Without sugarcoating it, the Resident Evil 4 Chainsaw Demo wasted no time in returning us to the world of Leon Kennedy—the survivor of the horrible Raccoon City incident—and his new lease on life as a special US Agent. Obviously, the demo didn’t go super deep into story lore but it had a similar opening to the original RE 4 but with new scenes and themes to remind you this new title has the heart of the original but is focusing on the newer version of Leon and the world of Resident Evil. We loved how it felt akin to Resident Evil 7 and Village but with the soul of Resident Evil 2 Remake. It excites us to see how much has changed with Leon after Raccoon City and how this new threat feels in comparison to his original battle as a rookie police officer 6 years ago.

Taking a more action-heavy approach versus the original Resident Evil games, RE 4 was always met with backlash as the horror was just not there. In the Resident Evil 4 Chainsaw Demo, we noticed that a few times we jumped and it wasn’t from silly jump scares or a village “zombie” hiding in a cabin. Resident Evil 4 Chainsaw Demo plays a lot like RE 4 and RE 2 Remake but clearly wants to set itself in both worlds. The action was still very intense as we set foot inside the new town center and survived till a similar event saved us but with the new enemies' variety and their new abilities—plus the iconic chainsaw-wielding enemy—there were times we were terrified!

There was a moment in our third replay—yes we replayed the demo several times—where a new scene we never saw occurred as the chainsaw enemy began tearing down areas around it and Leon was left to scamper away unless he wanted to become ground beef! We can already tell no two playthroughs of RE 4 Remake will be similar as each time we replayed a new scene occurred and that was just in the demo version!

Even if you loved the original tank controls, no one can deny the greatness of the gameplay mechanics found in the original RE 4. From the gun combat, the quick time events, and the inventory management system, RE 4 played incredibly well. Well, readers, we can tell you firmly that Resident Evil 4 Chainsaw Demo showed us that Capcom didn’t fail to deliver great gameplay once again, if not better. The third-person shooting returns but is enhanced with even more precision. Top that off, the melee of the original RE 4 and RE 2 Remake has returned but enhanced with more ways to counter enemies with Leon’s new training and knife that doesn’t break after one hit.

Resident Evil 4 Chainsaw Demo also has several exploration segments to scour for items and it just made us smile. We can’t deny that we are pumped for the bigger areas of Resident Evil 4 Remake and see what other surprises are awaiting us!

In our minds, visuals aren’t everything for a video game but we can’t deny… Resident Evil 4 Chainsaw Demo might be a brief representation of the final base game and it looks fantastic! From the character designs to the lighting effects, Resident Evil 4 Chainsaw Demo showered us with examples of how the final product will look and we were floored! We played on both the frame rate-focused settings to the visual-focused settings and both looked stellar with only minor differences between them. Resident Evil 4 Chainsaw Demo is only an appetizer of the main course but wow…what an appetizer it was!