Okay look I liked RE4 I thought it was a good game and was fun, a bit long winded and repetitive sure, but still generally fun.... It wasn't a RE game though. The story was rubbish, worm infected illuminati wanna be's kidnapping the US presidents daughter to infect her send her back home to infect him and then they take over the world? In the words of Albert Wesker, poor performance indeed. The game play was also to big budget action heavy, to many insane set pieces, Leon was to much of a one man army, your arsenal; was too big and the game often relied on standing on the fire button to get out of sticky situations far too often. So okay RE4 great game bad RE game.

This brings me to RE5. Same system of doing things same general game play same action heavy situations, but thanks to subtle tweaks to pacing and flow and massive nods to the previous RE storyline RE5 is a RE game. No RE5 is not scary, and yes Sheva's AI can be annoying and having her around takes some of that isolation away from the vibe, but the game design is more sound, levels aren't to big or to small and don't drag out beyond their sell by date like they did in sections of RE4, item drops from enemies don't produce ridiculous amounts of ammo, weapons for the most part must be found instead of bought, and despite Sheva being a pain in the butt sometimes having her around added a much need survival aspect to the game play. Taking care of two people added strategy to the game which is something RE4 lacked. So lots of similarities with RE5 to RE4, but tons of subtle tweaks make it the better RE game.

Still the real star of the show is the story. RE4 as has been admitted by the games producers was more or less a side story. RE5 is the real deal, its directly related to the pre existing storyline, answers many questions, asks some new ones, and ultimately wraps up the Umbrella area of the RE universe quite nicely. It offered us classic RE fans the satisfaction we so longed for with RE4.

In the End RE5 isn't my favorite RE game, but I can at least say that it is a RE game albeit very action heavy, and lacking in the scares department but RE none the less. RE6 will be a reboot, the question is will they take the series further back to its Survival Horror roots or go full action game. I'm hoping for the former.

That's my rant.