Clattertron

[dc]A[/dc] feature of Resident Evil 4 I always enjoyed was the Merchant. This mysterious character lets me but new weapons and items, and allows me to upgrade my arsenal.

In my earlier playthroughs, I would upgrade what I could, when I could, without much thought. Now, I’m trying to be a bit smarter about my choices. I’m not spending any money upgrading the basic handgun this time, that’s for sure.

Smart Shopping

Before I could even think about upgrading though, I had to make my first big decision of the game: do I buy the (bolt-action) rifle or the Attache Case M? I couldn’t really do both at the same time, unless I wanted to sell some of the bonus items I found (I picked up a couple of gold chicken eggs in the previous area, and they sell for 3000 ptas each).

What to do? The larger case lets me hold more items. However, the rifle is definitely a must-have when it comes to weapons: it packs a lot of power and lets me pick off enemies safely from a distance (and its scope acts like a poor man’s binoculars).

One of the ways the Resident Evil series ups the tension is you can only carry so many items at a time. Do you pass up on extra ammo to hang on to your cache of healing items? What do you toss away to make room for the more powerful, but larger, weapon?

While RE 4 lets you sell items to the Merchant, it doesn’t always make these choices easier.

I eventually decided it was silly to sell healing items only to hold more items, so I opted for the rifle. I’ll get the fancy fanny-pack next time.

Also: I love the voice of the Merchant. “Over here…Stran-ger.”

Tune Up

The benefit of revisiting a game so many years after it came out is, there’s a wealth of tips and playthroughs online. Heck, video playthoughs on YouTube have changed the “game tips” field.¹ You can watch someone play the entire game if you want.

One tip I learned before starting this go-round was, if you upgrade the ammo capacity of a weapon when it is empty, the Merchant reloads it for you. This helps. I picked off a bunch of villagers with the rifle, and when I ran out of ammo, used the upgrade trick to get 7 more rounds of rifle ammo.

I’m avoiding main playthrough stuff, however, unless I get stuck, and I’m not looking up ‘treasure maps’ either.

Resident Evil 4 Music

I need to mention the music and sound design again. Like most video games, RE 4 has an ‘enemy theme’ that plays whenever baddies are around. It’s an eerie, tension building bit of music that does its job very well. The effect of the enemy music is more obvious when you go right from it to the soothing, calm music of the Save screen.

Speaking of saving games…

I decided not to be conservative with how many times I save. Don’t care. I think I’m up to 23+ saves already and I’m barely two hours into the game. I know this affects your rating a the end (or something? I think?) but I just want to finish.

All in the Reflexes

Muscle memory is a weird thing. It took about an hour or so of gameplay, but I’m back in the groove of the controls, even though I last played several years ago. I’m working on using the quick knife more, but it’s still taking getting used to (mainly its effective range).

What’s Next?

I just started area 1-2 and cleared some of the buildings right outside Leon’s jail cell. I know there’s hairy stuff coming up, I just don’t remember when exactly. Ugh.

 

Extra Life

Speaking of video games, I’m playing games for the Extra Life charity next month (money raised goes to the Sparrow Children’s Center here in Lansing). Please pledge to me if you can, any amount helps.

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¹ Onion belt moment: Y’see, back in the old days, we had to call a 1-900 number to get video game tips from a real person! Yes, on the phone (as seen in the documentary The Wizard). Or subscribe to video game magazines (a printed out website mailed to your house). Sometimes both!