My Experience with Resident Evil 7: Biohazard
Played on: PlayStation 4 and PSVR
Play time so far: 6–7 hours
I could almost feel the humidity in the air condense on my face. The wet leaf litter underfoot steamed, slowly being baked by the hot Louisiana sun breaking through the dead trees that lined my path. I headed up the driveway, at the end lay the Dulvey Estate. According to a mysterious email received days ago, my wife Mia was somewhere within the walls of the run-down plantation, and nothing would stop me finding out what happened to her. Well, nothing but the locked front gate.
I doubled back and took a left. A van lay idle under the shade of the overgrowth; it hadn’t been there long, its occupants were nowhere to be seen. I pushed on, the unease in my mind slowly making room to terror as a hulking figure slowly made its way through the glade. I pursued after him, but he’d vanished. I suddenly felt thousands of eyes staring at me from within the woods and started running. The forest felt like it was closing in on me, twisted branches like bars of a cage I’d willingly stumbled into. My breathing quickened. I turned a corner and was startled by the grotesque horror before me, an arch made of raw and rotting animal parts. Let’s hope I don’t meet the same fate and become part of the landscaping too. I crawled through the hacked limbs and viscera, into an opening made up of small wooden buildings, a smouldering fire in the middle. The door of the dilapidated shack creaked open, and I crept inside. The door slammed behind me and I was enveloped by darkness. Something moved…
I ripped my PSVR headset off in terror and yelled ‘Fuck this shit’ louder than I’d like to admit. My pants were dry, but only just.
Resident Evil is back from the dead and spookier than ever. The long-running franchise was starting to falter with the last few releases abandoning survival-horror elements in favour of a more Call of Duty action-shooter vibe, leaving fans of the originals fuming. Resident Evil was in desperate need of a shake-up and good news, Capcom have delivered. By scaling back the scope of Resident Evil 7’s story and setting Capcom have managed to recapture what made the series great. Gone are the fast-paced action sequences and quick time events that had become the norm for Resident Evil games in recent times. Resident Evil 7 is a slow burn, an ever encroaching darkness that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. The introduction of a number of new gameplay mechanics help modernise the traditional formula too, and while they may not all pay off in full they breathe life back into the long-running series.
Resident Evil’s change to a first person perspective not only accommodates the new VR functionality, it also furthers the immersion for casual players. I no longer feel like I’m just controlling the character, I am the character. This also left me open to genuinely frightening moments when enemies snuck up on me. Not going to lie, I reacted with a yelp a few times.
Resident Evil 7 certainly borrows a lot from other survival-horror games with clear inspiration drawn from The Evil Within and P.T — yet the core DNA is still that of a Resident Evil game. The simple gameplay loop of exploring/puzzle/fight is easy to slip back into and plays to the series strengths. The Tetris-style inventory management system also makes a welcome return. Small items like keys and first aid kits only take up one slot whereas strong weapons like the shotgun require two. The light crafting mechanic introduced adds another layer of strategy with individual items needed to craft both medicine and ammo forcing you to decide if you’re going to rely on replenishing health or brute force in the next section.
The story is simple enough; When Ethan receives a panicked email from his missing wife Mia, he heads to Dulvey, Louisiana to rescue her from the Dulvey Estate and a pack of cannibalistic hicks known as the Baker family. Personally, I would’ve called the cops. It’s refreshing to get away from the usual Umbrella Corp storyline that was becoming ridiculous in the last few entries to the series. The lack of prior knowledge needed makes Resident Evil 7 a brilliant jumping off point for anyone unfamiliar with the franchise.
In my 6 or so hours with the game, I’ve admittedly lost interest in the main story, but I’ve become obsessed with the back story of the Baker family. The Dulvey property is littered with files, photos and letters that trace the origins of the Baker’s descent into insanity which at this point has made the fate of the family seem almost tragic. Of course, this view may change in the second half of the game. The Baker family do occasionally slip into parody — there is some questionable acting at times — but the environmental reminders of their old selves keep the characters grounded. They were a typical family at one point though, and each room is filled with reminders of a peaceful time. Relics of the past like an old football helmet or a baby’s rattle made the house feel real and lived in. Of course, a lot has changed since Jack and Lucas were throwing the pigskin around, and the events of the past have turned the once idyllic homestead into of the creepiest settings I have ever encountered
The smaller scale of Resident Evil 7 allows you to become more intimate with your surroundings. Great care has gone into making the estate feel like a character of its own. The fantastic level design of the main house, surrounding bayou and labyrinth of underground tunnels entice you to explore every inch but feel unsettling enough to keep your heart racing. As you progress through the estate, you’ll obtain keys that will unlock doors passed long ago, making you backtrack at times to explore further. Traversing back to a familiar area lulled me into a false sense of security a number of times but, you can never get comfortable in your surroundings. You walk down a hall you’ve walked down ninety-nine times before, but on the hundredth times, a savage beast breaks through the wall and buries a shovel in your forehead.
Though my encounters with enemies have been sporadic thus far, I’ve found a some of the characters quite hit or miss. The boss battles against the Baker family I’ve completed have been genuinely challenging and terrifying, resulting in many lost limbs for Ethan. The family members will hunt you through their respective areas of the house building up a suffocating tension that hits a crescendo in the final battle. The difficulty spike in these battles have ended in quite a few ‘You Are Dead’ screens popping up, making me take a step back and revaluating my approach The other enemies in the game — the Molded — seem quite lacklustre in comparison. These humanoid ‘zombies’ look like black mould (no shit, Sherlock) and will peel off the wall or smash through the ceiling to nibble on your softer parts. A few bullets to the head deal with them pretty quickly though and even when in packs, I never felt like I wasn’t in control — especially now that I have quite a sizable arsenal at my disposal. I’m only half way through the game, so hope remains that non-boss enemies become more diverse and interesting.
Resident Evil 7 is a bold step forward for virtual reality, being the first full-length AAA title to utilise the technology. I was nervous to see how I would react to being able to walk using the PSVR however I felt no adverse effects. The graphical fidelity certainly took a dip in PSVR but quickly became a non-issue for me as I become lost in my surroundings. The palpable terror felt when a character grabs you, or seeing a shadow flicker in your peripheral is hard to put into words. I’m not going to lie, I’m awful with horror games, and I’ve had to take the PSVR headset off numerous times when things became too ‘real’. According to Capcom, almost 10% of players have at least attempted Resident Evil 7 in VR, with that percentage sure to rise next year when Sony’s PSVR exclusivity ends, allowing PC players to use their Vive or Oculus to play the game. There’s a real interest in full length VR games, and this success will hopefully push other developers to follow suit.
By looking into Resident Evil’s history, Capcom has managed to create a strong entry that paves the way for the future of the franchise. With the Silent Hill in limbo, Resident Evil 7 manages to sate the horror-lust I’ve had growing inside since playing the P.T trailer while having enough new tricks up its sleeve to keep up with a new generation of horror games. Though not perfect — the Molded kinda suck and the puzzles don’t quite flow — Resident Evil 7 encapsulates what made the series a classic while still taking risks, catering to old fans and scaring the living fuck out of new ones.
