Ever since the release of the iconic Resident Evil so many generations ago now, there has been a consistent stream of titles from developers both big and small that have tried to recapture some of the elements that made it so special. Considering the fact that not even Capcom has always gotten the formula and execution right over the years, it isn’t hard to imagine that making a game that delivers so many thrills, but then backing it up with play mechanics and general design that bring everything together, is a serious challenge. That said, if you’re signing on to try to honor that legacy there’s a bar you’ll need to clear in order to be a success.

At least in some regards, Ebola Village does a decent job of putting together some crucial elements that are familiar. Everyday environments that are made a bit creepy by the threat of zombies around every turn, check. Periodic vignettes that try to amp up the excitement and creep factor, sometimes giving you a respite from trying to stay alive, check. A limited inventory you’ll need to manage, coupled with generally scarce save points, check. In these sorts of areas it’s clear the developers understand the essence of the assignment, it’s just a shame that on the implementation end of the deal things didn’t come together quite so well.

When it comes to typical complaints for these sorts of titles, a general degree of jankiness practically comes with the territory. Whether that’s some of the models being a little wonky, textures that range from decent to pretty awful, or more critically the controls being just a bit sluggish, Ebola Village pretty well checks all of those boxes as well. It’s still playable, but it’s hardly ideal. What’s more discouraging, and is a bit worse than the norm, is that the game outright stops every once in a while for more than a few seconds, and not only does that shatter the illusion of an immersive game, at some point it starts getting irksome. This sometimes seems to be tied to loading a new scene, but there are other times where it just feels random, making the game feel poorly optimized and less ready for market than it should be. To its credit, this is at least playable and shows some effort to impress, it’s just hard to overlook some of its critical flaws.