Resident Evil 4

Resident Evil 4, one of the greatest games of all time, is headed to Nintendo Switch next year.

Resident Evil: The Final Chapter may not be the final chapter in the zombie film saga after all, as the production company in charge of the series, Constantin Film, has unveiled its plans to reboot the sci-fi horror franchise.

With Resident Evil 7 tantalisingly close to launch, now seems like a pretty good time to reflect on the highs - and lows of the beloved franchise. Or, if you're Aoife Wilson, now is the time to find out which Resident Evil games Chris hasn't played and then force him to experience them for the first time on camera.

Resident Evil 4 is more than ten-years-old now, and despite myriad ports, we've still yet to receive a definitive edition, a remaster that matches and exceeds the quality of the GameCube original in every way. So when it was announced that Resident Evil 4 was being ported to Xbox One and PlayStation 4, we were interested to see how these new versions stack up. Has an iconic release finally been revisited, revised and remastered to the fullest extent? Or is it simply a port based on existing work?

This week's new PS4 and Xbox One releases are based on the PC version dubbed the Ultimate HD Edition. This is based, in turn, on the original GameCube codebase. It's an important distinction as the original 2007 PC port is actually based on the inferior PlayStation 3 conversion. Despite the age of the game, none of the many ports have quite matched every aspect of the original release. Certain effects, such as high intensity fire effects, depth of field and dust particles in the air are absent while the overall colours are desaturated, eliminating the contrast between light and shadow. These criticisms apply to every conversion of the game - and that includes these new PS4 and Xbox One remasters. However, while the overall image appears somewhat less rich, the majority of the experience is intact and the higher resolution helps to make up for the deficiencies.

That said, once you jump in, it quickly becomes apparent that image quality isn't quite what we would have expected here. While both versions operate at a full 1080p, neither port features anti-aliasing of any description - even something as lightweight as FXAA could have made a difference here. When combined with the lack of mip-maps (textures generated to combat surface aliasing) the game suffers from noticeable shimmering throughout. On the GameCube, this approach was likely taken in order to avoid blurring caused by trilinear filtering, but on modern consoles, it's possible to perform anisotropic filtering on mip-maps enabling sharper but cleaner results. Unfortunately, this is missing on the new releases.

Read more

Resident Evil 4, the highpoint of Capcom's horror series and one of the greatest games of all time, finally has a PlayStation 4 and Xbox One release date.

You'll be able to play a port of the classic on your latest console from 30th August.

Don't expect a remastered version of the game remade from the ground up. Do expect a version of the game which sounds and plays just as well as you remember.

Read more

Eurogamer noticed an increased number of readers to a four-year-old news story today. The article was about a Capcom PR stunt promoting Resident Evil by setting up a fake butcher shop with graphic sculptures of supposedly human meat. Now, nearly four years later, it looks like those images have sparked a rumour so widespread that the Chinese government had to issue a statement.

Resident Evil has a long and sometimes proud history. I think it's fair to say that the first couple of Resident Evil games were genre defining, which makes it all the more tragic to contemplate the state in which the series currently exists.

A third CGI Resident Evil film has been announced. This one's called Resident Evil: Vendetta.

Animation studio Marza Animation Planet (Harlock: Space Pirate) revealed the upcoming film, which is due in 2017.

The follow-up to Resident Evil: Degeneration (2008) and Resident Evil: Damnation (2012), Vendetta will star series stalwart Leon S. Kennedy.

Read more

Capcom's announced PlayStation 4 and Xbox One ports of Resident Evil 4, 5 and 6.

It doesn't take much more than a cursory glance at the pastiness of my skin or the way I flinch at the words "team sports" to realise I have never been a fan of the great outdoors. Nature seems a little bit too adept at making terrible things happen to adequate people for my liking, and video games seem to agree.

Very much like the shambling, slack-jawed corpses that stalk its instalments, Capcom's Resident Evil series is a curiously aimless beast at present. 2012's Resident Evil 6 deviated too far from the core values of the franchise by trying to appeal to horror and action fans alike, and Capcom has since fallen back on former glories by remastering the GameCube remake of the 1996 debut title for modern consoles. Meanwhile, Resident Evil: Revelations 2 skulks almost apologetically in the shadows, hoping to offer a spin-off romp which will maintain the interest of an increasingly restless fan base until the next numbered entry in the lineage hoves into view.

The swanky 1080p 60fps PC re-release of Resident Evil 4 still uses PlayStation 2-quality cut-scenes in the game's Separate Ways mode.

Surprise! Capcom has announced yet another re-release of Resident Evil 4 - Shinji Mikami's masterpiece of survival horror which remains the series' highpoint.

The Ultimate HD Edition for PC features 60 frames per second gameplay for the first time and the "highest visual fidelity ever" for the nine-year-old game.

A physical version will be available in Europe, while a digital version will be released worldwide via Steam, priced Ł14.99.

Read more

Every Sunday we haul an exciting article out of the Eurogamer archive so you can read it again or enjoy it for the first time if you missed it. Wesley's piece on Xbox's trials and tribulations in Japan was originally published on 14th December 2012.

Nintendo has hit back at concern over the power of the Wii U.

UPDATE: Tango Gameworks has released the first piece of art for project Zwei. It's below.

The survival horror market is too small for Resident Evil, Capcom has admitted.

Resident Evil 4 and 5 did not move the series away from its horror roots towards action, Capcom has insisted.

Estonian actor Johann Urb has reportedly been cast as Leon Kennedy in upcoming video game flick Resident Evil: Retribution.

You'd be forgiven for thinking Resident Evil 2 rookie cop Leon Kennedy and Resident Evil 5 star Chris Redfield would be the two most popular Resident Evil characters. But you'd be wrong.

Read more

High definition remakes of classic zombie games Resident Evil 4 and Resident Evil Code: Veronica are in the works, according to a Japanese magazine.

The thing about sequels is you know what to expect. The conventions of the franchise are usually well established; they're familiar, comforting even. They're what gives the game its identity.

Released in 1996, the original Resident Evil not only shifted PlayStations, but cemented the survival horror genre in gaming history. The game's original intro FMV uses real-life actors and features a scene where STARS Alpha member Joseph Frost is graphically ripped apart by Cerberus. Capcom had the intro toned down for the game's western release, warranting a 15 classification by the BBFC, although the PC port by Westwood a year later retained the intro with an 18 certificate. Either sets the tone.

Indistinct deathly murmurs abound about some movement on the next Resident Evil film.

Resident Evil 4, Onimusha 3 and Devil May Cry 3 are all coming out on the PC, Capcom's confirmed.

Capcom's hit upon a great way to convince Japanese people to buy Resident Evil 4 on the PlayStation 2: give them all guns.

Since when did Hollywood stop coming up with original ideas and start nicking game concepts instead? Big screen adaptations of Silent Hill, BloodRayne and Castlevania are already on the way, and now two more videogame adaptations have been announced - alas, not there's still no sign of Katamari Damacy: The Movie.

We're not sure how this is possible, but playing through Resident Evil 4 a second time is even more enjoyable than the initial run-through 10 months ago. It really is one of the best games Capcom has released in its long, glorious history. It's that simple. Its engaging premise, tense combat, gorgeous, varied environments, and some of the most terrifying boss encounters ever add up to something special - a true reinvention of the series, and one that deserves every superlative thrown its way. The fact that it's now being released on the PS2 (and therefore now available to the masses) makes us feel all warm inside. A game this exciting and this consistently entertaining deserves to be played by as many people as possible.

But, as we've said before, no one expected the supposedly humble PS2 to be able to cope with the graphical trickery that the GameCube managed with aplomb. Even the most optimistic Sony fanboy would have secretly harboured doubts that their machine could do such a fine-looking game justice. We all expected a few compromises; slowdown, less detailed visuals, longer load times and maybe the odd glitch here and there. But it couldn't be further from the truth. Not only has Capcom produced an almost compromise-free conversion (on one disc, too), but thrown in a ton of extra content into the bargain. Somehow, waiting ten months for the definitive version doesn't seem such a bad thing.

Cubes of comfort

Read more

Many dismissed the concept of a PlayStation 2 port of Resident Evil 4 as a pointless waste of effort; an embarrassment waiting to happen. Whether these premature opinions were borne of partisan conclusion-jumping or valid technical concerns, it's not entirely clear, but few expected Capcom to be able to bring its much-admired GameCube masterpiece to the PS2 without some hefty compromises. Surely the creaking architecture of the veteran Sony machine would be unable to cope with the lavish demands of Capcom's survival-horror epic and PS2 owners would be left with nothing but a pale facsimile of the glorious Cube original? And wouldn't the rush to convert the game to a machine it wasn't designed for merely amplify the PS2's shortfalls? Apparently not.

PlayStation 2 owners buying Resident Evil 4 later this year will have even more goodies than originally thought, according to Famitsu.

The PlayStation 2 version of Resident Evil 4, due out in Europe on November 4th, will feature proper a 16:9 widescreen mode where the GameCube version merely had an enforced letterbox at 4:3 that could be zoomed on proper widescreen tellys.

A limited edition PlayStation 2 version of Resident Evil 4 has been confirmed for the game's North American release, costing exactly the same as the regular edition ($49.99).

Capcom's masterful slice of survival horror, Resident Evil 4, is coming to the PS2 somewhat sooner than initially anticipated, with both the US and European releases now confirmed for a pre-Christmas release.

PS2-owning Leatherfaces across the country will be pleased to hear that Nubytech is releasing a new version of its best-selling Resident Evil Chainsaw controller.

Capcom Eurosoft is asking fans of the Resident Evil series what they would most like to see in the fifth game in the series, which was confirmed in March by producer Hiroyuki Kobayashi.

Polyphony Digital's PS2 exclusive racer Gran Turismo 4 has held on to the top spot in the UK sales chart this week, despite strong challenges from a host of new releases - four of which make it into the top ten ranking.

Dumber than a bag of hammers.

Version Reviewed

Cube (exclusive)

Publisher

Read more

The GameCube version of Resident Evil 4 will stretch to two of the console's proprietary mini-DVD discs, Capcom has reportedly confirmed over the past week, although unlike its Cube-exclusive predecessors it won't be the game's content that justifies the second squirt of silicon.

Publisher