Never played RE1-3, how are they and how do they compared to RE4?

[76561198055083273]

Well I played them as a kid but I have 0 memory of anything about them. Just wondering how good or bad of a game are they and how do they compare to RE4? Remake and original of all of them

[Kevin]

They are great games and suggest if you can, then to replay them. The only thing I can see stopping you from enjoying them is the combination of fixed camera/tank controls as some people just can't get past that.

[solaris32]

I like RE4 because combat isn't merely shooting enemies in the head or weakspot. You've got melee moves and now expanded knife moves. This makes combat varied and fun. The other RE games (except 5, the only other RE game I like) you only have shooting. Boring.

[Duke Leto Atreides]

RE4 stands out as being for more action oriented with enemies dropping supplies and character/ weapon upgrades. You don't get that in the classic games and their remakes.

[Zer0]

OG RE1-3 are like a completely different beast to RE4, even the original RE4 was a fair bit of a dramatic shift for the series (for good and bad, depending on perspectives).
The classics are a lot more focused on slow paced horror, watching your ammo (and inventory management as you had faaaar less item space, not to mention you couldn't just discard items whenever) and solving puzzles while memorizing the layout of the map and figuring out the best way to not constantly run into beasties and are far more horror focused overall (less so with 3).

4 leans far more into the action aspect especially with the departure of zombies and zombie creatures. While I'm a massive fan of the originals and would gladly play them over OG 4 and the remakes, they are all really good in their own respects.

RE1 Remake is a slight outlier in the comparisons as it's the remake of the original trio that retains the most of the original while adding A LOT of extra content, mechanics etc and I'd argue is the best remake overall but it's still really cool to play both it and the original for comparisons (if you don't mind how much the originals have aged I'd recommend OG then remake as the remake plays with your expectations).

RE2 and 3 remakes play very similar to RE4 and it's OG counterpart but there are some differences, Leon's movements' not quiet 1-to-1 and they adopt the more horror puzzle exploration elements (well 3 Remake might be the oddest of the bunch as it lies in the middle between the two gameplay wise).

TLDR: Old school fan, love all of them and I think they're all really good for differing reasons.

*Also the cheesy voice acting MIGHT put you off but they have their own charm imo

[Harris]

RE1-2 were mostly survival horror (aka resource management) and puzzle games with minor role of combat - you were encouraged to avoid it rather than engage in it.

RE3 was a more action focused one - it retained the core of the first two games but had more guns, more shooting, more kinds of ammo, ammo crafting and dodging attacks, simpler puzzles. It is also the first game that gave you a real choice between fighting or running away. Fighting was risky but rewarded great loot from Nemesis boss. In many ways it laid the foundation for 4.

RE4 was RE3 cranked to 11 - the revolutionary for the time idea of fighting everything rather than running away, and even more systems based around combat - tactical gunplay with enemies reacting to where you shoot as well as destructible surroundings like doors and red barrels you could manipulate in combat.

RE5 was in turn doubling down on RE4 - even more combat, a proper fighting companion instead of useless Ashley, even less puzzles.

RE6 was doubling down on RE5 and is perhaps the only RE game I never finished with its weird campaigns, weird combat, weird progression and weird camera.

RE7 was a reboot of sorts and kinda Capcom's attempt to invent something new rather than keep riding on the legacy of Shinji Mikami. It's not a bad game per se, but imo it's too different with that first person view, and got things like graphic dismemberment and horror that never really been a part of a RE game and feel out of place there. Though some people like it.

RE8 was a weird baby of RE7 and RE4 - it kind of continued what RE7 did with first person camera, limbs flying everywhere as well as a mandatory pace-breaking horror segment, but it also religiously copied many things out of RE4 like village, castle, factory, fish boss et cetera.

RE1make was more or less a faithful recreation of the original with just modern graphics. Imo, perhaps too faithful - fixed camera did not age well and the backtracking was god awful.

RE2make was a perfect compromise between a classic and modern game - it added that shoulder camera and modernized combat, but made it so that you still feel vulnerable and would prefer running past enemies when you can. Oh and it also butchered the story of the original.

RE3make was an abomination that should have bankrupted Capcom but turned out a commercial success instead. Least faithful to the source material, outsourced development, zero post launch support, awfully short with no replayability. A huge lost opportunity there, given how they could give us a semi-open world with tram fast travel and many other things.

RE4make is a baby of RE2make and RE8, aimed at maximum profits with minimal investment and lots of assets reuse. The combat system is straight outta RE2make and while it was perfect there, it doesn't work for that kind of game RE4 is. And Village's graphic violence and attempts at horror do feel out of place given the silly self-aware B movie RE4 always has been.

[EEddiii323]

Those who claim that Resident Evil 3 was action focused don't understand anything. The matter is that the events of Resident Evil 3 take place mostly in the streets of Raccoon city, so in the streets the normal thing is to have horde of zombies attacks you, and that means having a lot of ammo , it is not that the director of the game decided that the game would be an action focused , no, Resident Evil 3 was a complete horror game as 1 and 2 but the environment required more ammunition and more weapons, But this wasn't at the expense of the horror atmosphere, there wasn't any upsetting of the balance, The game has kept the same horror atmosphere that 1 and 2 had

[Kevin]

Originally posted by EEddiii323:

Those who claim that Resident Evil 3 was action focused don't understand anything. The matter is that the events of Resident Evil 3 take place mostly in the streets of Raccoon city, so in the streets the normal thing is to have horde of zombies attacks you, and that means having a lot of ammo , it is not that the director of the game decided that the game would be an action focused , no, Resident Evil 3 was a complete horror game as 1 and 2 but the environment required more ammunition and more weapons, But this wasn't at the expense of the horror atmosphere, there wasn't any upsetting of the balance, The game has kept the same horror atmosphere that 1 and 2 had

Actually, Resident Evil 3 wasn't even suppose to be Resident Evil 3 and there was concern with calling it Resident Evil 3 because it had more action.

On a side note, I'd go as far as to say that the shift to action started with RE2 as that game increased the amount of enemies, gave plenty of ammo, and had a bombastic soundtrack. Really, outside of the original game the series has been more of an action suspense thriller like Terminator 1 then actual horror in my opinion.

[EEddiii323]

Originally posted by Gradis:

Originally posted by EEddiii323:

Those who claim that Resident Evil 3 was action focused don't understand anything. The matter is that the events of Resident Evil 3 take place mostly in the streets of Raccoon city, so in the streets the normal thing is to have horde of zombies attacks you, and that means having a lot of ammo , it is not that the director of the game decided that the game would be an action focused , no, Resident Evil 3 was a complete horror game as 1 and 2 but the environment required more ammunition and more weapons, But this wasn't at the expense of the horror atmosphere, there wasn't any upsetting of the balance, The game has kept the same horror atmosphere that 1 and 2 had

Actually, Resident Evil 3 wasn't even suppose to be Resident Evil 3 and there was concern with calling it Resident Evil 3 because it had more action.

On a side note, I'd go as far as to say that the shift to action started with RE2 as that game increased the amount of enemies, gave plenty of ammo, and had a bombastic soundtrack. Really, outside of the original game the series has been more of an action suspense thriller like Terminator 1 then actual horror in my opinion.

Resident Evil 3 was never an action game, having a lot of enemies was a natural result of the large game environment, as the game was taking place in the streets of Raccoon City and not inside a mansion or police station, so what did you expect them to do? To put 3 zombies in every street? And having a lot of enemies means a lot of ammo. When does a game become action? When there is no balance between the number of enemies and the ammo and that wasn't the case in resident evil 3 nor 2. What determines whether the game is an action game or a horror game is not how much enemies are there or how much ammo you get, but rather the atmosphere of the game. The atmosphere in Resident Evil 2 and 3 is pure horror, as is the case, of course, with Resident Evil 1. The number of zombies was a contributing factor in increasing the dose of horror, because a horde of zombies breaking into a place through a window or through a door or fence is a shocking moment of horror. And this is what happened in Resident Evil 2 and 3, the zombies abundance was used in such moments

[Metro]

skip Re1 remake, play Re2 and Re3 remake, they are very similar to Re 4 remake.

[Kevin]

Originally posted by EEddiii323:

Originally posted by Gradis:

Actually, Resident Evil 3 wasn't even suppose to be Resident Evil 3 and there was concern with calling it Resident Evil 3 because it had more action.

On a side note, I'd go as far as to say that the shift to action started with RE2 as that game increased the amount of enemies, gave plenty of ammo, and had a bombastic soundtrack. Really, outside of the original game the series has been more of an action suspense thriller like Terminator 1 then actual horror in my opinion.

Resident Evil 3 was never an action game, having a lot of enemies was a natural result of the large game environment, as the game was taking place in the streets of Raccoon City and not inside a mansion or police station, so what did you expect them to do? To put 3 zombies in every street? And having a lot of enemies means a lot of ammo. When does a game become action? When there is no balance between the number of enemies and the ammo and that wasn't the case in resident evil 3 nor 2. What determines whether the game is an action game or a horror game is not how much enemies are there or how much ammo you get, but rather the atmosphere of the game. The atmosphere in Resident Evil 2 and 3 is pure horror, as is the case, of course, with Resident Evil 1. The number of zombies was a contributing factor in increasing the dose of horror, because a horde of zombies breaking into a place through a window or through a door or fence is a shocking moment of horror. And this is what happened in Resident Evil 2 and 3, the zombies abundance was used in such moments

I never said it was an action game, I just said it started a spin off and there was concern with calling it Resident Evil 3 because it had more action. As for the atmosphere and tone, the series has always had a horror/action mix with one or the other being emphasized more depending on the game. The series has never been pure horror...or at least if it was suppose to it failed miserably at it.

[Crunchy[Daz]]

Originally posted by EEddiii323:

Those who claim that Resident Evil 3 was action focused don't understand anything. The matter is that the events of Resident Evil 3 take place mostly in the streets of Raccoon city, so in the streets the normal thing is to have horde of zombies attacks you, and that means having a lot of ammo , it is not that the director of the game decided that the game would be an action focused , no, Resident Evil 3 was a complete horror game as 1 and 2 but the environment required more ammunition and more weapons, But this wasn't at the expense of the horror atmosphere, there wasn't any upsetting of the balance, The game has kept the same horror atmosphere that 1 and 2 had

You literally just explained how there was more focus put into action. Like, you understand its not one or the other right? They can retain a level of horror and still put more focus and attention into combat right?

[EEddiii323]

Originally posted by Gradis:

Originally posted by EEddiii323:

Resident Evil 3 was never an action game, having a lot of enemies was a natural result of the large game environment, as the game was taking place in the streets of Raccoon City and not inside a mansion or police station, so what did you expect them to do? To put 3 zombies in every street? And having a lot of enemies means a lot of ammo. When does a game become action? When there is no balance between the number of enemies and the ammo and that wasn't the case in resident evil 3 nor 2. What determines whether the game is an action game or a horror game is not how much enemies are there or how much ammo you get, but rather the atmosphere of the game. The atmosphere in Resident Evil 2 and 3 is pure horror, as is the case, of course, with Resident Evil 1. The number of zombies was a contributing factor in increasing the dose of horror, because a horde of zombies breaking into a place through a window or through a door or fence is a shocking moment of horror. And this is what happened in Resident Evil 2 and 3, the zombies abundance was used in such moments

I never said it was an action game, I just said it started a spin off and there was concern with calling it Resident Evil 3 because it had more action. As for the atmosphere and tone, the series has always had a horror/action mix with one or the other being emphasized more depending on the game. The series has never been pure horror...or at least if it was suppose to it failed miserably at it.

You don't seem to understand, does the game urge you to kill enemies or to save ammo and resources? The answer is definitely saving ammunition and resources, and this means that the game was not intended to be action focused as you and others claim. If the game was action focused, it would have given you too much ammunition and made you feel that you are able to erase all enemies and made you feel stronger than everything. And the other thing is that you do not know what action means. having a weapon in a horror game does not mean that this game is action focused, otherwise, Silent Hill games would also have been considered action focused games.
Are Silent Hill games action focused?! Silent Hill games, specifically the first three, contain various types of weapons. Can you say that those games action focused? as for the atmosphere, The atmosphere in Resident Evil 1, 2, and 3 was pure horror. This is a fact, because whoever plays these games for the first time feels nothing but discomfort, anxiety, and tension. That's what the environment in those games says, that's what the music says, that's what the fixed cameras say, that's what the settings says. All of these and others tell the player that you are in a pure horror game and not in a game that mixes action and horror, These games never make you feel comfort. Resident Evil 4 is the game that intended to be action focused because they changed the camera or the perspective and made the player move freely, and gave him plenty of ammo, This is the game that you can say it is an action game and that the developer wanted to try something new

[EEddiii323]

Originally posted by CrunchyDaz:

Originally posted by EEddiii323:

Those who claim that Resident Evil 3 was action focused don't understand anything. The matter is that the events of Resident Evil 3 take place mostly in the streets of Raccoon city, so in the streets the normal thing is to have horde of zombies attacks you, and that means having a lot of ammo , it is not that the director of the game decided that the game would be an action focused , no, Resident Evil 3 was a complete horror game as 1 and 2 but the environment required more ammunition and more weapons, But this wasn't at the expense of the horror atmosphere, there wasn't any upsetting of the balance, The game has kept the same horror atmosphere that 1 and 2 had

You literally just explained how there was more focus put into action. Like, you understand its not one or the other right? They can retain a level of horror and still put more focus and attention into combat right?

You do not understand, the events in resident evil 3 took place mostly in the streets of Raccoon City, and because of that they had to increase the number of enemies to show that the disaster has spread throughout the city , so increasing the number of enemies means also increasing the ammunition in order to maintain balance just like the first 2 games, So you have many enemies and you have the nemesis and this makes the ammo you get not enough to make you feel stronger or to feel safe.
and it seems that you did not play Resident Evil 3 in the first place, Resident Evil 3 contains more horror moments or events than 2 , it is enough that it has a monster that chases you everywhere and makes you feel that it will jump you at any moment from anywhere, so Resident Evil 3 increased the horror

[Veylox]

RE2 remake is close to RE4's level, I think it's visually slightly better, but the gameplay, especially combat gameplay, is much worse. RE2 is more puzzle oriented and you spend most of your time doing back-and-forth trying to avoid threats instead of gunning your way through

RE3 is basically re2 but worse, don't knowe about RE1