That sounds way too much like MGS3's stamina system, which sucked.
Trying to pull off something like Eternal Darkness would be cool, but it shouldn't actually affect the controls. Having to keep some gauge up by regularly consuming some item just so you can have decent control over your character, which should be a given from the start, does not equal fun to me.

Ben Judd is the producer of the two new Bionic Commando games at Capcom of Japan.

Pics of Kota Suzuki's recording session for RE 5 at the Newman Scoring Stage at 20th Century Fox.
(arranger Wataru Hokoyama)

http://www.scoringsessions.com/news/145/admin

Fantastic pics, though it's a shame to waste this whole 103-peice ensemble for only 15 minutes of live orchestra in the game (the rest will be synth).

March 12th (13th in US) will be a day when I finally buy an Xbox360.

Online co-op, huh?  Sounds interesting!  Hopefully I'll have a 360 by then!

Here's the new single-player trailer: http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36226.html

Did either of these guys compose the 'death march' Title Screen song for UMBRELLA CHRONS and/or the eerie FILE SELECT music?
As much as i hated the game itself, i am still seriously impressed with those two tracks..

The virus/parasite element is a metaphor for the AIDS crisis there.

LoL, that zombie looks like Mr. Mathers..
Inside joke, i'm guessing?

Great people, here!

Nope... RE:UC was done by Masafumi Takada and Jun Fukuda from Grasshopper Manufacture. They remade some old RE tunes on the album, but a lot of it is new material. That OST is awesome.

Thanks, i'll have to pick it up sometime.
( :

GC 2008's explosive trailer on display:

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/38537.html

Holy shit! For the love... man, this game looks absolutely unreal. Here are some things I noted in the trailer:

- Capcom's willingness to build Caucasian character models with a high hairline and thin, floppy hair gives me hope that maybe, someday, I will be wearing a white suit and sweet 70's style orange shirt in a video game.

- Gameplay footage is fantastic. It looks like RE4 on steroids, but I am perfectly OK with that.

- After Chris' "death" in the trailer, things take a turn for the worst. It's nice to see a couple of dark locales and some genuinely creepy things going on. What the F was in that truck?

- Who was that other "bitch in the red dress"?

- WAS THAT EL GIGANTE?!?!?!

Alright, I'm excited. Great trailer. Give.

EDIT: Also. That "unknown female" is smokin' hot.

My money's still on Sherry.  And I'm just getting this distinct feeling that they're going to be delving more into the Birkin family history.

So, has anyone tried the now-available demo on Japanese Live or PSN yet?  Really looking forward to giving it a go once it hits the U.S. servers, but one of the complaints I'm hearing that has me a bit concerned is the real-time menu HUD.  Heard it's tough to switch out weapons and choose curative items like herbs in the midst of the frenetic action.  I kind of had the same problem with Dead Space, at least with the demo version.  (For those who played Dead Space - is the HUD real-time only, or is there an option to go to a pause menu?)

Hey Angela,

As far as I remember, you can use curative items outside the real-time HUD. Sometimes you have to manage inventory (out of space, etc.) and if you need to heal, you can always use one of those curative items to free up space. Someone else might want to re-confirm though.

Yep. Was waiting for it all day yesterday, but it hit Live kinda late.
Is it also available on PSN? Cos the Official Homepage only mentioned Live for some reason...

Anyhow, yeah, real time menu HUD IS a pain in the ass.
I suppose they had to do that for co-op reasons.

There's two stages to choose from, the first will pit you against a whole onslaught of baddies testing your skills to survive until a certain amount of time has passed, much like the first village in RE4. The opening cutscene is pretty cool, but it throws you directly into the action which might cause some confusion.

The second stage was MUCH more fun, it starts out in a calmer area, and there's a tutorial manual lying around, so obviously this is the stage you should start with. Contrary to the first stage, this one is linear, and just requires you to make it to the end. It makes use of the fact that you're constantly running around with a partner, and it's a lot of fun, RE4 stylee.

I'm sure this'll be a blast to play in co-op, but I'm kinda worried about the single player mode.
Don't know if I want to babysit a second character ALL the time, so I hope Chris gets some time for himself in the final product...
Gears of War also has you running around with at least one teammate all the time, but the only thing you ever need to do is to revive them once they're down. Helping out your partner in RE5 seems MUCH more work and effort than that, involving lots of item-switching and sharing (she'll even pick up money and ammo right from under your nose) and very frequent ass-savery.

So, um, I'm not all that excited about the single player prospects of this game...

How many times has Shiva (Sheva?) died on you? Because if you have your doubts about the partner AI, you might try putting it to the test by leaving her to fend for herself...

I was especially intrigued by this comment I saw on NeoGAF:

She never actually died on me, but she came close a couple of times. It's easy enough to rescue her, it just seems she more of a handful than, say, Dom in Gears.
A closer partnership might not necessarily be a bad thing, but if I have to do that all game long, I'm not sure how enjoyable that would be...

My bad.  At this point, it's still slated for release on PSN - just not yet.  But seriously, why is PSN getting the cold shoulder when it comes to demo releases nowadays?  They didn't even get the Tomb Raider: Underworld demo. 

Thanks for the write-up, Amazingu.  How are the controls?  The Neogaf guys seem to have a hard time grappling with a proper controller configuration.  It can't be that much different from RE4, right?

Yeah, you'd think Sony would want to do something about that, wouldn't you?

The controls are, well, pretty much an RE4 affair. The default setting is indeed even called "RE4 setting", so fans of the prequel should feel right at home. There's 3 other optional settings, but none of them seemed to make as much sense as the one we're used to.
Unfortunately that also means you still kinda move like a tank...

I just wanted to say that this is the best damn video game trailer I've seen in a long long time:

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/43481.html

Interesting.  So, are they saying that they're going to survive at the end of the game? :)

Is that woman supposed to be Sheva?

The RE5 demo is now scheduled to hit stateside Jan. 26th.  Exclusive to the 360 for an undetermined period of time.

http://blog.wired.com/games/2009/01/xbo … ets-r.html

Until February 5th I believe I read. Supposedly that's when it comes to the PSN.

The second viral trailer is out:

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/44412.html?type=

Oh shit at the sea monster.

Seems Gamestop's revealed the U.S. Collector's Edition packaging:

http://www.gamestop.com/Catalog/Product … sku=200572

$89.99 will net you:

* Chris Redfield Figurine
* Tricell Messenger Bag
* BSAA Patch
* Kijuju Keychain
* Bonus Disc
* The game and bonus disc come packed in a Special Collector's Steel Book Case.

Looks pretty weaksauce for $90.  Gonna take a pass, and just pick up the standard edition.

Ditto.

So anyone see the TGS 2008 Extended Alternate trailer yet?  It's absolutely incredible, but packed to the brim with potential spoilers:

http://www.gametrailers.com/player/44538.html

So, I've played through the 360 demo a couple of times now.  I'm enjoying it, but it took a brief period of adjustment going from the excellent Wii-based controls of RE4 back to a conventional pad setup.  I've stuck with the Type D configuration -- which, in the U.S. demo, appears to be set as the default, rather than the RE4 Type A.

You're right, Amazingu - better to start off with the Shanty Town stage, rather than the Public Assembly.  (Although I did end up liking the Assembly stage more, since it included the ever-incredible shotgun.)  Haven't tried it online yet, so the jury is still out on co-op play.  As for the item system, while I'm not terribly keen with having to micromanage again (certainly not after the excellent flexibility of RE4's attaché case system), being able to swap weapons between one another is cool.  In that way, I was able to deck Chris out with the hand gun, sniper rifle, and Sheva's machine gun -- which certainly gave an added advantage on the Shanty Town level.  I like the idea of on-the-fly weapons switching via the d-pad, a la Gears of War - but it seems managing in the real-time HUD is only feasible during downtimes with no enemies.  Which sort of defeats the purpose of making it real-time in the first place, doesn't it?

Oh, how I love Chris' knock-out punch maneuver.  It's particularly impressive when the force of your downed foe interacts with any number of inanimate objects in the background.  So far, I've managed to smash an enemy through a door, into a table, and onto a pile of fruit.  (Which goes splat! The fruit that is, not the enemy. ^_^)  I'm hoping the final game extends to this level of interactivity.

The game looks like it's shaping up pretty well.  Graphics are vibrant, with that African sun feeling like it's literally radiating through my television.  The framerate is consistent, and definitely a step up in smoothness from RE4.  Explosions from the flammable drum cans look incredible.  Yeah, a lot of hit collision animation was lifted from RE4, but the observant will note a number of new animation sets for enemies.  I've never been one to complain about the stop 'n gun gameplay of the Resident Evil series, but here, it's becoming increasingly clear that it's beginning to feel dated.  The series is moving further away from survival-horror, and more into action territory - and it'd be great if Capcom catches up by implementing some sort of strafing system.  Either that, or faster aiming sensitivity, because it feels rather slow in the demo.

I'm pretty behind on my FPS lingo but I'm almost positive the TGS demo had left/right strafing incorporated into the control scheme (which still didn't keep me from dying a grizzly death).

Post-google:  So yeah, strafing was in there.  Is there no option for the "shooter" control scheme in the U.S. demo?

I don't see how the two have to be mutually exclusive.  Just cause a game can be frightening doesn't mean the controls have to be slow and cumbersome.  I just consider it an evolution of the genre, just as a lot of RPGs nowadays have moved towards real-time controls as opposed to the turn-based, menu-operated battles of before.

P.S.  Unless there are objections I'm gonna change the title of this thread.  It's grown to be about quite a lot more than some "unknown female in RE5".

Oh, there's certainly normal strafing in the demo.  What I meant was that they should put in a system where you can strafe with your weapon at the ready at the same time:

http://kotaku.com/5062105/resident-evil … ols-better

Says Kotaku: "The new scheme does have shooter layout elements, but it's still run/walk, stop, shoot.  The new action layout also lets characters strafe when they move — something that RE players have long been asking for.  However, since this is Resident Evil, it's not possible to simultaneously strafe and point and shoot. That makes the addition of strafe in the action controls seem somewhat half-baked. Sure, this is Resident Evil, but the action controls strafe doesn't alter gameplay: Players are still running to an empty corner and shooting and then running to another corner."

The argument being that one of the key aspects of the RE series was its stop and shoot gameplay - a mechanic introduced from the very beginning for adding that element of horror and suspense.  Which, of course, worked well back when you had, at most, three or four zombies lumbering slowly toward you with their only means of attack is to lunge.  Now, when the screen is littered with nearly a dozen rushing enemies at a time, with far more means of attack (including swift melees and projectiles), the feeling becomes that you too should have better finesse to meet this higher demand in action.

In any case, I just played through the demo again, and I take back what I said about the aiming sensitivity.  Turns out there *is* an option I overlooked that allows you to speed up the sensitivity, and it makes the game much better as a result.  Between Slow, Default, Fast and Fastest, I found the Fastest setting to work best.

Go for it.  Just "Resident Evil 5" by itself would suffice, wouldn't it?

Here's one more thing I'm hoping they'll rectify in the final game: have different buttons designated for picking up items and the close-up melee move.  Unlike RE4, picking up items no longer pauses the screen (and the action) to show you what you've gotten - it's all in real time.  The problem with this is, say there's an item near an enemy that you've just stunned to set up for a melee maneuver.  Because both the pick-up and attack commands are set as the same button, the game can't differentiate between the two.  Not cool when you mean to melee, and instead bend down to pick up the item..... leaving you temporarily vulnerable, and allow the enemy to regain his composure.

I'll probably stay far away from the demo. I know myself too well. I'd probably replay the thing like a million times, and get sick of those parts of the title when they actually come up in the retail version.

I still haven't played RE4, but I played the demo of this. It looks lovely, bar the tearing (I was so tempted to write it looks 'tearific' but resisted, sort of) and the setting is amazing. Feels really very different. That first cut sequence in the first area was absolutely chilling - I guess because it felt not far off news footage of some reasons.

And I loved that the people you saw in the cut scene were then just presented as normal enemies.

After all the positive press RE4 got though, I'm stunned at the controls. They are absolutely archaic. I share your inventory woes but that you can't even walk and shoot at the same time is plain nuts. It feels old, feels like I'm not really in control and has clearly affected the game itself - the animation of the infected looks like it is designed to be fast and deadly and yet they slow up around you, still with the same animation only slow, so it feels like I'm existing in a slow motion bubble. Seems like they wanted to go with fast, nasty enemies and had to chicken out simply because you wouldn't stand a chance with the control scheme.

And yet, with a decent control scheme, they really could have gone all out with the fast enemies.

The demo shows huge potential and I really do think that setting is amazing and really well realised. The light effects and little graphic extras like the rubbish floating through the air are excellent. But I loved the look of RE4 and still managed to miss that one. With 5, based on the demo, I'll have no problem skipping this as I imagine they have no intention of implementing a modern control scheme between now and release.