Tag Archives: Nintendo Wii

Resident Evil 4

Although completion of the main game revealed several shorter alternate game options, and although I actually do intend to look into and maybe even fully play through those options[1], I think it is fair to review Resident Evil 4 solely on the strength of the main storyline. The setting is some years after the fall of the Umbrella Corporation and the destruction of the T-virus, famous for its ability to create zombies. You play as Leon Kennedy, formerly of Resident Evil 2, who is now part of the Secret Service (I guess?) and has been sent to a small village in Spain to follow leads on the kidnapping of the President’s daughter, Ashley, whose only real utilities are a) to provide a sense of immediacy by being constantly kidnapped again or otherwise placed into danger and b) to provide a sense of fan service by wearing a Catholic schoolgirl skirt and hitting on the late 20s-something Leon according to the script of a Gordon Sumner song.

Of course, no Resident Evil game would make sense without zombies, and this is no exception. Well, that is, they aren’t technically undead zombies so much as parasitically-controlled voodoo zombies, but the point remains the same. Add in several more-dramatically mutated foes and a variety of ever-larger weapons with which to fight them, plus a handful of familiar antagonists and allies and a truly inspired Napoleonic midget, and, well, now it’s sounding like a Resident Evil game. Thankfully, I really enjoy those, and so with this, despite not having a modern console on which to generate acceptable graphics. Still, that’s what Resident Evil 5 will be for, once I get around to it. As far as the Wii aspect of the game? I actually think that the specialty controller makes this kind of game more immersive, what with the actually aiming at the screen and all, but still. It is telling that I’ve only ever finished two games on the Wii over the lifespan of the console.

[1] Cue derisive laughter

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess

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Once upon a time, there was a lame commercial rap that currently resides in my brain in the place where I ought to be able to remember things that were actually happening to me in junior high school.

It’s the Legend of Zelda, and it’s really rad
Those creatures from Ganon are pretty bad
Octoroks, tektites, leevers too!
But with your help, our hero pulls through

And then, presumedly, there were record scratchings, rap breathing, and so forth. And the game sounded incredibly cool, despite my lack of interest in rap and my lack of knowledge as to what, exactly, a tektite was. And in the fullness of time, I found it actually was incredibly cool. And then it had a sequel, which I liked well at the time though it kind of annoys me now. And then it had another sequel which was incredibly awesome, and then even more, and all of them bottomed out at really good, with several of them maintaining brilliance. So, y’know, yay franchise. And now we have the Wii, which is like a video game system, except that instead of purposefully wiggling your fingers, you purposefully flail your whole upper body. Which translates for your average Zelda fan into actually aiming the bow, or swinging the Master Sword, or taking Princess Zelda into your arms and… okay, maybe that part doesn’t happen. Fair enough. Still, though, even without creepy video game fantasies, Twilight Princess is a good game. In fact, despite that it’s a retread of two out of the last three Zelda games with only about 20% obviously new content, it’s pretty much a great game.

Of course there are bombs, boomerang, and bow. I mean, that’s the way it goes. Except for the motion control differences, really, the gameplay is unchanged in the last five years or more. The story has a fair amount of new to it. After starting out as the young man that everyone relies on to keep the village going, Link is quickly caught up in momentous events when a band of goblins steals all of the other children out of the village and, in the same evening, a mysterious twilit fog falls, transforming him into a wolf and leaving him stranded in a world of warped and powerful beasts intent upon his destruction. (And, Princess Zelda is in danger.) Naturally, therefore, Link sets out on a quest to retrieve certain artifacts that might enable his new friend Midna, who originates from the same twilight world that is now threatening Hyrule, to save her people from that threat.

Also, there’s fishing.