[Resident Evil / Biohazard] - Resident Evil Village expansion in October!

Lars · May 2021

Resident Evil (or Biohazard depending on where you live) is a horror/action/comedy franchise depending on your point of view and which game you're playing. It has good games and bad games. Initially focused around zombies and science mutants, later games included sentient leeches, robots, rage-inducing parasites, and sentient mold. All (supposedly) science-based and not supernatural.

Some version of all the mainline games (except Code Veronica if you count that) are available on Steam, along with Revelations 1 and 2.

After the generally regarded lowpoint of Resident Evil 6, they've been on a fairly good streak with the remakes for Resident Evil 2 and 3, and the first person horror experience of Resident Evil 7 (also available in VR on Playstation but not PC because stupid).

Resident Evil Village (Resident Evil 8 / Biohazard 8) is the newest entry and follows faceless (but not silent) first-person protagonist Ethan Winters from Resident Evil 7. Also Chris Redfield from a bunch of other Resident Evils, including the first. They will be exploring a mysterious village full of werewolves and a castle with a very tall classy vampire lady.

A one-hour demo is available to download on various platforms that lets you play two short snippets of the game.

Preordering the game gets you a Mr. Racoon weapon charm, and a Survival Resource pack, both will appear at the in-game merchant (no, he's not the Resident Evil 4 merchant). There's also a bundle that includes Resident Evil 7 if you haven't played that.

Here's a spoiler-free review of this latest entry:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ed0klLmbiIg

And if you're interested, here's a timeline of damn near every entry, including some stage plays and a musical:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bXMmCi1iQSQ

And here's the tall vampire lady the internet is going crazy about:

Grey Ghost · May 2021

I am excited for this here vidya game

Lars · May 2021

I've avoided spoilers, so I actually don't know too much of what the game is about, so Friday (or whenever Steam lets me play it) will be exciting.

I did play the demo though.

Demo Spoilers

"Oh look, there is a whole group of NPCs gathered in this house. I wonder if this will be some kind of side quest hub or something where I get to know each of them as I complete tasks for them? There are more facial-scanned character models in this room than in the entirety of RE7 after all."

(two minutes later)

"Oh, they're all dead and the entire house is on fire."

Lars · May 2021

Here's Ethan giving a recap of RE7. I have no idea if it's part of RE8 or if it's just promotional, so here it is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULSVsSZ03z0

never die · May 2021

I started playing Village and am enjoying it, but does it look...not as good graphically as RE2 Remake was?

Lars · May 2021

Been playing this morning.

I don't remember if it was a preorder bonus or deluxe edition bonus, but one of the extras I got was "The Baker Report" which tells about the cover-up after RE7.

It's written by Zoe Baker, who has a new identity now and is working as a reporter in New Orleans. The official story is that there was a natural gas leak that killed all the Bakers -- including Zoe. Joe Baker is never mentioned in the report.

Zoe is trying to find out what happened to Ethan and Mia afterwards, but only is able to discover they were moved to somewhere in Europe as a kind of witness protection.

I've played the game up to where the Castle demo started. Impressions so far:

They changed the "Why!?" voice clip from Ethan after Chris shoots Mia. It's toned down from the trailer version.

The opening doesn't seem quite as tense as RE7's.

There's definitely something weird going on, as Ethan seemed to fall in a basement full of bodies, then gets thrown though a wall but when you go back through the hole in the wall that area full of bodies doesn't exist.

I'm not sure if there is a way to remove Weapon Charms, which is a big oops from me for attaching them because they're distracting.

It's nice that Ethan keeps a journal of everything going on in the game, and he's apparently a good artist.

Lars · May 2021

Okay, finished my first playthrough and started my second.

I got 44/47 files the first time through and already stumbled upon the 3 I was missing on my replay (glad the files carry over this time).

I only found 16/20 goat figurines though, I'll probably have to consult a guide for the rest whenever one is available.

It's a good game, though I think I still like Resident Evil 2 Remake better.

I hope it gets a lot of fun DLC like Resident Evil 7, and not fucking nothing because they spent the budget on a multiplayer spinoff I don't give a shit about like Resident Evil 3 Remake.

Cello · May 2021

I just finished this game and it was wildly good

Like, the first real spiritual successor to RE4 good, but tweaked so instead of Popcorn Action Movie it rolls towards Evil Dead instead, and it drastically benefits from it

Lots of occasions where I laughingly said "fuckin, what, what"

Genuinely great game, here

PiptheFair · May 2021

it's good that ethan is dumb and also has many hands that can be replaced

Daebunz · May 2021

game owns bones with the one negative of a couple of the more puzzle oriented chapters lose all the magic on subsequent playthroughs when you know how it works

King Riptor · May 2021

Gotta wait a bit to play this and its killing me. I looked at the unlockable weapons and they seem pretty rad

RT800 · May 2021

I've still got Resident Evil 7 sittin' in my backlog.

Maybe by the time I've finished it RE8'll go on sale.

I've also technically got RE 5 and 6 in my backlog but they are bad and I don't want to play them.

cursedking · May 2021

if i'm a scared baby how scary is this game from 0 to Pretty Spooky Jump Scares Aplenty

Cello · May 2021

cursedking wrote: »

if i'm a scared baby how scary is this game from 0 to Pretty Spooky Jump Scares Aplenty

Hmmmm

The game is less scary to me on the whole than 7 but it has a better cycle of making you powerful and making you a weak baby and effectively maintains tension the whole way through and the fights are always a little scary

Jump scares do happen but it really varies horror styles from zone to zone like in 7 so it's hard to entirely outline the ways it gets scary without spoilers

PiptheFair · May 2021

RT800 wrote: »

I've still got Resident Evil 7 sittin' in my backlog.

Maybe by the time I've finished it RE8'll go on sale.

I've also technically got RE 5 and 6 in my backlog but they are bad and I don't want to play them.

5 is fun with a friend, but it's got problems

do not ever look at 6 with anything other than contempt

Daebunz · May 2021

5 is a great co-op game and fun shootbangs just not scary + the "problems"

6 is for sure the bad one though

PiptheFair · May 2021

5 contains the boulder punch and therefore rules at least a little

also josh and sheva getting thrown by the wayside like billy and rebecca and carlos is a damn shame

Dark Raven X · May 2021

Village is a lot less scary then VII to me, but also a lot more fun too.

Grey Ghost · May 2021

Started this, made it to the castle and stopped for the night. So far I'd say it rules

cursedking · May 2021

since this is first person are people playing it mouse and keyboard on the pc?

mxmarks · May 2021

PiptheFair wrote: »

5 contains the boulder punch and therefore rules at least a little

also josh and sheva getting thrown by the wayside like billy and rebecca and carlos is a damn shame

Every game since 5 I've hoped so bad Sheva and Josh show up. Both rule and I always thought it would be cool to see what other branches of the BSAA were up to.

PiptheFair · May 2021

mxmarks wrote: »

PiptheFair wrote: »

5 contains the boulder punch and therefore rules at least a little

also josh and sheva getting thrown by the wayside like billy and rebecca and carlos is a damn shame

Every game since 5 I've hoped so bad Sheva and Josh show up. Both rule and I always thought it would be cool to see what other branches of the BSAA were up to.

you learn more about the bsaa in the revelations games, which feature jills pixar mom ass and barry being rad and also sad dad

Daebunz · May 2021

i seem to be very trash at new mercenaries but its fun to have a build going of 5x knife damage + melee damage up x2 + defensive stuff

edit: nevermind I think i figured it out, build around the rifle

Karl · May 2021

Blackbeard7 wrote: »

5 is a great co-op game and fun shootbangs just not scary + the "problems"

6 is for sure the bad one though

The Leon part of 6 was excellent.

Then for some reason, they took this very good bit and just fucking.....binned it?

And nothing that came after was as good.

Mr. G · May 2021

This looks very interesting but I’m a complete coward so I have to cross my fingers and hope some streamer I like (specifically perhaps Abby Russell) plays through the whole game on video so I can actually see it

I’m very into how they’ve evolved the aesthetic into all kinds of supernatural bullshit and not just, well, biohazards

never die · May 2021

So, preface with I’m a huge RE fan, but I beat this last night and loved it. It’s got some weak moments, but overall I had a blast with the game.

My one complaint is it felt like to me that unlike RE4, where there were different benefits to the different guns of the same type, in this one it always feels like an upgrade when a new one comes up? Like the second pistol is better than the first, which is weaker than the third, etc.

Speed Racer · May 2021

I played through all of 5 with a friend a couple years ago and I hated it

like, nonstop racism aside, it just wasn't very fun to shoot stuff

the first few areas were okay but everything after about the first boss fight just felt tedious

We played through about an hour of RE6 and, maybe that game goes way downhill later, but that first hour was better than all of RE5. we only stopped because we were so burnt out after playing through 5, but I really wanna get back to it at some point

Anyway, VILLAGE seems alright. I've played up through the end of the castle area. It doesn't feel as sharp to me as RE4 or RE7. It feels like it's tryin' to synthesize those two games when the things that make both of them work so good don't really mix together. Like, the opening village encounter has all sorts of interactable elements like shelves to bar doors with or flourbags to shoot to create smoke screens, but also it's a borderline scripted sequence where you can't reasonably fight back against more than one enemy at a time and they constantly throw more than one at you, and you're not really supposed to use all the toys they give you to fight back, you're just supposed to run away until the timer runs out.

Hobnail · May 2021

Is there a way to do real good at the intro attack and have it go different to any degree, like if you really fuck shit up and use the explosive barrels and whatnot

Speed Racer · May 2021

Hobnail wrote: »

Is there a way to do real good at the intro attack and have it go different to any degree, like if you really fuck shit up and use the explosive barrels and whatnot

afaik the big hammer guy is literally invulnerable

Daebunz · May 2021

Speed Racer wrote: »

Hobnail wrote: »

Is there a way to do real good at the intro attack and have it go different to any degree, like if you really fuck shit up and use the explosive barrels and whatnot

afaik the big hammer guy is literally invulnerable

there is a postgame challenge that is for taking him out in the attack, and another for killing 30 lycans during this section

so it would seem you CAN but requires NG+ so that you have your guns

Hobnail · May 2021

I dunno I bet if you're tasty with the knife you can do some work, people would knife the whole game back in RE7

Daebunz · May 2021

Hobnail wrote: »

I dunno I bet if you're tasty with the knife you can do some work, people would knife the whole game back in RE7

the default knife sucks giant ass especially with much more mobile enemies compared to 7, but there is a postgame challenge for beating the entire game with only melee weapons except for times the game requires you to shoot

the good news is I think this means you can use the better NG+ unlockable melee options and it doesnt seem to care what difficulty you do it on

Javen · May 2021

As far as I'm aware, the sequence always ends with 1 of 2 things happening

If you get hit too many times, a lycan suddenly grabs you from behind and throws you to the ground, initiating the cutscene

OR, if you survive long enough, you take an arrow to the leg and the cutscene happens anyway

You CAN kill the big hammer dude. He drops a crystal treasure item.

Speed Racer · May 2021

Javen wrote: »

As far as I'm aware, the sequence always ends with 1 of 2 things happening
If you get hit too many times, a lycan suddenly grabs you from behind and throws you to the ground, initiating the cutscene

OR, if you survive long enough, you take an arrow to the leg and the cutscene happens anyway

You CAN kill the big hammer dude. He drops a crystal treasure item.

there's also the third way of it ending

where you get hit too many times but for one reason or another some flag didn't get set so you get a game over instead of a cutscene

sorry, i'm still grumpy about it

Lars · May 2021

Full Game Spoilers and Assorted Thoughts:

The barricades and flour bags didn't see much use after the opening sequence.
That bit where Ethan falls into a basement full of bodies that apparently doesn't exist is never really addressed. I halfway think the basement is just supposed to be real but for some reason it didn't line up with the world geometry so they just fudged it and hoped you never went back in that house and saw that it wasn't there. Returning to that area after the intro bit does have that whole house collapsed so you can't enter it at all.
I knew from the first trailer that Chris didn't kill Mia, but my theory was wrong. I figured that Connections was on to them, so Chris and Mia staged that to evac them and couldn't let Ethan in on the plan due to the house being bugged. I also thought one of the Wolf Hound Squad was going to turn out to be Mia. Ah well, couldn't predict shapeshifters.
Speaking of shapeshifters, Miranda's role as the old woman is a bit odd. She's apparently been doing that bit for a while though, as the townsfolk know the old woman and some think her to be crazy while others just think she's really devoted to their religion. Also for some reason Miranda came out to a field to personally murder Iulian (the last human outside of Ethan and the Duke).
On one hand I like how Duke is just this mysterious force, but on the other hand I distinctly got the impression that Capcom did not even know what this dude's deal is and just wanted a mysterious friendly guy. He is pretty great though (he also reacts if you try to attack him by laughing and clapping and complimenting your weaponry).
I kind of wish Duke offered a Storage service instead of having to sell him my weapons if I don't want them taking up space. He could even start with a small storage space and sell me upgrades to it if he wanted. I'd prefer that to having to sell/re-buy my weapons (they can get a bit expensive to buy back when they're upgraded).
Unlike Mr. X and Nemesis, you cannot temporarily down Lady D when she is after you. The most you can get is for her to stop briefly to adjust her hat or wipe some dirt off her dress. I take this to canonically mean she would destroy Mr. X and Nemesis in a fight.
I really hope this game gets some Banned Footage style DLC set around House Beneviento. There were plenty of blocked off rooms to make a fresh experience there.
Unfortunately my House Beneviento experience wasn't as good as it could have been, because I didn't notice you could interact with the dummy's mouth, so I spent a ridiculously long time wandering around that empty basement trying to figure out where the hell to use the tweezers. I'd even already figured out how to solve the remaining puzzles down there, I just needed the items to do it. So by the time the monster baby showed up I was already quite tired and like "yeah yeah, this route is blocked so I'll just go around the other way to get the item and wrap this up."
Why did you taunt Moreau, Ethan? You could have just walked away with the item and skipped that whole dungeon.
I was extremely surprised that nothing ever attacks you and you don't ever fight while riding around in a boat.
Heisenberg was entertaining, though I wish we could have gotten a fight against his normal form. Actually that's true of most of the bosses.
They didn't want to (or didn't have time to) make an updated model for Eveline for the big reveal scene, so she just gets to be a silhouette. So is the difference between Ethan and others infected with the mold is that he died before being infected, or is it something else?
Why did Miranda start to lose her powers right before the final boss fight?
Speaking of Miranda, how long ago did she replace Mia, and does her power let her copy memories?
I have no idea why the game decided to arbitrarily lock us out of returning to cleared "dungeons" for no good reason.
When it comes to cooked meals, I was one regular Fish short of cooking the final meal and I think I had some extra Meat left over. Did I miss a Fish or is it impossible to get it all in a single run? Fortunately it all carries over to New Game+ (including partially complete meals if you've only given Duke some of the ingredients).
Ending questions: Is Rose still actually Rose since Miranda performed her little ritual? Where the hell is Mia after the time skip? Did Rose age quickly like Eveline or was there a massive time skip? Why is Ethan's character model shown next to the vehicle after they drive away?
I suck at Mercenaries. The Darth Maul lightsaber may forever be beyond my grasp.
Concept art reveals that Ada was at one point planned to be in this game, dressed as a plague doctor. When Heisenberg first captures you and you first meet Miranda and the Four Lords, instead of Heisenberg playing a "game" with you, Ada was supposed to show up shooting them with a crossbow and enabling your escape. No idea what her role would be after that.

Javen · May 2021

Speed Racer wrote: »

Javen wrote: »

As far as I'm aware, the sequence always ends with 1 of 2 things happening
If you get hit too many times, a lycan suddenly grabs you from behind and throws you to the ground, initiating the cutscene

OR, if you survive long enough, you take an arrow to the leg and the cutscene happens anyway

You CAN kill the big hammer dude. He drops a crystal treasure item.

there's also the third way of it ending
where you get hit too many times but for one reason or another some flag didn't get set so you get a game over instead of a cutscene

sorry, i'm still grumpy about it

I'm pretty sure

That there's always a 'survive' time factor. The game prevents you from, well, gaming that section by trying to suicide immediately and triggering the scripted event right away, so I'm pretty sure that there's a set time that you need to survive before the cutscene will trigger. I think you can tell how close to are based on Ethan's dialogue. He'll say like, 3 lines over the course of the section, that are spaced by time, and if he hasn't said all 3 yet, you can definitely still die just by damage.

Daebunz · May 2021

For people having a hard time adjusting to new mercenaries like I was, my suggestion, at least for village area, is sell your starting first aid juice, all shotgun ammo and probably never buy one, and some of your handgun ammo in order to at least upgrade the power and clip size of the rifle that you can buy. Continue to sell excess handgun and shotgun ammo between rooms

It's much easier to keep the combo going when your gun kills everything in one or two shots but I am unsure if this will continue to work in later areas. A rank will open the next one

rhylith · May 2021

Speed Racer wrote: »

Javen wrote: »

As far as I'm aware, the sequence always ends with 1 of 2 things happening
If you get hit too many times, a lycan suddenly grabs you from behind and throws you to the ground, initiating the cutscene

OR, if you survive long enough, you take an arrow to the leg and the cutscene happens anyway

You CAN kill the big hammer dude. He drops a crystal treasure item.

there's also the third way of it ending
where you get hit too many times but for one reason or another some flag didn't get set so you get a game over instead of a cutscene

sorry, i'm still grumpy about it

I had this happen to me too.

astrobstrd · May 2021

At Marceau and enjoying it a ton so far.

Vaguely spoilery meme:

Lars · May 2021

Random non-spoilery tips and tricks for RE8:

Weapon parts are permanent upgrades that cannot be removed. This also includes the annoying weapon charms you get from preorder/deluxe edition, so if you put those on they can never be removed. However, fortunately there is an option to disable seeing them, though this option is only available from the Main Menu, and not from in-game.
You can kneecap most enemies to make them fall down, and can also shoot their hands to make them drop weapons.
Your own mine can't hurt you, and you can always pick it back up if it doesn't get triggered, or you can shoot it to detonate it.
If a treasure doesn't say "[Valuable/Combinable]" on it, then you can just sell it immediately. There is no need to hold on to them. Most combinable items only have one combination, but "Necklace with Two Holes" has two gems that you add to it to get it's most valuable form.
The map will usually tell you what key a locked door requires.
If a room is still red on the map after searching everywhere, it's probably one of those damn sparkles somewhere up high that you shoot to get a small crystal. However, those sparkles don't always show up even if you're looking at the right spot. I haven't nailed down the specifics but I think sometimes you have to stand in the right spot for the sparkle to appear and it may also be effected by what weapon you are holding (ie. might not be there if you have the knife?). So this can be a little annoying trying to stand everywhere and scan every inch of ceiling and wall.
Files and Goat Statues do not count towards if a room if red or blue on the map. However, both of these things carry over to New Game+ so they do not have to be done in a single run.
When you need to light hanging torches, rather than walking into them to push them, it's more effective to line up and just shoot them with your handgun.
Exploding flour bags does not effect the player and has a pretty wide radius for effecting enemies, so they're fairly useful for a mass stun, when they're available.
The game timer does not count while the game is paused or in a cutscene, and if you die and Retry it dials back the clock too, so it's very forgiving for speedruns.
If you can shoot a crow before it flies away, it will drop money.
There is no achievement or challenge for completing all Labyrinths, there is just one for completing a single labyrinth, so if you hate these then just do the easiest one and never do them again, you'll just be missing out on some cash you get for selling the special skulls.
Inspecting a weapon in your inventory will give all of it's exact stats.
You do not have to have a complete recipe to give ingredients to the Duke, you can just give him whatever you have to get it out of your inventory. This also carries over to New Game+ so you'll just have to give him the remainder on that run. There only appears to be those 6 recipes and no further ones to unlock, so any other ingredients can just be sold.
When you beat the game, the Challenge list becomes visible (with any challenge you've completed already being marked) and the Bonus Shop opens up where you can spend points earned from the Challenges (same as Resident Evil 3 Remake). You can purchase Infinite Ammo for any weapon that you have completely maxed out. However, you can game this by loading a save, selling everything but one weapon and then maxing out that weapon, triggering an auto-save so the game will remember it and then re-load your manual save and do the same thing to a different weapon. This will let you get the Infinite Ammo a little earlier if you have the Challenge Points to afford it. the S.T.A.K.E. Magnum is the best weapon to get infinite ammo on but is crazy expensive. Once unlocked, Infinite Ammo for a weapon applies to all save files unless you turn it off.