Resident Evil 4 2023 PC Review

Resident Evil 4 has recently had itself the remake treatment that Capcom has been slowly rolling out to the RE franchise, dropping the name Remake and instead keeping the original title, confusing many search engines and game categories. Remaking in the same light as RE2 and RE3, as RE1 was much different, Resident Evil 4 feels the closest to its original counterpart in both camera and action. How has Capcom done with this remake overall, though?

For most purposes, I will refer to this entry as the Resident Evil 4 Remake or RE4R.

Ashley Is No Longer a Rat

The story of Resident Evil 4 pretty much follows the original to a T, a fantastic quality found in most of the RE remakes thus far when compared to other titles that claim to be a “remake”. Leon has been taken in by the government, either for knowing too much, or to use his skills in areas that would benefit the country the most. Trained for 6 years in the special services, Leon takes on the mission of a lifetime, or at least his second.

With the president’s daughter being kidnapped, Leon is sent in, lone-wolf style because how else will he brood, to find and bring back the target, Ashley Graham. Deep within a rural and countryside part of Spain, Leon throws away normal currency for Pesetas, a somewhat out-of-date currency for the time period, and the inventory box for an attache case to see him through it all.

Leon will move through three separate “maps” in Resident Evil 4, while mostly intact from the original release they have seen some expansions and revamps. Sorry to say, like RE2 and 3, many areas and bosses have been cut. You won’t see Leon running from boulders, no cable car rides, no laser room of death, nor Ada’s side campaign among other things. Ashley also has a reduced area to move around in.

With all the removals, and the higher focus placed on backtracking and undertaking challenges, your first run of Resident Evil 4 will last up to 20 hours. My first blind run took me just under 20, but that was with doing all of the merchant’s tasks and doing plenty of sightseeing. If you just want to experience the story you can get it done in around 15 hours, with a challenge for under 8.

When it comes to replayability, I would say this title sits somewhere between RE2 and 3. There aren’t any coins to increase your damage and whatnot that was found in RE3, but you can still get the unlimited weapons to speed through another run. Alongside that, you can unlock several outfits and accessories for the two main characters. For completionists and collectors, there is also a plethora of in-game models and concept art to unlock.

Leon, I Require Cheese

Operating almost the same as the original, Resident Evil 4 is a free-movement third-person survival horror game with an emphasis on “The Thing” style monsters and mutations. Shooting enemies in the head for more damage, attacking red weak spots, or hitting the legs to stumble foes for a follow-up kick and suplex. If you played Resident Evil 4 in the past, you know most of what this game has to offer.

Once you get Ashley out of her prison, she’ll tag along with you for a good portion of the game. With a cooperative action, she can unlock a lot of doors you couldn’t get past before, mostly awarding treasure and collectables, meaning she isn’t “required” to complete the game past two instances, as well as, you know, rescuing her is your mission.

New additions and changes to the gameplay are varied, though the first you’ll see is the knife, it now has durability. With the durability, the knife can now be used to parry and block attacks, perfect parries allowing you to do your melee attacks, and stealth kill foes from behind. You can also break out of grapples similar to RE2 with a knife stab.

Each new style of use of the knife requires a sacrifice of its durability, acting as a balance to its new mechanics. You can only stealth kill four or so enemies before it breaks, just as you can only parry attacks so many times for the same effect. Perfect parries take no durability, so a knife plus kick run is possible except for bosses on a New Game file. Your knife can be repaired at the merchant and can be upgraded like other weapons.

I was annoyed at the knife changes, to begin with, a fan’s hatred of change trying to ruin a new experience. However, towards the mid to late game, I enjoyed the parrying systems that were introduced. It was still a pet peeve to have to repair my knife or keep some spares on hand, but in the end, I felt it was a good change to keep the speed of the gameplay going.

Another new addition is that of the bolt thrower, basically, a crossbow that can break the economy of a run if you are accurate. Shooting bolts into an enemy, the floor, or low on a wall, allows you to retrieve the bolts for reuse infinitely. However, if you shoot off the map or too high, you cannot get them back. Using these to stagger a foe with 1-3 shots in the legs, or a headshot, lines you up nicely for a melee attack.

The aspects of “survival” are highly diminished with this weapon, if they weren’t already due to the melee systems found in the earlier game combined with the infinite knife. After getting the bolt thrower, I found I only scrambled for ammo after boss fights or in ambush situations where I was in tight spaces.

Talking about the survival parts of this game, for those who haven’t played, Resident Evil 4has a set amount of loot in the world for you to gather. Crates and barrels contain a random drop of ammo for the different types of guns, herbs for healing, and money to spend at the merchant. When everything is considered, you’ll be fine gathering items for your situation. Unlike RE1 or Zero, you won’t often find yourself in a spot where you’re dying of thirst for ammo.

When it comes to remakes, Resident Evil 4 feels the closest to its original counterpart. A real “graphical upgrade” sort of remake. While a lot of content was removed or changed to fit a modern era, with jokes removed completely, or silly segments replaced with the aim of making the game more “serious”, Resident Evil 4 at least plays like the original without any dire consequences on its storyline.

6 Years of Special Remaking Training

With the graphical upgrades, so does the remake update its suite of musical tracks. Instead of high-energy, guitar riffs, and electric slides, Resident Evil 4 keeps to a mellow and foreboding soundtrack. You’ll find that most tunes are set to flow with the atmosphere and ambience, rather than be at the forefront of your mind while playing. It is very fitting to where you’ll find yourself, though sadly only leave five or so songs to be memorable.

The best tracks are the last bosses, by far, plus the famous typewriter and save room theme that is prevalent throughout the series with slight changes here or there. Of course, the best track is given to the best character in this game, Mike. Five out of twenty-six isn’t a bad ratio though.

Difficulty is a hard thing to pin down in this title, as in many other Resident Evil games. It will be dependent on your RNG if an enemy is moving slow or fast, as well as the drops from both foes and boxes. I would say it keeps a general incline in harshness, however, the annoying adaptive difficulties found in RE2 and 3 are still present, even if it is harder to notice than in those two titles.

First occurrences of enemy types will almost always be stronger than any that follow, with some boss-type scenarios turning into casual foes later down the line. Many enemies have weaknesses, some of which are explained in intel around the levels, while others are revealed in challenges and achievement descriptions or kept from the original release.

When it comes to a pure experience concerning Resident Evil 4, the remake is a shaky ride. You can find laundry lists of removed content online, though many can be forgotten due to the Mandela effect. However, memorable and meme-able scenes are hard to hide away.

Many fans of the series hated the QTEs that were constant in the original, while others relished their interactions with cutscenes. Similarly, the quirky and silly dialogue, Codec-styled conversations and subsequent hacking of your communications, jokes, one-liners, insane parkour, and more are all gone from this remake. There are a handful of one-liners, but most of the memorable ones are gone.

With a serious tone, as much as you can have with non-zombies, mutations, and cult-like societies, the remake seems as if it wants to immerse you in its world further than before. However, with many removals, such as any focus on Ada as she only appears three times, Luis, and Ashley, it can feel like it’s just the Leon show with things happening in the background.

This lack of presence is also felt with Saddler and Salazar, among other villains and heroes found within the title. You don’t really come to hate or love them too easily, outside of the sparse time they are on the screen. I think Salazar is only shown for 10 or so minutes in total, with Saddler getting close to maybe a half hour. Without a villain, what are you fighting against? I feel like we should have had at least an extra hour to delve into these characters outside of the intel files you’d find in the levels.

With the hacking of the codec in the original, Salazar had so many memorable lines and moments to put him into the spotlight of “This guy needs to die”. Now, we have a number of scenes you can count on one hand, and then you fight him. There’s little buildup aside from what his cronies do to you.

When it comes to Ada, her underutilization feels rather jagged and bizarre. There is no discussion between her and Leon about what happened in Racoon City, what was real and what was fake. The change in actress I found was quite well-hidden, if not for a few lines where it was clear she was different. Uninterested, work-focused, and teasing as always, Ada doesn’t show a lot of emotion in this release when compared to RE2R.

Now, Capcom loves their money, so it is a sure-fire bet that we’ll see Ada’s assignment, Ashley’s segments, and more in the form of DLC. The Mercenaries mode has already been released as free DLC. But the fact that these other portions could potentially be paid for means that we’d be paying extra for stuff we’d expect in the full release.

There’s already the scummy practice of pay-to-speed-up with paying £8 for upgrade tickets for getting exclusive upgrades for your weapons. We’ll just have to hope that the story that was in the original isn’t locked behind a paywall. The main game is only £50, so a bit cheaper than new releases nowadays, so some consumers could see that as a balancing act with the potentially paid-for story.

All-in-all, I would say this is within the higher echelon of remakes in recent years. No drastic changes to the story, outside of some portions being removed. No drastic changes to the environments and enemies, outside of removing U3 and its area, the second Verdugo, and some others. And no drastic changes to the overall gameplay outside of knife durability and the bolt thrower. However, adding all the removals together does create quite an upsetting list.

Some fans may find these changes too much for their liking, which is totally fine, while I was ok with most as an avid fan of the whole series. The corny overtones being dialled down to a two out of eleven was a bit jarring at first, and I did find myself missing the Codec calls, but it was “fine” for me. I did find that at the end, a bit too much was taken out, though we shall see down the line what is added to the game.

Overall, Resident Evil 4 (2023) gets an 8/10. The gameplay is engaging and smooth throughout, as well as keeping to the original very closely. Graphics have seen a major overhaul with faithful renditions of previous locations and music tracks. The tone is vastly different whilst still keeping a lot of what we have come to expect from the remake franchise. Avid fans may feel a bit too much is missing, while others will enjoy the changes made to the game.

Platforms PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X and Series S, Microsoft Windows

Reviewed on PC

Enjoy the review? want to read more of our reviews? then click right here to be whisked away to the realm of our opinions.