Overview
Resident Evil Village is a masterpiece in every way and is one of the brightest entries to series to date. Capcom finally succeeds in combining and utilizing different types of horror into one comprehensive story after failing miserably in trying to do so in Resident Evil 6. Without going too much into spoiler territory, let's just say that Mr. Winters will have his hands full with a variety of entertaining and harrowing encounters on his journey to piece together what happened to his daughter.

Gameplay
This game has perhaps some of the tightest and well-woven gameplay I've ever had the pleasure of experiencing. Every weapon feels unique to shoot and utilize, keeping you on your toes and forcing you to think carefully about each encounter. With limited ammo and crafting materials in the environment, I was constantly rotating between my weaponry and trying to optimize my resources to get the job done. There are also various ways to use the environment to your advantage, such as the classic red explosive barrels, movable shelves, and bags of flour.

A useful mechanic that returns from Resident Evil 7 is the blocking mechanic. As series veterans know, it reduces incoming damage. To adjust to the more action focused nature of Village, Ethan is capable of pushing enemies away immediately after blocking, a wonderful addition that opens up new layers of strategical combat. Another upgrade over RE7 is the move away from item boxes to a RE4-like attache case. Being able to constantly carry your weapons and sub-weapons allows for experimentation with different weaponry whenever you want and allows you to utilize different approaches to solving enemy encounters. Thankfully, crafting materials are placed in a different menu from your weapons along with treasures and key items, freeing up much-needed space.

Speaking of enemies, there are a variety of threats that blow RE7 out of the water. Werewolves, nuns, and zombies comprise many of the basic enemies and they are capable of closing in on you quickly and efficiently, taking off sizable chunks of Ethan's health. There are also many different sub-bosses to deal with, each having different weak points and approaches to fighting. They often come out of nowhere as well, adding to the suspense. Last but not least, the five main bosses are perhaps the best encounters of them all. They offer a satisfying ending to their respective areas, witty and entertaining banter and personalities, and of course, difficult to reach weak points.

A final notable gameplay element is the Duke, Village's version of RE4's merchant. He is personable, likable, and mysterious and provides many useful services such as weapon, ammo, and healing purchases, weapon upgrades, and even cooking up feasts that upgrade Ethan's stats. These meals are made with the help of hunting for animals, another new mechanic. Animals are often hidden in optional areas that require backtracking and sometimes even solving puzzles. However, it is well worth it to collect their meat for the permanent stat boosts and high selling value of meat. Backtracking and scouring the environment should be done anyways because there are also valuable hidden treasures and additional resources to find as you progress through the game and village slowly starts opening up new areas. These resources will likely be the difference between survival and death, especially at higher difficulty settings.

Difficulty
Casual is the lowest and easiest difficulty. This is recommended for players brand new to the series and/or brand new to shooters in general. For achievement hunters, this is also the go-to choice as none of the achievements besides the difficulty achievements are difficulty-dependent. Ammo and resources are plentiful, enemies have significantly reduced health, and Ethan takes less damage. Enemies are also slower and less aggressive in general, sometimes just standing there and taking damage without retaliating. Another notable difference is that Lei pickups from enemies are low and less common than in higher difficulties.

Standard is the "normal" difficulty although series veterans and veterans of other shooters might find this difficulty a little too easy. Ammo and resources are still easy to find and enemies are still relatively passive although they do hit harder. Lei pickups are a little more frequent and of higher amounts than what is found in the Casual difficulty.

Hardcore is the difficulty I recommend RE veterans to start off at. It is the highest difficulty offered at the beginning with the standard version of the game. It is a lot more tense and satisfying than Standard, as enemies make an effort to get in your face to take you down. Ammo and resources are more scarce than in Standard and even common enemies will be capable of taking multiple shots before dying. Thus, smart weapon upgrades are needed, blocking will need to be utilized often, and running may be resorted to more often to save precious resources. Lei drops are frequent and higher amounts than in Standard.

Village of Shadows is the highest difficulty in the game and can be unlocked by completing the story once or by buying the Deluxe Edition of the game. It is not recommended to start on this difficulty, as that is quite masochistic and an exercise in frustration. That is likely because this difficulty appears to be made unbalanced unless you have infinite ammo. Enemies will not hesitate to kill you, sprinting up to you in droves and making frustratingly well-timed dodges to waste your valuable and scarce ammo. They are also found in new locations around the map and previous "late-game" enemies will spawn earlier in the story as well. On top of that, you can only take two to three hits before dying, even with all of the cooking upgrades and with perfectly timed blocks. Some bosses also have new tactics up their sleeve and are tanky to the max, which makes things excruciating especially in the late-game and this is regardless of you having infinite ammo. To help soften the blow a bit, enemies drop generous amounts of Lei early and more often, making weapon upgrades a breeze.

Length and Replayability
On my first playthrough, I took around 14 hours to complete the game because I wanted to explore every nook-and-cranny of the game and find all of the hidden files and treasures. Even when skipping this optional stuff, a first playthrough would average around 8 to 10 hours. Additional playthroughs are definitely recommended to unlock some sweet new weaponry, finish upgrading your weapons, trying new difficulties, and unlocking achievements. There is also the Mercenaries (an extra minigame) and cool figures and documents that give a behind the scenes look behind the production of the game and an expansion on the game's lore. As you can see, I've put in a little over 80 hours into this game trying to unlock everything so there's quite a bit of content to stick around for.

Performance and Issues
GPU: GTX 1660 ti
CPU: Intel Core i7-9750H
RAM: 16GB

The game ran consistently smooth with very little in the way of stuttering and tearing. My frame rate fluctuated between 70 to 120 FPS, even during intense sequences. Only when my PC ran a little too hot were there any noticeable frame drops, notably when the sisters and their flies appeared or if there was a mass enemy spawn. I have so far not come across any bugs yet so the game is clean in that department as well.

Issues with the gameplay and story itself that I hope will be addressed is adding a FOV slider (it's currently locked at around 85 or so), adding more characters to the Mercenaries, and adding some story related DLC to expand upon the Lords or explore how the Village came to be before Ethan's arrival.

Conclusion
Overall, Village gave me plenty of great moments and scares and I have thoroughly enjoyed my time with it, 10/10!