Review: Resident Evil 3 is tense but has potential to be much more

After last year’s highly acclaimed Resident Evil 2 Remake, fans have been incredibly eager to revisit Resident Evil 3 under an all-new modern lens. I figured it’s important to note I have not personally played the original Resident Evil 3 from the PS1 but am quite familiar with its almost black sheep reputation.

With that said, Capcom has done a lot to make sure it doesn’t feel like Resident Evil 2.5 Remake. Yes, this game has the same engine (which allows for some incredibly gorgeous visuals) and was developed somewhat in conjunction with 2 but it still distinguishes itself.

Resident Evil 3 Remake follows S.T.A.R.S member Jill Valentine in the epicenter of a chaotic zombie outbreak located in Raccoon City. As she attempts to flee the undead ravaging the city, she’s hunted by a seemingly unstoppable and ever-evolving brute of a bioweapon known as Nemesis. With the help of Umbrella Corps soldier, Carlos, the two team up to escape the city before its impending destruction.

While still being bred from the same DNA, Resident Evil 3 manages to have a different tone than Resident Evil 2. It still has horror elements but it almost has shades of the action titles of later entries in the series. There are a LOT of explosions and set-piece battles sprinkled throughout the entire game.

On top of that, Carlos packs an AR with plenty of ammo and rarely struggles. Given he’s a highly-trained soldier and certified badass, it makes sense and his sections act as a welcome contrast to Jill’s more traditional Resident Evil gameplay. There is still a ton of resource gathering and crafting when playing as Jill, I had a handful of moments where I ran out of ammo that resulted in mad dashes away from hordes of zombies.

The biggest fault is with the game’s new dodge mechanic. The dodge mechanic allows you to evade grapples and incoming attacks with perfect timing being rewarded with slow-mo that lets you get in some free headshots. Great on paper, doesn’t work well in execution. You’ll find that it has taken away pretty much every other defensive option and zombies grab on to you like magnets because they have some NBA player-esque wingspans.

When you get grabbed on to, you’ll be prompted to mash a button which, in most zombie games, would allow you to push them off if you do it properly. In Resident Evil 3, it just lessens the damage you take but they will ALWAYS overpower you and bite you. There is literally no possible way to avoid it, you will always get bitten.

In crowded areas, it can turn into an intense shoving match where every zombie takes a chunk out of you and passes you to the next one. You get little to no chance to get out of it and it’s incredibly annoying.

Going back to tone, pretty much all of the horror and tension come from Jill’s sections. If you’re looking for the level of terror that was seen in RE2, you probably won’t find it here. This wouldn’t be that big of a deal if RE3 didn’t dip its toes in the scary stuff. There’s one section early on where you have to go through what’s essentially a maze filled with these horrifying bug-like creatures that try to force parasites down your mouth like a mother bird feeding its child.

I haven’t felt that uneasy playing a game in quite some time but that feeling ends right after that sequence and is never brought back. Thanks to Resident Evil’s slower gameplay, we do still have plenty of tension. The Nemesis offers a feeling of dread that can’t be shaken for hours on end as he gives chase. The best way to describe it is the “Must go faster” scene from Jurassic Park when the Jeep is being chased by the dinosaur.

Unfortunately, his appearances feel super scripted once you leave the streets of Raccoon City which alleviates some of that tension.

Resident Evil 3 makes an attempt to broaden its scope but quickly restrains itself. While there are some more buildings to enter and explore within the city, the game hurries you along to much more linear spaces after the first hour or so. The first hour is by far the highlight of the game with a really kick-ass opening sequence and a bit of time to soak in what once made up Raccoon City.

Sadly, when that part of the game is over it begins to lose a bit of its identity. From sewers to hospitals, you’ll have a deep desire to go back up and see the bright neon storefronts with cartoon mascots but will be restricted to sterile environments.

The game’s also quite brief and I didn’t see much in terms of replayability. I cleared the game in just over 6 hours but that felt like I was still taking my time by looking through every room I saw on my map. While Resident Evil 2 had a second campaign and even a challenge mode, Resident Evil 3 has the one and done story mode.

It does have a Hardcore difficulty and you can unlock new weapons and gear to help you in a new playthrough but if you want more substantial single-player content, you’re not going to find it here. There is an asymmetrical multiplayer experience called Resident Evil Resistance but access for that was not provided in time for this review.

Despite being a mostly standalone story, Resident Evil 3 still has heavy ties to Resident Evil 2. Given the story takes place both parallel to and before the events of the second game, you visit locations, see characters, and ultimately set off certain events that you see the results of in Resident Evil 2. I even found a safe that was in Resident Evil 2 and Googled the combo for the RE2 solution to see if it worked in RE3…. sure enough, it did.

If you haven’t played Resident Evil 2, you won’t feel out of place, it’s more of a fun touch for fans.

The Verdict

While enjoyable and filled with plenty to enjoy, Resident Evil 3 unfortunately feels like an uneven mishmash of horror and action. It wants to do two things at once and while it does them in a passable way, it doesn’t always feel like it reaches its full potential especially when following in the footsteps of Resident Evil 2 Remake.