Resident Evil 5 Lost in Nightmares DLC Review

I played on: PS3
I paid: £4.65
Available on: PS3, PS4, Xbox 360, Xbox One, PC
Notes: N/A

Lost in Nightmares takes place 3 years prior to the main Resident Evil 5 story. This is a loving tribute to the first game in the series. It’s also a wonderful way to connect the beginning and end of Wesker’s story.

Chris Redfield and Jill Valentine track down Umbrella founder Oswald E. Spencer. Any fans of the original PS1 classic will, of course, know Spencer as the man who owned the mansion. Lost in Nightmares sees you returning to a very similar mansion but this one is in Europe. A lot of the rooms here are heavily based on the rooms from the original although the entire house is much smaller than it’s PS1 counterpart. The ties to the original game don’t end with the cast and setting. If you check the front door in the lobby 3 times you will be able to play the first part of the story with a fixed camera perspective. The game looks great like this and it really makes me long for a modern take on the classic Resi formula. After you finish with some simple puzzles you make your way into the basement.

This is where the gameplay takes a step away from the nostalgic puzzles and instead focuses on more modern combat. You have to fight or escape from a number of monsters that seem to take after Lisa Trevor from the GameCube remake of the original. You learn through notes around the mansion that these abominations are products of Spencer’s loyal butler’s experiments. Seeing as it was Spencer that experimented on poor Lisa in the original it can be understood that the butler was trying to recreate his masters early “successes”. This is never directly said but after seeing the similarities between these monsters and poor Lisa herself it’s reasonable to assume. After a while, in the basement, you will lose your weapons and are forced to use a number of traps to defeat 3 of these monsters to progress.

This takes me to something that Lost in Nightmares excels at and that’s horror. Resident Evil 5 was a little disappointing for horror fans as it was more of an action game than a scary one. Lost in Nightmares fixes this with a decent and creepy build-up in the mansion that sets the tension well. Then when you enter the basement the game puts you up against difficult and deadly monsters with very little ammo or health. After it’s established the threat it removes all your gear and leaves you alone with nothing but the environment to fight with. If you play on normal or hard then this can be really scary with these monsters posing a very real threat.

It’s rare for a piece of DLC to outshine the main game but Lost in Nightmares does just that. The tributes to the original game with the way it tells its story and uses its environments are amazing. Sure it may be a little on the short side but given that every part of this little story feels so good I really don’t mind. It’s a case of quality over quantity and Lost in Nightmares is very high quality. This is one of Resident Evil’s best bits of extra content and easily my personal favourite part of the Resident Evil 5 experience.

Recommendation Rating: 9 out of 10.