Almost every large, established game company has at least one cash cow to call their very own: Nintendo has Mario, Konami has Metal Gear, Sega has Sonic, and Capcom's over-milked brainchild is Resident Evil, the creepy series that has sold millions of copies since its inception on the PlayStation. The problem with these poor, overworked cows, top-of-the-line though they may be, is that they tend to lack variety and eventually often work themselves into ruts where each instalment is just like the last, only with a few new weapons, some sharper graphics and maybe an improved storyline. Fortunately for all those concerned, Capcom decided to give their baby cow a break and re-invent what they'd been doing well for so many years - a risk to be sure, especially on a system that was obviously on the decline.

Thank God they had the balls to do it.

Resident Evil 4 is without a doubt one of the best games of the GameCube's lifecycle, and will likely stand as a pinnacle of gaming in years ahead, a true masterpiece that really should be experienced by all those even remotely interested. Capcom has taken what was a pretty darn good series, albeit with a few sometimes questionable and almost always frustrating gameplay mechanics, and completely revamped it: entirely new gameplay, a new location, a new perspective and a very beautiful 3D graphics engine are just a few of the changes. The game also sacrifices the frightening, moody, slow-paced atmosphere of past Resident Evils for an intense, action-oriented, fists-up kind of game that starts throwing its pitches before the player has even selected New Game.

Perhaps the biggest change between this game and its forbearers is the change in perspective. Instead of using a fixed-camera with hand-drawn backgrounds as seen in the earlier games of the series, Resident Evil 4 favours an over-the-shoulder perspective in fully three-dimensional environments. This makes aiming with the many weapons of Resident Evil 4 (shotguns, rifles, handguns, machine guns, rocket launchers, this game's got it all) incredibly intuitive since you're seeing where the bullet goes almost from the perspective of Leon Kennedy, the typical Game-Over-screen-can't-stop-me-from-kicking-some-sweet-zombie-ass-and-looking-pretty-fly-while-doing-it protagonist, and a member of the STARS rescue team. The camera is incredibly tight and follows Leon from behind absolutely perfectly. This makes the running and gunning/knifing all the more immersive.

Aside from the basic shooting, which is really more fun than it sounds, there are two main forms of gameplay: puzzles and action sequences. Action sequences, one of the games biggest strengths, are when, only when specified, pressing a certain combination of buttons will cause Leon to do something that couldn’t be done with the regular controls, such as running or shooting. For example, if a massive boulder is rolling down a hill straight at Leon you can press the indicated combination of buttons to make Leon dive, very smoothly, out of the way. The action sequences don't require particular skill, but they test the reflexes of the player and make for some really cool cinematics. The puzzles, which are quite few and far between, are probably the most disappointing feature of Resident Evil 4. The puzzles presented to the players are all easy and not particularly engaging, which is very disappointing given how impressive and difficult Resident Evil’s puzzles used to be. There isn't a single memorable puzzle in the entire game, though this is easily forgiveable considering how memorable each of the game's 20 hours is anyway.

Resident Evil 4 takes place in a very brown Spanish village devoid of friendly animals, blue skies and rainbows, and instead offering up grizzly forests, gruesome corpses and disease. But man, I'm sure even vegan peace-activists would agree that the bloody, gore-filled carcasses and mutations look damn fine. There isn't a technically better looking GameCube game than Resident Evil 4, a game that surely pushes every inch of processing power that the GameCube offers. Every crumbling brick on each building, every insignificant leaf on each decaying tree and every whisp of hair show incredible detail and look remarkably lifelike. It should be noted, however, that due to the beauty and realistic visuals of Resident Evil 4, it is an extremely violent videogame. Blood squirts everywhere, dismembered enemies try to regain their footing and chainsaws cleanly decapitate anything that blocks their way. Basically, this game shouldn't be played by young children, but if you're old enough to responsibly appreciate the violence, incinerating and blowing the heads off of baddies provides an adrenaline rush second to none.

To go along with the enormous environments are hundreds upon hundreds of zombie enemies, all trying to get their measly hands on Leon (one of the few elements in Resident Evil 4 that should be familiar to those who played the game's predecessors) who must fight off these disgusting, relentless foes who will stop at nothing to wrap their hands around Leon’s neck or impale him with their pitchforks. They are relatively smart enemies given their quantity, putting up ladders to get to roofs and alerting their comrades of Leon's presence, and are both tricky and entertaining to dispose of. All of these zombies, as well as the exhilarating boss fights interspersed through the game, make rescuing the President’s kidnapped daughter Ashley, Leon’s objective in Spain, that much more difficult. Along the way Leon meets up with some old friends and enemies and encounters a deadly virus which infects even himself, all the while trying to protect the innocent Ashley, nevermind himself, from the terrors of Spain!

So, the story isn't particularly original or impressive, though it does do a good enough job of moving the game along at a fast pace, and there is certainly some nice fan service to hardcore fanatics of the series. Also, perhaps in an effort to keep this at all a Resident Evil game, many familiar faces appear either just as brief cameos or even as important, full-fledged characters. There are some nice new characters in the mix, though, such as Ingrid Hunnigan, Leon's sassy contact back to STARS headquarters. Leon communicates with Hunnigan through a communication system similar to the radio display used in the Metal Gear games. Just like in Metal Gear Solid, it acts as a great way to move the story along, but Hunnigan and Leon, as well as most of the characters in the game, tend to exchange some very bizarre, unintentionally funny dialogue, though this fails to detract very much from the game.

Whoever said that change was good knew exactly what they were talking about. Resident Evil 4 is exactly the re-invention that the series needed. Thankfully Capcom didn't throw on a multiplayer portion or try to make a deep story to keep the series from going on life support, instead finding a new way to make the series fun again. There still may not be a great story, interesting characters or even decent dialogue in the game, but if you’re playing the game for anything other than the extremely impressive graphics, moody and daunting audio or white-knuckle gameplay and action then you’re completely missing the point: Resident Evil 4 is pure, unadulterated gaming fun, and if taken at face value you will have the gaming experience of a lifetime. More companies need to take some advice from Capcom and bring their franchises back from the dead.