Resident Evil Requiem

I love how Leon picks his weapon, I like the absolute hand cannon Rsh-12 in the game

Requiem is genuinely the best Resident Evil game since 4, and in some aspects, it is better than 4. I feel like, as a Res-E fan, that is the highest praise it could get. The story, which is expanded from the Racoon City Outbreak in RE2, is beautifully tied together to make it believable and 28 years later still being relevant in the verse. Grace's involvement is also really natural, being the adopted daughter of one of Umbrella's founders, who made everyone believe he was working on a bio-weapon, but it turns out it was an anti-virus, to battle the various strains of the T-Virus. Brilliantly put together and amazingly tied together at the end. Chris's crew appearing at the end to save Grace and Leon was epic, and the 2 endings was something I have never seen playing Res-E, besides maybe 7 where you pick who to take with you near the end. I picked the bad ending where Grace destroys Elpis and Leon dies and I genuinely cried at that scene, and was left speechless for a good few minutes. Immediately went back and got the canon, better ending. I still appreciate the bad ending being there, however, I was just too stupid to tie together that I should have activated Elpis from the start, which was severely hinted throughout the game. Such a well-written experience. Every single character in the story is great. From Dr. Gideon being a surprisingly good villain, to Leon and Grace being magnificient protagonists. Grace is one of the best written characters I've seen in gaming, and the voice acting, dialogue writing and line delivery genuinely could not be better. Leon's quips are just as good as when he was younger, his determination and endurance throughout everything is so, so good. Grace's actress deserves ALL the praise and infinitely more, she is so well-acted. The combat is fantastic. Unlike RE2 and 3, where if you ran out of resources you were royally screwed, Requiem's sections where you're out of resources, most notably with Grace, always has you finding some sort of item to clear an upcoming area, particulary East Wing of the asylum and the licker areas in ARK. I honestly prefer Leon's combat in this rather than 4, and that is entirely because of his axe being infinitely reusable with no resource wasting, just a little time to resharpen it. For some Res-E fans that'll probably be a turn-off, but for most rational fans, including me, this is a massive improvement, always feeling like you could block instead of trying to manoeuvre around people to awkwardly avoid hits. The boss fights are definitely weaker than most of the franchise. Gideon's final fight is similar to 3's final Nemesis fight, even with Leon mentioning that Gideon was a Nemesis, so he was likely infected with the same strain that Nemi was in 3, but Gideon's fight is still weaker and really easy. The Girl in the abandoned oil facility thingie outside of Racoon city was a really well constructed fight for Grace, and a blast to play. Leon's fight against the Hunk wannabe was probably the best fight. Res-E always does a great job putting in that one niche fight that is somehow so so so enjoyable. The game is stunning and runs super well, something I certainly did not expect. Loved the lighting and how detailed everything was. Grace's gameplay was similar to Ethan's in 7 in a lot of aspects, yet you felt more powerful and in control the further you went along, and that was certainly a great thing. Leon's bike fight against Gideon is one of the coolest things I've seen in gaming, as well. They made Grace's sections super enjoyable and appropriately spooky, Leon's appropriately badass, combat-oriented, not tedious at all, and greatly fun. Genuinely could not have asked for a better experience, enjoyed it every step of the way. I adored it so much I might go back and try to get all the achievements sometime! Easiest 9,5/10 of my life.