Resident Evil 6

Resident Evil 6 tried to bring together the whole history of the series in a single package through four interconnected campaigns featuring Leon Kennedy, Chris Redfield, Jake Muller, and Ada Wong, set during a global bioterrorist crisis unleashed by a new strain of the C-Virus. Each campaign had its own tone - Leon's storyline leaned toward classic survival horror in an abandoned American town, while Chris's part built on military action in the style of a war shooter set in an East Asian metropolis, meant to serve as broad an audience of series fans as possible, from lovers of slow-burn tension to players who preferred nonstop action. In terms of gameplay, the game introduced a new movement system with dodges, rolls, and shooting while moving, bringing it even closer to third-person action shooters and further from the slower pace of the series' older entries.

On Xbox 360 the title offered extensive content including two-player co-op in every campaign and connected moments where the storylines intersected, letting players from one campaign briefly encounter characters from another storyline. Technically it was one of the most ambitious projects of the series on this generation, with a large number of locations from Chinese cities to European underground laboratories, accompanied by dramatic orchestral music underscoring the epic scope of the story and the number of characters whose fates intertwine by the end.

At the time the game received a mixed reception despite a large marketing budget - critics praised the scope and production values but criticized the inconsistent tone between campaigns and the shift away from the series' horror roots toward pure action. Today, Resident Evil 6 is seen as the point after which Capcom returned to more intimate horror in later entries, and it serves as a reminder of the most action-packed, most grandiose form the brand has taken in its entire history.

Why play it: Worth trying for its scope and production values as a reminder of the most action-packed, most grandiose form the brand has taken, even though the tone between campaigns feels inconsistent.