I played and loved Resident Evil 5 in its standard form on the PlayStation 3 when it came out. Back then I remember sometimes missing the Resident Evil 4 Wii controls a few times, wishing I could point to headshot and flick to defend myself. But I’m not expecting to ever see RE5 on the Wii anytime soon.
The PlayStation Move controller changes that. Now, I’m not saying that this new PlayStation Move version is just like the Resident Evil 4 Wii, but it does let me point to shoot, and I like that.
Read on for our impressions of Resident Evil 5 with PlayStation Move control.
First off, release detail: The Move controls will be added to Resident Evil 5 Gold Edition as a free downloadable update, set to drop right when the Move controllers are released. And no, the standard version of Resident Evil 5 will not get the update. It seems like this is an easy way to move more copies of their Gold Edition. To be fair, fans of the series and the fifth game shouldn’t pass on it anyway.
The Move-enabled version of the game uses both the Move wand and the navigation sub-controller, with a button mapping that will look mostly familiar to those that played Resident Evil 5 on the PS3. On the motion controller you’ll use the Move button to do things like fire and interact, but functions like changing items and running are set to the smaller face buttons, just like they were on the PS3. Surprisingly, you’ll hold a modifier button on the sub-controller and then use the Move button to swing your knife. I found myself wanting to flick the motion controller for knife slashes instead. That’s something they could easily be added on later.
The real advantage here is using the motion controller to aim. There’s no need to point directly at the screen. Instead, your hand movements move the cursor in a way that kind of reminds me of mouse movement. Aiming and firing was quite easy; I found myself pulling off headshots in no time. The motion of the cursor was incredibly smooth and perfectly accurate, which leads me to believe that this control configuration could easily be applied to many other third-person shooter type games.
If somehow you weren’t digging the Move controls, you could easily switch back to DualShock controls during the game. In fact, you can split the game (or play online), with Move players playing alongside DualShock players.
That said, I think that those that purchase the Move controllers will want to give Resident Evil 5 another spin with them. I only played the game’s first stages with the Move controllers, but I could already see the appeal, and I’m looking forward to going through the game again with them.
