As a fan of survival horror it was only natural for me to fall in love with the Resident Evil franchise,
it was the first of its kind in terms of the sub-genre which was specifically given to this game when it was created in 1996 by Shinji Mikami and Tokuro Fujiwara under the title Biohazard only called by this name in Japan, owned by the Japanese company Capcom.
But before I go deeper into my love of the franchise, im going to explain where my gaming journey started. I was 6 at the time and me and my older brother were given a NES for Christmas and the game that came with the console was Star Wars, based on the feature film of the same name. This game ultimately opened my eyes to the world of gaming at such a young age, even now when i hear the cantina song it takes me back to Saturday mornings, playing the console.
I moved onto various other consoles and games, SNES, Mega Drive, Game cube, N64 and finally Playstation. I did briefly play the Dreamcast aswell, but I hated the the controller so I didn't branch out with games on that console.
My main choice of genre was action, adventure,
role playing and puzzle which includes the following,
Super Mario Brothers
Earthworm Jim
Mega Man
Abe's Odyssey
Castlevania
Sonic The Hedgehog.
Tomb Raider
Golden eye
I could go on and on, but the main theme around all of these games were they very much action and adventure, not a huge amount of adult content or suspense. Don't get me wrong they were really hard, some I didn't even complete, yes im looking at you Mega Man the bane of my childhood.
Then a game came and changed the gaming experience for me, the game in question was Resident Evil, I didn't know what to expect when i put the disc in my trusty PlayStation 1, I got myself comfy ready to submerge myself into this game, little did I know the ride that I was about to jump on.
I was asked to choose between two characters at the start, one being Chris Redfield and the other Jill Valentine, I loved the badass female characters from my time playing Lara Croft on Tomb Raider, with this in mind I chose Jill.
The main story revolves around either Jill or Chris, depending on who you choose at the start. They are members of a task force known as S.T.A.R.S, they have to investigate the disappearance of their team members in Raccoon city. They follow various leads and end up being trapped in a mansion infested with zombies, rabid dogs and various other creatures.
The game quickly showed me its genre which I was taken aback by, I had never really been scared by a game before, this definitely heightened my excitement to play the game, as a horror fan at a tender age, I loved the feel of being scared from a film, it felt like I was on a roller coaster, so when I could get this feeling whilst playing a game, I knew the gaming future was bright.
The suspense in this game was apart from anything I had ever experienced, from the slow opening doors, to the sounds of the zombies lurking around every corner.
But the biggest moment of this game for me was when you was walking down a hallway and the demonic dogs jumped through the window behind you, im almost certain I screamed at that point. This scene will forever go down in survival horror gaming history.
The franchise quickly gained momentum with more and more games being released and being available on most consoles at the time. The franchise easily made the transition from gaming to movies with ease. To this date resident evil is still close to my heart, as much as i enjoy the movies, the games will always be my first love of the franchise.
What are your thoughts on the franchise?
Let me know
Tash.
credit:
Big Thanks to Dan Owen for helping me with the title. You rock!
Picture from Wikipedia
Excellent 🤘
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