Resident Evil 2

Like Final Fantasy, Resident Evil is the kind of game that transcends platforms (both are originally PlayStation titles) to become a phenomenon that affects all future releases and has massive impact on the gaming community's consciousness.

Essentially a gory action/adventure, you can play as either Leon, a copper, or Clare, an action girl, fighting your way through the living cemetery that is Racoon City. The exploration is extremely linear, but if you play the game a second time after completing it with one character you receive the bonus of new plot developments and new enemies.

The puzzles are quite simple, but they go beyond the usual feeble attempts found in straight action games and push towards an adventure game feeling. The gaming world, however, is quite restricted and the whole thing suffers from the limitations of its console roots.

It's unavoidable to talk about Resident Evil 2 and not mention George A Romero's trilogy of Dead films, as the game steals not only the terrifying sounds of the groaning, decaying undead, but also the camera angles and set pieces that scare the life out of you with unexpected shocks.

These 'borrowed' camera angles, however, are often frustrating and hardly show any of the action, giving only a fragmented vision of the zombie infested city and your struggle against them. At the same time it does create a hellishly tense atmosphere, simulating in many ways the tense helplessness of a nightmare.

For all its shortcomings though, RE2 still remains one of the most tense and frightening experiences you can have with a gamepad.

I lay the blame for the Resident Evil games solely at George Romero's door, the man who popularised flesh-ripping zombies with Night Of The Living Dead, and ensured that in the depths of our imaginations, our entrails would never be safe again.

Resident Evil 2 is the sequel to perhaps one of the most popular and undoubtedly goriest PlayStation games of all time. You play as either Leon (the Cop) or Claire (the sister of the lead guy from the first Resident Evil gam) and each character has their own story elements, monsters and new situations to deal with. The story of the two characters running into a town polluted by a virus and neck-deep in zombies, is rather farfetched, but it's kept in place with a decent script and some gritty storytelling.

Though the graphics are dated it still hasn't lost its edge, and there's no doubt it's one of the most atmospheric games ever, especially if you like to be haunted in your sleep by the sweet, squelching sound of a pack of zombies feasbng on your flesh.

Resident Evil 2 is a 1998 horror game that takes players on a journey to a very dark city called Raccoon City.

Plot

A small town turns out to be a testing ground for a new kind of virus. Umbrella has turned almost all the residents into zombies, and the infection threatens to spread throughout the country. It is necessary to find the inventor responsible for what happened - the investigation is led by two policemen, a girl Claire and a guy Leon. In order to find the survivors, they must penetrate into the heart of a city full of dangers. Here they meet a girl named Sherry and a spy named Ada Wong, who have their own mysterious reasons for being in the cursed city.

Gameplay

The player's task is to survive, and destroy the mutant turned scientist William Birkin. You will have to explore all the streets of the city, solve puzzles and kill aggressive opponents. It is not so easy to do - ammo is very scarce, and in one-type locations it is easy to get lost.

Pros:

• The campaign for each character has many differences
• Injuries are reflected on the characters' bodies

Cons:

• Uneven textures and unrealistic NPC movement
• Very small inventory
• Lots of blood and really scary zombies