Resident Evil 6 Demo: The Rule of Thirds

After a boring, 8-hour work day, I came home yesterday knowing that the Resident Evil 6 demo was going live. I hopped onto the PlayStation and I found nothing. No Resident Evil 6 Demo to download. WTF, I thought to myself. Eh, it's probably just Sony being Sony and effing something up. I'll play Skyrim instead (yeah, I haven't killed a dragon in months).

So I killed a dragon outside of Riften. Then I looked at my to-do list of quests and thought they all seemed mundane. Pausing, I checked the Internet for any news about Sony not having the RE6 demo (couldn't find any) and I switched to a Skyrim wiki and landed on a page about the Ghostblade. That's what I need, the Ghostblade. So I played until I obtained the Ghostblade.

An hour or two later, with the Ghostblade in my hot little hands, I checked PSN again and the RE6 demo was there. Spooky. So I downloaded it and played it. Here are my thoughts:

Finally, I can set aside all my speculation and muckraking - I have played a demo for Resident Evil 6 and it wasn't that bad. I'll get into more detail below, but I generally enjoyed the appetizer experience contained within the demo. As a preview for all three main campaigns, the demo lets you play as Chris, Leon, and Jake (their partners we're also selectable, but I only played the main characters). Each campaign is different and each character plays differently (we already knew that) but there is wide gulf that separates them, wider then I suspected.

Twenty Minutes of Chris

Band of Bros

No, I'm not abbreviating "brothers" here or alluding to the epic series. This is the BRO GAMER campaign. "Is he always this awesome?" says the rookie BSA moron as Chris Redfield walks away. Yes rookie...Chris is so awesome that he's probably the only one who will survive this mission. This means you’re going to die a horrible death at the hands of zombie hulk.

The running and gunning in Chris's twenty minutes felt exactly like RE5, but slightly faster. Switching weapons has the same intuitive directional pad controls as RE5. Healing was less intuitive until I realized herbs were picked up and compressed into Tic-Tac form. You have to go into your inventory to combine herbs and load them into your Tic-Tac container. The pop-a-health-Tic-Tac button is R2 and you can pig out like fat kid with Pez dispenser (as long as your container is loaded).

I used Chris's pistol more than his automatic weapon; the machine gun hopped around as you fired (I guess that's realism for you). Anyway, I was able to pick off a rocket launcher goon all the way across the map with the pistol as I was killing time while the BSA rookie was planting charges or something. Timed survival seemed to be a common theme. Twenty minutes of Chris's foray into the world of Call of Duty wasn't bad. But I don't know if I can survive the brotastic bullshit for an entire campaign; I played Chris's first because I knew it would be the hardest for me to stomach. And I was right.

Twenty Minutes of Jake

Zombie Tyranitars

Of the three characters, I am the most curious about Jake Muller, the supposed son of Albert Wesker. The demo didn't give away much of Jake's story; he is paired with Sherry Birkin and that can't be for no reason at all.

Jake's gameplay featured the most variety and the most surprising enemies. He comes fully loaded with a pistol, hand-cannon (think elephant gun, stranger), machine gun, sniper rifle, and hand-to-hand. Yes, you have to equip hand-to-hand. Jake's twenty minutes trained me in the ways of melee and close combat of RE6 and that's only because it was the best way to deal with the zombie lizards.

More like zombie tyranitars. Almost every infected enemy crusted over after you defeated them. Some of the crusties then broke apart revealing this new enemy. Sure, I could've wasted all my ammo on the zombie tyranitars, but it was most effective to engage the beasts in hand-to-hand and beat the brains out of them. More satisfying too.

Jake's run felt more familiar then Chris's; it actually felt the most like RE4 when you get onto the island. And I'm okay with that. I can only hope that Jake's story is well hashed out in the full game. After all, he has his father's shoes to fill.

Twenty Minutes of Leon

My Knife and the Ghostblade

I almost played as Leon S. Kennedy first, but I'm glad I didn't; I saved the best for last. Leon's twenty minutes felt like classic Resident Evil crossed with RE4.

I remember when books were used to hide things like keys, emblems, and clues.

The opening cut-scene drew from the first zombie encounter in the mansion back in 1997. Only I didn't actually get to shoot the zombie...cut-scene Leon shot the zombie and he looked cool doing it too. You then assume control of Leon on a college campus with a new flesh-bag partner (who isn't completely worthless) and joining the team again, codec-style is Hunnigan. Yesh!

Leon comes equipped with a pistol and his combat knife. I switched to the combat knife right away because the pistol only had forty bullets. Better conserve ammo, I thought. It was a good feeling, one I've not felt since Code Veronica. The zombies are zombies, occasionally they'll be carrying something that you can snatch away and use against them only once. I used the knife and the melee attacks for Leon's entire twenty minutes. Awesome. But I did notice the new stamina bar, which I drained quickly going all up-close-and-personal with the undead. My partner did help me get out of some tight spots and I had to use grapple quick-time events to get the touchy-feely zombies off me.

Resident Evil 6 now includes decorative urinal cakes.

The demo ended with an awkward quick-time event in a police car looking for the keys as zombies attacked and climbed all over the cruiser. Annoying, but it was tense. Leon's run was definitely my favorite; I might even play it again. I might even use his partner...I forget her name already and I don't feel like googling it.

Two Thirds Satisfied

One Third Worried

That seems to be a good summary of my experiences with the Resident Evil 6 demo. Overall, I was happy with it. Chris's campaign bothers me and it will probably still bother me when I play it in full. However, if I hadn't already pre-ordered Resident Evil 6, this demo would've sealed the deal. I am looking forward to playing the full game on October 2.