Resident Evil 2 Review

 (Originally published to Glitchwave on 10/12/2023)

[Image from igdb.com]

Resident Evil 2

Developer: Capcom

Publisher: Capcom

Genre(s): Survival Horror

Platforms: PS1, N64, PC, Dreamcast

Release Date: January 21, 1998

Despite how groundbreaking the first Resident Evil was in 3D game design and in popularizing the survival horror subgenre, something still wasn’t right about Capcom’s landmark horror creation. But what? What are the early trappings of the Resident Evil franchise endemic to the first release that grants its borderline rough draft reputation? My diagnosis is that all of Resident Evil 1’s elements were a little too uneven. Resident Evil’s series formula is a mix of a moonlit graveyard atmosphere, uncomfortable claustrophobia, and a tongue-in-cheek camp value with a body horror biological infection as its thematic nucleus. All of these attributes were certainly present in the first Resident Evil game, so the game is not so primitive that it predates the established tropes we’ve come to associate with the series. However, like a cocktail, there needs to be a nuanced blend of the ingredients in order to make the drink tasteful, and the first Resident Evil didn’t quite shake and stir them all to coalesced perfection. The atmosphere tottered throughout the Spencer Mansion, and the game added far more than a light splash of campiness. I don’t think I have to remind everyone of that whole “Jill Sandwich” situation because that line seems to stand as the most noteworthy thing from the first game. It should be an indication of how the first Resident Evil has aged, and the disputable king of the horror genre should not take this mockery sitting down. While the first Resident Evil was an early game on the earliest of 3D video game consoles, I do not think the series needed to sit in limbo to finally flourish on an advanced system released subsequently in the near future. The game’s graphics, admittedly as blocky as they were, did not factor into the first game’s follies as much as one would guess. Resident Evil 2, a direct sequel on the same hardware as the first one, proved that all of the other presentational attributes were the valves that needed to be tweaked, and out came one hell of a survival horror experience.

What is the extent of Resident Evil 2’s direct sequel status? Well, the events of Resident Evil 2 occur only two months after those of the first game. The initial source of deviation from the first Resident Evil is that its playable characters have hit the road, both figuratively and literally. Chris and Jill have gone backpacking to Europe to extend their conquest of taking down the international factions of the Umbrella Corporation. The former of the first game’s intrepid zombie hunters apparently forgot to inform any close friends or family members about his overseas adventure like the meathead clod he is, so his little sister Claire is worried sick about him. The anxiety about her older brother’s whereabouts is so severe that Claire rushes to the brink of the new T-Virus zombie contagion running rampant on the streets of Raccoon City, the metropolitan area where the S.T.A.R.S unit was founded. Meanwhile, rookie cop Leon picks the absolute worst day to join the Raccoon City police force, as he is stuck in the city’s precinct as the sole surviving team member of the police department trying to evade his would-be mentors who now want to sink their teeth into his warm flesh. Not even those who joined the Boys in Blue during the LA riots jump-started their careers under circumstances this nonideal. While the new protagonists in this Resident Evil sequel are still stacked with armor and weapons galore, the narrative context of both Leon and Claire being untrained amateurs in the heat of a pandemic evokes a better sense of fear and dread than with the seasoned supersoldiers in the previous game.

The first Resident Evil was rougher than unpaved concrete, so the sequel was ideally ripe and ready to potentially offer a plethora of quality-of-life enhancements like any worthy sequel should. In fact, improving on all of the erroneous aspects of the first Resident Evil’s foundation was so plainly obvious to anyone that not improving upon them would be an act of blatant sabotage on the part of the developers. Fortunately, Capcom did not poke holes in the Resident Evil raft in order to sink it and delivered on what was expected of them. For those of you who were put off by the hazy polygonal blemishes that rendered the visuals of the first game, all Capcom needed was more time with Sony’s debut 3D system to smooth over the jagged edges. The character’s mouths are still unnaturally sewn shut when they talk, but at least the characters uttering the lines of dialogue no longer resemble blurry Stretch Amstrong toys with clothes painted on them. The FMV craze of the mid-90s has thankfully bit the dust, so the cutscenes are now intertwined with the general graphical display. Foregrounds look far more realistic and blend together better for a more cohesive visual look. This improvement is the greatest source of satisfaction for me because the amount of unnaturally bright lights in a number of the Spencer Mansion rooms, namely the foyer, sullied the ominous horror atmosphere at times. Here, all of the foregrounds are lit appropriately throughout. I’m convinced the tedious door-opening sequences that subtly function as loading screens could not have been rectified because it's an intrinsic handicap of the PS1’s hardware, so I’m still stuck suffering through every long-winded door creek to progress through the game. Tank controls persist to further solidify their placement as a mechanical staple of the survival horror genre, and at least the character’s joints have been oiled even if controlling them still carries that clunky robotic stiffness. Other refinements to Resident Evil’s presentation are the zombies flinching upon being shot at like their muscle reflexes haven’t atrophied quite yet, and the pitiful limping the protagonists will do when the zombie bites start to take a toll on their health. These improvements might seem miniscule, but it’s still an integral fraction of Resident Evil 2’s strive for realism. Or, at least, a reasonable standard of realism for an early 3D game on the PS1, in which RE2 certainly surpasses the first entry on that merit. As for the voice acting, it’s not exactly on par with a Hollywood animated feature or anything, but the pronounced emotion in the dialogue with fewer cringe-inducing lines in the script can ensure that the player will be laughing less often at a game that is intended to make them scream (or at least startle them).

But do all of these refined touches make the Resident Evil experience a more frightening one? The consistent array of dimly lit corridors evokes a fittingly eerie aura, but I caught myself basking in the spooky glow rather than being in a constant state of tension. Really, I believe everyone understands that the monsters that roam around the horrid halls are what cause feelings of terror in anyone playing Resident Evil. Zombies are the supernatural haunt synonymous with the series, but are they really all that terrifying? Their abundant numbers in close quarters and the methods of strategy in the game implore the player to consider conserving the scant resources almost making facing them like a game of chess, and they’re the pawns to navigate around on the board. Other enemy types in the first game were momentary fodder like the crows and wasps, with a few zombie dogs sprinkled in to increase the beat of Chris or Jill’s pulses. RE2 introduces a relatively common enemy type that is liable to trigger a panic attack: the infamous lickers. All previous Resident Evil enemies resemble creatures with realistic biology, albeit in mangled and deranged interpretations, but the lickers are borderline Lovecraftian. They look as if a scientist merged their human form with a frog (a Brundlefrog) and the process removed their skin, pronouncing the muscular and nervous systems of the body and amplifying the physical brain matter. The adhesive properties of their webbed feet allow them to climb and stick to walls and ceilings, which is where Leon shockingly encounters the first one of many early on in the game. From this angle, they can lash their jump rope-length tongues at Leon and Claire like a whip, and tear them to shreds with their webbed claws when situated on the ground floor. The lethargic hobbling of the zombies allows them to make a strategized decision on whether or not to engage with them, but the swift rabidness of the lickers will almost trigger an involuntary reaction to fire their weapons out of fright. Capcom has crafted a Resident Evil monster worthy of soiling one’s pants over, and they crawl all over the game’s setting.

Given that Leon and Claire are trapped in the police precinct, the main police station building serves as the primary setting. Raccoon City’s domain of righteous order is the Spencer Mansion equivalent for RE2, a layered superstructure whose locked rooms are to be unraveled as the player progresses through its vacant hallways. While the police station is atmospherically consistent and more accessibly designed than the last major enclosed setting, it’s ultimately inferior to the Spencer Mansion on a conceptual level. A decrepit old mansion is the perfect place for a horror game that revels in widespread quasi non-linearity and utility-gated progression. The Spencer Mansion is such an ideal setting that the series teetered on peaking with it at the series debut, so any sequel would have to fire on all cylinders to meet it at eye level. Sadly, I don’t think the police station accomplishes this. Something about the inherent domesticity of this public building doesn’t exude the same bewitching ambiance. Only a few days prior to the outbreak, this was a place of business operated by a group of average joes, shoveling a truckload of coffee and donuts in and out of the place as frequently as the flow of paperwork. The prevailing tone of the empty facility is a dismal one, lamenting the collapse of organized justice with the shocking sense of how sudden it happened. It simply doesn’t make sense for this establishment to mirror the design of the private Spencer Mansion estate but oh boy, do the developers attempt to turn this molehill into a mountain. According to lore pieces, the building was once an extravagant art exhibit, explaining the ostentatious decor and winding, multistoried design. Still, why does the building retain the architectural qualities of a museum years after it shifted into something completely different? Wouldn’t the stained glass windows and goddess statue in the foyer be a little distracting? I’m surprised the latter of the police station setpieces isn’t covered in beads. The game could arguably still skate by under the pretense that Leon and Claire are unfamiliar with the station’s layout, but it can never match the esotericism of excavating a Gothic manor. Besides finding the poker keys and chess piece plugs, the police station also doesn’t offer too many engaging puzzles that inhibit progression either.

Everything else in Resident Evil 2 gets a little complicated. The player still has the choice between two characters with their own unique attributes, but the decision of which character to play affects a grander scheme of things rather than a relative difficulty curve and a different arsenal. RE2 is divided into two discs and depending on who the player picks to play on the first one, the second campaign on the next disc will involve the shelved other character. Leon or Claire will not swap the onus of chief zombie slayer due to one’s fatal demise or throwing in the towel; rather, the opposite character’s campaign is a “B scenario” that occurs in conjunction with the events that took place in the previous story. It rounds out the entirety of RE2’s narrative with a Rashomon-esque double perspective, but the results will still vary beyond flipping the two sides of the RE2 coin. The events of Claire’s story will be altered if completed second, and vice versa with Leon’s. Apparently, the canon route is Claire’s campaign first with Leon’s following soon after. So, of course, my lack of intuition led me to do the opposite. Even though it’s not the “proper” order of the RE2 narrative, it's the only sequence of events I can use to divulge the game’s story, so shoot me.

I did not favor Leon over Claire because of our mutual Y chromosome, nor did I assume that he'd be more capable against the zombie outbreak because he possesses this stark male signifier. I chose Leon because growing up in the 2000s one gaming generation after RE2’s release, he was The Fonz of Resident Evil characters thanks to his successive protagonist role in a future title of the series. I was interested in seeing Leon’s humble origins as a junior varsity monster killer, a leopard before he got his spots scenario. Or, in this context, the time before Mr. Cool guy who suplexes mutants got his groove. In Resident Evil 2, it amuses me that Leon is a bit of a dork, and his police uniform is but a small factor in his dorkiness. Or, at least this is the case for the actual physical blue garb he wears. A bright-eyed Leon S. Kennedy exemplifies all that the badge stands for, or at least it does for the endearingly naive types. Leon’s soul and sense of justice have not been adulterated by corruption because it’s his first rodeo as an officer, so he approaches the unfortunate situation he’s been catapulted into with valor and conviction. Frankly, it’s adorable. Leon’s unique weapons in his arsenal are a shotgun and a magnum, two heavy-duty firearms from the first game that will effectively blow through the undead as efficiently as they always have. Somehow, I think Leon’s determination and police training have made him well-equipped for this dilemma, for his campaign is actually the smoother of the two.

I could’ve begun RE2 with Claire under the assumption that her campaign would be the easier one because this was the case for Jill in the first game. Capcom evidently changed their chauvinistic ways and proved me dead wrong. Considering that Claire has no combat training besides what rubs off from her brother, I should’ve known that she’d be a delicate little flower. To me, it seems sensible to play her campaign after becoming acclimated to the game through Leon’s, for she faces the brunt of the T-Virus contagion and its horrific spawn. Do not make the same mistake as I did and take the machine gun as Leon, thinking that it would be of no consequence for Claire. Even if Leon fails to consider Claire’s livelihood, she’s still armed with the high-caliber explosive weapons from the first game such as the grenade launcher along with the Spark Shot pistol to subdue the monsters. All these perks barely make a difference when an indestructible, trenchcoat-wearing enemy referred to as “Mr. X” decides to wreak havoc solely in Claire’s campaign, and the lighter and frailer of the two playable protagonists is the one to contend with his hulking invincibility, naturally. There is nothing wrong with offering a substantial challenge, but I shudder to think about the amount of people who unknowingly chose Claire first. All I’m saying is to let the buyer beware.

Besides the varying differences in weapons and barrage of monsters, the supporting characters unique to both campaigns are the greatest source of divergence in RE2’s narrative. In Leon’s campaign, he encounters Ada Wong, the seductive spy who is looking for her boyfriend John, who is a chief researcher for an Umbrella laboratory. When Leon descends down to the sewers beneath the police station, Leon and Ada work side by side together to find her estranged lover with a budding sexual tension between them. At times, the player gets the chance to play as Ada, who is armed with a pistol and a modest amount of bullet rounds to aid her in the brief section in the sewer plant. Mirroring the same accompaniment on the other side of the RE2 spectrum is Sherry Birkin, a little towheaded girl whom Claire feels obligated to help find sanctuary away from the zombie scourge. Sherry runs solo in the same section as Ada but must scurry away from the infected undead that roam about for she is but an unarmed prepubescent girl who is half their size. Her dynamic with Claire is a sisterly one where the older Claire will fend off all that could harm Sherry with strong opposition. The character that converges with both stories when the two (four) characters reach the underground laboratory is Annette Birkin, a virologist working for Umbrella and Sherry’s mother. She’s rather truculent with Leon and Ada as she suspects the latter is a spy and attempts to quash her meddling with Umbrella operations by shooting her dead. With Sherry and Claire, on the other hand, she worries greatly for her daughter’s well-being and begs Claire to find her daughter a vaccine on the likelihood that she’s been infected with the virus her husband formulated. I was surprised to see a lovingly maternal side of Annette after acting psychotic in Leon’s story. RE2 takes the concept of supporting characters for each playable character seen in the first game. It fleshes out their roles through more direct interactivity, something that these secondary roles need in order to have more relevance to the narrative.

After traversing through the police station, I was beginning to fret that RE2 omitted boss battles completely. The gargantuan animals that served as roadblocks in the Spencer Mansion were only slightly perturbing, but I still appreciated that something served as an incentive to conserve my ammunition. Why would you consider avoiding all the zombies if not for the possibility of facing off against a durable beast on the horizon? Thankfully, my concerns were quelled in the latter half of Leon’s campaign, and RE2 has two bosses. Well, one mutant creature in the sewers and once recurring one has a significant role in the narrative. William Birkin: father of Sherry, loving husband to Anette, and head researcher for the T-Virus, has seen better days. While he played an integral role in the contagion that spurred the zombie pandemonium, his claim to fame is the “G” Virus, an even more potent biological weapon that Umbrella is foolishly trying to cultivate because they learned nothing from their previous mistakes. Before the evil corporation usurped his work, William injected himself with his creation which caused a striking mutation to the point of an unrecognizable superbeast. His first encounter where he summons his parasitic bugs to infest the investigative journalist, Ben, resulting in the creepy crawlies bursting through his chest like a face hugger from Alien, is the most horrific display of gore seen in the series thus far. He presents himself as a formidable threat capable of great harm, making him a horrifying beast. William is a burly foe that requires relinquishing every bullet and explosive our heroes have while he’s still relatively humanlike, but his final form is so ghastly that it would make HP Lovecraft beam with pride. William’s final form can only be unlocked if the player finishes both Leon and Claire’s campaigns, and the promise of a gruesome and sad character arc with William should be enough reason to commit to the time.

Resident Evil 2 is one game split in two, and even that logical statement could be fervently argued against. Many could voice the opinion that the two halves of Leon and Claire could’ve been melded together and that retreading the same areas as either character for a second time is shameless padding. What these people fail to realize is that Capcom already did this with Chris and Jill in the first game, with the same slight deviations in character build and sequential progression beats. The difference is that there was no real motive to play as either Jill or Chris after playing as the one of first choosing, and maybe the first game would’ve benefited from a second playthrough after all. Admittedly, I did grow tired of the police precinct setting and its lackluster puzzles, but I grew to appreciate Leon’s campaign I completed first after finishing Claire’s. The underwhelmed feeling that resonated with me after only one campaign was relieved because the game exfoliated through Claire’s differing perspective, even if it was through the same areas. The decision turned out to be the ideal method of letting Resident Evil 2 blossom, and it resulted in something grander than the first game by default. Even if Resident Evil 2 drags, one still can't deny its objective quality compared to the first game. With better focus, presentation, gameplay, and a more ambitious narrative, Resident Evil 2 is finally where gaming’s most celebrated survival horror franchise earned its title.