| Jill has a taser that will send a large amount of voltage through the zombies bodies, while Chris can lodge a hand grenade into the zombies mouth, shoot it and watch the special effects. While both of these weapons will stop zombies in their tracks both characters can also use defensive knifes that can be lodged in the zombies throat or neck to give you some extra time and breathing space. Knowing when to use a defence item can often be the difference between life and death.
Another addition to the gameplay is the super zombie. Where as in the past you have been able to kill a zombie and leave it for dead, now if you let them be; the zombies will become very nasty acid breathing super zombies that are faster than both of the lead characters, a couple of swipes from their claws and you will be dead. To prevent this from happening you will have to burn or behead all zombies that you defeat; if you choose not to dispose of dead zombies properly you will have to learn the hard way. From the very start of playing Resident Evil you will have trouble recognising it from the original, this is because Capcom have changed 70% of the original game. New items and enemies have been added and rooms have been switched around so that the game will seem completely changed. While some of the puzzles are new and others have been rehashed there are quite a few that have not. You'll still be collecting a variety of items you will still have to make sense of where they might be used in the mansion. This basically means there will be a load of back tracking throughout the game. In traditional Resident Evil style you will be pushing boxes and statues around, this sort of trial and error gameplay could become annoying if the game wasn't so scary and atmospheric, not to mention incredibly addictive. When you fist play Resident Evil you will realise that it is a very good looking game. Screenshots and video clips don't in any way do Resident Evil justice, the perfect pre rendered scenery with ambient animations result in the most visually impressive video game ever. Attention to detail is brilliant, your characters image is reflected by everything, dust particles float by in the light while fog blows across the screen. The detail is so great that even individual blades of grass sway in the wind. Those are the very nice subtle graphical parts of the game now let me tell you about the gore. To start with it is the most realistic gore ever seen in a video game, blood will gush from bodies and splatter all over the walls and carpet, even when loads of blood hits the carpet you can still see the pattern though the gory red stuff. Blowing off a zombie's head with a shotgun is very rewarding; it produces an explosion of effects that simply has to be seen to be appreciated.
Just as much care has been taken in the constructing of the character models, hair flows in the wind, clothes appear to have real textures and weapons can be seen on your character. Zombies are "believe it or not" amazing too, although a better variety would have been nice. Only a couple of negatives on the visual side of the games, the character animation is pretty bog standard and the dogs look to move a bit awkwardly. The video sequences have slight pauses in the middle of them which is slightly distracting. At the end of the day; this game looks absolutely beautiful and these are very, very minor points. The voice acting was a pretty weak point in the original version but this time it is better although there are still times where you will get some funny dialogue. Dolby Digital and Pro Logic II are not supported but the Dolby Surround works pretty well even though the two rear channels have been merged. The sound effects are great, if you hear some dripping liquid somewhere it is likely that you will find a leaky tap near by. In the open you can hear weeds and bushes brushing up against your characters pants and there are loads of sound effects for footsteps alone. The zombies let the sound down a bit as the groans are pretty much the same with not much in the way of variety. Collectively all the elements of Resident Evil come together to make for a truly creepy experience. With two characters and three difficulty setting plus a load of different endings and branch-off stories the game offers plenty to do. Even if you are only vaguely into this sort of game you should still buy it because it's a must for anyone who owns a GameCube. This is the tour de force of all Resident Evil games and it shouldn't be missed by anyone. 9 out of 10
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