It becomes immediately evident that RE5 is more Black Hawk Down than Night of the Walking Dead. Infected Kijuju locals with splitting heads might still be the enemies coming your way, but most of the game's set pieces are giant shoot 'em up arenas set under the bright African sun where you've got to kill ten, twenty, maybe even thirty guys at once. It's clearly designed to emphasize the series' first foray into fully co-op multiplayer, a beautiful dream that Resident Evil has always harbored since the days of the first game, and it's occasionally clumsy and dull to play through solo, especially after the fantastic single player experience that was RE4. Still, I'm able to forgive this since I'm almost kind of proud that RE finally made it into the "big leagues" of co-op. (These are the sorts of emotions you feel when you play an entire franchise in release date order!)
But the focus on wild gunplay with a buddy is a jarring cry from the dark corridors of spooky solitude that filled previous Resident Evil games, and it's part of the reason why this title is a controversial entry in the franchise. "It's not scary at all!" the detractors cried when RE5 was released a decade ago, and they're kinda right, though the game does have an excellent DLC chapter called Lost in Nightmares which makes up for this by taking place in a creepy European mansion filled with fanservice.
"Not scary" was nothing compared to the other major criticism leveled at this game prior to its release, though. At that time, all the general public had to go by when assessing RE5 were images and short videos of Chris Redfield - a white dude - killing lots of black and brown Africans. The "it's racist!!!" narrative made RE5 blow up on a level like nothing else, and even my survival horror-snubbing weenie self became aware of the controversy back in 2009.
Upon playing the actual game, though, you quickly realize that Capcom kinda just wanted a cool setting for players to shoot zombies in, much like how they chose Spain for Resident Evil 4. As a Japanese company, they were ignorant of the imagery behind a Caucasian man killing dark-skinned locals, and while the game's portrayal of Kijuju is unfortunately stuck in the Hollywood stereotype of depicting most African countries as third world hellholes (a side-effect of RE5 so slavishly imitating that Black Hawk Down template), there are enough solid black characters in the game - like the aforementioned Sheva and the very cool West African BSAA chief Josh Stone - to make it clear that racism was not the intention. There are even some in-game story bits that delve into how Umbrella and other international corporations run by white people have been pillaging the resources of Africa for centuries, which has the potential for very intriguing social commentary. Unfortunately, the game's not quite subtle or skilled enough to expound upon this potential, especially when the plot turns into a 90s comic book in the last few hours as Albert Wesker makes a glorious return and starts throwing missiles and backflipping around like Agent Smith from the Matrix movies. Ah well.
Nevertheless, despite the nosedive into silliness that is the final few hours of Resident Evil 5, the majority of the game's plot plays it straight and offers up a real sense of progression, which is something that I truly enjoyed. After playing all of these games in a row, it's kind of amazing to see how the same characters and threats have evolved. Chris Redfield and his posse started out as lone survivors in a haunted mansion, fighting for their lives and barely able to make it out by the skin of their teeth. Now, they're hardened and experienced members of a tactical SWAT team policing the world for mutated threats. The sense of amplified scale is very, very cool, and the game successfully pulls off the hat trick of feeling bigger and more awe-inspiring than any other entry in the series thus far…even if the gameplay isn't quite up to standard.
Therein lies the complexity of Resident Evil 5…mediocre in some ways, filled with problematic imagery in others…but at the end of the day, still a game that provided a surprising amount of enjoyment by advancing the lore and scope of a series that, by this point in time, has come to mean quite a lot to me.