I have a relatively complicated relationship with the original Resident Evil 4 from 2005, but as of now I really like it. It’s crazy varied, its influence is still felt in modern games, the soundtrack is extremely memorable and while the game is not very welcoming, when it clicks with you, you can’t stop loving it. A remake of a game like this sounded incredibly pointless – apart from QTEs and a couple of moments nothing in the original required a redo. Now, having played a couple of playthroughs of this alternative Resident Evil 4 from 2023, I have to say – yeah, it is kinda pointless. But fun nonetheless.
To set the stage, I should remind what Resident Evil 4 meant originally for the series and the gaming industry in general. It essentially saved the franchise during the time when the sales of the classic survival horror entries were disappointing. And due to how different this new “survival action” approach was, and how popular the game got, it changed the direction for the series – moving away from the very niche survival horror audience to a broader action-focused games audience. Its camera, mechanics and challenges also influenced… well, basically every single action adventure game as a lot of the things that became the standard were either first done by it or popularized by it.
Of course, Resident Evil 4 (2023) cannot have the same effect. Resident Evil is once again extremely successful and this new RE4 isn’t a wild new direction, but rather an update to the RE2 (2019) formula which in itself was a combination of the original RE4 and REmake (which itself is a remake). The game doesn’t really do anything completely unexpected or revolutionary, instead just reimagining most (but not all) of the original RE4 moments and locations on a modern engine and with some twists and ideas borrowed from more recent Resident Evil entries.
It’s still an over the shoulder view action adventure where you can shoot or stab enemies in weak points and follow it up with melee attacks, but the way everything feels is different. The precision of weapons was greatly reduced and their effect on weak points isn’t 100% guaranteed. Invincibility frames on Leon (the main character) for when he performs most actions, are now all but removed. Your main knife and additional knives are similar to the RE2 (2019) defence items in that they have durability and will break. Most of the enemy throws or rush attacks home on the player far more precisely and persistently than they did in the original. And player movement has more “weight” and inertia, making it less precise.
What do players get in return? Light stealth mechanics with an ability to crouch walk. Ability to consistently dodge some types of attacks with the same button as crouching. Parry other types of melee or ranged attacks with a knife at the cost of its durability. And an insta-kill knife attack in addition to classic melee moves that also costs durability and can be triggered in specific conditions. If that sounds like this makes this new RE4 slower and harder to play, that’s because it is. You also get far less ammo from enemies and when they’re not dropping money they may drop crafting resources instead. Yep, crafting from all post RE7 games returns and just like in RE7 the materials take space in the inventory. So do the knives, actually. Though treasures and key items still go to a separate infinite inventory space. So you will run out of ammo and out of space far more often than you would in the original game.
Enemies were tweaked as well and while most of the basic enemy types are the same, you will notice changes right away. There’s a crimson head reminiscent idea here for basic enemies. Two of the three parasite plaga types were tweaked, with the last one of them being entirely different in how it works. Some of the special enemies are now more prominent with their abilities and have fun or challenging changes. Though I have a gripe with how Regenerador enemies are now able to go into sprint at any point, not only becoming fast when lying on the ground. The bosses, on the other hand, mostly behave exactly as they did before and when not, I found the changes to be an improvement. Although one of the boss fights was cut entirely and is only mentioned in one text file.
Speaking of cuts and changes… Vast majority of the locations and scenes from the original RE4 are still present, though often shuffled around or condensed. Places that were transitional areas can now be dead ends you have to go into and backtrack from. Places that had multiple paths now have one linear path to take with no choice in the matter. But while a lot of the crazier moments are preserved, some are gone entirely, so no cable car rides, giant lava rooms, spikey ceiling traps, laser hallways or that truck ride that was so memorable, Dead Space 2 “borrowed” that entire section entirely back in the day.
This brings me to the biggest conceptual change between the games. The original RE4, for how wildly different each room felt, was a focused experience about constantly moving forward and fighting enemies to get ammo dropped from them to fight more enemies. RE4 (2023), despite streamlining a lot of the paths, has lots more backtracking, lots more inventory management and its bonus objectives, exploration and new game plus unlockables, different unlock currencies for the trader and constant lack of ammo and due to that often feels like a slow messy mix of new RE2 and Village that doesn’t quite work. Except, when you try to play it closer to the original RE4, then game is a fun challenging fast-paced action adventure again. You just have to ignore most of exploration and bonus objectives, ignore the really complicated end game ranking (as a reminder – the original game had none, for the first time since RE1), ignore trying to unlock things and collect things.
It also tricks you at the very beginning, the same way Max Payne 3 did, by saying that Hardcore difficulty is for people who played the original game. Don’t do it on your first playthrough, it’s frustrating and in fact I’m not sure why that difficulty is there in the first place – I’d recommend first playthrough to be on Standard and then just play Professional if you’re up for it, just like in the original. Although, I will praise the way unlocks work in that you can carry your NG+ save through the whole game as any unlocks you do in parallel, including ones that require playing new game, will still get added to that NG+ save. That’s the best implementation of this idea for a game with upgradable equipment and unlocks tied to different difficulties I’ve seen in my life.
I did enjoy this new Resident Evil 4 quite a bit and will get back to the game to unlock more stuff sometime later. I did like how most of the characters and the script were updated too, although it managed to make the Merchant annoying as he never shuts up now. And even if the music is, yet again, almost non-existent because apparently Capcom thinks that modern gaming should remove prominent music, when it plays it’s rather neat if unremarkable. It’s just that – I doubt it can ever become the game I can just decide on a whim to play start to finish just to enjoy myself, as I can with the original RE4. Too many confusing conflicting systems and ideas for that. But at least I’m not disappointed, as I was with RE3 (2020) or utterly bored as I was with Village.