Resident Evil 4 (2023) | Agent of Agency

Our Resident Evil 4 (2023) review saw Capcom respectfully reimagine its 2005 classic, turning it into a greatest hits package that honors the original while modernizing it for today’s audience.

At a Glance

Release Date
Mar 23, 2023

Developer
Capcom

Platforms

Genre
Third Person Shooter, Survival Horror

Rating
Mature

Price
$59.99 (Release)
$39.99 (Current)

Proton
Proton Experimental

Reviewed on: Linux, Normal

Time: HLTB 14½ Hours (Main + Sides) | My Clear Time: 15hrs 33min

Resident Evil 4 (2023) Background

Resident Evil 4 (2023) launched on March 24, 2023, for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 4, and PC. It later expanded to Mac and iOS on December 20, 2023, with a dedicated PlayStation VR2 mode released on December 8, 2023.

The project was led by Yasuhiro Ampo and Kazunori Kadoi, the directorial team behind the 2019 Resident Evil 2 reimagining. Regardless of their success with previous entries, the duo initially hesitated to tackle the project. Anpo candidly admitted he “didn’t want to do it” out of fear of upsetting fans of the original masterpiece. The development philosophy focused on staying faithful to the 2005 classic while incorporating two decades of series evolutions. The goal was to modernize the experience without attempting to “recapture lightning in a bottle” by reinventing the genre a second time.

Visually, the team used benchmarks from Resident Evil 7 and Village to achieve modern fidelity, while the narrative was expanded with new lore notes and deeper characterizations for Leon Kennedy and Ashley Graham. A major mechanical shift involved the near-total removal of Quick-Time Events (QTEs). This led to the creation of the reimagining’s signature knife parry system, which originated as a solution for the Jack Krauser boss fight before being applied to the entire game.

To help player agency, the team introduced stealth mechanics, new weaponry like the bolt thrower, and sidequests inspired by the upgrade systems in Village. This made sure the “winning formula” felt fresh for a modern audience.

Development team for Resident Evil 4 (2023) includes:

Resident Evil 4 (2023) Experience

I’ve been familiar with the Resident Evil series since 2000, starting with Code: Veronica on the Dreamcast and going on to play nearly every entry in the franchise. The only exceptions are Outbreak File #2 and Survivor 2. I’ve completed Resident Evil 4 (2023) multiple times over the years, and this review makes my first return to the game since launch as the series approaches Resident Evil Requiem. I just finished Resident Evil 2 (2019) and Resident Evil 3 (2020) again before this replay.

Resident Evil 4 (2023) Impressions

Introduction

Six years after the catastrophic destruction of Raccoon City, Leon S. Kennedy is no longer the rookie cop who barely survived his first day. Now an elite agent reporting directly to the President of the United States, Leon is dispatched to a remote corner of rural Spain. His mission is a high-stakes rescue: find and extract the President’s kidnapped daughter, Ashley Graham, from the clutches of a mysterious cult known as Los Illuminados.

What begins as a search for a missing person quickly spirals into a fight for survival against an ancient, parasitic threat. While the original 2005 release leaned into over-the-top action and campy quips, this reimagining grounds Leon’s trauma in a world that feels far more oppressive and sinister. As Leon navigates crumbling castles and blood-stained villages, he must confront his past while protecting a young woman whose survival is the only thing standing between the world and a global biological nightmare.

Gameplay & Mechanics

Combat & Follow Up Attacks
Respecting the original Resident Evil 4, the reimagining rewards players that make use of shooting enemies to get a stagger, and using follow-up attacks to maximize your ammo efficiency and damage. Advanced techniques with the follow-up attacks like using them to get invincibility frames carry over from the original game. Stealth kills are a newly introduced mechanic along with the knife finisher to make sure they don’t mutate. You can see all of these in the above video.

Item Drops & Resource Management
Enemies drop ammo, money, and recovery items when defeated, continuing a tradition from the 2005 original. Every drop feels meaningful because resources are tight: you quickly learn to weigh whether to push forward for that extra ammo or retreat to conserve what you have.

Item Box & Key Items
Item Boxes, now integrated into the typewriter, let you store and retrieve gear across areas. Key items like fuse boxes and special keys are crucial for progression, but once used they can be discarded to free up precious space. This creates a constant mental juggling act: do I keep this key just in case, or drop it to make room for more ammo?

Status & Healing
One of Resident Evil’s longstanding traditions is the status mechanic. Health is displayed in the pause menu on a scale from Fine to Danger: green for full health, yellow for caution, and red for critical danger. The iconic yellow herb returns, allowing you to permanently boost your maximum health pool when mixed and consumed.

Puzzles & Weapon Parts
Puzzles range from keycard doors to dial rotations. They reward careful exploration and often trigger an autosave, giving you a brief moment of relief. Weapon parts found throughout the game let you upgrade firearms with recoil dampening or increased damage. Attaching the right part to your shotgun or pistol feels like a tangible reward for thorough searching.

Story & Writing

Leon is no longer a quip-machine; he is a man visibly haunted by the events of Raccoon City, which colors his protective relationship with Ashley. Ashley Graham herself receives the most significant upgrade in the script. She is reimagined as a capable companion whose personality evolves alongside Leon, moving away from the “damsel” trope that defined her previous incarnation.

The narrative also digs deeper into the supporting cast. Luis Serra’s role is expanded with a much stronger narrative focus that makes his involvement feel crucial to the plot. Perhaps the most effective narrative decision is the integration of lore from Operation Javier. By pulling elements from Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles, the reimagining finally provides a solid foundation for the tension between Leon and Krauser. Their shared history is no longer a vague footnote: it is a defining past that justifies Krauser’s motivations.

Art & Audio

Resident Evil 4 (2023) emphasizes its thriller tone with moody blues and very dim lit environments. Each piece of the environment is highly detailed and makes the world feel more alive. Sometimes it even comes alive, such as the armor knight enemies.

The Garrador is a terrifying example of how sound design becomes tactical. This blind, muscular monster reacts purely to noise. One careless footstep or gunshot can send it charging through the darkness, forcing you to use environmental sounds or thrown bottles to distract it while you flank for a kill.

Standout tracks:

The Drive
A mournful, flamenco inspired acoustic track that plays during the opening car ride. It establishes the Spanish setting with a sense of isolation.

Serenity
The reimagining’s Save Room theme. It retains the ethereal qualities of the original but adds a melancholic layer that reflects Leon’s weary state of mind.

Witness The Power
The theme for the encounter with Jack Krauser. It is a high tension, percussive track that mirrors the rhythmic nature of the new parry combat loop.

Unique Features & Mechanics

Ashley Partnership
Ashley is no longer a simple escort. Boosting her up to high ledges and protecting her during ambushes turns what could have been a frustrating mechanic into a genuine partnership. The co-op prompts feel meaningful, and her evolving role adds emotional weight to the journey.

Knife Parrying & Durability
The standout addition to the combat loop is the knife parry. Timing the button press perfectly as an enemy lunges lets you negate damage and stagger them for a punishing follow-up. The strict durability system adds constant tension: every successful parry chips away at the meter, and a broken knife forces a risky repair or retreat.

Attache Case Customization & Adaptive Difficulty
The Attache Case returns, bringing back the classic inventory management. You can now change the physical color of the case to trigger passive buffs, like increasing the drop rate of red herbs. Plus, the game tracks your performance through a hidden Game Rank that adjusts enemy aggression on the fly. When you play well, enemies become more aggressive. It creates a constant sense of being tested.

Merchant & The Mercenaries
The merchant’s requests and the shooting galleries turn exploration into a rewarding side activity. Completing weapon challenges for coins and rolling for charms adds a layer of light strategy. Mercenaries is a high-score mode that tests your mastery of the combat loop, rewarding precise timing and resource management.

Seiyuu Performances

The Japanese voice cast brings a veteran presence that grounds the more anime roots of the original characters into this darker reimagining.

Performance

On Linux, the game ran smoothly without any noticeable lag, stuttering, or crashing. Running at 1440p with a mix of high and off settings, I averaged around 139 fps, with 1% lows around 89 fps on Proton Experimental. Outside of Linux-specific workarounds, the PC version runs fine across hardware. Load times are short, frame pacing is stable, and visual clarity holds up. No frame generation or upscaling was used at all in our playthrough.

Resident Evil 4 (2023) Review Verdict

Resident Evil 4 (2023) respectfully reimagines its 2005 classic, acting as a greatest hits package that modernizes the original while keeping its essence. The knife parry turns every encounter into a tense dance of timing and positioning. Expanded roles for characters like Ashley and Luis transform what used to be mechanical hurdles into genuine emotional anchors, delivering the most satisfying single-player experience in nearly two decades.

Yet this modernization demands a trade-off. By leaning into a grounded thriller tone, the game sheds the campy B-movie charm of the original. The loss of radio banter and over-the-top set pieces leaves a void the more serious atmosphere cannot always fill. This shift is joined by the combination of adaptive difficulty and knife durability, creating a mastery resistance that prevents the game from being fully learnable. It forces a playstyle that is reactive rather than proactive. Moving the U-3 boss fight to paid DLC is a final, disappointing step back from the complete package fans loved in 2005.

Despite these compromises, the game never loses its grip. The oppressive atmosphere of the fog-shrouded villages and the mechanical precision of the combat loop shine through. This remains the peak of the modern reimaginings, setting a high bar for the series’ future while honoring the legend that came before.

Resident Evil 4 (2023) TLDR

Tested On
CPU: Ryzen 7 5900X | GPU: AMD RX 9070XT 16GB | RAM: 64GB DDR4 | Storage: Crucial P5 Plus NVMe SSD
OS: Nobara Linux | Resolution: 1440p | Settings: High/Custom | Framerate: Uncapped

References

Interviews

• Stewart, Marcus How Resident Evil 4’s Directors Approached Designing The Remake
  [Live | Archive]

Music

• The Drive – Nozomi Ohmoto [Live | Archived]
• Serenity – Nozomi Ohmoto [Live | Archived]
• Witness The Power – Kota Suzuki [Live | Archived]