Post by Dan-RN on May 12, 2004 17:20:47 GMT -5
Note: This thread was originally on the E3 2004 Board.
A nuclear explosion rocks the city. Buildings fall. Houses are incinerated. The population obliterated. It's the stylistic opening cinematic for Capcom's hugely anticipated "survival horror" sequel Resident Evil 4 and it's also the official goodbye to one of the franchise's longest-running zombie hangouts. That's right. Raccoon City is no more.
When RE4 writer and director Shinji Mikami decides that it's time to redesign a series, he doesn't play around.
Of course, Raccoon City did have it coming. The eerie location, saturated with the walking, flesh-hungry dead, has too long been the aftermath of the Umbrella Corporation's dirty deeds. The US government eventually found out about the city and the experiments contained within and when it did, it didn't hesitate. It set out to find and destroy the evil maker of the T-Virus and it largely succeeded. Which brings us back to that nasty nuke. Kaboom!
Speaking at a private event held just days before E3 2004, RE4 producer Hiroyuki Kobayashi goes over it all again. In this latest addition to the series, the Umbrella Corporation has been destroyed. The enemy is entirely new and just as deadly. There are no zombies in the game. But there is a wide assortment of other dark creatures.
"Six years have passed since that horrendous incident," Leon S. Kennedy narrates as the intro progresses. We notice right away that the cheesy voice work for the character we heard so many months ago in Vegas has been replaced entirely. Kennedy, whose voice is deeper and calmer, sounds every bit as realistic as he looks. "I've received special training via a secret organization working under the direction of the president," he continues. The camera slides back and reveals that two foreign soldiers are chauffeuring the hero to some unseen location. They seem to mock him from the upfront compartment. He doesn't notice.
Leon is deep in thought. He has a big mission ahead of him. The president himself has requested that Kennedy travel to an undisclosed European country and try to rescue his kidnapped daughter. The kidnappers are every bit as mysterious as the once-prominent Umbrella Corporation. Their leader -- if they have one -- has not been revealed. Their demands have not been stated. And before Kennedy has another second to ponder his situation, his car is attacked.
And this about brings us back to the first playable demo of the game. To summarize, Leon finds himself in an old, dusty village in the middle of nowhere, and groups of crazed townsfolk -- armed with everything from pitchforks to knives and chainsaws -- seem intent on slicing him to pieces. We wrote about this same single-level demo back in March, but a number of changes have since been implemented.
In the original demo, Kennedy could only use his binoculars in one spot during one of the cut-sequences. Now the character can use them at any point to zoom in on anything. Chickens now run about the level, adding an extra layer of atmosphere. There are more herb items. Mikami's Watch, a special pick-up in the March demo, is now gone. Oh -- and remember Mr. Chainsaw Man? If he swings his saw into Leon's neck now, he cuts the hero's head clean off in a red eruption of blood. How's that for disturbing? We also noticed that the level is overall generally more polished. It looks cleaner, runs smoother and overall knocks our socks off from a technical standpoint.
The demo still amazes, but it was once again what wasn't playable that has us most excited for what's to come. Capcom showed a brand new RE4 teaser trailer that debuted new play mechanics and never-before-seen areas from the game. The footage clarified the play relationship between Kennedy and the president's daughter, whose name is Ashley. Evidently about halfway through the game, Leon will rescue the kidnapped girl and then he will have to lead her safely out of danger. At that point, as in the Sony PlayStation 2 title Ico, gamers will as Leon actually have to guide Ashley around the environments and protect her from evil creatures and crazed villagers. There's a lot more to it than meets the eye for Ashley is not nearly as strong or as capable as the hero. As a result, players must consider both characters when exploring. For instance, just because Leon can jump out of a window doesn't necessarily mean Ashley can. There will be occasions even when Kennedy will have to catch the president's daughter as she jumps down behind him.
The teaser also showed more new, completely dazzling play scenarios, grotesque graphic elements and story sequences. It appears that Leon's weapons, which now include everything from hand grenades to a sniper rifle and a rocket launcher, do more damage than ever before. Villager body parts explode into bloody pulps quite often. Meanwhile, in one intriguing story cut-scene we saw a group of villagers paddle a small boat out into the lake and unload a group of dead bodies into the water. In another, we saw Leon being choked by a gargantuan-sized bald man with a beard and rippling muscles, one of his eyes not completely functional. In another still, we watched as Leon fight the even bigger Ogre-like creature featured in the original RE4 trailer; as the thing tried to literally squeeze the guts out of the hero (we could see blood squirting from the hero's body), he could use his knife to slash at the monster. On the ground again, players could press L and R at the same time to dodge the enormous monster's swipes. In another scene still, Kennedy fought off hordes of near-zombie-like creatures, some of which wore black priest robes and shot fire. Believe us when we write that these latter foes were incredibly spooky.
Resident Evil 4 does not take place entirely outside. The video showcased to us previewed a giant castle area that Kennedy could explore. Using context-sensitive commands, the character could jump atop dangling chandeliers and then swing across chasms to other levels of the structure. The place looked incredibly large and gothic in design.
A new character was also introduced. His name was not revealed, but we assume he's something of an alley to Kennedy. He's got long, dark hair and talks with an accent. He can twirl a gun like Revolver Ocelot from the Metal Gear Solid franchise. And he doesn't seem to care much about the president's daughter, who may run into bigger troubles than being kidnapped. In one cut-scene, Ashley looks frightened and almost sick. The new character, unsympathetic, turns to Leon and says: "There's supposed to be some kind of symptoms before you turn into one, anyway."
Resident Evil 4 remains one of the most beautiful games we've seen not just on GameCube, but on any console. The gorgeous art style, vividly detailed character models, crisp texture effects, lighting and shadow models, particle system, and animation system all come together for an overall visual presentation that is largely unequaled. Capcom was of course quick to point out that everything shown, but in playable and video form, was running entirely in-game on Nintendo's hardware.
The single-level demo of Resident Evil 4 is playable on the E3 2004 show floor. Which means that, as the new character to the series said at the end of Capcom's video teaser, "it's game time."
But even readers who can't attend E3 can dig into the Resident Evil 4 goodness because IGNcube has posted an incredible new trailer of the game in motion in our media section. Click and be blown away.
Wow. Raccoon City completely demolished. Capcom is serious about changing the direction of the series apparently. The tag team action with Ashley reminds me of RE Zero, but she isn't an equal like in that game. Also, the head coming clean off with the chainsaw man? That leaves much less room for error, but apparently the weapons are stronger, too. I'm psyched about this one. It's number two under Zelda for me.
Source:
cube.ign.com/articles/514/514091p1.html
A nuclear explosion rocks the city. Buildings fall. Houses are incinerated. The population obliterated. It's the stylistic opening cinematic for Capcom's hugely anticipated "survival horror" sequel Resident Evil 4 and it's also the official goodbye to one of the franchise's longest-running zombie hangouts. That's right. Raccoon City is no more.
When RE4 writer and director Shinji Mikami decides that it's time to redesign a series, he doesn't play around.
Of course, Raccoon City did have it coming. The eerie location, saturated with the walking, flesh-hungry dead, has too long been the aftermath of the Umbrella Corporation's dirty deeds. The US government eventually found out about the city and the experiments contained within and when it did, it didn't hesitate. It set out to find and destroy the evil maker of the T-Virus and it largely succeeded. Which brings us back to that nasty nuke. Kaboom!
Speaking at a private event held just days before E3 2004, RE4 producer Hiroyuki Kobayashi goes over it all again. In this latest addition to the series, the Umbrella Corporation has been destroyed. The enemy is entirely new and just as deadly. There are no zombies in the game. But there is a wide assortment of other dark creatures.
"Six years have passed since that horrendous incident," Leon S. Kennedy narrates as the intro progresses. We notice right away that the cheesy voice work for the character we heard so many months ago in Vegas has been replaced entirely. Kennedy, whose voice is deeper and calmer, sounds every bit as realistic as he looks. "I've received special training via a secret organization working under the direction of the president," he continues. The camera slides back and reveals that two foreign soldiers are chauffeuring the hero to some unseen location. They seem to mock him from the upfront compartment. He doesn't notice.
Leon is deep in thought. He has a big mission ahead of him. The president himself has requested that Kennedy travel to an undisclosed European country and try to rescue his kidnapped daughter. The kidnappers are every bit as mysterious as the once-prominent Umbrella Corporation. Their leader -- if they have one -- has not been revealed. Their demands have not been stated. And before Kennedy has another second to ponder his situation, his car is attacked.
And this about brings us back to the first playable demo of the game. To summarize, Leon finds himself in an old, dusty village in the middle of nowhere, and groups of crazed townsfolk -- armed with everything from pitchforks to knives and chainsaws -- seem intent on slicing him to pieces. We wrote about this same single-level demo back in March, but a number of changes have since been implemented.
In the original demo, Kennedy could only use his binoculars in one spot during one of the cut-sequences. Now the character can use them at any point to zoom in on anything. Chickens now run about the level, adding an extra layer of atmosphere. There are more herb items. Mikami's Watch, a special pick-up in the March demo, is now gone. Oh -- and remember Mr. Chainsaw Man? If he swings his saw into Leon's neck now, he cuts the hero's head clean off in a red eruption of blood. How's that for disturbing? We also noticed that the level is overall generally more polished. It looks cleaner, runs smoother and overall knocks our socks off from a technical standpoint.
The demo still amazes, but it was once again what wasn't playable that has us most excited for what's to come. Capcom showed a brand new RE4 teaser trailer that debuted new play mechanics and never-before-seen areas from the game. The footage clarified the play relationship between Kennedy and the president's daughter, whose name is Ashley. Evidently about halfway through the game, Leon will rescue the kidnapped girl and then he will have to lead her safely out of danger. At that point, as in the Sony PlayStation 2 title Ico, gamers will as Leon actually have to guide Ashley around the environments and protect her from evil creatures and crazed villagers. There's a lot more to it than meets the eye for Ashley is not nearly as strong or as capable as the hero. As a result, players must consider both characters when exploring. For instance, just because Leon can jump out of a window doesn't necessarily mean Ashley can. There will be occasions even when Kennedy will have to catch the president's daughter as she jumps down behind him.
The teaser also showed more new, completely dazzling play scenarios, grotesque graphic elements and story sequences. It appears that Leon's weapons, which now include everything from hand grenades to a sniper rifle and a rocket launcher, do more damage than ever before. Villager body parts explode into bloody pulps quite often. Meanwhile, in one intriguing story cut-scene we saw a group of villagers paddle a small boat out into the lake and unload a group of dead bodies into the water. In another, we saw Leon being choked by a gargantuan-sized bald man with a beard and rippling muscles, one of his eyes not completely functional. In another still, we watched as Leon fight the even bigger Ogre-like creature featured in the original RE4 trailer; as the thing tried to literally squeeze the guts out of the hero (we could see blood squirting from the hero's body), he could use his knife to slash at the monster. On the ground again, players could press L and R at the same time to dodge the enormous monster's swipes. In another scene still, Kennedy fought off hordes of near-zombie-like creatures, some of which wore black priest robes and shot fire. Believe us when we write that these latter foes were incredibly spooky.
Resident Evil 4 does not take place entirely outside. The video showcased to us previewed a giant castle area that Kennedy could explore. Using context-sensitive commands, the character could jump atop dangling chandeliers and then swing across chasms to other levels of the structure. The place looked incredibly large and gothic in design.
A new character was also introduced. His name was not revealed, but we assume he's something of an alley to Kennedy. He's got long, dark hair and talks with an accent. He can twirl a gun like Revolver Ocelot from the Metal Gear Solid franchise. And he doesn't seem to care much about the president's daughter, who may run into bigger troubles than being kidnapped. In one cut-scene, Ashley looks frightened and almost sick. The new character, unsympathetic, turns to Leon and says: "There's supposed to be some kind of symptoms before you turn into one, anyway."
Resident Evil 4 remains one of the most beautiful games we've seen not just on GameCube, but on any console. The gorgeous art style, vividly detailed character models, crisp texture effects, lighting and shadow models, particle system, and animation system all come together for an overall visual presentation that is largely unequaled. Capcom was of course quick to point out that everything shown, but in playable and video form, was running entirely in-game on Nintendo's hardware.
The single-level demo of Resident Evil 4 is playable on the E3 2004 show floor. Which means that, as the new character to the series said at the end of Capcom's video teaser, "it's game time."
But even readers who can't attend E3 can dig into the Resident Evil 4 goodness because IGNcube has posted an incredible new trailer of the game in motion in our media section. Click and be blown away.
Wow. Raccoon City completely demolished. Capcom is serious about changing the direction of the series apparently. The tag team action with Ashley reminds me of RE Zero, but she isn't an equal like in that game. Also, the head coming clean off with the chainsaw man? That leaves much less room for error, but apparently the weapons are stronger, too. I'm psyched about this one. It's number two under Zelda for me.
Source:
cube.ign.com/articles/514/514091p1.html
Thanks!