Morbid is good

My drooling can finally come to an end. I have been spoiling myself by downloading small movies of the game play and stills on various websites, and the graphics looked and are quite impressive. I bought this game knowing full well that I would love it and I wasn't disappointed. It came with 2 disks and a T-shirt and the price was right. (T-shirts, good!)

The game starts off with a nice FMV setting up the mood for the game. You are en-route to find out what happened to various members of the S.T.A.R.S unit as they have failed to report back. As at this point all you see is through the nightvision goggles through various S.T.A.R.S members whom come across a downed S.T.A.R.S chopper. As the S.T.A.R.S member that came across a corpse of the pilot, he gets scared and is then attacked by several zombie dogs. As the screaming and growls continue, the last thing you see is the blood splatter on the goggles before it goes to Jill and Chris. When they turn around, they see the nice little doggies feasting on their fallen comrade.

As the camera zooms onto the feasting dogs, you see them tearing flesh off and drool dripping off their mouth, giving you the chance to look at the detailed lacerated bodies dogs. When the lead dog spots the other S.T.A.R.S members, he gives chase. Jill starts to fire her pistol then runs out of ammo. Frozen with fear as the lead dog lunges for her, Chris shoots it with his gun, then they continue to run through the forest into a huge mansion while the dogs continue the chase.

Once inside the mansion, Chris has gone missing, Weskar (the head member of the S.T.A.R.S team) tells you and Barry to investigate, this is where you first encounter a zombie. As another FMV kicks in, you see the zombie feasting on a corpse. You actually see the hunks of flesh being taken off the body and blood dripping from the mouth of the decomposing zombie. As you run away to meet up with Barry once again, this is where the game play takes place.

With that said, lets take a break from the details and start off with the control; A-investigate, fire weapon when ready and select inventory, B-run and cancel, C-rotate character 180º, X-not used, Y-inventory, Z-call up map, R-weapon ready, L-defensive weapon or to push off attacker. The control scheme seems to meet with the button layout of the cube controller, it sometime seems somewhat tight, but that only happens when the angle changes.

The sound is very typical of Res evil only with a little more detail. When something bad is about to happen, the "scary" music kicks in. When you are walking in water, you hear the sploosh. When you walk on the ground outside, you can hear the pebbles underneath your feet. When walking on wood, you can hear the hollow sound that wood makes when it's semi rotted away. Gunfire sound is amazing, sounds like the real deal, as do the casings when they drop unlike Res evil 2. The zombie’s sound superb, they sound like your typical everyday drunk lost in they’re own world, which is the way a zombie should sound. Zombies, drunks, whets the diff? The dogs, sound like dogs, you can hear them panting, the pitter patter of their paws when they walk or run and their growls. When the zombies and dogs are taking chomps out of something, you can hear the teeth hit bone.

The graphics are smoothly rendered with a chilling use of detail and atmospheric lighting. Like when running in a dusty place, dust actually gets stirred up, water actually ripples. While investigating, you can see dust settling, cockroaches scurrying about. When shooting anything that bleeds, blood stays on the ground, in the water, the blood eventually disappears. Most people have said the graphics are realistic, I however would not. While I would say the graphics are pretty decent, you can most certainly tell that you are playing a game. The graphics are on par with the Final Fantasy movie, close but no cigar.

The over all game play experience is amazing, there is no short supply of puzzles, places to explore and baddies to kill. When I first acquired the shotgun, I was trapped on the stairs with two zombies, I made a break for it up the stairs, took one of their heads off (he was on the landing) the other one confused on the stairs, turned around. I got my shotgun ready, pointed down figuring I was going to take his head off also. But much to my morbid delight, I blew his kneecap off. So there I am, just laughing away thinking that is the coolest thing I had seen so far in the game, while Mr.Zombie fought his way up the stairs just to take a bite out of me. However he did not even attempt to bite me, the limping bastard puked on me, needless to say, I shot him where he stood. I then discovered even further into the game, that not only can you make melons into grapes and take out kneecaps, but you can blow off entire arms and torso's as well. There is allot of places to explore, but gets a little repetitive somewhat, because you have to run back and forth. Unlike Res evil 2, 3, this revamp of the original didn't make me jump, I was a little disappointed, but it still did not take away from the fun factor of this game.

I was impressed with the dialog, but was a little surprised when I heard the word sh!t a few times. Foul language doesn't bother me, and I found the usage appropriate for the circumstances. The whole gaming experience was like playing a horror movie. If you beat the game under 5 hrs, you unlock some goodies. My best time, so far, on normal, is 6:28. While you still unlock stuff, over 5 hrs doesn't really give you much, just a closet key to change your outfit, woopie.

Below is what you will find in the game weapon wise and character wise. Here are some descriptions of the above mentioned. If I have missed anything, lemme know.

Zombie-they bite, puke and swipe at you. One shot to the head and various shots to the abdomen to drop. Most you can just run away from.
Runner-fallen zombie, if you didn't A) blow their heads off, or B) cremate the body, then you get one of these lovely fellows chasing after you. They pretty much do the same as a zombie (cause they are, duh) but I haven't seen this one puke. Runners are very quick and will slash at you with their claws.
Cerebiuos-Nice doggie, good little pooch, maybe I have a milkbone in my pocket for you.
Hunter-quick an could easily kill you with one swipe, takes 2 shots with the grenade launcher
Lisa-Some experiment gone hideously awry. She is chained up in shackles and wears her mothers face with her own (must be leather faces girlfriend), she's carrying out a vengeance towards "normal" people for the hell she and her family were put through thanks to the gracious people at Umbrella. Lisa cannot be killed so don't waste your ammo
Snakes-a really large python with massive fangs, the smaller ones strike and can poison you
Sharks-some kind of zombie greatwhite. They will grab a hold of you and try to rip your leg off. The larger one will grab you by the head and shake you around like a ragdoll, very cool indeed!
Bees-slightly bigger than the typical bee's in real life, act more like gargantuan mosquito’s
Spiders-two shots with the shotgun, dead, watch out for the back end when they croak, acid shoots out, sometimes baby spiders, just step on them and watch them go shplurpt
Tyrant-some kind of experiment unlocked by a member of your team, you figure this guy would be nice considering his heart is so big, it's literally beating out of his chest
Suicide runner-apparently when you beat this game on hard or survival, there is a zombie that runs around the game covered in grenades or c-4, don't shoot em, other wise they'll be picking up pieces of you in several countries
Giant plant-sucks the plasma out of you, easy enough to kill, either make some v jolt 20 or shoot it a couple of times with flame rounds

Assault shotgun- holds 10 rounds of ammo
Shotgun- holds 6 rounds of ammo
Pistol- holds 16 rounds of ammo
Magnum- holds 6 rounds of ammo
Flame-thrower-not used by Jill, haven’t found it with Chris yet
Grenade launcher- holds 6 rounds of ammo
Self defense pistol- holds 1 round of ammo, so why is it in the game?
Hunting knife-haven't used it, however because of the kerosene, it's got my wheels turning, it may be used to decapitate zombie heads? Ofcourse you can stab them too.
Survival knife-well, there are two knives in the game, and this one is only for stabbing, not very effective.
Dagger-self-defense weapon, when a zombie, dog or.... Is about to take a chomp out of you, you will automatically stab them
Taser-self-defense weapon, when a zombie, dog or.... is about to take a chomp out of you, you will automatically fry them
Rocket launcher-as far as I know, it's only used at the end of the game, which is too bad. It turns the Tyrant into meat chunks, imagine what it would do to anything else.
Grenade-self-defense weapon, when a zombie is about to take a chomp out of you, you strategically place the grenade into the mouth, get a few feet back and shoot the grenade, and Walla...Mr.Zombie's melon goes bye bye.