Umbrella Corps (PS4) Review

Resident Evil is no stranger to the world of spin-offs. Multiple lightgun games, co-op shooters and even java games on old mobile phones. Now the series has taken a crack at the world of competitive shooting and the end result is one of the worst games I’ve ever played.

Umbrella Corps takes place in a training zone for members of Umbrella’s armed forces. Just don’t expect any cut-scenes or narrative, because there isn’t any. The game combines first person and third person shooter elements. The controls are jerky and the way the character slides around the environment is really awkward. Furthermore, you can only take cover in specific spots, but the cover system is made redundant by the fact that no zombies can fire projectiles. 

The single player campaign is comprised of short missions in maps plucked from the multiplayer component. It's also a real slog. Mainly because it recycles the same six tiny maps and constantly cycles through the same three types of objectives. Collect zombie DNA, defend strategic points and collect briefcases. You go through this same cycle during the entire 3 hour campaign. Deaths are flat out cheap with some enemies killing you by simply rubbing up against you. Even the 10 minute missions force you to start from the beginning. It's frustrating and feels like a cheap trick to extend the life span of the game’s short campaign. The game gives you a radar, but it’s so tiny and difficult to read, it may as well not even exist.

Multiplayer is pretty much a ghost town, but if you can find other players, it allocates you into teams of three people in the following modes of game play: One Life Match and Multi-Mission. As the name suggests, One Life Match gives you a single life and you’re out of the match until everyone in a single team has been defeated. The emphasis on quick kills is similar to Quake 3. Which would be a compliment if the controls and gameplay weren’t so tedious.

Multi-Mission has you co-ordinating in teams to complete various objectives which keeps changing with every round. Unfortunately this mode brings in additional problems such as respawning in front of zombies and enemy fire. Plus the zombies take twenty shots to kill and just like the single player, many can kill you by brushing up against you. It’s a mess and the only good thing I can say is the netcode functions without any lag. Progression is awarded with additional costumes, patches and weapons. But variation in guns is minimal, with every type of machine gun, pistol and shotgun behaving in the same manner.

Capcom has a reputation for making good PC ports but Umbrella Corps suffers from poor optimisation. You can adjust the resolution and couple of effects. However there isn’t any options for anti-aliasing, texture quality or v-sync. You're simply locked to their unknown solutions. I have to admit I don’t have the most powerful rig but I can still run Resident Evil 6 and the recent Revelations 2 with all the graphic settings turned maxed out while hitting 60 frames per second. With Umbrella Corps I was forced to switch off most of the effects to reach the desired 60 frame per seconds. But even with this concessions, I still experienced constant drops in frames. Which doesn’t make sense when the game looks nowhere near as good as the aforementioned games.

I was visiting Japan when Umbrella Corps was released and there were shelves dedicated to this game including a limited edition PS4 console. It’s really depressing to seesomething so rotten like being given the red carpet treatment. Between this and Street Fighter 5’s botched launch, I’ve lost all faith in Capcom. Which is really sad since they use to be my favourite third party publisher with fresh games like Ghost Trick. Killer7, Okami and Viewtiful Joe. Sadly those golden days are no more.

RATING - AVOID LIKE THE PLAGUE

Touhou Genso Rondo: Bullet Ballet (PS4) Review

 (Discloure: Review copy was provided by the publisher.)

I have to admit I’m not familiar with the Touhou Project or any of the games in the series. But I know this new game, Touhou Genso Rondo Bullet Ballet is an awesome game.

On paper, Bullet Ballet is a mixture of the bullet hell shooter and the fighting game. Just like a fighter, it’s a match between two characters with a health bar and a time limit. But instead of using kicks and punches, use a barrage of bullets to defeat your enemy. However you can still home in on opponents and attack them with your melee weapon. The tutorial can waffle on a bit, but I recommend playing through it since there’s a lot of depth to this game. For example you can mix bullets with other bullets to create unique attacks. Also the game has various cool down and charge meters you have to govern. The speed and pace of the game combined with the flood of bullets makes for an exhilarating experience. 

The roster is comprised of just ten characters, but the good news is each character has their own unique feel. One character can surround herself with bullets while another can summon dolls to attack the enemy. Every character also has their own special attack, which places both characters in an empty space and allows you to shower your opponent with bullets. The frame rate never skips a beat and while the backgrounds are pretty basic, it does allow you to clearly see the bullets.

Unlike Street Fighter 5, this game has an arcade mode where you fight CPU opponents until you die. There’s also a local 2 player versus and online matches available. Unfortunately because I was playing the game before release, I was at the mercy of people using review codes and sadly I couldn’t find a match to test the netcode. I’ll be sure to make a note in the description when the game is released and I can find a match to see if the game suffers from any lag.

Other modes include Boss Rush, which is basically a marathon against all the character’s special attacks. There’s a story mode, which is kind of mediocre to be honest. There’s some nice 2D artwork, but the writing and characters are bit drab in my opinion. Annoyingly one of the character’s storylines is locked behind a paywall, which is a bit scummy.

Having said that, Bullet Ballet is a fun little game that is unlike anything else I have ever played, which you can’t say about many games these days. If you’re a fan of bullet hell games and looking for something new, you should definitely give this game a spin.

RATING - RECOMMENDED