Resident Evil: Deadly Silence
Resident Evil: Deadly Silence is a reworking of the very first game in the series for the Nintendo DS, and it's one of the few versions made directly for a handheld rather than an unchanged port of an existing console game. The core of the game - the Spencer mansion full of zombies, locked doors, and classic item puzzles - stays the same, but Capcom added two extra game modes: Rebirth, which makes the game slightly harder, adding new enemies and puzzles that use both of the console's screens at once, and Knife Mode, in which the player faces zombies with only a knife and controls combat entirely via the touchscreen instead of buttons.
Touch controls also carry over into the inventory menu, which can be navigated with the stylus similarly to later entries in the series, and into some puzzles that use the bottom screen as an interactive surface for assembling items or rotating mechanisms - a clearly handheld-specific feature that doesn't exist in the console versions. The graphics and camera are based on the acclaimed 2002 GameCube remake, but due to the DS's limited power, the textures and character models are simplified, so the atmosphere is somewhat less tight than in the original. The game also offers local wireless multiplayer, where two players compete in a timed zombie battle directly within Knife Mode, another feature tailor-made for the handheld that you won't find in the console releases of the first game or in the GameCube remake.
Deadly Silence is exactly the kind of port that deserves attention on its own - not just a shrunk-down copy of the console remake, but a version adapted for touch controls and a smaller display, with its own game modes not found elsewhere in the series.
Why play it: Deadly Silence will appeal to Nintendo DS owners who want to experience the original horror of the Spencer mansion on the go, and to fans of the series curious about Knife Mode and the touch-controlled puzzles that don't exist on other platforms and couldn't even be replicated on a classic console controller.
Game 124 of 150 for Nintendo DS
From the same series Resident Evil →
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Resident Evil: Director's Cut PS1 · 1997 
Resident Evil 2 PS1 · N64 · GCN · PS4 · XONE · Series · PS5 · 1998 
Resident Evil 3: Nemesis PS1 · DC · GCN · 1999 
Resident Evil Survivor PS1 · 2000 
Resident Evil: Code Veronica DC · 2000 
Resident Evil Gaiden GBC · 2001 
Resident Evil Code: Veronica X PS2 · GCN · 2001 
Resident Evil 0 GCN · 2002 
Resident Evil: Dead Aim PS2 · 2003 
Resident Evil Outbreak PS2 · 2004 
Resident Evil Outbreak: File #2 PS2 · 2004 
