A Little Bit Of Poo Came Out

Picture the scene. It’s 2am, and Frank and I are up playing a game on the Gamecube.

Did I mention the game is Resident Evil 4?

Let me explain this game. It’s a veritable buffet of fear. It has the whole spectrum from the creepy “It’s quiet…a little…too quiet.” To the “Oh my God, There’s THOUSANDS of them! They’re coming through the window, OH SHIT!! I’m out of shotgun ammo!” (There’s nothing like trying to hold back a tide of brainwashed zombie-like cultists with a peashooter of a handgun.)

It has blood and gore, from blowing the zombie like cultists’ heads off, to gigantic insects dissolving your face, to the psychotic ‘burlap sack over the head’ guys who enjoy chain sawing your head clean off.

One of my particular favorite scare moments was the time when Frank was walking through this exceedingly quiet, creepy hospital building. He walked through the deathly silent kitchen area. He stops at the door, raises his shotgun and does a sweep of the room…just in case there are any of those gigantic invisible insects that like to drop from the ceiling and eat your face.

“There’s nothing there.” I say, forgetting the game likes to lull you into a false sense of security. Every room so far has been clear. “Just go in there, you pussy!”

Frank takes a tentative step forward. He arrives in the middle of the room.

“See?” I say.

We both visibly relax.

“ARRRGHHLOOOOOOBLARRRRGGGAAAAAA!” The industrial oven door bursts open, and a knife wielding maniac, who just happens to be on fire, charges out…all waving arms and screaming (Which was amazing, after that scream, I was doing exactly the same thing…um, only I wasn’t on fire).

Pure adrenaline makes Frank’s hands move. His gun comes up and BLAMMO! Mr. On-fire-scary-psycho flies back as though he’s been hit in the chest with a bowling ball. Frank holds his gun on him in case he gets back up (In this game, MUCH stranger things have happened). The whole incident from door opening to gunshot took maybe a half second tops. Frank reacted on pure instinct, no time to think.

Oh, and we both managed to achieve a record breaking four feet off the floor…still in the crossed legs sitting position.

I haven’t even mentioned the set-piece battles, of which there are hundreds. You cross a bridge, when suddenly thousands of the zombie-cultists appear in both directions, trapping you. You run to the nearest cabin, and try and hold them off, all the time watching your ammo tick slowly down.

You have to cross a lake, and wouldn’t you just know it, there’s a 50 foot long sea-monster in there…and it snags your anchor line…meaning you’re getting towed around this lake a break-neck speed, trying to hurl harpoons at the thing while keep control of the boat. Oh, and then you get knocked in the water, and have to hammer the A button as fast as you possibly can to swim back to the boat…watching the sea monster getting closer and closer…while opening its gigantic mouth. (seriously, you could fit a medium sized apartment in there).

As you can imagine there was lots of:

“Ok, be careful, this looks bad…WHAT THE F**K!!!........RUN, RUN DAMN YOU! RUN LIKE THE WIND!!!”

“Right, I’d better reload, you never know when you’re going to get jum…KILL IT! KILL IT!!! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, MAKE IT DEAD!”

“What’s the strange clicking noise?” “OH MY GOD, DODGE, DODGE!!!”    “I’M TRYING, I’M TRYING!”    “HOLY SHIT! LOOK AT THOSE TEETH!!!”

“SHOOT IT!”    “I’M TRYING! THE BULLETS ARE JUST BOUNCING OFF!”

There’s nothing like a game where running away while screaming like a little girl are viable, and sometimes necessary, options.

Above all, it was fun, there’s nothing quite so effective as something as simple as a game scaring the ever-living crap out of you, to get you laughing.

At one point, we were laughing so hard at something I just came out with, it instantly become my lifelong ambition to get on TV to say it. I think it sums up the game perfectly.

So let’s imagine I’m being interviewed in the street for a gaming TV show:

---------

Interviewer: “So what would you say your favourite game is?”

Me: “Hmm, that’s hard to say, but I’d have to say Resident Evil 4 is in my top 3 games of all time.”

I: “Why is that?”

M: “Well, the visuals are absolutely stunning, a perfect example of why the Gamecube SHOULD have been one of the top consoles. The control system is flawless, as is the in game camera. It’s perfectly balanced weapons and enemy wise, but I have to say the best thing is the atmosphere and the scares.”

I: “Is it really that scary?”

M: “Well, let’s put it this way. At one point I was riding in a mining car, Indiana Jones style, and all these badguys kept jumping into it. Suddenly I heard a chainsaw start up, and turned around just in time to see…Well, let’s just say…a little bit of poo came out.”