Resident Evil Outbreak Review

By Kristan Reed Published 13 August, 2004

Capcom's now-offline-only survival horror sideshow rolls into town next month, and it's not the game that PlayStation owners deserve after all these years.

Version tested: PlayStation 2

Order yours now from Simply Games.

Online gaming, one day, will be the norm for console gamers. For now, though, we're still scratching around waiting for the broadband installed base to creep up and for the likes of Sony and Nintendo to get their acts together before game companies really take it seriously. Some are taking it seriously, of course. Microsoft, in particular, seems to think that Halo 2's online features for Xbox will create an explosion in demand for its Live service. Others, it would be fair to say, are merely dipping their toes into the water to see what the potential is - and one of those companies is most definitely Capcom, which has so far put out a couple of low key Xbox Live titles. Many felt that Outbreak, its PS2 online multiplayer Resident Evil title would prove to be a major draw for online gamers - only to find that this groundbreaking feature has been stripped out of the PAL version.

We've known this for a long time, of course - nearly a year in fact - but it's not until you sit down with the single-player mode that you realise what a depressing fact that is. We imagined the game would still play very much like all the Resident Evils we've played over the years, but it does only in the loosest sense.

Bitesize

'Resident Evil Outbreak' Screenshot 1

The magic of the stubbornly old school RE titles is their sense of immersion, atmosphere, cunning puzzles and the gradual unravelling of a steadfastly B-movie-esque plot. Outbreak may share the common gameplay mechanics, such as a rough approximation of the lock/key puzzles, the same health system, and usual bugbears of limited inventory and vile control system, but it sacfrices timing, suspense and plot to just wade in with zombies that refuse to die, dull and exceptionally simple puzzles, and some of the most dim-witted buddy AI ever.

Set over five reasonably short episodes, or 'scenarios', the game has been designed from the ground up to be a co-operative multiplayer game for four players. From the off you're essentially trapped in a fairly closed environment and have to work out how to get to the next section while groaning creatures of the undead lurch relentlessly at you and sap your will to live. In the discarded online game, you would all work together (skill-related issues notwithstanding) and help fend off attacks while others players scouted for objects, lending them a hand in distress by swapping first aid sprays and the like, and generally sticking together to eventually get out of your current situation.

With eight diverse characters to choose from, each with their own unique strength (better weapon, rarely attacked, lock picker, can carry more, etc), it's possible to get a decent amount of replay value out of each scene, with different cut-scenes occurring and different objects accessible depending on who you choose. The question is whether the offline mode will make you want to play it at all. To all intents and purposes, once you know roughly what objects you need, and where you need to go, you rarely need any AI help at all, but, frustratingly, on the occasions you do need their help - such as some health - swapping objects between players can be a black art, with many requests failing to register at all.

Evil, but not to the core

'Resident Evil Outbreak' Screenshot 2

Most gamers are seemingly well versed in the variety of annoyances that Resident Evil games can present in terms of control, combat and camera issues, so we won't harp on too much about those except to note that they're still here after all these years (although directional control does at least allow you to run in a specific direction - that is, until confusion hits you when the camera angle swaps to the opposite side, and you're still pressing up, but running down the screen). No, we can live with most of those issues, given that we're normally too sucked into the proceedings to care very much after a while, but Outbreak's online design origins manage to introduce entirely new and spectacularly irritating issues, such as the inability to reload or equip your weapon or do any kind of map reading/ inventory juggling without risking being eaten alive by a posse of slavering zombie flesh eaters. Because inventory pauses would change the entire design of the game, Capcom has, at a stroke, dispensed with one of the few saving graces of its clunky object management system and introduced a new level of pain to the hapless gamer.

Having a keen aim would be fine, of course, were it not for Capcom's baffling decision to allow zombies to rise from the dead an infinite number of times - meaning that if you're attempting to read a memo or search a room thoroughly, your chances of being attacked are increased exponentially, especially when the game decides to quickly introduce multiple enemies into a confined room in a matter of seconds. Even on Easy, Outbreak gives the player very little time to explore, gather objects or take in the scene before being beset by an unending succession of relentless drones that can reduce your character's health from Fine to Danger in one short attack for some bewildering reason.

Very quickly, the solo Outbreak experience breaks down into a series of Game Over screens before you eventually work out where the relevant keys are, and where to head. Once you've got the knowledge, it very quickly become apparent that there's little in the way of meaningful puzzle solving (not, at least, until you try the Hard and Very Hard levels - but then that's ruined by an even more fascist posse of enemies and bosses), and the game feels light in the story department too, with nothing like the sense of purpose there normally would be in a RE game. It's a very formulaic find key/unlock door experience all the way through until the next mini cut-scene kicks in.

We're losing him...

'Resident Evil Outbreak' Screenshot 3

We're guessing that Capcom kept things simpler than usual so as to make the game more about survival and keeping your team mates alive, but, if anything, put into a single player context the buddy AI is just a nuisance, and characters come and go seemingly at random. You'd honestly be better off on your own, and the chance that they might have an object you need but aren't around can be especially aggravating. The ridiculous decision to only let you carry four objects (eight if you're Yoko) leads to all sorts of shenanigans, and is the kind of tired, pointlessly particular game mechanic that should have been put to death a decade ago.

On a technical level Outbreak falls down too, with horrendous loading pauses between every single room (20 seconds plus for no good reason at all), making simple reccy activity a chore, while the visuals themselves do little to justify such painful pauses. Sure, they're rendered on the fly, and are reasonably attractive, but nowhere near the splendour of the Cube, and certainly not up to par compared to other PS2 efforts. Even Capcom's own Onimusha 3 beats it hands down in all departments, and Outbreak's vanilla animation, unhelpful camera angle switching and proliferation of obscured objects just makes us long for RE4 even more. For the love of all that is Evil, Capcom, put this tired set of gaming mechanics out of their misery once and for all, and give PS2 owners a Resi Evil game they deserve, not some ham fisted attempt at an online game that simply doesn't translate as a single-player experience.

As a footnote, even with online play, there was no headset support (bizarrely) and players were left communicating the same way as they do offline, with a set of four commands (help, thanks, etc) mapped to the right stick and some context sensitive commands mapped to the square button. To put it politely, they're useless and highlight even more what an ill-conceived project it was all along.

Dead on arrival

It's a shame, because on paper Outbreak sounded like a grand and ambitious concept that could shake up the survival-horror game into something much more than it could ever be alone. We still believe that Capcom will get things right eventually, and as an idea it has great potential, but for now it's a botched attempt and should be put down to experience. For the PAL consumer, it's one for the absolute die-hards we're afraid, and even they might have issues trying to live with the lack of online play.

Resident Evil Outbreak is due out on PS2 on September 24th.

Order yours now from Simply Games.

5 / 10

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Picture of Kristan.

About Kristan Reed

Kristan is a former editor of Eurogamer, dad, Stone Roses bore and Norwich City supporter who sometimes mutters optimistically about Team Silent getting back together.

Read more articles from Kristan by visiting the Kristan Reed archive page.

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Comments (29) Latest comment 8 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • perilikid #1 8 years ago

    I hate zombie games, but if this had been a proper coop game it could've been fantastic.

    As a side-note, I'd just like to mention the invariably fantastic looking letter-box picture that EG uses to illustrate its game reviews (particularly the Spider-man 2). The one used for this one's pretty creepy.

  • ssuellid #2 8 years ago

    This is probably the first RE title I won't be buying. It sounds crap.

  • Blerk #3 8 years ago

    Oh dear! Won't be bothering with this one, then. How about doing a preview of Obscure instead, chaps?

  • frod. #4 8 years ago

    Bah. Was looking forward to this as well. Have they actually given a reason as to why they took out the online support? I think I remember them saying they took out voice coms as it woudl detract from the atmosphere or something, i.e you could be running around with an 8 yr old asking you what you had for tea every 5 seconds.

    Roll on RE4 then I guess...

  • krudster #5 8 years ago

    Basically the PS2 online set up for Europe is entirely different from the rest of the world. Capcom would have had to entirely re-code it to make it compatible, and the Japanese didn't want to do that. In a nutshell.

  • Aretak #6 8 years ago

    Pretty much along the lines of every other review I've read. Shame, really.

  • Frank #7 8 years ago

    They need to take a shotgun and blow the head off this tired old franchise. It's the only way to kill it...

    No wait I can see the series expanding in to new fields.
    Resident Evil Underground - Tuned up imports, racing around zombie filled city streets (at night of course)
    Resident Evil Di Amigo - Zombies, Maracas, need I say more?

    Any more suggestions?

  • perilikid #8 8 years ago

    Voice comms would ruin the atmosphere? Have they even played Pandora Tomorrow? What a load of nonsense.

  • krudster #9 8 years ago

    And good riddance! Imagine if you were still playing Doom in its old graphical and control style eight years after it came out. That's more or less what has happened here. The re-invention is long long overdue.

  • Razz #10 8 years ago

    Resident Evil 4 is the future, not this poor game, it's stifiled by the crap PS2

  • Blerk #11 8 years ago

    I'm still a bit worried about Resi 4, to be honest. For all their talk of it being 'completely different' I don't feel I've seen enough of the actual game to be able to make a judgement on whether it really is different or not.

    As for the PS2 not being up to the job of Resi 4... you're probably right. But I'll be astounded if we don't see Resi back with Sony next generation. It's not exactly been a resounding success on the Cube, has it?

  • Tweakmonkey #12 8 years ago

    This is such a disappointment :-(

    Capcom must be very angry with Sony for this network cockup, however it makes me wonder what they really think of us here in Euroland. They take our money but don't care about sub-standard products.

  • read_only #13 8 years ago

    If its difficult to make it work online why couldn't they have made it multiplayer in the traditional way? I guess four players would be a nightmare because with a quarter of the screen you would never see what was going on (difficult to start with). But a two player co-op mode could be fun.

  • krudster #14 8 years ago

    Sure, the graphics have moved on since 96, but it's still using a system that rarely helps the player - the camera angles, the controls, the menu/inventory/map system, etc. Other survival horror games have sorted these aspects out, why not Ressie?

    And, yes, REmake at a tenner is a must have.

  • hp_on_toast #15 8 years ago

    "Sure, the graphics have moved on since 96, but it's still using a system that rarely helps the player - the camera angles, the controls, the menu/inventory/map system, etc. Other survival horror games have sorted these aspects out, why not Ressie?"

    What pisses me off is that Capcom acknowledge the problems with the series and show off a title as revolutionary as RE4, and then continue to churn out bog standard RE products on the ps2 - isnt there eventually going to be between 4 and 8 of these Outbreak titles planned :S

    If Outbreak controlled / felt like MGS 2 (ie decent cameras which doesnt keep switching, lots of scenery interactivity, simple to access inventorys, stationary first person mode for headshots, leaning round corners) it couldve be f*cking great!

  • valli #16 8 years ago

    with horrendous loading pauses between every single room

    That's what put me off in the US version.

    There's a 1-2 sec loading time each time you check your map and/or your inventory, FFS! The developers must think the players are as braindead as the zombies to allow such a "feature" slip into the final version of the game!

  • tiddles #17 8 years ago

    As a side-note, I'd just like to mention the invariably fantastic looking letter-box picture that EG uses to illustrate its game reviews (particularly the Spider-man 2). The one used for this one's pretty creepy.

    I was going to say exactly the same thing! This one's superb - very striking. Pity the game's a bit shite.... Who does them/chooses them?

  • Dizzy #18 8 years ago

    Next time Capcom try again.. on XBox Live.

  • mcmonkeyplc #19 8 years ago

    Here here dizzy!


    Do capcom not like us xbox gamers except for giving us online 2d fighters they have done nothing of note for the xbox.

  • Tweakmonkey #20 8 years ago

    "Next time Capcom try again.. on XBox Live"

    Good thinking however I think Capcom didn't really have the commitment to re-write any of their net code from the original Sony network, so if they're gonna do Xbox they might as well do Sony Europe too.

  • cloudaaa #21 8 years ago

    re: online gaming

    The infrastructure needed to host online gaming on PS2 really is huge, and Capcom don't have the cash to make the game viable for Europe with its massive number of network operators, tariff systems etc




    Don't forget, Microsoft are the ones who pay for all the Xbox Live facilities like server farms, hosting, front-ends, publicity and maintenance etc - NOT the game publishers

  • krudster #22 8 years ago

    Tom mostly chooses our title images - plucks them from whatever's available. We haven't seen the cover art yet for the PAL version, although clicking the Simply Games link might take you to it.

  • krudster #23 8 years ago

    Indeed it does, lots of creepy hands.

  • Tweakmonkey #24 8 years ago

    "The infrastructure needed to host online gaming on PS2 really is huge"

    Is that really true? A game like this might have a few hundred people online at any one time. The servers wouldn't need to be anything special to cope with that.

  • Freek #25 8 years ago

    RE4 can't get here soon enough!
    Edited by 1 at 13/08/04 @ 16:22

  • inpHilltr8r #26 8 years ago

    Basically the PS2 online set up for Europe is entirely different from the rest of the world.

    Tell me about it :( One of the more retarded decisions made this gen. Spank 'em until they learn.

  • rez606 #27 8 years ago

    no not that interested, from the moment the devs said that 'hopefully' outbreak would be online in uk i havnt realy taken any notice of it, damm shame, seems like ps2 online is just like the dissater that was dreamcast online... :(

  • Tweakmonkey #28 8 years ago

    Hmm - I just read that link to the capcom board... totally unbelievable. Seems like they are totally inept.

  • Ruhen #29 8 years ago

    Big Up to resident evil team, this game looks hype!!!