I've warmed to the demo with a few more replays.
The new opening is great and the pacing feels a bit more logical than the original (apart from the ToD going from middle of the night to daylight in the span of 10 minutes). The game is leaning into the horror more which is welcome. I was also happy that the game knows what it should keep the same and what needs updated. The path to the village is I think a definite improvement, much more visually interesting and rustic, while the iconic village layout is almost 1:1 with the original. As a remake of the scenario and setting, Capcom have done a phenomenal job.
What I was unsure about was the gameplay, and I think I am still not 100% sold on it. It doesn't feel nearly as tight as the original game, in part due to the speed of the animations winding up, the slight deadzone in the aiming (noticeable even on PS5), and also how the Ganados are more unpredictable. The last point of course can be considered a positive, but it does change the flow of the game considerably. Old crowd control tactics can no longer be relied upon, because Ganados will just surround you and/or charge you with pitchforks if you stay still for too long. I had a great moment where one grabbed me from behind and while I was struggling to break free, Dr. Salvador chainsawed me through the stomach.
As a series vet, this is refreshing and helps set the remake apart from the original. However, I feel that the remake's movement does not prepare you well enough for that increased enemy aggression. There is something missing to make it fully work. To me, it's like there should be some sort of dodge mechanic like in Alan Wake, which would let you scoot out the way of an attack at the last minute. You can just move out the way, sure, but then you're contending with Leon's sluggishness.
I wouldn't ask for slow-motion like in Alan Wake, but just a reliable one button solution to dash out the way of imminent danger. When the game character and the controls cannot keep up with what I want to do fast enough, there is an issue. In the original, it's not like Leon was amazingly agile, but everything like player speed, enemy speed, level of aggression etc were all perfectly tuned to create an almost dance-like flow to the encounters, which is now harder to replicate in the remake. I think a dodge mechanic would go a long way to bringing back that flow. Right now the game feels a bit stiff and more difficult to string the action together into a pseudo-combo, making it feel slightly disjointed from a design point of view.
Enemies also seem a bit more bullet spongy and difficult to get them into a staggered state so you can melee them. You can fire a few shots at them and get little reaction. Likely by design, but again something to consider when comparing that flow of the original to the remake. I've also yet to see what happens when the knife fully depletes, and by extension of that, what happens when you completely run out of ammo and knife. Does the game become essentially unplayable at that point? Because the original never did and knife-only runs were possible.
It's a tough question to decide what actions should affect knife durability. Blocking Dr. Salvador's chainsaw or parrying certainly should, but then what should happen at 0%? Should it break and become unusable? I'd say it should get weaker like a blunt knife should, but should still be useful enough for melee attacks, and should always be able to be used for killing downed enemies or stealth kills (a nice addition btw to ease you into that village part).
I need to spend more time with the game to explore the nuances of its mechanics. Right now it is a solid game, but I think it does not supplant the original design. It just feels like a new take with its mechanics rooted in the previous RE2 and RE3 remakes they did. That's good enough for me to buy it of course, but the demo has definitely made my expectations for the full game more realistic.
