Board 8 > FFD Rates/Ranks/Generally talks about all things Resident Evil [thisisthetopic]

(+) Yeah! (+)

Capcom has injected the series with something lately to bring it back into the spotlight. Between ThREeMake (don't @ me), the hype for RE2 contending for Game of the Year, and my general need to reconnect with things I enjoy, my plan is to fill this topic with all things Resident Evil. Please join me, give me things to tangent off onto and don't let me escape without actually finishing this. I've got a series ranking hammered out, but everything else is up for grabs. I'm sure I'll hit on characters, music, bosses, etc etc but I haven't even begun to consider them yet to be honest. You can also use this topic to decide what is for lunch and/or dinner. Itchy. Tasty.

I think I did something like this once before, years ago. It may even be on the wiki, but I'm not going to look it up and bias myself.

Now that I hit post topic this becomes official and I can't keep procrastinating about it tbqh. If this goes well maybe I'll even hype myself up into hosting mafia or something.


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Hell yeah, the topic

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Rebecca still the best or na

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Ffd what's for dinner

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i'm eating leftover hot and ready pizza from lunch

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First thing I want to throw up as an intro, is the lifetime sales of the games (across all versions). I had some commentary for this, but it's better to just the numbers speak for themselves here. Anything not on here failed to break 1 million.

Lifetime Sales (in millions):

[11.3] Resident Evil 5
[10.0] Resident Evil 2

[9.2] Resident Evil 6
[8.8] Resident Evil 1
[7.5] Resident Evil 4
[6.8] Resident Evil 7

[3.5] Resident Evil 3
[3.5] Resident Evil 0
[2.6] Resident Evil CV
([2.5] Resident Evil ORC)
[2.4] Resident Evil Rev2

[1.9] Resident Evil Rev
[1.5] Resident Evil Outbreak
[1.3] Resident Evil UC

greengravy294 posted...

Ffd what's for dinner

I had a chicken cheesesteak.

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I'm assuming those numbers reflect all versions of the game.

RE3 will probably boost to near the top. RE5 still king!

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You know, RE6 was actually really cool on release with that crossing paths stuff

too bad it was impossible to keep up after release week, since really how often will two groups be playing the same stage on different stories. I wonder how well a mode would do where you could literally just sit in a queue as an 'opposing story' and get paired with someone else/another team playing. I might have done that occasionally if i was bored!

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pjbasis posted...

I'm assuming those numbers reflect all versions of the game.

No need to assume when I say it!

FFDragon posted...

lifetime sales of the games (across all versions)

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uh re6 was actually bad...but i played for like 30 minutes and died on some dumb QTE and everything felt kinda loose

not tight and crisp like a re4 or 5 experience

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it certainly didn't have chris punching a boulder

...actually now that I type that, I feel like maybe it did have something equivalent

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Jake does a bunch of nonsense, but nothing Boulder tier

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xuXkVzBdJQ

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oh fuckin cmon i didnt even refresh before searching for that :(

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hey i'm not upset, every topic is improved with chris punching a boulder.mp4

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oh hey a topic
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ahem, i believe you mean "the topic"

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RE6 is amazing and I want to play it again.

It is not as mechanically sound though as other entries.

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Alright so I've broken down the games into seven tiers, completely subjectively. A big part of things is how much I enjoyed playing them at the time as well as how much I enjoy playing them now. Because this series still remains the only one that I've gone back multiple times to replay from start to finish. But I also consider how much I like the contained story, plus how it effects or changes the other games around it. But really, all subjective.

Every tier has three games, except this first tier, which has four... because they are just bad.

YOU ARE DEAD Rank:
[Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D]
Resident Evil: Dead Aim
[Resident Evil Survivor 2 Code: Veronica]
Umbrella Corps

Non-canon games in brackets (there's four total, for those of you playing the home game). Everything about Umbrella Corps makes me mad, from the whole E-SPORTS push before it was even finished, to the fact that it's somehow canon. The only good thing I can say about it is that it failed so spectacularly that it forced Capcom to sit down and re-evaluate their life decisions. And since then... They've actually gotten their shit together. Thanks? Survivor 2 is just a bad light gun game with reused assets, and Nemesis is there for no reason, but IT'S ALL A DREAM. Dead Aim continues the tradition of cruise ships being the second most dangerous mode of transport in the REUniverse after helicopters, but it's another bad light gun game. And the TG Virus had potential, but in reality it just makes you transgender and zappy. Doesn't really affect the series as a whole, so why should I care about it? And then there's Minigame: The Game, which is whatever, I can play it while pooping I guess. Best thing to come out of that is some of the bonus costumes, like AMERICA BARRY.



Hulk Hogan eat your heart out.

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i'm dumb and was thinking of operation raccoon city

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Yeah ORC they kinda lied their way into it selling millions of copies, since people really wanted a modern Outbreak.

We learned from that mistake and I don't think there were ever 20k concurrent users playing UC.

That said, I do have a small soft spot for ORC. It could have been good, it just... wasn't. Even though I did enjoy our short time with it at it's peak. At least that one is non-canon so I give it more slack too.

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ok I got curious on if any sort of stats saved globally for ORC, so I popped it into my XB1. "This game is not backwards compatible"

oh well

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Cool
Tag

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Hm.

If Resident Evil had to go by a different name than Resident Evil, what name would you give it?

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If my only experience with Resident Evil is the railshooters for wii/PlayStation move am I a real Resident Evil fan?

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Lolo_Guru posted...

If Resident Evil had to go by a different name than Resident Evil, what name would you give it?

Biohazard, as it would have been without the copyright issues, obv. Quite fond of how they meshed both for 7.

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X_Dante_X posted...

ok I got curious on if any sort of stats saved globally for ORC, so I popped it into my XB1. "This game is not backwards compatible"

I wonder if RE Net still has those stats. I haven't been on there in forever though.

Eddv posted...

If my only experience with Resident Evil is the railshooters for wii/PlayStation move am I a real Resident Evil fan?

This bandwagon accepts all riders. You got the cliffnotes versions of most of the games tbqh.

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sorry pj but

D-Rank:
[Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City]
Resident Evil Survivor
Resident Evil 6

This is a major reason I posted those lifetime sales stats. I very much do not like RE6 as a Resident Evil game. It's the Michael Bay of RE games. And despite selling over NINE MILLION copies, it (coupled with Umbrella Corps) was definitely a tailspin for the series in the middle of last decade. I don't like Jake at ALL as a character, and that's without the weird handwave of Wesker banging out some eastern European chick. Conversely, I do like adult Sherry and her complete nonchalance about still rocking the G-Virus. Leon's section was okay, but I hate everything "The Family" and why is there a T-Rex what the christ. The crossplay thing, as mentioned already, was cool for the hot second it was actually a thing, but otherwise no. There was so much in this game, and very little was worth it the first time around, and none for subsequent playthroughs. Also Ada might be the worst waste of potential in the entire series. I'm sure I'll go into way more depth about a lot of these things later, but for a game with SO MUCH in it, there is literally nothing to it.

Survivor, another light gun nonsense game, PSX style this time. But it gets the nod over the others for actually tying into things. I love the background on the mass production of the T-103s and for this reason alone keeps it out of the gutter tier, since I will actually replay it from time to time. Hypnos is pretty awesome too. Plus it's the only side piece game that gets a shoutout in a numbered game (the opening scrawl of Zero).

ORC is just a hot mess of wasted potential. I played so much of it the first week and then just fell off hard. The concept is actually really strong about what else is going on in Raccoon City during the outbreak, and at least on the Umbrella Security Services side I enjoyed the characters a lot (Four Eyes the best). Echo Six are all expendable. Any time the game actually tried to reconcile itself with the rest of the series though (like with the canon survivors or Nemesis) things fall apart very quickly. Beautiful setpieces though, and of all things they handle G-Birkin quite nicely. I really wanted this game to be better. It's not so much bad as just very underwhelming.

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and you'll notice I didn't even mention Chris' RE6 campaign

i'll just leave this here

https://i.imgur.com/EfH5aKD.gif

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I still like 6 more than 5

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i want to like 6 more, i really do. i just cant

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I think that's the best way to put it, actually.

There are snippets of really great things in 6, but at the same time it's like they refused to turn down any idea that was pitched. Nothing was cut, just slam-jammed in there until it was a big pile of C-Virus goo. I want to really get behind the Sins of the Father storyline for example, but I just... can't, with how it's presented.

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This topic makes me want to fire up another retrospective myself!

Umbrella Corps could really be my least favorite game of all time. What a total dumpster fire that was. I don't even like having it in my purchased section.

ORC is definitely a fun time every once in a while. it always startles me though how little story there actually is, despite having pre-baked RE2 & RE3 plots to work off of already. I just feel like there's barely any continuity between the campaign missions.

I've said a lot about RE6 recently so I won't repeat myself too much; just a really fun game in my eyes and I still think as far as character moments go it has a lot of memorable ones for me actually. Definitely doesn't rank high for me though in the wider series still.

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I don't really enjoy playing much RE6, which is the biggest problem for how long it is. I can usually forgive bad gameplay OR bad plot, but RE6 is at the weird intersection for me where everything strikes me the wrong way for some reason. And for a numbered entry, that's just not acceptable.

It's also the culmination of biohazards continually growing, so going global was an inevitability, but it was always going to be unsustainable. (Fun Fact: We've had an outbreak on every continent now (if you include the stage play (which Capcom does)).

I'm just happy it didn't completely push the series in that direction, despite its sales.

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i kinda get an itch to play re6 every other year or so, but i don't want to undertake the journey alone which prevents me from going through it

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It is way more palpable (gameplay-wise) with someone else, this is true.

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per steam, i last played re6 on jan 8th, 2017. perhaps it is almost time

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FFDragon posted...

It's the Michael Bay of RE games.

I agree with this and I think it's what the series needed if it was going to continue down the path of being an action game first. I love the setpieces in this game.

But I'm not looking back now that we've returned to form.

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C-Rank:
[Resident Evil Gaiden]
Resident Evil Outbreak/File #2
Resident Evil: The Umbrella/Darkside Chronicles

I lump the Chronicles games together because half of each game is retellings that are just there to pad the runtimes. Granted, Darkside's are way better than the phoned in Umbrella', but neither are amazing. These "light gun" games are the best of the genre though because they actually have real impact on the canon. UC goes about filling in gaps in the story, like how Rebecca gets from the end of Zero to her spot in original, with an explanation of how she loses all that combat prowess too (she's been awake for almost 72 hours and is exhausted). Plus you get to play as my boy Richard and see how he lost to Yawn originally. But then there are things like fleshing out Ada's escape from Raccoon City, which frankly I am SHOCKED they didn't integrate into RE2Make. But the best of all is the actual taking down of the remains of Umbrella (and not that stock market bullcrap), from the POVs of both Jill/Chris and Wesker (also bits of Wesker throughout the series, like immediately post-virusing). A lot of little story bits that I really enjoy. DC goes the other route and doesn't really fill in much (except like Leon in police custody after RE2), but instead fleshes out the Leon/Krauser bromance pre heel turn by bringing back the T-Veronica virus and sending us to South America. Good stuff here too.

I also lump the Outbreaks together because they could really be one game, and 2 even has the exact same opening level and exact same characters doing the exact same escapy things. Which isn't bad! I'm still waiting on my modern day version of this game that could take things to the next level. Project REsistance maybe? But I've always said that Raccoon City circa Sept 28 - Oct 1 1998 is the peak point of the Resident Evil universe, so I'm always excited for more things in that era. Plus these games gave us things like ZOMBIE ELEPHANTS, so you cannot go wrong here. And since UC (Tyrant-R in Death's Door) and 7 (Alyssa Ashcroft article) have hammered home these games are canon, I find myself caring way more about these random collection of characters than I normally would. Bonus: The Rat's Eye view opening is one of my favorite in the entire series, and the Outbreak Theme is easily Top 10, maybe Top 5 for me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0HcxMvprYa0

Now let me be clear, Gaiden is not a good game... objectively. But I got into speedrunning it for a while, and let me tell you I ended up enjoying it way more than I'm going to say most people. It plays weird, its story is weird (but non-canon), it started the love affair with cruise ships the series has... But then again it has BARRY after every other game forgot about him and it took the bold decision of infecting Leon, which could have been fun. But when you've played as much of it as I have this all becomes... charming, in a way. For a GBC game it actually plays better than most and it's the only real horror experience you'll find on the console. Would I recommend it to someone else? Probably not. Would I play it again? Definitely.

I still hear this tune in my nightmares sometimes though.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xk8QRGSYvrk

Reset. Reset. Reset.

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Gaiden hype brings in all the viewers.

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i actually like this gaiden music

i can see how it would get old very quickly though

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It's a good loop, don't get me wrong

It's just a very short loop


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Still never completed Gaiden. Got so far in then stopped. That track brings back memories. I'll have to give the game another go

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Should have been rereleased on 3DS virtual console! I would have bought it.

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Still hilarious T-ALOS was brought down by two agents with conventional weaponry.

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B-Rank:
Resident Evil Zero
Resident Evil: Revelations
Resident Evil 4

This is the point where I consider all the games to be above most others in the medium, so hold your pitchforks. RE4 did a lot of good for reviving the series in the mainstream, has an incredibly satisfying gameplay loop, and is generally fun to play. We all know that. The things that hold it back for me come from the evisceration of the story on both ends. Here are the final lines of the preceding three games:

[RE2] Leon: Its up to us to take out Umbrella!
[RE3] Jill: Thats it. Umbrellas going down.
[RECV] Chris: Yeah, it's pay back time. We gotta destroy Umbrella, now let's finish this once and for all!

Handwaving away Umbrella as dying to the stock market in the intro is basically unforgivable to me and is a pillar of salt I am not over to this day. It basically forced other later games to pick up the scraps at feeling any sort of conclusion to the original games and it was never as satisfying as it could have been. On the other end of things, I've gone in at length about how Separate Ways ended perfectly to set up a Wesker/Ada showdown at some point, but absolutely none of that is ever followed up on. This is a trend for the series as a whole unfortunately, opening up amazing plotlines and then just abandoning them. I'll also reaffirm my statement from earlier that Ada is continually the worst waste of potential in the series, since she's almost always involved in those abandonment. As a self contained entry, RE4 is really good, but once you zoom out and try to chunk it in with the others it doesn't quite stand the test of time for me.

Revelations on the other hand, I think was a return to form for the series when things had been going off the rails for a while. I put well over 100 hours into this thing on my 3DS, to the point where I actually broke my thumbstick. I'm a huge NERD, so I enjoyed the Divine Comedy nonsense. Obligatory mention of cruise ships. A real Chris/Jill tag team again was great, as was seeing the fledgling BSAA, and how things ran right into Lost in Nightmares at the end. There are some really bad characters in this one, like the BSAA C-Team, and the triple/quadruple crosses sort of go off the rails, but it was the first real survival horror experience in a while and I latched onto it hard. I would love to see some of these characters/viruses revisited. Also the flashbacks might be the best part of the game. Also also I wish they would have stuck with some of the things from the original trailer, like actually incorporating HUNK into a real game, but alas.

Zero I think gets a bad rap from a lot of people, I think. My favorite parts of the Resident Evil lore revolve around the corporate espionage that swirls around Spencer/Ashford/Marcus/Wesker/Birkin. And this game hits a lot of those high notes, including the Wekser/Birkin bromance that doesn't get much exposure outside of Umbrella Chronicles and Wesker's Report II (which I lump into Zero for ranking purposes). This is a top tier scene in the entire series

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vriy5uJOxPY

Especially with the reverse-foreshadowing of Birkin going out in nearly the exact same way, since Spencer is a paranoid control freak. As far as the rest, Bravo team needed their moment and this game handles it well. Billy is just there, but Rebecca earns her stripes and I actually enjoyed the zapping system. My only real gripe is the magic elevators that do not connect where they should if you know Arklay geography, but I'll give it a pass for giving us beautiful recreations of NEST. Zero expanded the lore of the series to the point where I'm willing to ignore some of the minor flaws. That means so much to me that I even had this higher for a while before finally pushing it down to the top of this tier.

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pjbasis posted...

Still hilarious T-ALOS was brought down by two agents with conventional weaponry.

Umbrella continually goes out not with a bang, but a whimper.

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to be fair theres normally a huge explosion not long after

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All I can think about is the poor stressed out IT guy who has to set up all these self-destruct devices.

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https://youtu.be/Zp39VeJaEVg

I autotuned a song with UMVC3 Wesker lines

Why, well, don't ask me

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