Wowie part 2 of talking about this game just fuckin' make it stop tee-hee haha.

Talking about these two videos, and by extension their publishers, is merely just an exercise to express my thoughts on the hit video game Resident Evil 4 (2023) in their entirety. I do not mean to draw ire towards the creators, nor do I believe they deserve hate for their opinions and coverage of the game. Gaming isn't that serious and hate campaigns that go on in this hobby are the corniest, most pathetic shit to bear witness to. Just buy a $20 skin for a game you barely play like a man and shut up already.

First video on my docket:

 Resident Evil 4 Remake Adds Dumb & Unnecessary Weapon Upgrade Microtransactions...

A video by YongYea

This video from videogame news channel YongYea covers the post-launch additions of microtransactions, those being the Exclusive Upgrade Tickets from your preferred gaming digital storefront. To call them ‘pay-to-win in nature’ feels odd, seeing how the game is exclusively a single-player game. They are closer to ‘pay-to-skip’ however, rather than grinding money and collecting loot to sell so you may buy the ‘exclusive’ upgrade for any given weapon, the tickets allow you to acquire it right away. These purchasable tickets can negatively impact the experience of the player by giving a significant boost to a weapon early in the game, but the game does NOT punish you for not buying them. In my time playing game, there wasn’t a moment where I felt like the game was stonewalling my progress to the point where I felt like it was unfair. These tickets will, at most, allow your guns to kill enemies a tad faster than normal, the difficulty of the game will not suddenly melt away.

Yong does make a fair point about cheat codes disappearing from games, which sort of kills that vintage aspect that made older games so replayable, but these tickets don’t really fit that bill either. They do not max out weapons like a cheat code potentially could, they really just make a preferred weapon stronger, typically in the damage department; you still have to upgrade the rest of the weapon the old-fashioned way, with dead folks’ coin purses. Cheat codes may have died, but PC modding has broken the throne it used to sit on with its huge swollen ass cheeks. You can mod games to absolutely insane levels nowadays, the RE Engine games are apparently incredibly easy to make mods for; if I weren’t so lazy I’d play on PC just to have the luxury of wild mods, alas I just want to play games and turn them off, adjusting settings for a game so it runs at 60fps sounds miserable even if it only takes a minute or two.

Capcom has offered similar DLC items in most of their previous games after launch, RE7 & 8 have DLC packs that unlock all of the title’s bonus rewards, for example. This is only a news headline because RE4R is a massively popular title at the moment (no shade to YongYea btw), it’s not even a new thing Capcom is doing. As someone with a couple of bucks to burn, I bought a 3-pack of Exclusive Tickets to make my S+ Professional run go faster; I do not enjoy the difficulty mode and think it drags the title down to a lower ranking in my eyes. After I finish my current Professional run without bonus weapons (with Cat Ears) I will never play the difficulty again. (Future edit, I beat Professional without bonus weapons and now I’ve finally put the game down, what an annoying and irritating difficulty.)

soul vs soulless Resident Evil 4 comparison

A video by Crowbcat

This video by brutal game critic and hit YouTube sensation Crowbcat compares the original GameCube release of Resident Evil 4 to its latest 2023 release. I imagine most people in the gaming space have seen/talked about it already, but so have I and that’s why I’m writing about it in this 2-part, way-too-fuckin’- long review of a game I’m already sicking of seeing and hearing about. So, let’s start with the most valid and, I believe, irrefutable edge the original has over the remake:

-The difference in the ambient sound is very apparent and a genuine criticism, to deny or justify that is ridiculous; the recent RE games are quiet very quiet, it may be an intentional decision to get the audience to up their audio for deeper immersion, and to make loud jump-scares even more so, but the audio is mixed low. RE 7 is the last game in the franchise I can remember having great atmosphere, I can still easily recall walking into the basement/Processing Area for the first time: after Ethan forces the folding door open there was a loud popping-sound from the ceiling, I remember jumping and whipping the camera around to see nothing. It was just a regular noise houses make when they settle, the atmosphere spooked me so bad the cheap audio scare genuinely got me.

-The differences in the map layout are interesting to see, the original has more open sight lines whereas the remake has more mountains that obscure more of the village. It may be to save on resources needed to render farther off buildings, as well as hide loading as you approach new areas. These changes, I feel, still retain the isolated feel of the original RE4: in the original, the more open sight lines make you feel as if this village is far off the beaten path and would be near-impossible to find without a guide because of its remoteness. The remake makes it feel as if it’s tucked away in the mountains and difficult to get to without someone knowledgeable of the area to help you traverse the land.

-Comparing cutscenes is also interesting because they highlight different directing and camera work, with most of them still retaining the same tone. 4 original is definitely more stylish and over the top like an action movie, the remake is more reserved with showing off its ridiculousness, usually in favor of genuine character interactions instead. Comparing QTE cutscenes that have fail-states, to scripted cutscenes meant to be seen a specific way, is a puzzling choice that is more critical of the game’s interactivity than its screenwriting and cinematography.

Though the video has more valid criticisms in it, in the spirit of Crowbcat, I will specifically target the comparisons I don’t like and label them as “dishonest” or “irrelevant” without an ounce of nuance. I will also be ignoring comparisons that counter my narrative of “Crowbcat is dead wrong” for they are inconvenient to acknowledge.

• The opening sequence, titled “He’s not a zombie” in the video gives all you need to know about Crowbcat’s ire for RE4 Remake. It’s similar but not 1:1, it takes creative liberties while still respecting the original intent. Making the player deal with the ‘crimson head’ Ganado first tells new players “He’s not a zombie, be careful” and veteran players “They’re not dead because you put them down like before, be thorough.” Most gamers have played a Third Person Shooter at this point, we know how to play them, showing them where the real threat is isn’t a negative.

• Mendez’s introduction. He’s alone and towering over Leon in the remake, easily dispatching the player character. Less action movie flare, still demonstrates Mendez’s strength and the threat he will be.

• Mendez doesn’t jump through a window to chase Ada; again, less ridiculous action, Mendez still leaves the scene so the player can resume without him in the room. He appears more pragmatic and less like an attack dog in the remake.

• “No sex discrimination here” was established with the zealots sacrificing a woman in the intro cutscene. The Ganado are fairly hygienic for a parasite-controlled populous, why would they just leave up a pitchforked woman? They even clean up the charred police officer when you return to the village.

• The post Del Lago talk with Hunnigan has Leon sound less like a wannabe playboy and like a guy just ready to continue his mission. Capcom clearly wants Leon to be snarky and sarcastic while having women’s advancements towards him either unreciprocated or ignored due to his obliviousness. “No rizz” as they say.

• El Gigante being awakened by a Zealot may not have the same bombastic as a slew of Ganado being slaughtered with ease, but it highlights that the monster is so uncontrollable that they locked it up and isolated it to be forgotten.

• The church escape is written entirely different because Saddler doesn’t show up to confront the duo in the remake. They sneak out because they are surrounded almost immediately, the cutscene also establishes that Ashley is blindly trusting Leon out of necessity, and that Leon won’t fail her. In the original, the cutscene is used to establish 1: Saddler is man behind all the happenings and 2: Ashley and Leon are infected with Las Plagas. The cutscenes establish that the duo are infected with the plaga by way of seeing Saddler’s order to stop Ashley and Leon’s escape. The remake’s plaga-based telepathy shows Saddler’s reach with the plaga, he isn’t present because he doesn’t need to be.

• The first save room shown with Ashley is no longer a save room in the remake, of course the save music isn’t in there. Also, still hammering away at that long sunk in “Audio is different” nail.

• Leon (more the player) perving on Ashley is highlighted. Choosing to respect their female characters by taking out the ability to upskirt them doesn’t make game worse or Capcom ‘woke’, it is a good way to make people out themselves as weirdos, however. Regardless of devs’ decisions, people have been commenting on her (and Ada’s) jiggle physics for a week now at the time of typing this; no number of creative changes will stop horny modders (god bless them).

• The exemption of Ashley's objectification by Luis is sort of portrayed as a negative. Luis addresses Ashley in a demeaning way by just referring to her as ‘senorita’, as if she’s entirely helpless and without autonomy. The same goal for the scene was achieved as the original, without a gratuitous shot of Ashley's chest beefers.

• Mendez’s eye drop. Though it popping out of his skull is objectively flatter and goofy looking, it is no longer an important key item to escape the village, it doesn’t justify having a cutscene of Leon picking it up.

• The bridge to the castle was destroyed by the Ganado in the remake, Leon and Ashley couldn’t possibly be chased into the castle that was conveniently left open for anyone to trespass into. The gate raising behind them eludes to someone besides Mendez watching their every move. As if to say they aren’t going to be any safer inside its walls.

• The Castle’s infamous Water Room in the remake is depicted to be larger and more empty. Enemies arrive as you make some way into the room and continue swarming you in waves for the duration of your time there. It seems to be made that way to very casually toy with veteran players’ expectations and not completely overwhelm new players.

• The fight between Leon and Ada is more of a back and forth in the remake, it shows they are both skilled in close encounters and that maybe Ada had underestimated how much Leon has grown since she last saw him as a rookie cop. Same effect was achieved, it was just done with a choreographed dance instead of a slow-motion flip.

• Saddler and Salazar are pretty different in the remake. Saddler is more of a straight-forward, zealous cult leader and is missing that aura of “snake oil salesman pretending to be a religious leader to achieve ulterior motives.” His threats to spread Las Plagas feel genuine now.

• Salazar is overall less of a prankster that taunts Leon and is more of an elite that turns his nose up to him. The changes give them less of an iconic presence compared to the original, but they fit better in a story together, Salazar feels more like he’s under Saddler’s thumb compared to his wildcard original counterpart.

• Mendez’s comparison uses two different scenes that are hours apart in the story. The comparison makes him look more fleshed out as his role of Saddler’s religious confidant in charge of the village and its going-ons. The comparison makes original Mendez look more generic as ‘big guy with weird voice.’

• The Zealot chanting comparison isn’t accurate. In the original game it takes place in the hall after the Water Room section, in the remake Crowbcat used footage of the room that seems to be the replacement for the Gatling Gun room, this being the room with the Chandelier that can be dropped. The correct comparison for the remake would be back at the entrance of the castle, where a Red Zealot and a group of other cultists are waiting for you to backtrack for treasure. Crowb-am’s razor suggests they didn’t do their due diligence and were lazy when making this comparison. Or maybe it was just a soulless grab for another negative comparison.

• Verdugo shakes his finger in disapproval in the original whereas the remake version taunts you to come at him. He is Salazar’s dedicated bodyguard and assassin, neither version feels better or worse, I suppose the finger wag is sassier.

• Merchant’s voice comparison is entirely a waste of time, all the lines are there, he’s just less raspy. Not being able to kill him is a moot point, who gives a shit?

• Reload animations are different and less satisfying in the remake in general, you’re not stuck in place and forced to look at them anymore so the key features of what make a reload satisfying in a game seem to have been less important. A bit unfortunate, I care more about how fast it’s reloaded compared to *how* it’s reloaded. I’m not standing still long enough to see them anyways.

• Leon doesn’t handspring up after a suplex, I imagine it’s because the new stand up animation blends better with movement and aiming animations. Another stylistic change.

• Death animations for chainsaw kills are different and lack any significant gore, instead going for blood and brutality. Garradors and the Ganado can still decapitate Leon, they can even slice him in half if the right conditions are met; the gore is still there, just in different areas.

• The dog death is still the same, the struggle animation is different probably because you’d be dead immediately if a wolf was ravaging your neck.

• The comparison made in the Ashley segment is completely disingenuous and made me discredit any validity the video has in its entirety. The scene from the original game was right after you solved the slide puzzle, the final room before you had to backtrack back to Leon. The remake showed Ashley waiting on the elevator to get to the final set of rooms. A proper comparison would have shown the remake Ashley grabbing the crest and fleeing the basement area, which would have led to the remake being seen in a more positive light as you’re running through a room of scattered hostile knights.

• The Krauser knife fight comparison is entirely off base and misrepresented. The original is a QTE sequence where the player simply listens to the back and forth and presses the prompts as they appear. The remake cutscene has very little in terms of the original dialogue, but it establishes the relationship between Krauser and Leon and acts as an introduction to the knife-only fight coming. The video also cuts out the remake’s in-game fight and skips right to Luis saving Leon, this isn’t much of an issue if you’ve played the game, but if you just watch hit-piece videos without any context, the remake looks absolutely worse.

• Blowing up the nest in the Ballroom in the original is equated to shooting the huge hive in the mines in the remake. As just stated, they aren’t even in the same area; they have the same function in each games’ canon however, that being where the Novistadors come from. The remake has 4 openings that can be shot to complete a side quest, in the original it can be destroyed to get all the jewels inside. Same concept, different implementation.

• “Women” being changed to “Story of my life” fits Leon better. He’s not a playboy, he’s an above-average guy that’s always caught up in B.O.W-related situations and often left without a full deck of cards. Ada also keeps him in the dark when she appears. Similar events keep happening to him.

• Most of the island portion is just ‘original 4 has better atmosphere’, which was established in the first portion of the video, the intro for the video would have been better to just show all these areas compared, probably save the Regenerador introduction for this part.

• The final rocket comparison is dishonestly portrayed. Saddler dies from the rocket in the original, in the remake it is used to open up Saddler for Leon to skewer him with the staff he carries around. You’d think they would like the actiony reimagining more.

• The post Saddler cutscene with Ada functions exactly the same, the remake just has less action movie melodrama tropes and worse v/a for Ada.

• The final cutscene dialogue with Ashley in the remake is written more tactfully and realistically. Rather than her asking Leon if he wants to smash junk together she asks if he wants to be on her security detail, an assignment where they’ll be in close proximity often. People can have infatuation with others without wanting to pound them into a puddle the moment they’re alone. Exempting the question about Ada is also valid, if Ashley likes Leon why would she care to know about another woman he knows but is clearly not dating?

The cut content lightning round:

• Gondola ride is missing, good.

• Castle gatling gun was replaced with the room with the big chandelier, the room is still there.

• Sewer section was fused together with the pit section leading to Verdugo, there’s no cells or shitty one-step puzzle so of course they missed it.

• Arc Axe traps never made sense in their placement and were just something to do after the sewer section, pointless filler.

• Floating cargo section that leads to the church ‘key’ was replaced with a more expansive section that had exploration, improved not cut.

• Split path was condensed down to the Bella Sisters fight because it was more unique and tonally consistent with the village’s last best effort to try and stop you, El Gigante fight route sucks ass anyways [from guy who always went down Gigante path because chainsaws scary :< ]

• Truck was parked in the remake because the path to the castle is cut off from the Ganado after the bridge blew up, there was no one to drive it. Pay attention to the story.

• Outside shot leading to the tomb/mine cart ride is missing because the mines leading straight to the mine cart ride makes more sense, sorry the set piece placement is logically placed.

• Cage fight with Garrador is referenced in the remake cutscene before the Ashley section, this fight is annoying and clearly just meant to drain your resources. Good riddance.

• What even is that wheeled contraption and why did Salazar have it built in the castle?

• The double rocket launcher room is where you get the goat head, right? Just a room where you fight a bunch of zealots, nothing of value is lost.

• Freeing Ashley doesn’t exist because she was never clamped to a trap wall in the remake, a better scene was written to separate them in the castle.

• The castle cart exists in the game without the view of the other castles in the background, you never go to them so there’s no point in even having them exist. There’s also an obvious seam in that jpeg on the left side lmao.

• U3 cage maze sucks and just drains ammo and tests QTE reaction time, boring.

• Giant Salazar exists but doesn’t stomp at you towards the clock tower because it’s IN the clock tower now. What a weird sequence, where else was the big mech going to go besides straight into the chasm anyways?

• Excavator trap hallway is missing, and I forgot all about it until I watched this video, what a memorable set piece.

• Castle crush ceiling lead to what exactly? I have to replay the original game because some of these castle cuts are not iconic in the slightest.

• We have evolved past the need for turret sections. The bulldozer ride is just a turret sequence that makes you use your own ammo rather than giving you an infinite weapon, like how the remake gave you a godlike unlimited Red9 for the mine cart ride.

• Laser hallway is just action movie schlock and the animation team jerking themselves (and Leon) to death, also a painful reminder than the live action Resident Evil movies exist.

• U3 doesn’t fit in the canon and its entire section is filler before Krauser. It(haha) might be back for Separate Ways, I’m not ruling it out.

• Why does Salazar have a lava room and why does it have fire-breathing dragon statues? The Spanish sure are weird and opulent.

• No flirting with Hunnigan, Leon’s not a playboy, he’s an above-average guy that’s always blah blah blah I said this already. Leon’s a cool action guy with little luck when it comes to the ladies, it’s more endearing and logical when you look at his RE2 debut.

Postmortem of Crowbcat’s video:

It was hilarious, and incredibly petty, to change the title and video description once people started criticizing this upload. Crowbcat made their points and people didn’t agree, maybe not overwhelmingly but not inconsiderably either. A majority of their videos are ruthless critiques of games and making a mockery of live gaming events, and for the most part the general gaming audience has agreed with their videos and the narratives they tell. This was the first time I’ve seen a video of theirs get push-back in a significant way, and, to disrespectfully assume based on their actions, they probably never would have assumed to be ‘wrong’ in their opinion either.

It reminds me a bit of another high-quality YouTuber (who you should subscribe and donate to btw) that had a controversial Resident Evil take: NeoCranium. To say they were unimpressed by the Resident Evil 2 Remake would be an understatement. As the collective gaming world enjoyed the game, Neo aired his grievances with the title, he was very articulate and justified his complaints. I read his post and thought, “This is all valid. His opinions and thoughts do not subtract from my own enjoyment of the game, I will respect this content creator by not arguing with his OPINION, such a thing cannot be wrong.” Others did not agree, and from what I could tell, Neo caught hell for having differing thoughts from the gaming collective for a good while before he was left alone about it.

Though similar situations, their channels are very different. NeoCranium makes edits of his streams with animations; Crowbcat makes videos that break down and analyze games and adjacent media, often with an uncharitable and objective demeanor. You’d go to Neo’s comment section to argue with him, you would go to Crowbcat’s comment section to argue with others about the subject matter. As far as I know Crowbcat doesn’t stream or really have a personality attached to his channel, it’s more like a content spectacle when a new video drops. It makes the title and description edits weird; I’ve never seen such a passive aggressive tantrum thrown like that from such a quiet (social media wise) channel.

Good on Crowbcat for changing the title back to its original state, the video description is good as well. I don’t agree with most of the video but that’s a difference in OPINION, something everyone is entitled to. If you don’t stand by your thoughts, even if they prove unpopular, you’re probably not worth listening to anyways.

Closing/Review Score

I think RE4 Remake is a 7/10; the texture loading issues, audio balancing, unrealized atmosphere, several below average/okay voice actors, the move away from reliable guns in favor of melee, and missing game content (Seperate Ways, Mercenaries characters, Assignment Ada to a lesser degree) are what keep an otherwise fun and easily replayable game from being its absolute best. It’s the best REmake so far, not counting the GC Resident Evil Remake; I have never played it and don’t really care to, so I have no opinion about it.

Yeah man...

'Why did I write these long-ass posts', you ask? I spent most of April off of social media to unfuck my addicted brain from it. I obsessed over this game to make up for it and didn't have a lot of people to talk to about it irl, so here it all is now lmao. Hopefully Separate Ways comes out soon and doesn't suck.