Resident Evil Survivor Review

The version played for review: PS1
Available on: PS1
The price I paid: ??
Other Notes: N/A

Resident Evil Survivor is a lightgun shooter set in the cannon of the main Resident Evil story, between Resident Evil 3 and Code Veronica. Despite being cannon this game is thought of by most fans to be one of the worst entries in the series and after playing through the game twice I can see why.

The story starts with two men fighting on a helicopter before it crashes leaving the main character with amnesia, a common cliche. The plot will vary slightly depending on certain different paths you take through the game. This adds some replay value but seeing as my first playthrough only lasted about an hour and a half there is still a shortage of content. Despite the short lengh this game manages to drag on with the story feeling so thin and stretched out that it just feels frustrating and tedious. The events of this game are known as the Sheena island outbreak, one of the 3 major outbreaks that lead to the downfall of Umbrella. This is even mentioned in the opening of Resident Evil 0. The fact that such an important event feels this lackluster is a failure of the pacing and writing.

It's not just the disappointing plot that has this game feeling like it drags on with the gameplay just as much to blame. Now to be fair to Resident Evil Survivor it was intended to be played with the PS1 lightgun giving it a more unique feeling. I imagine if I had played this back in the 90's with my light gun set up I would have loved it because it would have felt like I was at the arcade. Playing this now however on a modern TV means that the PS1 lightgun simply won't work so you're stuck the PS1 controller. This boils Survivor down to nothing but a really slow, dull first-person shooter with mild puzzle elements. When I say mild I mean mild, 90% of the time the key to the locked door is in the only other unlocked room. Honestly, they feel less like traditional RE puzzles and more like filler fetch quests from an MMO. All together unless you have a CRTV setup with a PS1 and lightgun there is little the gameplay offers you.

All in all Survivor commits a far worse sin than being awful like I expected it to be, instead it's boring. The 90-minute playtime on my first run felt closer to 3 hours. If the game had simply been bad, or even terrible at least it would have amused in its failings. If you are able to play this with the classic PS1 lightgun then it might be worth checking out but if not then I'd say avoid it. If you are interested in the connected lore just read the wiki page.

Recommendation Rating: 2 out of 10