History YMMV / ResidentEvil4

** The HD and Ultimate HD Editions released for PS3, Xbox 360 and PC are pretty solid ports all around (see PolishedPort above), but they have one major gameplay bug that can make certain sections unpassable: the QTEs are tied to the frame rate, but the game was originally designed to play at 30 frames-per-second. This means that when running the game at 60 FPS, players need to mash the onscreen button prompts ''twice as fast'' as they would when playing at 30 FPS. While most of the QTEs are generous enough that one can still pass them while playing at 60 FPS, the two sequences where Leon must pull himself up from a ledge (after the mine-cart sequence and the robot-Salazar chase) have a much slimmer threshold for success--a player will likely find themselves falling from the ledges over and over no matter how quickly they mash the on-screen prompts. The only way around this is to go into the options menu during these sequences and set the game to run at 30 FPS.

** The Zeebo version is this to the (already heavily cutdown) mobile ports. The game's original soundtrack, which plays faithfully to the console and PC releases in the mobile versions, were poorly converted into MIDI and sound horrifically off-key on the Zeebo version, along with incorrect lighting and jarring use of fog in some areas, struggles to maintain 20 FPS, and all of the humanoid enemies have blue skin for seemingly no reason (only the cultists had blue skin the mobile versions).

** When the game first came out, Ashley was considered TheScrappy for being helpless and forcing the player to divide their focus between protecting her and fighting enemies. With [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQhkR1AFaBA&ab_channel=RapidCrafter leaks]] of ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil4Remake'' removing most of the tension in escorting and protecting Ashley by having her hide in the safe room during combat, some fans admitted that the tension of escorting Ashley actually enhanced their gaming experience and that the change was completely unnecessary, arguing that her AI was actually quite good, given she knew how to duck, hide, and follow Leon accordingly.

* MagnificentBastard: Chief Bitores Mendez is one of Osmund Saddler's lieutenants within the Los Illuminados and "The Big Cheese" of the village [[GeniusBruiser who combines cunning intelligence with frightening strength]]. When Leon Kennedy begins investigating the village to find the president's daughter, Mendez organizes the villagers in stopping him, setting up various ambushes and deploying monsters against Leon. Mendez personally confronts Leon multiple times, defeating him with ease and only sparing his life on Saddler's orders. Mendez also captures and nearly kills Ada Wong when she interferes. Setting up one final ambush for Leon, Mendez's only reaction to Leon blowing him up is to mutate into a more dangerous form and [[{{Determinator}} continues fighting even after being reduced to just a torso]].

** What's better, the [=Red9=] or Blacktail? Arguments over this rage to this very day.[[note]]The HD re-release makes the race even tighter by increasing their respective power maximums to 6.5 and 4.5, reducing the relative difference between their damage per shot.[[/note]] On one hand, the [=Red9=]'s damage is second to none and has some steady aim with the stock, but the Blacktail's superior handling and comparable damage make it almost as good, if not better in the right hands. It's worth noting that the Red9 becomes the superior option when played on the Wii, since the slow handling on consoles is completely counteracted by the pointer aim from the Wii remote.

** What's better, the [=Red9=] or Blacktail? Arguments over this rage to this very day.[[note]]The HD re-release makes the race even tighter by increasing their respective power maximums to 6.5 and 4.5, reducing the relative difference between their damage per shot.[[/note]] On one hand, the [=Red9=]'s damage is second to none and has some steady aim with the stock, but the Blacktail's superior handling and comparable damage make it almost as good, if not better in the right hands. It's worth noting that the [[CoolGuns Red9]] becomes the superior option when played on the Wii, since the slow handling on consoles is completely counteracted by the pointer aim from the Wii remote.

* SeinfeldIsUnfunny:
** The over the shoulder gameplay was revolutionary for the time, and later games like ''Gears of War'' and the original ''Dead Space'' were compared to ''[=RE4=]''. Now that this style of play is everywhere, it's easy to forget that this was the game that blazed the trail, and many players who play ''[=RE4=]'' after playing those later games may find its implementation lacking.
** The [[PressXToNotDie Action Commands]] were a neat little gimmick that caused Leon to perform cinematic feats that normal mechanics wouldn't allow, like flipping and dancing around lasers and having a cutscene revolve around them for a knife fight. Ask almost anyone nowadays, and they'll tell you that Action Commands have [[ScrappyMechanic overstayed their welcome by a long shot]].

* MagnificentBastard: Mendez is one of Saddler's lieutenants within the Los Illuminados and "The Big Cheese" of the village [[GeniusBruiser who combines cunning intelligence with frightening strength]]. When Leon begins investigating the village to find the president's daughter, Mendez organizes the villagers in stopping him, setting up various ambushes and deploying monsters against Leon. Mendez personally confronts Leon multiple times, defeating him with ease in each encounter and only sparing his life on Saddler's orders. Mendez also pursues Ada and that leads to her tranquilized when she interferes. Setting up one final ambush for Leon, Mendez's only reaction to Leon blowing him up is to mutate into a more dangerous form and [[{{Determinator}} continues fighting even after being reduced to just a torso]].

** When the game first came out, Ashley was considered TheScrappy for being helpless and forcing the players to divide their focus between protecting her and fighting enemies. With [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQhkR1AFaBA&ab_channel=RapidCrafter leaks]] of ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil4Remake'' removing most of the tension in escorting and protecting Ashley by having her hide in the safe room during combat, some fans admitted that the tension of escorting Ashley actually enhanced their gaming experience and that the change was completely unnecessary, arguing that her AI was actually quite good, given she knew how to duck, hide, and follow Leon accordingly.

* CondemnedByHistory: A rather unfortunate and arguably unfair example, but with the release of the remake, quite a lot of people have started to heavily criticize this game and comparing it very unfavorably to the remake, usually citing stuff like:
** The clunkier controls. [[labelnote:Note]]Despite the game still being perfectly playable, it’s just that it was the first time an over-the-shoulder kind of gameplay was implemented[[/labelnote]]
** The unscary atmosphere. [[labelnote:Note]]This is despite the fact that the remake isn’t that different, it just takes itself a bit more seriously, and the original was praised by having some of the scariest moments in the whole series[[/labelnote]]
** Ashley’s character. [[labelnote:Note]]While she is a polarizing character, it is agreed that her hatedom is way overblown and the remake tried too hard to tone down her escort mechanics[[/labelnote]]
** The supposedly outdated and problematic content [[labelnote:Note]]This is mostly regarding stuff related to women, like Ashley’s panties easter egg, the memorable “Ballistics” scene, Leon flirting with Hunnigan, making a joke about sex discrimination and muttering “Women...” after Ada leaves him yet again. Of course, a lot of people feel these aren’t as offensive as they’re made out to be, especially when most of these were outright removed for the VR port. [[/labelnote]]

** The graphical quality of the game is seen as amazing, for the time it released as well as as time marched on, and the graphics on all the ports (save for the original PC port) look amazing to this very day. Animations are also incredibly fluid and realistic for the time, especially during the cutscenes, and still look fantastic in the 2020s. One of the main reasons the planned remake is aiming for a major AdaptationExpansion with the plot and setting is that the original has aged well enough to make a straightforward graphical and gameplay update somewhat redundant.

* {{Adorkable}}: While most appearances of Leon have him being a DeadpanSnarker of some fashion, this version's of him is one of the most beloved due to the sheer cheesiness and NarmCharm of his bad one-liners, making him a likeable dork.

** Saddler is infamous for being one of the easiest bosses in ''Franchise/ResidentEvil'' history, as not only does the arena provide a multitude of traps that can be used to stun and damage him, but he has a [[GoForTheEye blatantly obvious weak spot]] that can be easily sniped with the Rifle. He's a little less anti-climactic when battling him in Separate Ways, where he's faster, has difficult to avoid attacks, and takes a lot more firepower.

** Chapter 4-1 is a gauntlet MarathonLevel with tons of unique and varied encounters. It features such unique scenarios like a massive lava chamber and [[spoiler:''two'' Garradors at once]], as well as being capped off with a fight against the BestBossEver: Verdugo.

** Chapter 3-4 is almost as short. Aside from a sniping section at the start, the rest of the chapter is played through Ashley, who has to face easily avoidable enemies and solve stupidly simple puzzles.

** The TMP. Quite a few despise it as a useless waste of space, just as many swear by it as essential to their toolkit.

** Among Spanish fans, there are [[MexicansLoveSpeedyGonzales those who find funny]] [[SoBadItsGood how badly their country is represented]], and [[EthnicScrappy those who find it insulting]].

* CompleteMonster: [[SinisterMinister Osmund Saddler]], the master of [[ReligionOfEvil Los Illuminados]] ("The Enlightened Ones"), reawakens [[Characters/ResidentEvilMonstersIrregulars the Las Plagas parasites]], infecting multiple villagers before determining the strain works. Injecting himself with a "master" Plaga, Saddler spreads the parasite to the rest of the village, destroying the minds of everyone it comes into contact with and leaving them as Saddler's puppets. Saddler also conducts horrible experiments on those in his clutches and disposes of the corpses by feeding them to Las Plagas infected monsters. However, when children are infected they die painfully due to their bodies not being developed enough to handle the strain. Saddler plans to use the President's daughter to infect her father and from there [[TakeOverTheWorld take over the United States and then the rest of the world]], infecting everyone with Las Plagas and leaving them as [[EmptyShell broken shells]] for him to control while Saddler reigns over the world.

* DamselScrappy: Ashley. You'll hear "LEON HALP!!" so much that you're bound to want to kill her yourself by the end of the game. Anytime the player starts wanting to cut her some slack for being a defenseless young woman stuck in such a nightmarish situation, she'll go and do something [[IdiotBall eye-twitchingly stupid]] like shove Leon (i.e. the only thing keeping her safe) away and run headlong into a booby trap. The most frustrating part? Unlike [[TheManyDeathsOfYou you and your comrades]], she only has one death animation, so you can't even enjoy the momentarily therapeutic satisfaction of [[VideoGameCrueltyPotential ignoring the cries of]] "LEON HALP!!" and just standing back to watch Dr. Salvador slice her obnoxious head off.

** The Novistadors are not well-liked among the ''Resident Evil'' community. They fly, they lunge, and they almost always come in a crowd. In the higher dynamic difficulty setting and Professional mode, not only they're a lot more durable and can tank more shotgun blasts than usual, their flight pattern also becomes a lot more jittery and unpredictable as the game goes on. At least they only appear in the Castle and are only seen three times through the entire game, and since they kidnap [[DamselScrappy Ashley]] in a cutscene, you don't have to look after her while dealing with them.
** Shield-wielding Ganados are introduced in the Castle level. Their shield essentially acts as their second health bar, hides their weak spot, makes them immune to Flash Grenades and increases the range of their attacks, making avoiding them difficult. They always appear in squadrons of 2-3 members, often guarding other enemies. Thankfully, once their shield is broken, they're just a normal Ganado that you can easily dispatch.

** Luis due to his style, characterization, and personality.

** "Super Salvador" for the giant Ganado wielding a double-bladed chainsaw in the Mercenaries mode.

** Leon. Plenty of his one-liners are memetic due to being SoBadItsGood.

* FranchiseOriginalSin: ''[=RE4=]'' was met with commercial and critical acclaim for being an ActionizedSequel that still had enough horror elements to stay true to the genre. Nearly every other SurvivalHorror game, including its sequels, [[FollowTheLeader tried to follow suit]], upping the action further in response to the more mainstream popularity of FPS and other shooters. This is viewed as an AudienceAlienatingEra for the genre, where it neglected the horror aspect and became indistinguishable from any other action game, because they lacked the action-horror balance that let ''[=RE4=]'' succeed. The genre only got back on track with smaller titles that often removed the "action" half to focus purely on the "horror" end, while the ''Resident Evil'' series itself (after the massive BrokenBase ''[=RE6=]'' caused) only started getting back on track with ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil7Biohazard'' and the ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil2Remake''.

** The Crossbow Ganados. They are annoying as sin, especially when you can't tell where they are. They also have excellent accuracy on Professional mode, and will do more damage than you'll be pleased with.

** Colmillos are Plagas infested wolves that are smaller than other enemies, move erratically, and can easily pounce on Leon to deal heavy damage. While dealing with one usually isn't too bad, they often come in packs to make things more difficult and annoying. They are also ''fast'', often not giving the player much time to react to their attacks while also being able to easily catch up and pounce on the player when they attempt to run away. Lastly, they can also sprout Plagas tentacles to deal additional damage and interrupt the player. On the bright side, they don't have much health compared to other enemies and can be instantly killed with incendiary grenades.

** Salazar is a pain to fight, if only because his reaction to being hit anywhere but his weakpoint is a LargeHam.

* LowTierLetdown: While Leon is the most balanced out of all playable characters in Mercenaries mode, his equipment load is still strict and he has no quick access to highly damaging melee attacks outside of suplexes, which pales in comparison to other characters like Ada's massive loadout, Krauser's punching power and mutant arm, Wesker's balanced combination of the two, or HUNK's neck snap. This makes it hard to rack numbers on Bonus Time compared to all other available options.
* MagnificentBastard: Mendez is one of Saddler's lieutenants within the Los Illuminados and "The Big Cheese" of the village [[GeniusBruiser who combines cunning intelligence with frightening strength]]. When Leon begins investigating the village to find the president's daughter, Mendez organizes the villagers in stopping him, setting up various ambushes and deploying monsters against Leon. Mendez personally confronts Leon multiple times, defeating him with ease and only sparing his life on Saddler's orders. Mendez also captures and nearly kills Ada when she interferes. Setting up one final ambush for Leon, Mendez's only reaction to Leon blowing him up is to mutate into a more dangerous form and [[{{Determinator}} continues fighting even after being reduced to just a torso]].

** Mike the helicopter pilot. He shoots and blows up some Ganados, [[spoiler:only to get shot down at the end]].

* PlayerPunch: Some of Saddler's appearances have him doing this, such as him killing [[spoiler:Luis]] or [[spoiler:Mike]]. The former is made worse by the fact the victim spent the last minutes of his life searching for medicine that would suppress the plaga inside Leon.

** The Punisher. Its exclusive upgrade pertaining to penetrating rounds falls flat when compared to the better crowd control a shotgun or TMP can offer, and its strength is the weakest among all the handguns - even the initial one's special upgrade of increased critical headshots has its uses.

** Out of all the secret weapons, the [[VideoGame/ResidentEvil2 Mathilda]] pistol is essentially the weakest of them. Not only you had to fully upgrade it to unlock its Exclusive upgrade (which is very risky and drain bullets faster than almost any weapon in the game), it's not even any stronger than the Blacktail, one of the best weapons in the game for its power and availability.

* TakeThatScrappy: Ashley's deaths can lead to a GameOver. But to the players who regard her as a DamselScrappy, her deaths can be oddly satisfying.

** The battle against Salazar can be challenging even in Easy. It doesn't help that Salazar can instantly kill Leon with one move, though he can only do so if he's standing too close to him.

* SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome: For a [=GameCube=] game, this one has gotten a lot of milage in the visuals department:
** The graphical quality of the game is amazing for the time it released, and the graphics on all the ports (save for the original PC port) look amazing to this very day. Animations are also incredibly fluid and realistic for the time, especially during the cutscenes, and still look fantastic in the 2020s. One of the main reasons the planned remake is aiming for a major AdaptationExpansion with the plot and setting is that the original has aged well enough to make a straightforward graphical and gameplay update somewhat redundant.

** The VR edition ramps up the decade old game's visual by readjusting the lighting for every location in the game and upgrading the VFX, making them more atmospherically uneasy and ramping the horror even more, especially with the Castle areas. In addition, textures were sharpened and touched up to account for the new perspective, meaning that textures generally still look good up close.

** The Verdugo is a two-legged nightmare to kill unless you have serious firepower, and you first have to confront it in a room full of tight corridors without enough room to avoid its attacks. It's also NighInvulnerable unless you freeze it with a nitrogen canister, and there's only a few of those lying around the area. It's ''sorely'' tempting to either keep dodging long enough to escape down the elevator or just hang onto that free rocket launcher you found and be done with it in one go.

** Krauser can be made into this if you know that the ''[[BoringButPractical knife]]'' actually does the most damage to him. Granted, actually being able to slash at him is a bit tricky since it would require that you bring him to his knees by shooting at his legs, which by itself can be difficult since he moves at superhuman speed and his parasitic shield covers a wide area of himself. But once you ''do'' make him vulnerable, be quick and slash at him with the knife. Repeat, and the battles will be over sooner than you'd expect. The VR edition allows you to trivialize the entire fight using only the knife, as you can manually dodge most of his attacks with ease and the moment when you couldn't can still be avoided with [=QTEs=].

** If you play well, conserve your cash, and purchase a single-use rocket launcher, you can use it to defeat any boss easily.

** If you play well, conserve your cash, and purchase a single-use rocket launcher, you can use it to defeat Salazar in under 30 seconds.

** The military island, the final section of the game. One half of players enjoyed the island for increasing the combat and digging deeper into the game's lore. Others, however, view the island as a DisappointingLastLevel due to the DifficultySpike and feel that the action-oriented atmosphere clashes with the more survival horror feel of the game's previous sections. There's also a third group of fans who otherwise enjoyed the island but agree that some elements (like the introduction of gun-toting enemies) could've been either better executed or left out entirely.
** The game's control scheme, and whether it has aged well, has also become somewhat divisive. Detractors argue that certain elements of the game's controls, such as the TankControls and strict enforcement of DoNotRunWithAGun are archaic compared to more modern and/or conventional shooter control schemes that allow for strafing and moving while aiming. Others appreciate the controls for giving the game its own unique feel, and are more grounded and realistic compared to other shooters that allow the player to [[RoadRunnerPC move unrealistically fast]] without sacrificing accuracy, and argue that the gameplay is balanced around the controls.

** After the hold-the-line sequence with Luis in the village cabin, most players will choose the right path to fight El Gigante for a good reason: you can skip the entire fight as long as you have the key to escape. In the left path, you have to whittle down an army of villagers and kill one of the Bella Sisters to progress, which is tougher than El Gigante. Plus, the left path is essentially a mini-maze.

** Several flirty and suggestive lines, such as Luis' flirting with Ashley on the cabin or Leon trying to get Hunnigan on a date in the end were omitted for no inexplicable reasons, but the cutscene that has it still has the aggressive and tense tone which doesn't really make any sense (Ashley snaps at Luis for making a rather rude comment in the original, whereas here she randomly snaps at him for no reason at all, making her look like a total jackass). It's really jarring especially the lines in question are considered T-rated at worst, among many other explicit elements like the amped up gore compared to the original game.

** Chief Bitorez "Big Cheese" Mendez can be easily dispatched by four well-placed incendiary grenades, two for each phase.
** If you play well, conserve your cash, and purchase a single-use rocket launcher, you can use it to defeat Ramon Salazar in under 30 seconds.

** Osmund Saddler is infamous for being one of the easiest bosses in ''Franchise/ResidentEvil'' history, as not only does the arena provide a multitude of traps that can be used to stun and damage him, but he has a [[GoForTheEye blatantly obvious weak spot]] that can be easily sniped with the Rifle. He's a little less anti-climactic when battling him in Separate Ways, where he's faster, has difficult to avoid attacks, and takes a lot more firepower.

** Chapter 1-3 features the memorable dock encounters and has the boss fight against the SeaMonster Del Lago as you fire harpoons at it in a reenactment of ''{{Film/Jaws}}''.

** Chapter 5-3 is a BossOnlyLevel, but with ''three'' boss battles instead of just one: [[spoiler: a QuickTimeEvent battle against Krauser, the terrifying multi-stage battle with the U-3, and a second fight against Krauser in a wide open area as he utilizes guerilla tactics to try and kill Leon.]]
** Chapter 5-4 [[spoiler:has Leon ''finally'' getting some backup in the form of BadassPilot Mike, who mans an attack gunship to support Leon as he tears the remaining ganado forces in half. The following is one of the most protracted and explosive enemy encounters in the game, and it feels very satisfying to finally cut loose and even the odds after an entire game of getting swarmed by enemies.]]

** Chapter 3-4 is almost as short. Aside from a sniping section at the start, the rest of the chapter is played through Ashley Graham, who has to face easily avoidable enemies and solve stupidly simple puzzles.

** In more CasualCompetitiveConflict, the Riot Gun versus Striker[[labelnote:note]]the first default shotgun didn't count since it's strictly inferior to the other two[[/labelnote]]. Casual and some hardcore players prefer the Riot Gun because it's practical jack-of-all trades that can be used in any situation when needed, while in more competitive (speedrun) scene the Striker is a superior choice because of the Ditman glitch alone, which allows users to sequence break the harder parts of the game while also allows them to move faster than the enemy could hit you.

** Veterans of this game would only use two of multiple available pistols that you can buy; [=Red9=] (with stock) and Blacktail. The [=Red9=] with the stock gives you firepower and stability worthy of a handheld rifle while the Blacktail is a practical and powerful pistol with solid DPS and stability and doesn't take as much space as the [=Red9=]. Other pistols aren't as useful as those two and are largely ignored unless you're doing a challenge run.

** After the hold-the-line tag team with Luis in the village cabin, most players will choose the right path fighting El Gigante for a good reason: you can skip the entire fight as long as you have the key to escape. In the left path, you have to whittle down an army of villagers and kill one of the Bella Sisters to progress, which is tougher than the El Gigante. Plus, the left path is essentially a mini-maze.
** Experts would rather start off in Professional mode over Normal mode because the game uses adaptive difficulty that changes depending on your performance on the entire game. Professional mode simply fixes the difficulty to the highest so that you don't need to worry too much if you're performing too well.
* CompleteMonster: [[SinisterMinister Osmund Saddler]], the master of [[ReligionOfEvil Los Illuminados]] ("The Enlightened Ones"), reawakens [[Characters/ResidentEvilMonstersIrregulars the Las Plagas parasites]], infecting multiple villagers before determining the strain works. Injecting himself with a "master" Plaga, Saddler spreads the parasite to the rest of the village, destroying the minds of everyone it comes into contact with and leaving them as Saddler's puppets. Saddler also conducts horrible experiments on those in his clutches and disposes of the corpses by feeding them to Las Plagas infected monsters. However, when children are infected they die painfully due to their bodies not being developed enough to handle the strain. Saddler plans to use the President's daughter to infect her father and from there [[TakeOverTheWorld take over the US and then the rest of the world]], infecting everyone with Las Plagas and leaving them as [[EmptyShell broken shells]] for him to control while Saddler reigns over the world.
* ContestedSequel: Some fans think this game is too action-oriented and not atmospheric, while others think the previous ''Resident Evil'' games sacrificed fun and playability for said atmosphere. Its sequels have mitigated this somewhat. After ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil5'' and ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil6'', it's hard not to look back on ''4'' as the most subtle and haunting of the "new age" ''Resident Evil'' games.

** Shield-wielding Ganados are introduced in the Castle level. Their shield essentially acts as their second healthbar, hides their weak spot, makes them immune to flashbang grenades and increases the range of their attacks, making avoiding them difficult. They always appear in squadrons of 2-3 members, often guarding other enemies. Thankfully, once their shield is broken, they're just a normal Ganado that you can easily dispatch.

** That dog you save from the trap at the beginning of the game. The VideoGameCaringPotential is nice, but what cements him into the hearts of fans everywhere is when he repays the favor by helping you kill your first El Gigante. Creator/{{Capcom}} had made another game called ''VideoGame/HauntingGround'' where an identical dog called Hewie spends most of the game as the protagonist's loyal companion.
** Luis Sera due to his style, characterization and personality.

* EvenBetterSequel: The ''Resident Evil'' games were always well liked, but this game is considered the apex of the entire series. It's sitting at ''96'' on Metacritic and is considered the game of the year for 2005. It's been released on multiple platforms and holds the Guinness World Record for best-selling survival horror game. It did so well and is so liked that almost all of the main entry ''Resident Evil'' game since ''[=RE4=]'' have followed its template and tropes. On top of all those accolades, it's credited for bringing the AlwaysOverTheShoulder viewpoint into new prominence in ThirdPersonShooter genres and [[FollowTheLeader inspired a lot of other games]], such as ''Franchise/DeadSpace'' for one. As such, while ''Resident Evil 4'' may lead to a bit of a BrokenBase for fans who decry its shift to a more action-oriented tone, you're more likely to find a lot more people who treat this game as a SacredCow.

** Bitores Mendez is well loved despite his scant screentime for his truly intimidating physical presence, his great boss fight, and being a NoNonsenseNemesis unlike his blowhard superiors.

** Leon. Plenty of his one-liners are memetic due to being SoBadItsGood.
* FranchiseOriginalSin: ''[=RE4=]'' was met with commercial and critical acclaim for being an ActionizedSequel that still had enough horror elements to stay true to the genre. Nearly every other SurvivalHorror game (including its sequels) [[FollowTheLeader tried to follow suit]], upping the action further in response to the more mainstream popularity of FPS and other shooters. This is viewed as an AudienceAlienatingEra for the genre, where it neglected the horror aspect and became indistinguishable from any other action game, because they lacked the action-horror balance that let ''[=RE4=]'' succeed. The genre only got back on track with smaller titles that often removed the "action" half to focus purely on the "horror" end, while the ''Resident Evil'' series itself (after the massive BrokenBase ''[=RE6=]'' caused) only started getting back on track with ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil7Biohazard'' and the ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil2Remake''.

** Colmillos are Plagas infested wolves that are smaller than other enemies, move erratically, and can easily pounce on Leon to deal heavy damage. While dealing with one usually isn't too bad, they often come in packs to make things more difficult and annoying. They are also ''fast'', often not giving players much time to react to their attacks while also being able to easily catch up and pounce players attempting to run away. Lastly, they can also sprout Plagas tentacles to deal additional damage and interrupt players. On the bright side, they don't have much health compared to other enemies and can be instantly killed with incendiary grenades.

** Creator/ShinjiMikami's insistence that the game would stay exclusive to the UsefulNotes/NintendoGameCube becomes this when not only was a UsefulNotes/PlayStation2 port announced before the original version was even released, but as of 2019, it's become one of the go to examples for games that are PortOverdosed (along with ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsVSkyrim''), having received fourteen ports across thirteen different platforms.
** Leon's infamous "Your right hand comes off?" quip. While Salazar's may not, there sure would go on to be [[VideoGame/ResidentEvilVillage another character in the series whose right hand proves detachable.]]
** After overpowering Ada in a cutscene, Leon snarks "next time, use a knife", emphasizing that they are better for melee combat. Jump forward to the Resident Evil 2 Remake, and the knife has been made exceptionally useful against both Lickers and the final Super Tyrant fight due to its unique properties in that game.

* HomegrownHero: This is lampshaded, despite not being an example itself (being a Japanese game with an American protagonist): The U.S. President's daughter is kidnapped to a Spanish speaking {{Ruritania}} and [[VideoGame/ResidentEvil2 Leon S. Kennedy]] (now a secret service agent) is sent to rescue her. The villains enjoy taunting him over how things won't turn out "like your American action movies".

* MagnificentBastard: Chief Bitores Mendez is one of Osmund Saddler's lieutenants within the Los Illuminados and "The Big Cheese" of the village [[GeniusBruiser who combines cunning intelligence with frightening strength]]. When Leon Kennedy begins investigating the village to find the president's daughter, Mendez organizes the villagers in stopping him, setting up various ambushes and deploying monsters against Leon. Mendez personally confronts Leon multiple times, defeating him with ease and only sparing his life on Saddler's orders. Mendez also captures and nearly kills Ada Wong when she interferes. Setting up one final ambush for Leon, Mendez's only reaction to Leon blowing him up is to mutate into a more dangerous form and [[{{Determinator}} continues fighting even after being reduced to just a torso]].

* MisBlamed: The criticisms towards the original 2007 PC port are often pointed against Creator/{{Ubisoft}} as the ones responsible for its dire state. While they did publish the 2007 PC port in Europe, they didn't ''develop'' it; the port was developed by [=SourceNext=], a Japanese PC-based development and publishing company whom previously released well-received (and Japanese-only) PC ports of ''Resident Evil 2'' and ''3'' among other ports of [=PlayStation=] games.

* NarmCharm: As [[WebAnimation/ZeroPunctuation Yahtzee Croshaw]] has pointed out in his retrospectives on the game, the scenes where Leon and Ramon Salazar trash-talk each other does not really come across as the intense battles of wit and sharp tongues the writers clearly intended, but rather as a bunch of pitiful verbal {{Wimp Fight}}s where both parties manage to embarrass themselves over and over, and yet, somehow, it still works.

* PlayerPunch: Some of Saddler's appearances have him doing this, such as him killing [[spoiler:Luis]] or [[spoiler:Mike.]] The former is made worse by the fact the victim spent the last minutes of his life searching for medicine that would suppress the plaga inside Leon.

** The Oculus Quest 2 version, which turns ''the entirety of the single-player campaign'' into a VR first person shooter, is masterfully done. Enhanced visuals and sound, stellar controls with plentiful amounts of accessibility options, quality of life improvements like being able to have a two-handed and one-handed weapon equipped at the same time, reprogrammed AI to account for the new perspective, and you have yourself an amazing VR game as well as an excellent version of ''4''. The only downsides are, at launch, all side content is not available, having only the single player main story to play, but that's more than enough. However, this downside is mitigated slightly with the announcement that The Mercenaries mode will return as a free update in early 2022.
** The ''HD Edition'', released on UsefulNotes/PlayStation3 and UsefulNotes/Xbox360, has higher native resolution, added shadows and colored lighting in many locations. The PC port of the HD release, dubbed ''Ultimate HD Edition'', is playable at even higher resolutions than its console versions, has an added hi-res texture pack, has controls comparable to the Wii version thanks to supporting mouse and keyboard controls, and can run at 60 frames per second; the ''HD Remastered'' version on [=PlayStation=] 4, Xbox One, and to a lesser extent, the Switch are also comparable to the ''Ultimate HD Edition'' in terms of visual fidelity and frame-rate with some extra character model improvements. This is opposed to...

** The UsefulNotes/PlayStation2 version is also inferior compared to the original [=GameCube=] version in a number of ways. While it was the first version to feature Ada's additional story campaign and the unlockable P.R.L. 412 for completing Professional mode, eliminated the need to swap discs at the last third of the game, supported proper widescreen presentation[[note]]the original [=GameCube=] version's game screen is displayed at 16:9 letterboxed to a 4:3 viewport, while the [=PlayStation=] 2 version features an option for widescreen presentation, provided the player has a widescreen television that can stretch the video output to fullscreen[[/note]], and features some minor fixes that are exclusive to this port, the game's graphics and audio were downgraded in order to run on the console despite being released in DVD format. Downgrades includes lower resolution textures, simplified models and environments, missing details and effects, sound effects and voice overs compressed so badly it sounds muffled, and introduces some glitches and loading issues. The cutscenes where also noticeably replaced with pre-rendered [=FMVs=], rather than rendering them in real-time with the game's engine.
** The Switch port is also another downplayed example. While it is based off the ''HD Remastered'' ports like the Xbox One and [=PlayStation=] 4 versions, it is prone to performance more frequently than the [=GameCube=] and [=PlayStation=] 2 versions did despite rendering the game at 600p in handheld mode and 900p while docked. Also not helping matters was the game initially retailing for $29.99 without any additional features nor the ability to use the Switch's gyro motion controls[[note]]although it does supports [=GameCube=] controllers like in the Wii version through USB-to-[=GameCube=] adaptors[[/note]] whereas every other digitally available port at the time of release was cheaper than the Switch version.

** The over the shoulder gameplay was revolutionary for the time, and later games like the first ''Dead Space'' and ''Gears of War'' were compared to ''[=RE4=]''. Now that this style of play is everywhere, it's easy to forget that this was the game that blazed the trail, and many players who play ''[=RE4=]'' after playing those later games may find its implementation lacking.

* SelfImposedChallenge: This game has managed to spawn many different challenges. All grenade runs, no attache case runs (ie. never opening the attache case), no Merchant runs, knife only, handgun only (normally just the original handgun, upgraded, but some people will pick their favorite handgun instead), no deaths, speed runs, no ammo and grenade pickup run, minethrower only runs, rocket launcher only runs, no running 'run' by exploiting a certain gameplay quirk, completing the game with the least amount of kills possible, etc. One certain streamer challenges himself by [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPpPhSdKj-M&ab_channel=NeoCranium collecting all of the fishes available in the game and keeping them all the way to the endgame without eating them]].

** The rewards for the Shooting Range (24 trophies and some pesetas) aren't particularly useful, but the minigame is fun enough to warrant a few plays.

** The Verdugo is a two-legged nightmare to kill unless you have serious firepower, and you first have to confront it in a room full of tight corridors without enough room to avoid its attacks. It's also NighInvulnerable unless you freeze it with a nitrogen canister, and there's only a few of those lying around the area. It's ''sorely'' tempting to either keep dodging long enough to escape down the elevator or just hang onto that free rocket launcher you found and be done with it in one go.
** The boss fight against U3 wouldn't be considered that hard if not the fact that you had to race against the time to escape each segment of the stage while you had to fend him off at the same time. Pray that he doesn't block your way or be ready to waste a lot of ammo, and maybe restarting.

* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter: In spite of having a role in the main story and Separate Ways, Luis is unavailable to play in the Mercenaries in spite of being proficient with a gun himself.

* SugarWiki/VisualEffectsOfAwesome: For a UsefulNotes/NintendoGameCube game, this one has gotten a lot of milage in the visuals department:

* HighTierScrappy: Krauser is considered to be the "Easy Mode" of the Mercenaries thanks to his kit: a compound bow that almost guaranteed to kill enemies in one headshot, a knife bigger than Leon's, two devastating melee hits that provide multiple utilities, and a powerful [[SituationalSword rechargeable]] mutant arm attack that clears out every enemy in a straight line in front of him, including [[ThatOneBoss the minibosses]].
* LowTierLetdown: In Mercenaries mode, these characters tend to be considered disappointing:
** While Leon is the most balanced out of all playable characters, his equipment load is still strict and he has no quick access to highly damaging melee attacks outside of suplexes, which pales in comparison to other characters like Ada's massive loadout, Krauser's punching power and mutant arm, and Wesker's balanced combination of the two. This makes it hard to rack numbers on Bonus Time compared to Krauser and Wesker.
** The only one weaker than Leon overall is HUNK. He has no knife, only has one gun that chews through ammo in no time, and his signature NeckSnap move which only works on common Ganado (and the Bella Sisters) and leaves him vulnerable to attacks afterwards. At least Leon can knock back and stunlock most of the minibosses with a well placed headshot, but HUNK's magic will run out and you'll be quickly exhausted afterwards.

* TierInducedScrappy: Plenty in the Mercenaries mode:
** While Leon is the most balanced out of all playable characters, his equipment load is still strict and he has no quick access to highly damaging melee attacks outside of suplexes, which pales in comparison to other characters like Ada's massive loadout, Krauser's punching power and mutant arm, and Wesker's balanced combination of the two. This makes him hard to rack numbers on Bonus Time compared to Krauser and Wesker.
** The only one weaker than Leon overall is HUNK. He has no knife, only has one gun that you can incidentally drain it's ammo real quick, and his signature NeckSnap move only works on common Ganado (and the Bella Sisters) and it also leaves him vulnerable to attacks afterwards. At least Leon can knockback and stunlock most of the minibosses with a well placed headshot, but HUNK's magic will ran out and you'll be quickly exhausted afterwards.
** On the other side of the spectrum, Krauser is considered to be the "Easy Mode" of the Mercenaries thanks to his kit; A compound bow that almost guaranteed to kill enemies in one headshot, a knife bigger than Leon's, two devastating melee hits that provide multiple utilities, and a powerful [[SituationalSword rechargeable]] mutant arm attack that clears out every enemy in a straight line in front of him, including [[ThatOneBoss the minibosses]]. Wesker is also this to a degree, thanks to his pistol being fully upgraded and his deadly melee attacks, but lacks a knife, starts with no spare ammo, and has very little inventory space with how many guns he has.

** The original 2007 PC port, which claimed it was going to have the graphical quality of the [=GameCube=] with all of the [=PlayStation=] 2 version's content. It was a buggy product with visuals that are ''much'' less detailed than the [=PlayStation=] 2 version with missing lighting, visual effects, and heavily-compressed [=FMVs=] that look worse than the [=PlayStation=] 2 version, which needed to be patched (and [[GameMod modded]]) frequently to even be playable. As with many PC ports of Japanese console games at that time, it's primarily designed for gamepads, with no native mouse support and rather clumsy keyboard controls. The in-game button prompts only refers to generic numbered gamepad buttons, not the keyboard controls or conventional gamepads such as Xbox 360 ones, which would be forgivable if it wasn't for the game's ''extensive'' use of quick-time events. What's also {{iron|y}}ic is that the PC port of ''[=RE4=]'' was handled by [=SourceNext=], the very same company behind well-received (and unfortunately Japan-only) PC ports of ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil2'' and ''[[VideoGame/ResidentEvil3 3]]''.

*** The former is a massive MarathonLevel that introduces the new Castellan enemies by forcing you through multiple close-quarters encounters with them. It also introduces the DemonicSpiders known as the Garradors, and then puts you through the infamous "Water Hall". There's little space to maneuver, EliteMooks are coming at you from every direction, who have the highest Plagas spawning chance in the game and they will constantly get reinforcements until you've taken down a substantial amount of them, and you have to protect Ashley during the whole process. Prepare to hear annoying cries for help a lot. Finally, if you leave her in the back room to deal with the enemies, Zealots will drop down a hole in the ceiling to attack her while you're outside-- Not capture; ''attack'', when she can only take about two hits before dying.

*** The former is a massive MarathonLevel that introduces the new Castellan enemies by forcing you through multiple close-quarters encounters with them. It also introduces the DemonicSpiders known as the Garradors, and then puts you through the infamous "Water Hall". There's little space to maneuver, EliteMooks are coming at you from every direction, who have the highest Plagas spawning chance in the game and they will constantly get reinforcements until you've taken down a substantial amount of them, and you have to protect Ashley during the whole process. Prepare to hear [[MostAnnoyingSound "LEEEEEEEOOOON!! HAAAAAALP!!"]] a lot. Finally, if you leave her in the back room to deal with the enemies, Zealots will drop down a hole in the ceiling to attack her while you're outside-- Not capture; ''attack'', when she can only take about two hits before dying.

*** The former is a massive MarathonLevel that introduces the new Castellan enemies by forcing you through multiple close-quarters encounters with them. It also introduces the DemonicSpiders known as the Garradors, and then puts you through the infamous "Water Hall". There's little space to maneuver, EliteMooks are coming at you from every direction, who have the highest Plagas spawning chance in the game and they will constantly get reinforcements until you've taken down a substantial amount of them, and you have to protect Ashley during the whole process. Prepare to hear "LEEEEEEEOOOON!! HAAAAAALP!!" a lot. Finally, if you leave her in the back room to deal with the enemies, Zealots will drop down a hole in the ceiling to attack her while you're outside-- Not capture; ''attack'', when she can only take about two hits before dying.

** While Leon is the most balanced out of all playable characters, his equipment load is still strict and he has no quick access to highly damaging melee attacks outside of German suplex, which pales in comparison to other characters like Ada massive loadout, Krauser's punching power, and Wesker's balanced combination of the two. This makes him hard to rack numbers on Bonus Time compared to Krauser and Wesker.
** The only one weaker than Leon overall is HUNK. He has no knife, only has one gun that you can incidentally drain it's supplies real quick, and his signature NeckSnap move only works on common Ganado (and the Bella Sisters) and it also leaves him vulnerable to attacks afterwards. At least Leon can knockback and stunlock most of the minibosses with a well placed headshot, but HUNK's magic will ran out and you'll be quickly exhausted afterwards.
** On the other side of the spectrum, Krauser is considered to be the "Easy Mode" of the Mercenaries thanks to his kit; A compound bow that almost guaranteed to kill enemies in one headshot, a knife bigger than Leon's, two devastating melee hits that provide multiple utilities, and a powerful [[SituationalSword one time rechargeable]] plaga arm attack that clears out every enemy in a straight line in front of him, including [[ThatOneBoss the minibosses]]. Wesker is also this to a degree, thanks to his pistol being fully upgraded and his deadly melee attacks, but lacks a knife, starts with no spare ammo, and has very little inventory space with how many guns he has.

** Plagas. Specifically, the second and, especially, third forms. The second type is only dangerous on Professional due to it potentially [[OffWithHisHead biting your head off]]. However, the third appears to exist specifically to piss off players accustomed to using flash grenades or shotguns to kill Plagas.

** Leon getting decapitated if you’re caught by the chainsaw wielding mook in the village brawl is one of the most infamous death animations in the series.

** The very first level, where all you have is the basic pistol, a knife, and maybe a couple of grenades. After facing about six enemies in groups of at most two, you come to the village where you can end up with about a dozen villagers, two with chainsaws, coming after you.
** The notorious Cabin Fight, where you must survive an onslaught in a cramped cabin, covering six entrances over two stories with and endless stream of Ganado until forty enemies are killed.
** Chapter 2-3, the section after said Cabin Fight. Due to the previous section you'll have used up much of your ammo and the section is frustratingly stingy with giving you new supplies, forcing you to conserve until you get to the end. Said section is covered with Ganado, and has a particularly tough mini-boss fight with the Bella Sisters. Luckily, you can skip this section by taking an alternate route... [[SadisticChoice And then have to fight another El Gigante in a cramped ravine instead.]]

*** The former is a massive MarathonLevel that introduces the new Castellan enemies by forcing you through multiple close-quarters encounters with them. It also introduces the DemonicSpiders known as the Garradors, and then puts you through the infamous "Water Hall". There's little space to maneuver, EliteMooks are coming at you from every direction, who have the highest Plagas spawning chance in the game and will constantly get reinforcements until you've taken down a substantial amount of them, and you have to protect Ashley during the whole process. Prepare to hear "LEEEEEEEOOOON!! HAAAAAALP!!" a lot. Finally, if you leave her in the back room to deal with the enemies, Zealots will drop down a hole in the ceiling to attack her while you're outside-- Not capture; ''attack'', when she can only take about two hits before dying.

** While Leon is the most balanced out of all playable characters, his equipment load is still strict and he has no quick access to highly damaging melee attacks outside of german suplex, which pales in comparison to other characters like Ada massive loadout, Krauser's punching power, and Wesker's balanced combination of the two. This makes him hard to rack numbers on Bonus Time compared to Krauser and Wesker.

** Downplayed with the ''Ultimate HD Edition'' release on Steam. While it's a vast improvement over previous PC port from 2007, it initially shipped with incorrect gradients and lighting effects, making the game look off compared to the Xbox 360 and even [=GameCube=]/Wii versions, which were thankfully fixed with patches and through mods. Some of the other issues with the ''Ultimate HD Edition'', however, were left unaddressed. Problems includes the imperfect mouse aiming calibration, which may be unplayable for some players, performance issues, slightly blurrier image quality due to a vertex buffer error, an orange tint in some scenes caused by a broken effects filter that carried over from the Xbox 30 version, some missing details, forced V-sync that cannot be disabled through conventional means, and various bugs (both major and minor) caused by playing the game at 60 FPS as opposed to 30 FPS like in the previous releases. The game offers the bare minimum for keyboard remapping in-game; some of the other keys such as the keys used for [=QTEs=] (which are the X and C keys by default) can only be remapped through editing a config file, with [[GuideDangIt little-to-no help]] on how reconfigure said keys, and some keys are already hardcoded. Not all of the game's textures have been remade in higher resolution, with most of them have been ran through an image upscaler, resulting in an mix of muddy upscaled textures with the few new ones. Thankfully, the original [=GameCube=] textures are included as an option, and modders already have faithfully recreated the game's areas with updated textures, lighting fixes, and model edits while using references to real-life architectures the game's original assets were based off. Other modders also created a plugin that restores various aspects missing from the [=GameCube=] release, fixes for the QTE speeds when running the game at 60 FPS, convenient tweaks for the keyboard and mouse controls, among other enhancements and fixes.

** Lion getting decapitated if you’re caught by the chainsaw wielding mook in the village brawl is one of the most infamous death animations in the series.