Resident Evil 8 Village Review

-For the Uncensored!

Oh, Resident Evil, how you have managed to divide and unite the fan base, from RE zero to 4, and then 5 and 6, while 7 for me was akin to playing a souped up version of Texas Chainsaw Massacre. While I do see that most of the industry, and I myself as a writer, have my influences where I am inspired by, remains troubling. Released on May 7th, 2021, Resident Evil 8, we are back in the role of Ethan Winters, after the events of Resident Evil 7, where he and Mia are living a quiet normal life.

            Resident Evil has maintained development by Capcom, which is responsible for the mainline games, and with the updated RE engine, that created the RE 2 and 3 remakes, brings all there talent to the 8th. According to Gamer rant, Resident Evil has sold “100 million copies” worldwide (https://gamerant.com/resident-evil-games-ranked-copies-sold/). 

            After this point, it’s spoiler heavy, so just a fair warning. 

            Now, what happens is very similar to a Guillermo Del Toro movie. Mia is reading a dark fairy tale to there infant daughter, Rosemary. It details a young girl who is lost in the woods, and a bat lets her drink its gold blood, then another figure gives her a gold dress to keep her warm, then a fish gives her a fin to eat, and then a horse lets her take a cog off its head. When finally confronted, a witch appears, and the story ends. 

            Once that’s over, Mia and Ethan are far from happy. Mia gets jittered, as she doesn’t want to remember her time in Louisiana. It seems normal. Most lovers want to get away, but in Europe, and even Chris Redfield helping, it seems odd. It’s funny to see that in Ethan’s office he has a book on survival by Kendo, who owns the gun shop in Resident Evil 2. When he puts his daughter to bed, it goes to pot really quick. Mia is killed by Chris Redfield, and kidnaps his daughter, Rose. 

            When he’s knocked out, he wakes back up in the snow, and finds the team that captured him dead. He hears from a dead soldiers phone that “did you deliver the package?” referring to Rose and Ethan Winters. He learns nothing, and then travels through the snow. When he makes it to an undisclosed town, a castle is in the distance. Only we see that its invaded by beasts that walk menacingly, not lunging, but daunting, confident in there abilities. Covered with hair, werewolves, or Lycans. 

            A man gives you a pistol, a LEMI, which is one of the worse pistols in the game. If you didn’t buy the deluxe version that comes with the classic Beretta Samurai Edge (a staple of all the main games), because Beretta’s are the most amazing handguns on the market. You are also introduced to your second weapon, a pump action shotgun. It helps against the Lycans, as you make your way out of the town.

            It’s what I mentioned before about influences, and how artists will take the personality of an influence and run with it. Resident Evil seems to be influenced by Bram Stoker’s Dracula, as the game progresses. What Ethan experiences in Castle Demitrescu, is that someone wants his daughter, and the sibling dynamic between the villains is often entertaining. 

            As Ethan’s fingers on his left hand is torn off from a Lycan, he looks good and fucked, but a horn calls them back. The Lycans are riding horses too. 

            When Ethan is introduced to the villains, Heisenberg, a man with a large Thor like hammer, that has the ability to put cogs all over his body to trap him, argue and fuss, over who gets to hunt Ethan Winters. 

            It’s amazing that Ethan is the one character in the game that everyone knows who he is. It gives you the sense of terror. When a group of survivors are holed up in Luisa’s house, an elderly man, Leonardo and his daughter are hiding, and he’s wounded. He opens the gate and as the group prays to Mother Miranda, Leonardo turns into a lycan. When he escapes, by ramming a truck, climbing up out of the attic, Leonardo is alive and calls out to his daughter. “Elena.” Only she’s suckered in and before she falls into the fire, says, “Go, save your daughter.”

Ethan is heading after his daughter, in the castle Demitrescu, he has to find four masks in order to escape the castle. Joy, Sorrow, Rage, and Laughter. He kills all of Demitrescu daughters, who are affected by harsh winds that turn them into crystal once you shoot and stun them. (The obvious nod to Dracula, as it’s referring to how holy water can stop vampires, is not missing to me.) 

You also find your next weapon, the sniper rifle, where it can be used from a distance. While I played on Standard difficulty, I had plenty of ammo, but I can only imagine that you would have to run more than shoot. Lady Demitrescu just shrugs off your shots and says, “Are you finished?” So, it’s best to avoid her.

            When you fight Lady Demitrescu, she’s pretty invincible, and you have to spend your time avoiding her, like Mr. X, in Resident Evil. In Resident Evil, they have always remained fervent in running away from an enemy that you can’t defeat. Only once you find a sword, you stab her, and she turns into a large monster, typical of Resident Evil fashion. Yes, it’s the staple of the series, but like every Resident Evil monster, it can be destroyed.

            The original body on Lady Demitrescu appears on top of the monster. She’s all white, so shooting it is not a problem. Just stay out of the large fish heads way as she tries to ram you from the sky. Once you kill her, she pulls you through the castle.

            When you make it down, you have some brief respite. Only Ethan learns that he must face all the lords that hold your child hostage, but they are all missing pieces of your daughter, Rose. You have to get all the missing body parts from the lords, which are stuck in containers. When you face off against Donna Beneviento you have to take apart a doll, as your weapons disappear with a girl whispering, “It would have been better if Rose had never been born.” 

            You have to figure out a puzzle and make peace with losing your wife. When you’re finished, you are being chased by a huge anthropomorphic child. You don’t have to face it, just run away. You have to put a fuse box together, and then escape. It’s pretty creepy. Only once you get back to the top of the house, you have to find and kill the doll, Angie, as it’s part of a psychic medium. It does seem like it’s taking from Annabell. 

            Along the way, you acquire a grenade launcher, a sawed off shot gun (my other best friend), and that became my best friend throughout the campaign.

            When you get out, you go back and then face off against the second lord. Salvatore Moreau, who seems pathetic at first, vomiting in the dark. as he begs you to not leave with Rose’s body part. But I didn’t buy that. He started creating weird fungu but he turns into a fish and you have to run across a reservoir dodging his gaping mouth. At one point he uses a fart to try and poison you and he says, “I have been holding that one in.”  

            Once you deal with Salvatore Moreau, you get back and face off against Heisenberg. As you make your way into the lair, Ethan fends off attacking Lycan, as he has to reach the threshold and then hold himself against the attackers. When he faces off against Heisenberg’s captain, he then puts all of his children’s parts together, and he finds Heisenberg at his fortress. Heisenberg wants to make a deal. 

            Now, we see from all the characters, other than Madam Demitrescu, as she is vicious, she is bold. Moureau is a blobby villain in the end. But Heisenberg. He seems almost like a Kojima character. The whole game seems like an ode to Kojima but also popular horror stories mashed together. Remember when I brought this up before. Moreau is obviously a homage to the Island of Dr. Moreau, where the doctor is creating anthropomorphous creatures. While Heisenberg, who considered the most cunning, doesn’t come after Ethan. 

            He slays all his siblings, and he’s reserved. He offers Ethan help as if he wants out, too. If I was Ethan, I would have played possum and befriended Heisenberg. The way Heisenberg acts is bombastic, and almost akin to the most fleshed out villain in the story. The children of Mother Miranda all obey her orders, but Heisenberg doesn’t.

            It does create doubt within the player. And the smartest ones can always act like sheep when there fangs are just as sharp.

            Heisenberg him use Rose as a weapon against Mother Miranda. Ethan refuses, and he’s chased through his underground factory, as he has to escape, and face Heisenberg. The underground factory is almost daunting. Everything about the game is gorgeous, but at some moments, the game can be dark even in the middle, on the HDR version on XBOX One S.

            Ethan has to ascend the factory by making mold keys so that he can get through locked doors, but also fight off any mutants that come his way. The factory area is definitely the arcade section of the game, and you get to fight a monster with blades as a face, like a helicopter mutant. But like every lumbering tank villain, you let it try to run you over, but then shoot it in its back. It sends flames at you, and when you finally kill it, all seems fine. But Heisenberg sends you back down, saying, “I have a rebellion to lead.” You finally meet Chris, and he explains that Mother Miranda was hiding as your wife, and the mold from Louisiana kept her alive. So, you take a robot like tank with chainsaws on it topside. 

            But even on normal mode, you will run out of bullets, and you have to plan ahead all the time. When you deal with Heisenberg, it’s almost a sign that the Resident Evil team wants you to have fun. You ran away from your attackers so long that when you’re blasting Heisenberg with an M60, rocket launcher and chainsaw on top of a tractor like device, it’s a sign that you’re enjoying the game as it was intended to be. 

            But after you shoot Heisenberg, with the tractor lifted up into the air, he dies, but then Miranda then approaches you. So, Ethan is killed. It was a bit of a shocker. But then you take control of Chris. As you then head to fight Miranda. This section, now feels like it should have been in a Call of Duty section. You fight off waves of Lycans with an AK-47 and it’s really fun. It is a callback to the action adventure of Resident Evil 6. 

There’s trees growing all around it. I do seem to remember in Sleeping Beauty when the trees were growing all around the fortress of Maleficent, as this does seem to be more fairy tale inspired than zombie esque-game. 

You even call in a missile strike on the megamycete, but it turns out, Mia is alive. Yes, and then you get a cut scene where it ends with “You don’t know how special he is” and then pans back to Ethan, as he is alive. Man, what does it take to kill Ethan Winters? Also you find out that the creator of Umbrella also used part of the megamycete for the T-Virus.

            Then Eveline, the villainous girl from the first game, tells you that you were dead the whole time. It’s hard to fathom that you were dead this entire time. He tells her “screw you” and he finds out his body was infected with the mold. A light then opens up and he says, “I will save you.”

            When you awake back in the merchant’s carriage, and he’s been knocked out. But he’s dying. The merchant, with all his coy devilishness, doesn’t tell you who he is either. When you arrive at Mother Miranda’s, you find out that she had lost her daughter, Eva, from the Spanish Flu and she was trying to bring her back this whole time. But she’s shocked that it’s not her daughter Eva, but Rose. Only she turns into a black angel, and Ethan fights for Rose.

            You have to prepare carefully. I went with upgrading the sawn off shotgun, and using the small scorpion pistol, but it felt like I was fighting at an unfair advantage, but every time she would fly, it made me think I was in Guillermo Del Toro’s Hellboy. But when Miranda is dead, Chris comes to his rescue, but part of his hand turns to mold and he’s spent physically. Ethan decides to sacrifice himself and detonate the bomb. Chris makes it back with Rose, and Mia is safe. But they find out that they sent bioweapons to fight. Yes, zombies. 

            It ends with a sad note, but ends with a young girl dropping off flowers to a grave stone. It’s his daughter. Only his daughter is being used as part of the BSAA, to stop bioterrorist threats. 

            The credits roll with the “the father’s story is now done.” 

            Overall, it was a really great game that did manage to bring Ethan’s story to a close. Overall, the game is a technical marvel. Both graphically and the story, but also the special effects, sound was really heightened during the game. You could hear a house creak if you walked through it. You can hear the snarls and I was instantly on edge. What does this mean will become of Chris Redfield too? Also, will we see zombie mutant soldiers become part of the series again? It might happen, but it’s too early to say. While I was sad to see Ethan die, the end makes sense when you realize what Ethan did to save his daughter. I would be interested if the characters from RE 8 meet Claire and Leon from the remake games. But then, who wouldn’t be surprised at this point. Overall, the game is an achievement for the Resident Evil franchise. The only negative is that it holds onto literary influences too much, but that’s a minor gripe. Favorite weapons of the game are the AK-47, the sawed off shotgun, the colt Revolver (even though you don’t get much ammo for it), the combat shotgun, and the grenade launcher. All can help you through a tough jam. 

            Final Analysis: 9/10

-Louis Bruno is the author of more than 15 books, including, The Michael Project, The Michael Project: Book 2: The Lost Children of Eve, Thy Kingdom Come, The Disintegrating Bloodline, Apocalypse Soldier, Hierarchy of Dwindling Sheep. His books can be found on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and Lulu. He can be found on Gab, https://gab.com/thereallouistbruno, Minds https://www.minds.com/lbruno8063/, and Parler https://parler.com/profile/therealLouistbruno/posts. Instagram @lbrruno8063 and @louisbrunoofficialbook. He has written for the Intellectual Conservative and Ephemere. Also, he writes on https://louisbruno.substack.com, where you can support him directly, and where he will post one article a day (the bulk of his work will appear on substack officially). Also he can be found on Our Freedom Book https://www.ourfreedombook.com/thereallouistbruno17 His latest, Come Home, Young One, a dark fantasy novel is out now at Lulu.com. Link is here: https://www.lulu.com/en/us/shop/louis-bruno/come-home-young-one/hardcover/product-pw8q7z.html?page=1&pageSize=4.  His next series, City of Sand, will be available at the end of May 2021.