- Resident Evil Survival Unit brings a tactical twist to the classic survival horror series
- Battle iconic RESI creatures alongside fan-favorite characters.
- Jump between real-time combat and base building elements.
Lock yourself in a ruined police station as hordes of infected cannibals approach, and explore a sinister mansion where twisted experiments were conducted; RESI fans have been here a hundred times before, but the series' latest mobile spin-off, Resident Evil Survival Unit, puts a tactical twist on these concepts, keeping them fresh and new.
Co-creators Aniplex and JOYCITY have put a painstaking effort into reimagining Capcom's flagship survival horror series for mobile, and the result is everything that has made it a genre-defining classic over the years, in a pocket-sized, touchscreen-friendly package.
What kind of fresh hell is this?
Resident Evil Survival Unit begins in typical end-of-the-world fashion. The action begins in a darkened hospital where our protagonist, Anthony, has slept through the beginning of Judgment Day, in a coma as an infection sets in.
It's an alternate universe to the main Resident Evil saga, but a viral infection has still turned it into a biohazardous hellscape, and the hospital Anthony wakes up in is no longer a place of healing, and the morgue appears to have a revolving door policy.
Then a third-person horror game unfolds, reminiscent of classic RESI. It's reminiscent of the original console games, enhanced to take advantage of the graphics capabilities of current-generation mobile devices, with controls specifically designed for the touchscreen.
Using the on-screen joystick and a single action button, you'll shoot the series' ubiquitous infected as they crawl through darkened hospital hallways, nervously scan each room with the help of a discarded flashlight you grabbed, and solve a few easy puzzles.
It's vintage RESI stuff, and it works well on mobile, but you soon realize that Survival Unit has a lot more to offer than just nostalgia.
Tactical turn
One of the most impressive technical achievements of Survival Unit is its touchscreen controls.
Survival Unit features an updated haptic interface from the start. After crossing paths with and playing as Resident Evil star Claire Redfield—one of several series stalwarts featured in the game to ensure she's riding on the fan service—the game introduces you to solving a potential standard obstacle: real-time strategy-style combat.
However, as the action moves to the streets and then to a police station under siege (another nod to the classic), you'll find yourself under attack by hordes of iconic RESI baddies, from infected in police uniforms to mutant dogs, and the action switches to real-time strategy mode.
Here you can move your team members around like chess pieces, strategically placing them so that enemies are in a direct line of fire or they can effectively cover their comrades. Each character also has special abilities that complement each other.
Claire Redfield, for example, can wield a Gatling gun to mow down waves of attacking infected, while Marvin Branagh (of Resident Evil 2 fame) can erect a barricade to hold off enemies while teammates with more powerful firepower can unleash hell on them.
The inclusion of RTS combat complements the core survival horror game well, adds another layer of strategy, and feels like the right compromise to balance out the gameplay on mobile.
It's all about this base
It won't take long for Resident Evil Survival Unit to reveal its true nature. It's a hybrid beast that combines survival horror and real-time strategy, but base building also plays a central role in the game.
Shortly after escaping what's left of the police station, your group arrives at an old mansion, blissfully unaware that terrible things are happening on this type of property in the RESI universe. The grounds of this stately home serve as a sandbox for missions that combine all of the different types of Survival Unit gameplay, but there is also base building going on here.
One minute you'll be upgrading the on-site farm to produce supplies for your party, and the next you'll be engaging in real-time battle at the mansion gates to repel an Infected invasion. It even takes you on a classic survival horror adventure through the various hubs that make up the mansion's estate to investigate power outages and other phenomena.
In other words, this is Resident Evil at its most diverse. Survival Unit combines several different types of gameplay, but balances them well by playing to the strengths of smart devices.
Resident Evil Survival Unit promises to please fans, and if you want to try it out for yourself, it can be downloaded for free from the website App Store And Google Play.
