Over the last month, Resident Evil fans have had the opportunity to learn more about Capcom’s upcoming Resident Evil Village. Resident Evil Village, also known as Resident Evil 8, is set to release on May 7th, 2021. Throughout April, PlayStation gamers had the opportunity to preview the game through two demos. The Resident Evil Village: Village and Castle Demos were only available for a limited time each weekend. This last weekend, on May 1st, 2021, PlayStation, Xbox, and PC gamers had one last opportunity to preview Resident Evil Village. After playing the Resident Evil Village Demos on PlayStation 4, we decided to compare it to the Xbox One version.
Today, you will start to see Resident Evil Village reviews. For those who do not have access to it yet, the Resident Evil Village Demo was a great way to see what is to come. In fact, during the final demo’s run time. Players were able to mod the demo; some mods included Barney, Thomas, and Cassandra. With the game set to release this Friday, we wanted to know which felt better, Xbox One or PlayStation 4? Yes, the Resident Evil Village does come out on PC, Xbox Series X, and PlayStation 5 as well, but we wanted to see how it works on the last generation. The Resident Evil Village Demo definitely took longer to load on the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One compared to their newer counterparts; however, this was to be expected.
The Gameplay
Over the course of the last three weeks, We have played the Resident Evil Village demo a total of seven times. Each week, we attempted to explore the level during the first playthrough. Then any remainder of the time was spent trying to speed run the demo. The Resident Evil Village: Village Demo, allowed players to explore the village. The village seems to be early in the game if not the opening area after the beginning cinematic. Even on the PS4 and Xbox One, the environment is vibrant. Yes, some of the textures aren’t as solid or crisp as their new-gen counterparts, but nothing sticks out like a sore thumb.
Unlike the Resident Evil 2 and 3 Remakes, Resident Evil Village returns to the first-person perspective. The player is reunited with Ethan Winters, the protagonist of Resident Evil 7. Ethan is looking for answers and his missing daughter. The player first arrives at the village and is greeted by an older lady. Now depending on difficulty, the pacing of the game changes a bit. On easy, the player can stroll through the level with ease and not expect any ramifications. On hard, the player feels like they are deprived of resources to an almost unfair amount.
Demo Was Not Enough
In both the Castle and Village demo, the cutscenes and story cinematics felt rather lackluster. Yes, it was exciting to see Lady Dimitrescu and her daughters, but beyond that, there was no wow factor. The demo allows the player to get used to the environment and gives some easy little puzzles to solve. Sadly, the player is rather limited with what they can explore and for how long.
Both the Village and Castle Resident Evil Village Demos had a limited amount of time to complete them. During the first two weeks, the player only had thirty minutes to play the demo. Each demo could be complete in under 6 minutes if rushing through; however, if you wanted to explore the level, you would use up most of your time. Aggravatingly, after completing the demos, a pre-order trailer would play showing additional things that the player should expect in Resident Evil Village. Once the trailer was complete, you would notice that the force trailer ate up a part of your available time to play.
The Resident Evil Village Demos may have been enjoyable to look at and explore, however, the demos were rather linear. They showed us stuff that we already knew about the game, just in a little bit more detail.
Take Away From the Demos
After playing both Resident Evil Village demos, I felt disappointed. My curiosity was peaked but not enough to rush out and buy the game. I get that the demos were broken up into two separate experiences, but why do I have to buy the shotgun in the second demo when I already had it in the first. The demo does accommodate that by giving the player items that they can sell, but if you are playing on hard or with limited time, it feels tedious.
What was easily the most annoying aspect of the demo weekends was the fact that you had such a limited time to play through each demo. When I am looking forward to a game, I want the ability to play through the demo as much as I desire. Beta weekends are better than only having a narrow 8 hrs to play the demo. The fact that the first two demos only allowed for the player to play for 30 minutes was also annoying. The fact that some of the playable demo time was lost with in-game cutscenes and the pre-order trailer was especially frustrating.
The Resident Evil Village demos were smooth and easy to play but felt rather empty. In the village demo, there were not enough enemies to kill and you were kind of locked into the area. The castle demo forced you to explore but there were a lot of dead ends. So it was rather easy to lose demo time. The player could see some of the enemies in the castle as well as the dungeon but left you on a cliffhanger. Sadly, it was not a cliffhanger that I need to find the answer for. They should have ended the demo with a better cliffhanger.
