We have another community pick this week! Thank you so much and shout out to KingDarius4lyfe for continuing his membership on Kofi. If you're a tier 2 or above, you get to choose a topic for discussion (you can also commission a topic). This week, he asked me to write about my favorite Resident Evil game. Resident Evil Revelations 2 is in my top 3 and will probably forever stay there.
My top three favorite Resident Evil games at the moment are Resident Evil 7, Resident Evil Revelations 2, and Resident Evil 5. The top 3 changes often, but I think that Revelations 2 has always been a constant title in that list. It's honestly hard to choose one game to talk about especially because the franchise has many (all worth talking about) and I’m constantly reassessing what my favorite ones are. But if I have to focus on one, I’d say that Resident Evil Revelations 2 quickly became one of my favorite Resident Evil games. The gameplay and the story felt unique to me especially due to the plot.
Revelations 2 focuses on four protagonists; Clair Redfield, Barry Burton, Moira Burton, and Natalia. The game begins with Claire and Moira attending Moira’s welcome party at TerraSave (an organization, not affiliated with the government, that formed after the events of Raccoon City to aid victims against bioterrorism. TerraSave also works to expose unlawful pharmaceutical testing). The party is quickly crashed when armed forces arrive. There’s chaos and frenzy and in the midst of this, Claire and Moira are knocked out. They later wake up in dingy cells and have to work together to find out why they were taken and what hellscape they were dumped into.
The player also gets to play as Barry Burton in alternating chapters as he’s on a mission to find his daughter (Moira). You’ll notice that he prepares himself for what gets thrown at him and shows no fear as he fights his way around to find her. Barry meets a little girl named Natalia and she chooses to help him on his mission instead of staying on the boat that he'd arrived on. The two face true horror, but work together to keep each other safe.
This was a bit of a spoiler free section, so I would recommend stopping here if you haven’t played the game or haven’t watched someone play it. If you’d like to continue on, there will be spoilers for the plot, the characters, and more. The trailer is below if you're interested in watching it.
The first time I played Resident Evil Revelations 2, I didn’t have any idea what I was getting myself into. I got it on PS4 initially because I thought that it would be a good co-op game that me and my partner (at the time) could play. The co-op mode was set up in a weird way (in my opinion). We couldn’t understand why the screens were formatted horizontally, but neither screen stretch all the way across the TV. Maybe it didn’t bother some, but it bothered us and it was decided that I would play alone.
Now back in this time, I wasn’t much of a horror gamer. The idea of playing alone was dead on arrival and I ended up getting rid of the game.
Fast forward to 2020, the year of lockdowns. I was fairly new to streaming on a somewhat consistent basis and for an actual (small) community. I had just finished The Last of Us: Part II and was playing through Resident Evil 2 Remake and Resident Evil 3 Remake. I hadn’t any clue what I should play next and a wonderful viewer opted to gift the first episode of Revelations 2 to me. I fell in love immediately because this didn’t feel like any other Resident Evil game that I had played (besides the fact that the end goal was just to escape a nightmarish situation). In Resident Evil 5, Chris knows ahead of time that there’s a situation and arrives prepared in Africa to figure out what's going on. Resident Evil 6, our protagonists are aware of where they are when their games start. They are there for a reason and are prepared for the occasion. In Resident Evil 4, Leon is sent to Spain and was aware that there was a crazy threat there. Each protagonist is prepared for their situations even if they don’t explicitly know what is happening, but Claire and an unprepared Moira are completely unaware to what is destined for them after their kidnap.
Resident Evil Revelations 2 begins with Claire and Moira getting knocked out and waking up in an unknown location. The horrors that await them are yet to be known they don’t even enter into their situation with weapons. Now… Barry and Natalia have the upper hand because Barry came prepared with weapons to find his daughter and Natalia is just a badass kid with powers. Claire and Moira’s situation truly instilled fear in me, the player, because of the fact that I am “waking up” alongside them with no way to defend myself for a little while. There is added fear when Moira speaks up about her inability and unwillingness to use guns. She’s only able to use a crowbar to help get through blocked places and a flashlight to point out useful items and stun enemies for Claire.
Another cool concept is that you can switch between characters, but this function makes it horrifying for when you’re in situations that have many enemies. There are many parts of this game that stress me out, but one specific part is when Claire and Moira have to escape the above-ground jail where many of the experiments were being held. I truthfully get stressed there every single time I play it and it’s always hard for me to switch between characters when they’re being constantly hoarded. If I could successfully get the makeshift flamethrower set up correctly, then I wouldn’t have any problems, but somehow there are a few experiments that always walk through the fire.
The funny thing is, there are plenty of enemies that make things harder for the player. The normal enemies are scary enough, but then there are creatures like the Executioner and the Glasps. You can see the full list of creatures here.
I don’t remember facing all of the creatures on the list, but I do remember feeling like I was introduced to a new enemy each time I progressed a chapter. Some are more tolerable than others, but some areas I knew were a pain based solely on which enemy I would be facing.
The overall story felt new in comparison to other Resident Evil games as well. It was like if the kids of Hunger Games were sent to this island to see who could survive the longest against these experiments. Claire and Moira were fitted with bracelets that tracked their fear levels and they were also injected with the t-Phobos Virus, a virus created by the ultimate antagonist called the Overseer. The Overseer uses the bracelets to help track who endures the least mental stress in a fear inducing situation. The bracelets would light up depending on how the virus was affecting the host and would let the Overseer know what stage they were at. The lights’ meanings were:
Green: The host was in their normal, calm state.
Orange: The host was experiencing anxiety.
Blinking Red: The host was experiencing fear & were in the process of mutating.
Red: The host was mutated.
The experiments all started off as humans until they were put through the Overseers tests. They turned into various monsters that traversed the island and attacked anyone who came into their spaces. I always wondered why they didn’t also attack each other? Anyway, I feel like I’ve talked at length about Claire and Moira so I would like to move onto Barry and Natalia.
Barry finds his way to this island in search of Moira and upon arrival, he is met with a little girl named Natalia. The player can immediately see that she is wearing a fear bracelet and that it’s a solid red. You later find out that she has the ability to see through walls and spot invisible creatures. Natalia is truthfully so helpful throughout this game and besides her special abilities, she functions in the same way as Moira in terms of pointing out objects that better help Barry. Barry immediately feels the need to protect Natalia and even with her powers, wants her to be safe and listen to him when situations become dire. I loved their dynamic and I don’t know much about Barry’s past, but it feels like he truthfully enjoys being a father. He's genuine in how he interacts with Natalia and I wondered what truly happened between him and his daughter for her to not want to speak to him.
Revelations 2 is a good game in my opinion due to the story and its characters, but I also enjoyed the different environments that each chapter took us through. The player goes from exploring an abandoned prison to the wilderness, to a desolate town, to crumbling buildings… It feels like a lot, but I enjoyed being able to see different parts of this island as opposed to being confined to one space. I also enjoyed the areas that were big enough to run around during hordes and during boss battles. The boss battles in Resident Evil 2 Remake, for example, felt stressful in a different way because the areas were tiny in comparison (I understand that RE2 Remake was a different game set in a more confined area, but I digress).
I think that this is a wonderful entry into the Resident Evil universe and it takes place between the events of Resident Evil 5 and Resident Evil 6. For awhile, I wondered if Claire and Moira were ever cured and upon further research, the virus adapted to Moira because she overcame her greatest fear. And apparently Claire doesn’t become scared enough for the virus to affect her. I would have to do more research on this though because the Resident Evil universe has so much happening in it at once. It also spans across everything from games, to movies (the CGI ones), to novels and comics. I’m sure it’s explained somewhere.
Anyway, this game is one of my top favorite in the Resident Evil universe and if you’ve read this far… thank you. Do you enjoy Resident Evil as a franchise? Do you enjoy certain games, movies, or books with this title? Let me know your thoughts by commenting below.
I’ll catch you guys later!
🔪Versa
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