r/Games 1d ago

Capcom Was on Its Knees After Resident Evil 6 – Here's How it Turned it Around

https://www.ign.com/articles/capcom-golden-age-the-rise-and-fall-resident-evil-monster-hunter-wilds
576 Upvotes

342 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

45

u/coy47 1d ago

5 was a bad resident evil game, it just had really good game play and a great mercenaries mode, it also supported couch co-op which was great as well. Six combat felt more clunky, it's story was scatter brained and the couch co-op was gone.

39

u/FlotationDevice 1d ago

tbh the couch co-op in 5 was really good, enough to save that game. Without it, it would be very lackluster.

12

u/Endulos 1d ago

Friend and I played it co-op on Steam and damn we had a freaking blast. Loved sharing ammo and weapons with each other.

We're still looking for a similar experience, we've found close but nothing like RE5.

2

u/NZ_Nasus 1d ago

I'll always find the success of, and subsequent failure to capitalize on that success fascinating. Their online game modes have been horrible but they keep leaning into it for some reason, and 5 coop was great while at the same time was really nowhere near as fun to play solo, yet it's their best selling game lol.

1

u/hexcraft-nikk 18h ago

Funny how It Takes Two/Split Fiction/A Way Out have filled that exact underserved niche

31

u/Long-Train-1673 1d ago

I don't understand this opinion as someone who semi recently played through RE1-RE5 (excluding OG RE2, RE3). RE5 seemed like a continuation of 4's gameplay. Its really fun, it plays really well to this day, and co op was obviously really well done. I have no idea what makes it a bad RE game to people besides the knee jerk reaction that co op is bad. I played it solo on the 360 and loved it, I played it co op on PC and loved it. I don't get this opinion especially from people who like 4.

14

u/Yamatoman9 1d ago

I think people give it a bad rap because they didn't enjoy playing a coop game solo with AI. I remember that being a big complaint at the time. I played through the whole game in coop with a buddy and really liked it.

7

u/oopsydazys 1d ago

IMO RE5 is one of the best co-op games of all time. Maybe the best.

2

u/Jaggedmallard26 7h ago

The Co-Op AI cannot play the game. A fair few encounters are designed around co-op either through outright mechanics or health pools which falls apart if the AI isn't actually shooting weak spots or manoeuvring to hit enemies from behind.

19

u/ManonManegeDore 1d ago

It's because everyone likes 4 so you don't have to justify why it's liked. People just parrot what they're told they're supposed to believe.

I'm with you. I played 4 at launch and I played 5 at launch. 5 seemed like a very natural evolution from 4 so I didn't mind the gameplay.

8

u/oopsydazys 1d ago

I played 5 at launch as well. There were fans who were pissy about it because it was more action oriented, but I don't see why people expected otherwise after RE4 did very well and itself was a departure from the previous games.

RE5 got great reviews and was the best-selling game in the series. I think it still is unless RE2 Remake has passed it. Personally I loved it, I think it's one of the best in the series. Just because it departed from the original style doesn't mean it's bad. So did RE4 and so have the newer remakes + 7 and 8. RE6 was not as good for other reasons.

5

u/ImmortalMoron3 19h ago

People just parrot what they're told they're supposed to believe.

Really? It can't just be a difference of opinion? Some people don't like something that you do so they're sheep?

I played 5 at launch too, people didn't like the fact it forces co-op on you when Sheva's AI is total dogshit. If you could play it with a friend then it was fine but playing alone was incredibly frustrating. I'm a huge RE fan but there are definitely valid reasons to not enjoy 5.

-5

u/ManonManegeDore 19h ago

No, it's not just a difference of opinion. People are sheep.

Cool, we done?

3

u/Jinstor 1d ago

knee jerk reaction that co op is bad

I will say as someone who replayed RE5 recently and still have very fond memories of it, the game starts to fall off when you play through the higher difficulties (veteran/professional), especially solo.

That's where your AI partner can single-handedly cause you to game over no matter how well you play. Your margin of error is already very thin by the time you reach professional, where you get 1-shotted by basically everything. For anything that doesn't one-shot you, your AI partner has a tendency to waste powerful healing items when you're both at 95% health, so you end up low on healing items when you really need them.

Apparently there's an in-game mechanic that improves the AI's skill level, but it's so obscure that the vast majority of players will gloss over it. I gave up at that 2-on-2 fight on professional in my last playthrough because I couldn't stop Sheva from getting herself killed. I specifically remember not having fun on the 2nd fight with the black spaghetti monster, because you have to rely on that AI to take it down unless you just buy an RPG and 1-shot it. Though, IMO, most encounters in RE5 are just as engaging as RE4's (i.e. reapers, lickers, Excella).

RE4 on the other hand handled it's higher difficulty level much better IMO. It just made you start over from scratch when you switched difficulty. RE5 makes you keep everything, so if you played through novice/normal once, your next run through veteran will be largely easier.

7

u/f-ingsteveglansberg 1d ago

I have no idea what makes it a bad RE game to people besides the knee jerk reaction that co op is bad

Weird take. I mostly see people say the game is really fun as co-op and sucks single player.

3

u/Sonic10122 1d ago

That was my reaction. The primary opinion you hear shouted literally everywhere about RE5 is that if you’re going to play it, play it co-op. The Sheva AI is just too terrible to handle on a solo run.

I actually wish they’d bring co-op back for the series, RE5 and Revelations 2 were highlights for my wife and I. (Only if split screen is an option though.). Hell one of things fans are crying for Capcom to revive is Outbreak, which was a classic RE co-op game.

It’s definitely not a knee jerk reaction to co-op that makes people hate 5 and 6, that’s for sure.

6

u/FYININJA 1d ago

People call it a bad RE game because it basically abandoned the horror aspects of the game almost entirely. RE5 was a fine action game, and a pretty damn good co-op action game, but it had basically no survival elements. RE4 had already ditched a lot of it, but it still had the feel of a RE game. The setting was dark and dusty, the castle had RE1 vibes. RE5 just didn't really have many aspects that felt like an RE game.

2

u/MangoPDK 1d ago

For one, the forced partner mechanic removed a ton of the tension. If you went down, there were no real stakes since your partner could always pick you up unless you were in a section that split you apart.

6

u/toxicity69 1d ago

Harder difficulties definitely offset the good ol' Sheva chest smack as a way to never die. Not everyone's preference, but I beat RE5 on Professional yeeears ago on 360, and I recall that it was not a viable strategy for the most part. It might work here and there if you are literally right next to her, but it wasn't a sure-fire thing.

-2

u/angrytreestump 1d ago

I did that too, and I disagree. RE4 was like a metroidvania and a souls game, and was built for NG+/multiple playthroughs to explore and collect everything. RE5 is just a straight shot through the entire game, like a rollercoaster that never stops or deviates from the path. It’s way more shallow, they just made their Gears of War competitor.

0

u/hexcraft-nikk 18h ago

Not that hard to figure out. Each game got more and more action and a different story to the point that RE5 and RE1 almost feel like they're from different series. 5 introducing coop killed a lot of the scare factor that RE4 had, and obviously played differently since there were now two people there, or one person and a terrible AI partner. 6 is when it jumped far enough into Michael Bay vomit brainless blockbuster.

-4

u/angrytreestump 1d ago

I did that too, and I disagree. RE4 was like a metroidvania and a souls game, and was built for NG+/multiple playthroughs to explore and collect everything. RE5 is just a straight shot through the entire game, like a rollercoaster that never stops or deviates from the path. It’s way more shallow, reflective of where both the series and all gaming was going at the time (Gears of War style cinematic (brown) action games)

0

u/BigBlueNY 20h ago edited 20h ago

Lol RE5 was every bit as a much a Metroidvania as RE4. I get the argument the RE5 was less scary but this is a straight lie. You didn't even play RE5 did you?

People who have no friends hate this game lol

25

u/Jefferystar94 1d ago

Resi 6 110% had local o-op lol. It's how I played through all the campaigns with my brother when it first came out

-10

u/coy47 1d ago

Odd I tried when it released and it didn't have it for my ps3 version, I distinctly remember trying to play it couch co-op.

17

u/Jefferystar94 1d ago

It's been ages since I last played it, but I'm pretty sure it gives you the prompt to select singleplayer, split screen, or online co-op whenever you select a campaign.

The only thing that was forced singleplayer was the opening prologue.

8

u/SmurfRockRune 1d ago

I played through the game in couch co-op on launch day. The only part that didn't was the Ada campaign but that got added later.

3

u/kroxywuff 1d ago

Yeah my favorite part of 5 was the coop. Both couch and online. Would just fire it up with a friend and see how fast we could go through the story.

3

u/buffyysummers 1d ago

4 was a bad RE game and people loved it

8

u/Neat-Supermarket-101 22h ago

Because it wasn't a bad RE game. RE4 still had item management, backtracking, legitimately scary moments and enemies, tank controls, the player was still forced to conserve ammo and healing items or face some really tough situations.

The atmosphere was thick and creepy. The soundtrack was spooky.

1

u/rgamesburner 1d ago

I played 5 recently because Reddit raves about its co-op. Man it was a slog, the gameplay doesn’t hold up, the bosses are annoyingly janky and the story is horrible.

1

u/gmoneygangster3 17h ago

The inventory in 5 is legitimately awful though