Nintendo DS NintendoSpin.com / Reviews / Resident Evil: Deadly Silence

Posted on July 24th, 2007 - 1797 Reads

Rated Mature Resident Evil: Deadly Silence Nintendo DS Review

-- Written by Clark Nielsen



 With Resident Evil DS, Capcom has essentially taken the Playstation original and squeezed it onto a smaller screen. While some polish has been sacrificed--character models are a bit jaggy--it's an impressive feat to see this running on the DS. A live-action introduction and a good amount of voice acting (both incredibly cheesy, but still...) are things you just don't expect on Nintendo's little handheld. In the confines of a smaller screen, however, Resident Evil loses much of its scare power. Zombie dogs no bigger than your stylus just aren't that intimidating, though the game still manages to effectively create the atmosphere of a moody, monster-ridden mansion.

And that's what has always made Resident Evil so intriguing. The mansion you find yourself trapped in is spooky as hell (ideally). Zombies wander the hallways, gruesome dogs jump through windows, and giant spiders fall from the ceiling. It feels real, because, once you dispose of a monster, it doesn't come back. So if you've wiped out all the zombies thus far, you can freely move between rooms as you try to solve puzzles to open new doors. But you always have that sinking feeling more zombies are going to pop up at any minute. And it is advised not to kill everything you come across, anyway. Ammo for your handgun, shotgun, or even bazooka is hard to come by, meaning sometimes it's better to just run past a zombie than to waste bullets on it.

Health, in the form of medicinal herbs, is also sparse. This means every confrontation with a monster has to count, because you can't afford for them to hurt you. Thanks to some rascally camera angles and placements of zombies, however, you'll often find yourself nabbed by a creature when you had little or no time to defend yourself. These moments are supposed to scare you, but they'll probably end up just making you mad. Because save points are just as spread out as health, you can't just hit reset thinking, "Okay, this time I'm ready," without losing a half hour's work. Another grieving point to the save system is that you can only save at a typewriter if you have an ink ribbon on hand. There are enough ink ribbons to let you save maybe 20 times or so, but it's nerve-racking to think that every time you save your game, you eliminate the chance of saving it when you really, really need it. Cautious gamers who like to save a lot will be flustered.

It's always handy to carry ink ribbon with you, but that takes up one slot of your precious inventory. Depending on which character you chose to play as, you only have six or eight inventory slots. Carrying a handgun, handgun bullets, a shotgun, shotgun bullets, and ink ribbon leaves very little room for herbs or other useful objects you may find. Some rooms have a chest in them where you can universally store your items, but these chests are rather inconvenient. Some puzzles will have you needlessly running all over the mansion, discarding items one at a time to make room for new keys and weapons... one at a time.

Granted, these annoyances add to the intensity of the game, putting the whole "survival horror" label into perspective. That's well and all, if you can stomach that kind of gameplay, but Resident Evil's biggest shortcoming is its method of control. Pressing up on the D-pad doesn't always mean your character is going to move towards the top of the screen. Movement is relational from your character's perspective, so pressing up makes him/her walk forward, even if they are facing towards you. This is incredibly confusing and awkward, particularly since the camera angle changes so much. These controls are why I could never get into Resident Evil before, and it's upsetting that Capcom didn't bother to fix them for this remake.

If you've played Resident Evil before, though, this probably doesn't matter to you. Returning RE fans will be the ones who get the most out of this game. But then, you've already seen all this game can offer. Okay, so there is a Rebirth mode that alters the classic formula with some DS specifics. Entering certain rooms will transform the game into a brief first-person hack-and-slash. Treasure chests require solving touch-based puzzles. There is even an instance where you have to perform CPR by blowing into the mic. These DS add-ons may turn off hardcore gamers, but they don't feel as out of place as they sound, and they are kind of clever. If the DS has done anything remarkably good for Resident Evil, though, it's the map on the top screen. Having that always on is so useful.

Final Comments:
Resident Evil DS does a fine job of translating the original game to a graphically underpowered portable system. It looks good and plays just like the home console version. But that's not such a good thing. Resident Evil has always bothered me with its clunky controls, cheap scares, and restrictive options. These annoyances tended to play "second fiddle" on the big screen, where the mansion was more about being edgy and creepy than about being intuitive to play. While that atmosphere still leaks into the DS game, the other problems are much more apparent in smaller form. If you've never played Resident Evil before, the DS is probably the worst way to go. Resident Evil: Deadly Silence is strictly for established fans.

Recent Reviews

Page generated in 0.00911 seconds; 6 queries executed. Copyright © 1999 - 2007 Jesse MacVicar - All Rights Reserved.

Partners - Creative Uncut - Codename Revolution - Nintendo Wii News - PlayStation 3 - Nintendo Gamenet