Last night I left off right after defeating
I think the word I’d use to describe the game overall so far is “Sidegrade.”
Level design wise, the Village was mostly structured the same as the original, with a few changes that don’t really make or break anything.
When you get to the castle though that changes a lot. There’s a lot of the same/similar rooms to the original castle, but in different locations like a remix. Again not necessarily better or worse, as most of the memorable areas are represented.
I would say the original (level design wise), flows better because the remake seems to like making you go to dead end paths with key items more, but it’s not a huge deal.
Voice acting wise I think it’s worse. Leon, Ashley, and Luis are fine, but everyone else just seems less memorable or straight up bad (*Cough* Ada). Haven’t gotten to Krauser yet but from the trailers his voice just sounds like a teenager trying to sound like Solid Snake, and is way less intimidating than the original, deeper voice. Saddler sounds way more generic and less theatrical, losing a bunch of his charm. Salazar is just ok so far, but lacks screen time.
The gameplay additions though, make up for this. Making the knife even more integral to the combat is genius. Parrying and upgrading the knife is crucial. The combat feels both easier and harder at the same time. Enemies (on Normal) seem to be less damage spongey than OG, but more plentiful.
The Water room in particular seems like the opposite of the original in terms of difficulty. The fight at the bottom of the staircase was way easier than the Ashley sniping section, whereas in the OG it’s the opposite.
I kinda wish crafting wasn’t a thing though, because I found myself crafting for most of my ammo in the Castle, and I could just do without the middleman of “resources.” It gives the choice of what ammo I need to craft I guess, but the game could also just use the OG’s dynamic ammo drops to give me what I’m short on and save me from the fluff that is modern crafting systems.
Overall, so far this is a RE2R situation, and I’m relieved.