A game that's gotten a ton of attention since its announcement, Resident Evil: Revelations boasts not only some of the highest production values we've yet seen on the 3DS, but it promised a return to the "survival horror" style of gameplay, which we saw less of in Resident Evil 4 and then almost none of in part 5. Today, Capcom has released a downloadable demo of the game to the 3DS Shop channel, and after giving it a couple spins, I'm ready to leave my impressions.
First and foremost, this is definitely the prettiest-looking 3DS game we've seen yet. At a glance, the visuals look like a 360 game's, though once you start playing you can definitely notice some graniness and a bit of roughness to the visual presentation (jaggies) that make it not quite on that level. There are even some lengthy load times, which boggles my mind, since I didn't even think cartridges needed to load. Still, make no mistake, this is a great-looking game and the atmosphere's top notch. From the moment Jill wakes up in a bed onboard a dark cruise ship, the "survival horror" atmosphere is in full effect. This feels very much like the first few Resident Evil games, with a very palpable sense of intensity (due to a great soundtrack and subtle atmospherics) as you venture through the ship, occasionally seeing (and even being surprised by) some pretty nasty enemies.
The game uses a control scheme similar to Resident Evils 4 and 5, which means that moving and shooting at the same time isn't an option, but since you're no longer being surrounded by hordes of enemies at once, this makes much more sense here than it did in RE5. It all works fine, though the difference between using a weapon and a subweapon and switching between the two definitely carries a bit of a learning curve. Using herbs to recover your HP, as is traditional for the series, is now simply mapped to the A-button, which makes it too easy to use them by accident.
These flaws aside, though, this is a pretty fun demo. If you go after every enemy you see, you'll run out of bullets, so knowing when to fight and when to run is an important part of surviving the demo. If you die, it's over, so I definitely don't recommend fighting unless you have no other choice. The demo isn't too long either way, though a Hard mode is unlocked if you successfully manage to beat it.
All in all, I'm excited by what I've played. This definitely feels like old school Resident Evil with some new school twists, and the 3D visuals make the vibrant environments pop. The menu interface seems a little confusing right now and there are some long load times (!?) but this is looking like a game 3DS owners should definitely be on the lookout for.
Give the demo a shot to see what you think.
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