I’m enjoying RE5 but it’s an inherently flawed game that is marred primarily by the developer’s unwillingness to evolve the franchise in obvious and meaningful ways. The lack of full analog support, the inability to strafe or even move while shooting, and the general stiffness of the character are all conventions from RE4 that needed to be adjusted and tweaked to maximize the playability of the game. I reject the notion that RE5 is a “different” kind of action game because ultimately, adding in a few changes would have made the solid game play infinitely better.

RE5 is good but it’s safe and in that sense it’s also a bit mundane and redundant. After five years I guess I expected more than just an HD port of RE4 with some sloppy co-op.

@Bill,
I have to agree. Its very noticeable that the Enemy AI will purposely stop in front of you and wait before attacking as a design choice to compensate for the control limitations.
They should take a look at Dead Space, as far as Controls and how a third person horror game should handle, EA got it perfectly right.

That said, there are so many subtle yet innovative techniques that are prominent in RE5. Specifically with the Uroburos Effects. They have some sort of dynamic Mesh influence shapes that are essentially Deformers.

I disagree with you guys concerning the controls. You're actually more maneuverable in RE5 than in Dead Space. Dead Space allows you to walk slowly and shoot, but it does not allow you to 180 turn, nor does it have any decent melee attacks to make distance for yourself. Those two things alone make RE5 maneuverability a lot better than Dead Space.

RE5 may have some enemies slow down when near you, but the majority of them do not, only the zombies do it. Some enemies like the lickers, reapers, zombies with the stuff coming out of their head, zombies with long weapons, and bosses don't hold back when within range. To be totally honest the slowing down of the zombies makes them harder to avoid. For instance in DS I know an enemy is going to just rush me so as long as I turn slightly and run in a different direction that enemy will just slash right past me (makes the game easy mode to the point where I could beat it without being hit without much practice), but in RE5 it varies. Some enemies (ones with the long type weapons) will just rush (like DS) while others will slow down to calculate their attack. This 2 layer attack pattern of enemies creates a trap where if you try to avoid the long weapon bum rusher zombie the second layer of slow and calculating zombie will attack and hit you or grab you. You're left having to make the correct shooting decisions or 180 turning, it is much more suspenseful than that of DS's - turn slightly run to avoid every enemy in the game. I feel people jump to these conclusions on gameplay regarding RE5 because of what they think third person shooter games should be, and not being able to move while shooting clouds their view of the whole picture.

RE5 has a lot more replay value as well due to the more interesting locations, co-op, and mercenaries game. When I look at both RE5 and Dead Space, this generations two competing titles, I feel RE5 is still the best game of its kind. Dead Space 2 could potentially take the crown if it fixes some of the problems it had (same locations over and over, horrible weapons (first weapon, plasma cutter was the best gun in the game, no extras (Capcom has always added extras to RE games))).

I always hear about people complaining about the controls, but the #1 gripe I have on RE5 is the AI that has to be with you the entire game. I think Capcom should have done something where a co-op partner could jump in at any time as a character, but if playing solo that character wasn't with you unless needed/called for. They could have come up with some story element that made sense in this respect and it wouldn't have had any effect on the single player game and would have still allowed co-op like it has.

I respect Takeuchi for what he tried to achieve with RE5, but in all honesty this game really needed the direction of Mikami.

B N,

Special moves aside, I'm with others on DS's controls.

For reference, on the PC version of Dead Space, I can whip around to any point, weather it's a 180, or even a full circle in an instance, and this is in aim-mode which the developers intentionally slowed down. I can do this, because I have the game's vsync forced to that of my monitor, which is 60hz, and I use a mouse that has on the fly DPI switching.

When it comes to survival horror games, EA seems to have their direction straight, so on that tid-bit alone, I have much more respect for their entry into this genre than Capcom's latest action game.