outbreak has always been the resident evil game that's been the most interesting to me, it's not my favourite (that'd be dead aim or 3) but its the one that just makes me the most interested in it, in what could have been and what was there, the idea of the game has always stuck with me and the fact it was never fully realized (there's so much cool cut content like a motel and a dock level) and the fact i never even got to really see it in its prime because of the pal version not having online multiplayer at all, the idea of scenarios spanning the whole outbreak in racoon city is just such a good idea, there's so much potential and i don't think the games even fully utilized it as much as they could have, despite being the best depiction of the city in the whole series, the atmosphere of scrappy survival is so good, you have to scramble for what little supplies and items you can amid the chaos, using pipes and brooms and makeshift weapons and running away from it all, there isn't a big bad here at all unlike most of the mainline games, no real villain or evil, just survival and i think that gives it a far different vibe to the main series games, it almost feels silent hill-y with all the mcs being normal people, and a cop, using whatever they can find to make do and each level having its own slice of hell with new nightmare fuel bioweapon varieies gives it that "hell around every corner" vibe something like silent hill or even the mist (the tv show especially) often evoked for me, each character even has their own level based on their story with their exclusive cutscenes (eg yoko in below freezing point or george in decisions decisions) so they feel personalised to the cast

the actual gameplay here is pretty standard resi though, with the big additions being things tied to the online like the partners, the adlib system and the multiple playable characters and then some smaller additions like the SH style camera that pans and moves around, a virus gage that acts as a level timer that will kill you if you take too long, but you can prolong it with items if you need to and things like melee combat and hidden items you can find for extra points for unlockables. the things tied to the multiplayer are the most interesting though, the 8 playable characters are all really fun with their differences, yoko my main has double the inventory slots, alyssa can lockpick (labeled ingame as her being the master of unlocking) george can use a healing gun to heal teamates,cindy can store tons of healing items and spawns with far more, kevin has an exclusive gun and a shot type that deals extra damage, mark can ram enemies and doors down, david can make weapons and has wrenches that are outright kind of broken as weapons and jim, my other fav, who has the best dodge, a play-dead move and has a coin that he can use and if he gets 3 heads in a row, he has increased crits for the rest of the game, he's broken in file 1. they also have differing stats and abiities but its not something i ever pay attention to, you're stuck with 3 per offline game though and it varies depending on who you pick, you can kind of manipulate it with a guide though if you care to and you also have a communication system with the adlibs, which are pre-recorded messages to help you communicate, usually these just end up spammed at random though, they're all cool additions though, especially the characters, they're all so different and fun to play and a few of them are actually just interesting in general, yoko has probably the best story of the cast but i really liked davids and alyssas too, alyssa is even mentioned in 7 so her appearance is fully canon, over the years in all of my playthroughs, and i've done dozens i've gotten pretty attached to them all, they might as well be as iconic as the main cast to me and i get kind of emotional about it, love these losers. there's a ton to do in the game too, multiple endings for many scenarios, tons of unlocks like new difficulties and playable characters, hidden cutscnes and some characters even have combination endings if you survive with the right ones, there's so much to do here even beyond your initial playthrough, which'll take you about 6 hours or so, an hour per scenario and then 2 for decisions, decisions, i actually want to spotlight all the scenarios too because i love (almost) all of them.

the first real scenario you get is the tutorial, but it's probably my favourite tutorial level in any game. jay's bar aka outbreak. the level has such an almost hangoutable vibe to it, it's one of the best looking levels in the game and it has a lot of variety to it, you have the main bar area which has some really cool lighting and an escortable NPC connected to mark, who's the canon character for this scenario. there's a cozy staff room area up above with some very resident evil 2 style rooms full of antiques, this area is so detailed and fun to explore, here may also be where you notice a fun easter egg with the fact it's actually haunted, you'll hear random bottles breaking and falling and screams with no origin, the brady games guide even confirms this, upstairs you have a very old fashioned winery area too full of barrels and and your first real safe room, the game has them but not in the same way as other games, there's no decated music here but you are safe in them and you can even save here in solo play, after this you have to rush to the rooftop and onto the streets for the final chunk of it, the jump to the next rooftop here always killed me on my first playthrough, the game has a few instakill parts like this or the sharks in decisions, decisions. you can even trigger an alternate ending in this section if you fail to jump into the river during the puzzle with the tanker, the tanker area is also actually reused in the umbrella chronicles games, fun fact for you and the sewer area may also be from the intro, which i think is neat. the big setpiece here is the final swarm of zombies you have to beat after you meet with the police, it's a neat setpiece and the sheer number of them is honestly impressive, it's more of a puzzle boss too which i think works well for the tutorial, you can also see some connections with another map here as you run by the apple in, which is the setting for the hellfire scenario later in the game, i like to imagine the bomb going off is what causes a lot of the fire in that scenario, it's a strong starter and honestly my favourite scenario in the game and second favourite overall. it has a lot of cool areas, big variety and the bar really shows off the sheer detail the engine has, this and its sequel may be my favourite looking horror games on the system, even moreso than haunting ground or resi 4, though i'd have liked to enter the racoon mall that you pass by on the bridge, a wasted level oppertunity.

the next scenario is the canon scenario for my main, yoko who was a researcher at the facility. below freezing point is a semi-kind of remake of the lab from resident evil 2, the first of two remake stages in this one and it's a solid scenario, you have a little trainyard at the start with the next of the games instakill traps, the traincar elevaor that will kill you if you take too long and often kills npcs for me and then you're into the lab after this. the labs gimmick is that its frozen, the final elevator cant move and many doors and levers cant either, so you need to get through the place, dealing with the plants and eventually hunters that will be unfrozen and heat the place up, it's a scarier scenario for sure, the hunters are terrifying and the moths always freaked me out, you even find a little nest of them near the computer room and that bit always freaked me out, it just looks gross. there's some really pretty areas here like the main chambers and the cute little staff rooms with tvs on and steam rising from hot water and where outbreak was more of a race to the end, this is a full resi puzzle box and its a fun one, the gimmick is great, yokos story is fun and she even gets a bonus shotgun, you even get your first boss with a big test subject with an eye that you can ram a train into, it'd be my fourth favourite in this game, about tied with decisons decisons, very solid and it has a lot of cool effects, but it being a remake and the fact i'm just not super into lab levels drags it down for me, but i do love the gimmick and yokos story, this one connects to the other chapters by the train yard at the end, i like to believe they end up in the subway from underbelly or the zoo street in wild things after.

after this is my least favourite scenario in the game and indeed one of my most disliked levels of all time, the hive, it's an expanded remake of the hospital from 3. first the good, this is one of the best looking levels, only surpassed by the bar, the atmosphere is thick, the engines details shine the most here and it's a really cozy level from screenshots, it's a fantastic looking and sounding level and its layout is a fun puzzle too, but then there's the bad, the leaches. there's two kinds, the normal ones which act as enemies that will latch onto you and drain you of a full chunk of health over time and they're super difficult to spot and kill,but you can get rid of them by running to a new room, but then theres the boss who can posess a doctor you find early on, this ruins the level. he will follow you to basically any room right up until you kill him near the end (which wont even last if someone happened to die along the way because he will posess them and this time they cant be killed) and he basically cant be damaged, hes a pointless bulletsponge and you need all the bullets you can get here for the awful final boss, he's a pain and he makes the whole level into a boring rush and you end up just trying to abuse his AI into leaving you alone in rooms, it's boring and it makes the level far tougher than it should be, for years i actually couldnt beat it, either he'd kill me or the final boss would and i think it's a serious detriment to the game, you can make it easy though by cheesing the code to the room you use to kill him and getting rid of him early and then just going through the hospital for ammo for the final boss, just do that and skip the tedium. the level is cool beyond that, there's no canon npc sadly but its a big level with a cool layout, you can even go to the roof and get a really spooky cool view of the city in ruins, if it werent for him and the annoying final boss, which is a difficult to hit bulletsponge, even its weakness (pipes and a gas explosion) dont fully kill it even if you land the hits, it's the worst level over either game, still, cool setting and it is the best looking and explorable version of the racoon hospital to date, so it has that going for it, this level connects to i believe below freezing point since you end up in the underground of the hospital,but i cant be sure.

hellfire is up next and it's somehow the easiest scenario in the game, sadly with no canon protag either, but this level is much better overall. hellfire is set in the inn you passed in the outbreak scenario but now it's on fire due to a boiler explosion and full of lickers, including its boss, a weirdly sexualised female licker (yeah i have no idea how that fits in lore-wise). it's a cool level, 3 floors and a bunch of rooms and it makes good use of the fire to block off areas and create little traps, like gusts of fire that can make you fall from ledges or damage you trying to pick up items, it's a very aimless feeling level with its exploration and you can feel really lost at times, it's one of the more non-linier levels but i love the setting so much, hotels are just cool, and the fire really gives it a cool vibe to it, the fire looks amazing and i love how the smoke makes all the rooms look, it's also easy like i said, which is a breath of fresh air after how difficult the hive was, seeing the lickers was nice too, though some puzzles could be a little obtuse, an npc ended up finishing the map one for me somehow. this ones my second favouite i think,it's just a fun level and the low difficulty is a godsend for me, i think this one connects to desperate times, but this is one where its harder to say compared to the rest, you do see some npcs from it again in decisions, decisions though.

lastly is decisions, decisions, the final level set in a university, plus an underground research area and a water treatment plant and its by far the longest, it also has 2 canon protags, with george and yoko both having scenes and george shows up as an NPC even if you don't have him on your team. this level is double the size and length of the rest and it has the most content to it, 4 endings per character, a full non-linier level that gives you objectives you can do in basically any order and a ton of variety, it even has some aspects of other levels like the pursuer from hive in the form of a tyrant that stalks the main university in the lategame and the poisonous enemies from below freezing point, it's got so much variety to it like i said, after the initial objective of getting an elevator working you get to branch out from the main university, which is already big enough to be its own level and you get to do the underground, which is made up of a lil lab with bees and a huge nightmare fuel nest and it scares me so bad i do not like going there and then you have the water treatment plant, which has the hunter gammas from 3 and a key hunt for an item that will have you making very unsafe trips across water where you can get instant killed if you arent careful, this level has tons of them with the sharks as well in the little pier area you can come across and use as a shortcut between the different parts of the level. it looks amazing, the uni is cozy, the water treatment plant has some fantastic water and it feels really dynamic with the pipes you have to cross and the underground is horrifying like i said, especially with the spiders you have to fight, you even come across nicoli from 3 in a cameo after you finish one of the objectives! i love this level so much, i might prefer hellfire to it if just for the setting and ease, this is a long and difficult scenario and while the end boss can be cheesed, if you don't know that its really touch and you can lock yourself into a bad ending easily, but theres so much here to love and some of the bad endings, yoko/alyssas mainly, made me cry so bad, it's such a good final scenario and a fitting end to the game, this is tied with BFP for my third fav and it has a very direct connection to desperate times as you go from the RPD to here as shown in the intro!

the game has a lot to love overall, i hope i gave a good overview of why this game is so special, i didn't even touch on all the main stuff like the amazing ost by akihiko matsumoto, who also worked on the sequel and it's honestly one of my favourite osts in the entire series, the main theme may be my favourite resident evil song outside of the dead aim save theme and the character select and network songs both stick in all my playlists, it's an amazing ost overall. the fact the story is seemingly fully canon too is cool, with references later on in other games like 7 and 3 remake and explaining things like how the outbreak spread so much and how a cure got out and there's tons of cool notes that expand the lore a lot, there's a lot of reasons to play this game, it's shortish too with lots of replay value, if you want a classic resi experiance and you've beaten all the main ones, absolutely track down both games, they're cheapish and easy to find and they're the closest you'll find outside of the main games to that classic experiance and they're some of my favs in the series, i'll always love both. sadly there was never any real followups though beyond that file 2, REsistance kind of has that concept but it doesn't have the cool setting that inspired so much love from me and i just didn't vibe with the gameplay much and other online resi games tended to be much more actiony, as much as i do love 5 versus and umbrella corps they don't hit the same as outbreak did for me but outbreaks director, Eiichiro Sasaki (who has made games like power stone 2, star gladiator, zak and wiki and even directed resident evil 6) still works at capcom and with all the refereces in later games, maybe we'll see the outbreak crew again sometime in an HD ver or a third game, hopefully with some of those cut levels added back in, until then you can always still play it online though at least with fanservers, you just need a japanese copy and a hacked ps2 or emulator, i won't like it but there's guides out there for how to get this working online if you want that experiance.