Despite remaining one of gamings biggest franchises, and spreading its grasp into other areas such as movies and board games, the Resident Evil series has struggled to find its feet on the current generation of consoles. Resident Evil 5 and 6 both received generally positive reviews from the critics and journalists, however both games failed to strike a chord with the majority of gamers, who lambasted their more action oriented approach and called for a return to the survival horror roots of the series.

In the meantime, Resident Evil Revelations was released for the Nintendo 3DS handheld system to relatively little fanfare as the console was still trying to find its feet. Over time though people began to praise Revelations, and cries of it being better than Resident Evil 5 or 6 were obviously heard by Capcom, as they swiftly made a decision to port the game over to home consoles. Many figured this as a cheeky cash grab by the publisher, and thought the game would not stand up to the ‘triple A’ titles of the Xbox 360 and PS3. Thankfully, these fears can be allayed, as Revelations is a tense, taught survival horror that shows the consumer that the Resident Evil series is not dead quite yet.

The game stars you as series favourite Jill Valentine, as you board the ship the Queen Zenobia to track down another recognisable face, Chris Redfield, who has suddenly done a disappearing act. Once you arrive at the ship you begin to sense something is not quite right, as it turns out the bio-terror organisation Veltro has released the T-Abyss virus across the entire ship. So begins a story to track down your missing comrade and once again prevent the world coming to an end via a massive bio-terrorist attack. The story overall is steeped in the typical Resident Evil cliché, but manages to be gripping enough to see you through until the end due to a high level of voice acting and the character of the environment itself.

Being a port of a handheld game, the graphics were never going to be best in class on a home console, however kudos to Capcom for doing their best. The character models are excellent and the environments and enemies, although never spectacular, are solid enough not to break the immersive atmosphere. The Queen Zenobia ship itself is a fantastically claustrophobic setting, with very little room to maneuver and a labyrinth of rooms and corridors which really helps to create a sense of dread not seen in recent Resident Evil titles. In a lot of ways the concessions that had to be made to get the game onto a handheld console are ironically what makes it a better game overall. Rather than having the capability to relentlessly throw enemies at you in the way Resident Evil 6 does, Revelations has to find other ways to make the experience gripping, and doing so brings the series back full circle to the survival horror aspects of the olden days. The ‘Ooze’ you face take plenty of bullets before succumbing and coupled with the fact that ammo is in very short supply and it makes every battle a resource management exercise, which sounds tiresome but in fact gives the encounters a much more tense feel than we have seen in years.

Control wise the game is absolutely great, Revelations introduces a quick item swap and use system that works splendidly and prevents the jarring trudge through inventories that have plagued other Resident Evil games. The lack of sprint function initially frustrated, but once you are onboard the ship you will realise there is no need for it, as you soon learn to slow your pace to a crawl, waiting for the next monstrosity to reveal itself. My only slight issue on the control front is the dodge mechanic, which can prove a bit fiddly on occasion.

So Revelations campaign is a cracking one, but sadly there is not too much else, and this is the main area it falls short to the other Resident Evil games of home consoles. Resident Evil 5’s campaign was significantly longer than Revelations, and Resident Evil 6 had four separate campaigns, each of which was about as long as this one. Both those other games also had competitive multiplayer modes, co-operative campaigns and the extremely addictive mercenaries mode. Revelations only other option after the campaign is an arcade style score attack mode called Raid. This mode does support two player co-op and basically has you playing small samples from the campaign missions, with more frequent and tougher enemies. You can level up, acquire new gear and characters, but overall my gut feeling is that it will not catch on in the same way mercenaries did. It’s fun, just not as fun, in my humble opinion.

However, I can’t be too harsh on a port of a handheld game for being shorter than its home console counterparts. Overall Resident Evil: Revelations is a great return to form for one of Capcom’s biggest franchises. It’s a tense, creepy survival horror game as opposed to the overly macho blast-em-up’s that Resident Evil 5 and 6 turned into. The games proves there is still life in the franchise yet, and hopefully Capcom will realise the value of survival horror once again, so they can make the next gen Resident Evil game we are all crying out for. If you are one of the many who has shunned the series recently, I urge you to give Revelations a try. You never know, it might just win you back…

Resident Evil: Revelations is out now in America and releases tomorrow 24.5.13 in the EU on Xbox 360, PS3, PC, Wii U, and of course is still available on Nintendo 3DS in its original form. You can check out the launch trailer for the home console version below.

© 2013 – 2014, zero1gaming.com. All rights reserved. On republishing this article your must provide a link to this original post