Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles Review (WII)

No, it’s not a Resident Evil/Star Wars crossover…

After being chased by rabid undead hordes in Left 4 Dead 2 firing projectiles willy nilly, it’s somewhat comforting to hear the words ‘Aim for the head!’ beckoned from your dunderhead of an ally. The lost art of turning rotting brains into a stream of nerve spaghetti isn’t the only piece of nostalgia to rise back from the grave, as Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles looks back on the series’ greatest hits once again for a funny sense of déjà vu, in more ways than one.

Taking heed from the example left from Resi’s previous viewpoint fest The Umbrella Chronicles, 2009’s lightgun extravaganza takes the series’ annoying CCTV camera and places it into the eyeballs of Raccoon City’s fearful populace. On a standard day of work blowing the heads off undead terrors in South America, Leon.S.Kennedy manages to find the time to regale the tales of Resident Evil 2 and Code Veronica to future baddie Jack Krauser in the manner most befitting to his favourite episodes of Lost.

To suit this instalments evil subtitle aura, Capcom really have dug deep into their A Level in Media Studies to give us a fitting sense of ‘Mise en scène’. Simply by glancing at the clear-cut, darkened filtered main menu accompanied by an eerie howling echo, you realise that you’re in for a more cinematic experience than your standard lightgun fare. Lighting effects manage to convey a horrible sense of dread to every location you visit, making each landmarks grit and gore look every bit pleasantly unpleasant. Mute the telly so you don’t have to hear the terrible, yet somewhat signature voice-overs and you’ve almost got the true terror of the scenario that the unlucky have been thrown into.

Anal aesthetic analysis aside, Darkside Chronicles can be, perhaps coincidentally, incredibly likened to its older brethren Umbrella Chronicles. So much so in fact that it seems when the play testers at Capcom held a meeting on what to improve on, all arrogantly simply scribbled on a piece of paper; MORE PURPLE IN MAIN MENU. It’s easy to fix yourself to the tracks set for you and go trigger happy on everything in sight, yet it’s generally encouraged to aim for pale looking craniums so that your cursor can flash red. Firing at this precise time can stylishly detonate it, adding to your score and sharpshooting prowess. After ploughing through hordes of said shambling undead, it’s easy to feel like a veteran in proceedings, as if you’re Ironman sent on a massacre mission through a retirement home. The sense of security only proves to lure you into the huge boss encounters with a heavy sense of dread and can prove to be genuinely stressful, especially when faced with those who tower over you like Ireland is folding in on itself.

It’s easy to fix yourself to the tracks set for you and go trigger happy on everything in sight

The slightly weak unique selling point of simply picking off enemies one by one is doused in layers of what developers may consider complexity, yet just proves to be frustration. A constant shaking of the player camera is perhaps in place to add more of a human perspective to the proceedings, and do amp up the tension in certain scenarios. However, most of the time you’ll find yourself lining up perfect shots, only for the camera to be distracted by a nasty looking bit of mildew. It’s at times almost nauseous, as if you’re playing a game of Laser Quest in a bouncy castle, and although this may be the perfect combination for my next birthday party, it’s not the greatest of aids when I want to feel the satisfaction of painting the town AB+ red.

The Chronicles series main focus always lies in the objective to flesh out the Resi plotline, always in severe danger of forming too many loose ends to cope with, and the priorities of Darkside Chronicles do little to differ. As well as the flesh hungry, players have to keep on constant lookout for light bulbs, plants or lampshades that look at them particularly funny, as shooting them can earn character files, archive documents or ASBOs.

Even though some of these files can proves to be fairly interesting, most are particularly gimmicky and a needless attempt to boost the replayability of the title. Several plot holes and blatant changes to storylines also contradicts the history that the game is attempting to reinforce, as if Leon’s memory is trying to fight off some sort of amnesiac fuelled paradox.

Back in the day when the Wii was scarce of lightgun games, Umbrella Chronicles managed to at least make a minor mark on shelves. Yet after 2 years of developers overcrowding the genre, Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles does little to even excel in its own previous first person attempt. The somewhat minor improvements make it an enjoyable ride from start to finish, yet a timid difficulty and relentlessly shaky camera doesn’t convince you that it’s a keeper. Still, maybe this camera issue was just a big middle finger to those who keep complaining they can’t move and shoot at the same time.