Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City

Set as a side story during the events of Resident Evil 2's Raccoon City outbreak, Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City drops you in the heavy boots of an elite Umbrella commando squad. Your assignment: retrieve the G-Virus or, failing that, destroy all evidence of Umbrella's connection and remove any dangerous survivors — Leon S. Kennedy among them — who might blow the whistle on the zombie antics.

Given the huge amount of potential the developers of Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City had to work with, it's disappointing how little of it was actually realized. On several occasions I was legitimately surprised by the mention of the name William Birkin or the familiar sound of picking up an herb, having long forgotten that this was supposed to be a Resident Evil game. The terrible AI, the lackluster locations and the complete lack of atmosphere or memorable characters destroy what could have been a brilliant offshoot. In the end, Operation Raccoon City is little more than a poor man's S...

If you are going to play Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City, and the series' popularity suggests plenty will, please make sure you're with three friends who love this universe as much as you do.

Overall, ORC provides an extremely lackluster experience. With so much in the Resident Evil series to draw inspiration from, it's a wonder why it felt like the developers were scrambling for creativity. Any attempt to bring the series in a unique direction was squandered with atrocious AI, uninspired locations and its complete lack of memorable characters or any real story. Operation Raccoon City is a shooter that completely misses its mark and hits the player squarely in the head in an attempt to make them brain dead enough to not notice its many flaws.

With the varied class-based system and large amount of unlockables Operation Raccoon City attempts to entice the player into coming back for more but unfortunately fails to create an appealing reason to revisit the biochemical tragedy. Seeking to establish itself within the Resident Evil franchise Operation Raccoon city does little to create a fun squad based shooter in this universe because of fundamental problems, poor story, and forgettable characters. You can go back and play through the five hour campaign to gain a S+ ranking in each stage but with other more enjoyable shooters available ...

And so, I think of Resident Evil 2’s Licker once more. That single enemy struck fear into my entire body. In Operation Raccoon City, I faced an entire army of them, and never felt the pulsating of my heart make it’s way towards my throat. The intelligent use of horror, intensity, and most importantly, subtleness has gone. While this game is only a diversion until Resident Evil 6 arrives, Capcom have done an amazingly awful job. Resident Evil used to be the trendsetter, the series everyone...

The original Resident Evil was the game that made me shed my love of Nintendo and shell out for a PlayStation. The controls were clunky (no auto aim!), the puzzles were ridiculous and the dialogue... Oh, that sweet, sweet dialogue. Suffice it to say that being a master of lockpicking has now gone down in gaming lore. Fast forward a few years and the survival horror genre is on the wane a bit, with the series having peaked with Resident Evil 4 and now being in danger of stagnating slightly. A ...