Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles (Wii)

Shoots to thrill, but with mixed success: Definitely rent before making any potentially hair-whitening decisions.
1/31/2008 12:00 AM | 0 Comments | Page 2 of 2

Depth-wise, there's precious little to speak of here conceptually, though options are provided to upgrade your arsenal between missions (improving magazine size, damage effects, response rate, etc.). You can also decimate enemies by hitting weak spots that cause instant-kill effects, indicated by a blinking cursor, although some hits on cadavers' heads inexplicably result in exploding craniums, while others are virtually shrugged right off. It's further possible, by slightly tilting your head with the thumb-stick -- nice imagination there, Tex, but stuff it, there's no free-range movement allowed -- to spot collectible items such as health-restoring green herbs or antiseptic sprays, plus extra guns/ammunition and objects that unlock hidden narrative tidbits.

Learning to hunt for these bonuses while also keeping an eye on incoming assaults and monitoring current ammo supplies is predictably most of the challenge. As you might imagine, you're always given a painfully tight stock of shells with which to put down the large groups of baddies that ambush with troublesome regularity -- call it yet another concession to stereotypical genre convention, or just a nod towards the sort of trials for which most Resident Evil games are known. (You can also, however, call into action knife-slashing strikes when engaged in close-quarters battles, or support for launching corny counterattacks on grapple-initiating foes, by waving the Wii remote.)

You don't have to own the Wii Zapper to appreciate the game, and in fact you may be better off (from the standpoint of morning-after soreness) sticking to the standard remote/Nunchuk combo. But you do have to possess a sense of humor and be willing to overlook the tired graphical quality of most scenes and B-movie-esque voice-overs, which merely add to the overall sense of gaming antiquity the quest calls up. Further heightening the feeling of d&eacure;jà vu is an inability to inflict much visible destruction (read: flesh-rending holes or limb-amputating shots) on actual enemies, though background objects do shatter when struck. Still, you'll dig the cheeseball ambience and basic art direction put forth: Outdated as some aesthetic elements (i.e. menus and characters) appear, an impressive sense of detail has been poured into every set piece and environment.

Never mind presentation concerns, though. From the perspective of pure playability, while it most assuredly is not going to blow anyone's mind, the title does hold its own against competing genre stalwarts -- which, to be frank, considering what the franchise has produced before, is about all any of us true believers can hope for. Rest assured that Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles won't be setting the charts (or audiences' hearts) afire anytime soon, but it does offer a few hours' worth of happily brain-dead blasting, which just may justify you giving the game a well-deserved rental.

This review is based on a retail copy of the game provided by the publisher.