Gameplay:  
No zombies, no Umbrella Corp, no virus, still scary as hell. By the way, on the next Apprentice season, one team should be Umbrella Corp. They could infect Donald Trump and then charge him billions for the cure (assuming he has anything left from his failing casinos).

The switch to an over-the-shoulder 3D system has not only made the game scarier, but smarter as well. Enemies can form strategies to surround you, but you can also take them out from afar with a sniper rifle.

Pick a body part to shoot them in and change what happens, too. Shoot them in the head? You've got trouble. Shoot them in the arm so they drop their weapon? Well, you've "disarmed" them. If you shoot them in the leg they fall over, giving you more time to run or reload, but then it takes more bullets to finish them off since you didn't really hurt them.

What's great about this game is that even the lowly henchmen can be really tough. After you've faced several monstrous bosses, you will still die several times from hordes of baddies that just overwhelm you. They will smash windows, knock over barricades, and use ladders to get to you, and this is still before you even get to the castle or the island. Once there you'll have to face invisible enemies as well as some that regenerate body parts that you've blown off. You won't be totally helpless, though. Feel free to use the environment to help you. Shoot the gas tank when the enemy is near it- one shot can cause a huge explosion and save you ammo! Don't like those ladders? Knock 'em down while the enemies are climbing. How about knocking down liquid Nitrogen tanks to freeze your enemies? Shut gates behind you to keep enemies behind bars- just don't be surprised when they burst through those bars and are extra pissed...

Interestingly, handgun ammo and shotgun ammo can be found all over the place, but you never fight an enemy that has those weapons. Perhaps the merchant leaves it for you as an incentive to purchase the corresponding weapons that use the ammo.

You can buy new weapons and upgrade old ones by paying a crusty old merchant named Steve. I just named him Steve and made him crusty and old. I just don't like that he's charging a million bucks for something I really want in the second quest. He does help you a lot in the game though, and you repay him by leaving him to die as you escape at the end.

It's always best to upgrade the power of your weapons first. If your bullets are stronger, you won't need to shoot as many to kill your enemies. Likewise, you won't need to reload as often. The other options are increasing how many bullets your gun can hold, decreasing the time it takes to reload, and decreasing the time it takes to fire successive shots. I stayed clear of that last one, since I usually liked to aim my shots and not just shoot and shoot.

The puzzle elements have been greatly downplayed from previous Resident Evil games. There won't be a time when you don't know how to solve a puzzle or where to get a puzzle piece. There are also a bunch of optional puzzles- putting pieces together to increase their value when you sell them to the merchant.

Another interesting aspect of the gameplay are the cutscene actions. Never put down the controller during a cutscene- at any time buttons may flash on the screen and if you don't press them you die. In one knife fight (I love that hot knife-on-knife action), pressing a series of buttons in a row will keep you from getting stabbed.

Seeing the GameCube's colorful buttons on top of this dreary world is distracting at first, but most of the time you just enjoy getting to play the cutscene for a change. It's sort of the opposite of Final Fantasy 10, a game that you watched.

Control:  
The controls are very easy to learn. R aims your weapon, A fires. A also examines stuff and is used in inventory management. Funny story, I was fighting the final boss and got a new weapon mid-fight. The monster was kind enough to sit and wait while I went into my inventory screen and moved things around to fit the new weapon in my briefcase. He said he got a few more pages written in his book while he waited...

Pressing R, then B will reload your weapon- a smart thing to do between fights. Y opens your inventory, X gives commands to Ashley when you locate her. The C-stick is used to look around, and L takes out your knife so you don't have to open up your briefcase and equip it every time you want to break a box. Leon hates boxes and just wants to smash all that he finds. It's an important story element.

Sound:
The sound is just as convincing as the graphics. When you're outside you will hear twigs snapping and leaves rustling even when no one is around. Say it's the wind or a little critter if you want, but it will make you look around for enemies every time.

The voice acting is a major step up from the corny RE games of the past. Leon still has to say action movie one-liners, but some of them aren't too bad. At least it sounds like the actor recording it could imagine he was in this horrible place.

In Baten Kaitos, another game that uses a lot of speech, each actor must have been recorded separately, because in the course of a conversation every emotion is expressed from each different character. It's laughably bad, but you can turn it off. I never wanted to turn off the dialog from RE4 because it felt natural.

Multiplayer:
Hmm, no multiplayer in the game, is it possible for me to find something wrong with Resident Evil 4? Nope! Although there's no multiplayer, there are a good number of extras to be found while you play and after you beat the game. I'll just say that those make up for the lack of multiplayer (which would just be silly, having one person play a gun-toting Leon while three others play pitchfork-wielding villagers).

Resident Evil 4 has shooting galleries throughout and two bonus games that are unlockable after you beat the game. It also has new weapons in the main quest after you beat it if you want to play the "second quest." The second playthrough isn't as different as the famous Zelda second quest, but you get to kick villager ass with all your weapons you've collected from later in the game.

OVERALL:
Resident Evil 4 is so compelling I actually finished it- something I can't say about the other three RE games I've owned. There's something to be said about a game that's SO compelling I want to play through it again before going back to Metroid Prime 2, Viewtiful Joe 2, and Baten Kaitos, three great games in which my playing got derailed when I got Resident Evil 4.

This game is absolutely phenomenal. Nothing short of brilliant. My highest recommendation.

 

The Lowdown on  Resident Evil 4 Aesthetics: Awesome Control: Awesome Gameplay: Awesome Multiplayer: Sound: Awesome Innovation: 6/6 Lasting Appeal: 6/6 Rating Explanation Overall: Awesome! "Top of the Genre"