The sequel: The Resi series has gone through many permutations during its long and storied history, but we're going to go back to the start. None of this two-player action gaming with slightly suspect racial undertones, nuh uh. Nor...whatever the sixth game was. We're talking about classic Resident Evil, with all the survival horror and tank controls and mixing together of herbs to restore your health somehow. Even today the first game in the series is kinda terrifying, with the jump scares and the dodgy controls adding to the tension whenever you enter a room that's being plagued by a member of the undead. You know, after you've waited five minutes for the room to load whilst that animation of a door opening plays. And between all the goofy cut scenes. But the gore! The gore is nasty! And brilliant! The original: And is all absolutely in line with a game Capcom made ten years prior! Sweet Home was a psychological horror role-playing video game made for the NES in 1989, which is not the type of game you often got on the NES. It was more Kid Icarus and Super Mario Bros. Based loosely off the Japanese film of the same name, the game saw you wandering a mansion (like Resident Evil!) full of horrible ghouls (like Resident Evil!) which you had to either defeat in random encounters or else leg it from (sort of like Resident Evil!). Besides that, a lot of the other Resi trademarks originate with Sweet Home. The infamously unforgiving inventory system first showed up in the NES game, as did the emphasis on survival, a lot of the puzzles - yes, they mostly involve combining things to make keys - and even the door opening loading screen. Playing Sweet Home is essentially like playing an 8-bit Resident Evil. And it's every bit as terrifying as you're imagining that to be. The Resi series has gone through many permutations during its long and storied history, but we're going to go back to the original. None of this two-player action gaming with slightly suspect racial undertones, nuh uh. Nor...whatever the sixth game was. We're talking about classic Resident Evil, with all the survival horror and tank controls and mixing together of herbs to restore your health somehow. Even today the first game in the series is kinda terrifying, with the jump scares and the dodgy controls adding to the tension whenever you enter a room that's being plagued by a member of the undead. You know, after you've waited five minutes for the room to load whilst that animation of a door opening plays. And between all the goofy cut scenes. But the gore! The gore is nasty! And brilliant! The original: And is all absolutely in line with a game Capcom made ten years prior! Sweet Home was a psychological horror role-playing video game made for the NES in 1989, which is not the type of game you often got on the NES. It was more Kid Icarus and Super Mario Bros. Based loosely off the Japanese film of the same name, the game saw you wandering a mansion (like Resident Evil!) full of horrible ghouls (like Resident Evil!) which you had to either defeat in random encounters or else leg it from (sort of like Resident Evil!). Besides that, a lot of the other Resi trademarks originate with Sweet Home. The infamously unforgiving inventory system first showed up in the NES game, as did the emphasis on survival, a lot of the puzzles yes, they mostly involve combining things to make keys and even the door opening loading screen. Playing Sweet Home is essentially like playing an 8-bit Resident Evil. And it's every bit as terrifying as you're imagining that to be.
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
