I loved the Remake of Resident Evil 2, I was initially quite hesitant of it when it was originally announced as Resident Evil 2 is not only my favourite horror game, it’s one of my favourite games of all time.
How lucky was I then that it delivered on everything in every way, even surpassing the original by leaps and bounds, And thus all my hesitation towards Capcom remaking my favourite titles dissipated and I found myself INCREDIBLY hype for the remake of Resident Evil 3.
Is it as good though? Should I have approached RE3 with the same trepidation as I initially had with the 2nd installment?
The short answer to both questions is no, it isn’t as good as Resident Evil 2 but I definitely shouldn’t ever worry about it because it is still a fantastic game. I will start this off by stating that I only thing the game isn’t as good is because the source material simply isn’t as good as Resident Evil 2 so the remake could never live up to it’s predecessor.
First thing I will state in this review is that, I will only be reviewing the single player portion of the game at this stage because I haven’t had a chance to play much of Resistance as of yet and was waiting for a handful of my friends to come on, I loved the beta with them as survivors so happy to wait and see with this.
I think the main issue with Resident Evil 3 when you compare it to RE2 is that there is just simply not as much of it. The campaign only really warrants the one playthrough and it doesn’t feature the different character selections that RE2 boasts from the getgo. This obviously means that there isn’t any B scenarios or anything similar to it, making it seem less tempting to go through the game 2 or even 3 or 4 times.
This is about my ONLY negative thing I have to say about Resident Evil 3’s remake, everything else Is about it is absolutely perfect, and I have adored my time with it.
The level of detail and gloss that has been added to the game is astounding. It plays pretty much exactly as you would expect coming from Resident Evil 2 but this is in no way a bad thing as the gameplay sheen that was added to RE2 was perfect so I am genuinely thankful that they didn’t make too many changes to this formula.
There are of course some additions though, including a quickstep dodge roll, mastering of which becomes essential in some of the chase sequences with the games ever looming threat of Nemesis.
Nemesis in RE3 takes the place of RE2’s Mr X and throughout the games brief 5 hour run time gave me a run for my money in all of the games sequences which he was involved with. Unlike Mr X, Nemesis is able to use weaponry so every time he appears barging through a wall, he is equipped with an arsenal designed to make you have a hard time.
I have no idea why though, but he simply didn’t scare me as much as Mr X did in the previous game, I think maybe it’s because I had gotten so used to Mr X in the previous game I was so equipped to deal with Nemesis in this installment that I would just book it away from him at any given opportunity.
Those fearless enough to stand and fight him, however, will be rewarded with weapon upgrades or ammo for use against him. Usually it only takes a couple of grenades or an electrocution to make him stop chasing you and drop these upgrades so it’s worth standing your ground 9 times out of 10.
Resident Evil 3 has always been a bit of a controversial entry into the franchise as it’s arguably the first time the game stepped away from being a horror and focused heavily on action. Ammo is more plentiful, the set pieces often feel like something you would see in an Uncharted game rather than a Resident Evil title and the boss fights usually provide you with more than enough to get through without too much of a challenge.
Despite this however, I loved the original version of Resident Evil 3 AND its action game elements so a remake of this fits nicely onto my PS4 library as something I have had a blast playing through.
I give Resident Evil Threemake a 9/10. It won’t please many of the people who didn’t like Nemesis’ first outing but for those who wanted more action in their Resident Evil – the Threemake will deliver on every count.