Resident Evil Survivor

Resident Evil Survivor is a spin-off of the famous horror series that departs from the usual survival horror format of a fixed camera and a slow, cautious pace. Instead of walking through corridors from the classic viewing angle, it offers a fast-paced first-person light-gun rail shooter, in which the player, as a man with no memory of his own past, moves through an island laboratory full of infected creatures in order to gradually discover who he really is and how he ended up on the island.

The character moves through the environment largely automatically along predetermined paths, and the player focuses purely on aiming and shooting at zombies and other creatures typical of the Resident Evil series, ideally using a light gun connected to the console, though the game also works with a standard controller for players without the accessory. The pace is markedly faster and more action-heavy than the series' main entries; the tension here relies more on a rush of larger numbers of enemies at once and a limited ammo supply than on the slow environmental exploration and key-and-item puzzle solving the series is otherwise known for. In some places the player can still choose between several paths forward, which at least partly compensates for the missing freedom of movement found in the classic entries. The story adds to the series' mythology with the fate of Sheena Island and the Umbrella corporation, but it mainly serves as a framework for a continuous chain of shootouts with minimal rest between individual sections.

Why play it: Resident Evil Survivor is better suited to series fans curious about a peripheral chapter of its story and to lovers of arcade light-gun shoot-and-move-on shooters than to players expecting a classic survival horror with a slow pace, limited resource management, and puzzle solving.