Rail or Not?

When Capcom first announced Umbrella Chronicles for the Nintendo Wii, fans couldn't be more happier. After all it's still a long wait till Resident Evil 5 and the last three Resident Evil games on the Nintendo Gamecube had been great. When they later revealed that it's going to be a shooter game, fans were less than excited about the prospects, since previous attempts to transcend into the shooter territory using the RE license had been less than successful. When it was finally revealed that it's going to be an on-rails shooter much like the gun-games in the arcades, fans just went nuts....have Capcom finally lost it?

Well after playing Umbrella Chronicles for a good six hours, I can safely say that this is probably the best iteration of the Resident Evil Gun Survivor series. Having the game running on rails really creates a lot of tension or atmosphere because you have absolute no control over where to go or which way to look. The biggest difference between games and movies is that games are a form of interactive entertainment which the player actually have to take part in the game in order for the story to progress. The problem is, sometimes gamers feel that by taking away certain abilities like camera movement or in this case player movement, the sense of immersion is reduced and the gameplay experience is compromised. The quality of a good game should not be judged on such merits as it's not what makes a good game great. As much as fans love the level of detail in Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, it's not what made the game so memorable. In fact, it actually adds little to the actual game experience apart from allowing you to stray away from the main objective, having fun goofing around.

The point I'm trying to make is that games are as much of an art form as movies and that game developers should be treated with the same degree of respect and allowed the creative freedom to make decision to take away certain level of interactivity from the gamers such as this case. When was the last time you think to yourself, this movie would have been better if only the director/screenwriter did this instead of that? Would killer7 had be a better game if it wasn't running on rails? Probably not, maybe as games become more 'beautiful' and 'immersive', we gamers are becoming more 'possessive' and scoff when things are taken away from us? It's time to leave the reins to the people in-charge, have faith and ultimately they will deliver the best experience possible.... yes, we are looking at you too, mr. Suda.