Never Too Old To Play™

I know I’m not alone in wishing for a remake of the first (and second for that matter) Resident Evil games using the new perspective and game play style employed by Resident Evil 5. That may be a pipe dream, but for now players wishing to take a stroll down memory lane can do so by playing Lost In Nightmares, a downloadable episode available on Xbox Live (or as part of the Resident Evil: Gold Edition available for both Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3).

Lost In Nightmares is the playable version of the flashback in Resident Evil 5 where series protagonist Chris Redfield recounts his mission with ex-partner Jill Valentine searching the European mansion of Umbrella Corporation chairman Ozwell E. Spencer.

The setting is deliberately reminiscent of the Arklay Mountains mansion in which the first Resident Evil game takes place. In fact, the entire chapter is essentially a throwback to that first game with tons of tiny little homages to the one that started it all. For instance, when you open doors in Lost In Nightmares, the view switches to a head-on perspective of the slowly opening door just like in the original game. There are also little winks and nods involving shattering windows, ceiling traps and Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata.

The only problem is that for the most part the episode is really quite boring. While it’s nice to see puzzles that are very similar to the ones gamers enjoyed back in the 90′s when the first game came out, the near utter lack of action sequences is quite jarring after having played the action heavy Resident Evil 5 main campaign. It’s true that Resident Evil didn’t boast non-stop gun fights, but Capcom seems to have swung to the completely opposite end of the spectrum with this DLC.

This isn’t to say that there’s no action anywhere in the entire mission, but what little there is seems somewhat mundane. Gamers meet a brand new enemy about halfway through the episode, but aside from the final boss fight that new enemy is the only type you encounter.

There are no zombies, no infected dogs, no Majini, etc. so there’s really no traditional combat sequences because the new enemy is one of those “very dangerous but very slow” types that you can almost always avoid fighting altogether.

Just about the only part of Lost In Nightmares that feels like it’s part of Resident Evil 5 at all is the final boss battle in which you face an enemy you battled in the full game by using the same strategies and techniques. It’s very frustrating for me personally that this is the tie-in since the game play style for this particular boss was my least favorite in Resident Evil 5.

Despite all of the issues I had with Lost In Nightmares, I still recommend it to die hard fans of the series (or at least the first game) since there are a lot of little Easter egg type details that fans should enjoy. I’m torn on this download myself because while I enjoyed the nostalgic aspects, I found myself incredibly bored with a good portion of the episode. Perhaps I need to recognize that my tastes have changed and to stop wishing for what Resident Evil was so I can focus 100% on my enjoyment of what Resident Evil has become.

Final score: 3 out of 5

Parent to parent

While this is an expansion for a game that I would not recommend for children, the significant lack of combat almost allows me to offer an opinion that the episode is child-safe. However, what the new enemy does to your character if it manages to get a hold of them is easily as gory as anything you’ll find in Resident Evil 5. Further, you would need to purchase the main game in order to play this expansion so there really isn’t any reason a child should ever be playing Lost In Nightmares.

Experience this for yourself!

• Resident Evil 5: Lost In Nightmares (Xbox Live Marketplace)
• Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition (Xbox 360) (Amazon)
• Resident Evil 5: Gold Edition (PlayStation 3) (Amazon)