Simcity 3000 - Magic City

Resident Evil 4: Un Forastero! (Part 2)

I guess this is where my pathetic RE series ends. I tried to get my hands on RE5 but I don't want that Windows Live bullcrap, not since Bioshock 2. RE6 is out of reach for the moment but it's good that the last one is about RE4, a truly good game that I had fun playing.

So Leon get's sent to an undisclosed part of Europe because the intel suggests that the President's daughter might be there. You know that Leon has gone up a few levels in experience since RE2 and is some sort of badass because why else would the U.S. send just one guy instead of, I dunno, Navy SEALS?

Fun Fact: While I'm no linguist, several articles claim that the "Spaniards" in RE4 speak in an incorrect Mexican accent. I hope I'm wrong.

Leon stumbles into a quaint little Pueblo where the ambushed police officer who escorted him before is being roasted over a large fire. The town is batshit crazy and as Leon discovers, the people are cannibals. By the way, the sign outside calls the village, "Pueblo". It seems the pueblo is named "Pueblo" as if it's the only "Pueblo" in the world. The church bell rings and the villagers run off. This is a hint that there's extra spooky cult stuff going on.

Leon runs into a guy named Luis. To my utmost annoyance, Leon mispronounces his name as "Lewis" instead of the Spanish pronunciation. Luis is a researcher of sorts. All the villagers are infected with mind control parasites. Who he works for and what he's doing there is not ellaborated further until later but he's just there for Leon's and the plot's convenience. Seriously, Luis is keeping the RE tradition of having NPCs appear just to move the game along, then promptly die when they've outlived their purpose. Fortunately, it's not yet that time. They get captured and Leon gets injected with the "Las Plagas" parasite, which is the "in" thing with the bioweapons crowd. Naturally, they manage to escape.

Fed up with wasting time, Leon goes back to his mission of rescuing Ashley. He defeats a lake monster but collapses in a nearby lake house from fatigue and having a large parasite injected into his neck.

Fun Fact: If you stand at the dock and shoot the lake a few times before the boss battle, "Del Lago" will pop up and kill you. I nearly pissed myself when I tried this.

Leon obtains a key to open the church where Ashley's being held. He also fights a giant along the way because why not? He tries to escape with Ashley but they run into the big bad himself, Osmund Saddler, the leader of the "Los Illuminados" cult. Wait, Osmund? They named the main villain Osmund? Anyway, Saddler makes light of the situation and just cracks jokes about how there's parasites in both their bodies. They escape from him and meet up with Luis at a small cabin. Thus begins the "cabin siege" battle of the game and this was easily one of the best if not the best part of the game.

After the battle, Leon and Luis needlessly separate. Leon's discovers his escape helicopter has been shot down. Leon has no choice but to move forward but I always found it strange that Leon seemed to go deeper and deeper into enemy territory where he and Ashley blundered into increasingly dangerous circumstances. I mean, wouldn't you rather go to a safer direction or stay put rather than make your way to a creepy looking castle infested with cultists? Leon goes for the castle anyway. He beats the village chief, Bitores Mendez, and uses his eye to get past a completely out-of-place retinal scanner that blocks the passage into the castle

As if the bullshit wasn't enough, Leon runs into the castellan, Ramon Salazar, who's a Spanish midget Napoleon. The conversations between Leon and Salazar are comedy gold. While the voice acting is alright, the dialogue is just nice and stupid.

Ashley coughs up blood and fucking runs off by herself. She gets her dumb ass captured. Leon meanwhile, meets Ada Wong, the only woman he ever loved... and they split up. Leon goes through more bullshit, fighting off tentacle dogs and invisible giant mantis things. He solves a few puzzles too because you got to have puzzles or else this won't seem like an RE game. He eventually rescues her and Luis shows up with some meds and a sample of the dominant mind-control parasite. Luis got it! You know what that means?

After Saddler impales Luis with his boner, he runs off with the sample. Leon angrily vows to avenge the death of his friend Lewis. Just to summarize, the game goes for a stretch at this point. Leon kills everyone in his path, including that little dick, Salazar. Leon runs into some guy named Jack Krauser, who's this red beret wearing muscled badass knife nut. I honestly do not know who Jack Krauser is or why they stuffed him into this game. He just seems like an enigmatic character and by enigmatic, I don't mean "interesting" enigmatic but "why-should-I-care?" enigmatic. Leon hints they have a history together but we may never know. Literally nothing is elaborated on.

Fun Fact: The giant statue sequence is the craziest thing in this entire game. A giant statue of Salazar is being built underground. This statue is several stories tall and can MOVE. It chases Leon over a narrow bridge. What were they smoking when they came up with this!? Note also that the giant statue bit where you pull levers is similar to a level in God Hand, another Capcom game. A lot of things in RE4 remind me of God Hand actually.

Leon takes the fight to the Los Illuminados' top secret pirate island base. Is the Spanish government totally oblivious? It seems cultists have taken over the countryside, a large fucking castle and a whole island. Saddler's plan was to use Ashley to get to the President but Leon put's a stop to that. They manage to get a cure and chopper evac. Mike the chopper pilot is the second best character in RE next to HUNK. He's the only chopper pilot who lasts more than a fifteen seconds in the sky before being shot down; an RE record! Remember that chopper pilot in RE2? How about in RE3? Oh, that's right, they were all chumps who can't hold a candle to Mike. Mike even manages to take a lot of bastards with him before eventually getting gunned down. Resident Evil hates chopper pilots. Rest in peace Mike, you lovable bastard.

Chopper evac ain't an option so it's time for a final boss fight. As if the developers were checking boxes on a list, the self-destruct sequence activates. Leon manages to defeat the mutated Saddler thanks to Ada dropping a rocket launcher. It's a reference to RE2, GET IT!? Leon and Ashley escape on a conveniently placed jet-ski. In a scene that reminds me of the awkwardness between Snake and Otacon's ending in Metal Gear Solid, Leon and Ashley drift for a while on the sparkling blue ocean. The President's underage daughter then asks Leon if he'd be available for some "overtime". Disgusting.

Well that's it for now.