Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D Hands-On – Moving And Shooting Mambo

Since the focus of Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D is race against the clock action you can finally move and shoot in a Resident Evil game. Hold down both shoulder buttons to move and fire. However, you can’t move, aim, and shoot. Your gun is locked in place when you start walking.

Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D mixes enemies up so you may see Resident Evil 5’s majini in Eastern Europe or the Los Ganados in Africa. Key enemies like the Executioner from Resident Evil 5 and Dr. Salvador, the sack wearing chainsaw man from Resident Evil 4, are confirmed to be in The Mercenaries 3D. A Capcom representative said the game has 30 missions and some of them will have more creative objectives than kill everything before time runs out. Both missions available in the demo just had that goal, however. One level was a stage from Resident Evil 5 set in Africa and the other level brought players back to a dark Resident Evil 4 area.

I got a chance to play as all four characters in the Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D demo.

Chris Redfield has a handgun, rifle, and a shotgun to blast groups of enemies. He feels like the "base" character with no specific advantages or disadvantages.

This is Clarie Redfield’s first time in a Mercenaries game. Capcom gave her a handgun, a grenade launcher, and a sniper rifle. The latter wasn’t really useful because if you stand still long enough a zombie is guaranteed to pounce on you. Claire’s melee attack takes two hits to kill an enemy, so if she is interrupted an enemy can escape.

Krauser comes to battle holding a bow, knife, and rocket launcher. The first thing I did with Krauser was test the rocket launcher and it can kill a group fast, but ammunition is scarce. The bow is Krauser’s primary weapon and it has unlimited ammo. However, it takes at least two shots to take down one enemy.

Hunk may be the most "powerful" character out of the four characters Capcom brought to Game Developer’s Conference. He has a handgun, electrifying grenade launcher, and assault rifle. You could spray bullets with Hunk, but a Capcom representative suggested a different strategy. With Hunk you can shoot enemies in their knees and finish them off with a melee attack to add five seconds to the clock. That’s the main way to keep a stage in Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D going aside from shattering towers scattered in levels that add thirty seconds to the clock.

While each character has assigned weapons in the demo, players will get to select their equipment in Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D. The game also has a skill tree system, which wasn’t available. A Capcom rep likened it to a "talent tree."

I played Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D in 3D and 2D. The 3D effect isn’t gimmicky, you won’t see zombies trying to grab players outside the screen or anything like that. It’s subtle with your character popping out of the screen a little bit and added depth.

Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D is slated for a Q3 release this year in North America.