resident Evil 6. The couch co-op is great. My wife and I really loved playing through Resident Evil 5 together. Issue with 6, on the PS3... well that second player couldn't sign into their PSN profile or upgrade any weapons or upgrade anything. That made an already death filled game harder. The inventory system was terrible, there was no way to pause the game, and I still don't really understand how herbs work. On top of that, Chris' campaign might as well have been the new Call of Duty. Run and gun through eastern European towns with the arm-swollen Chris.
5. The Resident Evil Magazines
   
   The Resident Evil Magazines were comic books that came out in 1998. The first two comics were actually pretty great, covering the events of the first two games. But beyond that, they suffered from lazy writing. Essentially, "Ummm... an Umbrella facility has an accident... in South America... and here's Barry."
6. Resident Evil 5 Boss Battles
   
   Part of the tension of the Resident Evil series was the battle between your character and the bosses. They were chess matches of firing a few shots and running like hell. In Resident Evil 5, most the boss battles involved you jumping on a mounted machine gun and firing away.
   
   The height of the RE5 boss battles was the first one, the executioner. And you know why? Because it felt like an old Resident Evil boss battle. I didn't get a quick time event every 45 seconds so that a giant didn't punch the jeep I was holed up in.
   
   

Podcast and Update

So here's the first podcast. It came out better than expected. I had some problems when I streamed it for my own personal listening. A couple of times the sound went out, but we're working on that. You'll hear about 14,000 "umms" coming from me as I ponder my next genius thought. I had a blast recording it and I think Neil did too so there will be many more coming. The link is below

http://fellinlovewithtech.mypodcast.com/2008/09/Media_Whore_Sept_18-142916.html

The website is coming along. We've purchased a domain and Neil is currently putting that together.

Some point this weekend I will be putting up some reviews. I know Matt almost had one done. Neil got the new Iphone and he's working on the website so I don't know if we will see anything from him. Joe has been largely non-existent thus far. I'll see if I can squeeze something out of him.

Enjoy and tell us what you think.

Dead Rising

Game: Dead Rising
Platform: Xbox 360
Publisher: Capcom
American Release: August 8th, 2006
Reviewer: Neil


People keep dying, and I'd even be okay with that if I could make it back upstairs. Is everything I need to complete my goals even here? should I just ride out the night trying to avoid conflict? And, why, oh god, why is everyone talking like they haven't heard a word the other person has said.

There's an otherworldly feel to Dead Rising. Like the visual static isn't just a filter, but is actually hanging in the air like plasma from intergalactic travel. Built from the ground up in English by Japanese people, the game is abjectly bizarre. NPC affectations are as unpredictable as the murderous inclinations of boss characters.Finding paths around a mall feels like running through trenches on the Western Front.

Romero knew the real monsters weren't the guys gnawing on your neck. They were the infrastructure, madness and insecurity that led us into like sheep into slow-moving slaughter. Now the disconnect is outlined, made part of the grander cartoon, by people who twitch, squint, sob and moan in the goo -- a mocking approximation of human activity.

There's this book by John Saul I took from a lost-and-found at a camp ground a few years ago. Utterly ridiculous characters would flail and huff through the story like they were in a much-better Stephen King novel, but couldn't claw their way out of the bad acid trip they were trapped in.

Here, Kenji Inafune has strapped a billion grams of Coricidin Cold and Cough to the back of Dynasty Warriors: Code Veronica. The result is the kind of beautiful that slithers through the worst H.P. Lovecraft tale. "Here's your monster, are you happy now?" it prods.

Trapped between a save point and duty to the civilians, I can honestly say that I am not.