games: Resident Evil 5

Most games in the Resident Evil series have not really been much good for multiplayer. They’re games you play on your own, maybe with a friend sitting behind you. Someone to annoy the hell out of you.

Resident Evil 5, however, is a multiplayer game through and through. In fact, you could say that to play it single player is just time-wasting.

If you try to play it alone then your partner in arms will be controlled by your console. And she won’t be happy just shooting things, oh no: she’ll break open crates, pick up ammo, and heal you both, whenever she sees fit. Imagine your most interfering friend, and then imagine playing with him every time.

It’s breaks the mood of the game, having a rogue player running around and doing stuff you didn’t tell it. You can thwart them by constantly stopping and raiding their inventory, like a naughty child. But it feels strange, having to say “Is that a herb? Did you just find a herb, and pick it up? Give it to me. Come on, hand it over.”

It’s a little bit offensive, really, when you are ready to get into a lift and notice that the AI robot is running around, stabbing the barrels you missed, and picking up the ammo. It compromises the fundamental human right to be crap at games.

Basically, if you play alone, you’re missing out. But that’s because Resident Evil 5 just isn’t a single player game at heart. The entire game - including the amazing, screaming tension, has been transplanted into co-op. And the game only really comes together when you’re playing with another human. Luckily, the online functions make it easy to find someone to play with, although it’s far better to be playing in the same room as your buddy.

Rationing your bullets suddenly makes more sense. You don’t have to treat Sheva as a grenades and ammo pack mule. And the fact that you’re not in control of the situation suddenly becomes their fault, instead of Capcom’s.

There are some great uses of co-op play. For example, in the mines level, one player has to carry a lantern - which transforms them from a useful fighting companion into the level’s only source of light. When you realise a zombie is in the shadow that you’re casting yourself and your pal has to drop the lantern to help you, it’s genuinely gripping.

Although Resi 5 has removed a lot of the puzzle elements, you have to admit that Resident Evil was never really going to compete with Professor Leyton on that front. There’s still key collecting, but you’d have to be pretty stupid to consider that a puzzle.

If you’ve got someone who wants to play with you, Resident Evil 5 is a completely essential buy. If you’re a rogue agent who prefers to fly solo, be prepared to bat Sheva the Retreiver on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper, and make her hand over all the things she keeps picking up - with a gruelling regularity. For its amazing Co-op goodness, Resident Evil 5 gets an appropriate 5 stars!