Resident Evil Requiem
Starting the game, it somewhat keeps the stasis start that I liked from RE8 but not as much as it's more like RE5 where you start in an area with the general public heading to a mission, or crime scene in Grace's case. Feels like a nod to RE5 in that respect. But one hour into the game and my interest is absolutely piqued. Playing both the beginning chapter with Grace and Leon and getting a little taste of what the game has to offer, my theory so far is that it's not as much about finding a balance between the aspects of action and horror but is more like a swinging pendulum that gives you heavy doses of both subsequently one after another. I can see how this may feel a little jarring for some players but I feel this going back and forth is perfect with how Capcom achieves the goal they were going for with creating tension with Grace's parts of the game and then catharsis with Leon, going around killing all the monsters that brought Grace torment.
I think the story is one of the best in the series, which granted with the utmost respect as a lifelong Resident Evil fan, that is a pretty low bar to clear. The stories aren't the worst but they definitely aren't the strength of the series. I see Resident Evil as being a horror franchise that has the Nintendo focus where the focus of Capcom is to put out a game that is peak fun above all else. But with that said, I'd say this story in RE9 is better than most in the series and what excels even further is the acting especially Angela Sant'Albano who voices and does mocap for Grace. Grace in general is an instant classic character in my opinion. She has so much personality in a unique way to how many characters are done in this series. She's extremely shy and awkward which given her backstory you learn of in this game, but I will not go into to avoid spoilers, it all makes sense. The only character criticism I have is with Alyssa and the villain Zeno as I feel they have very little development which definitely should have been fleshed out more, especially with the latter as so much of his origin is more implied and requires knowledge of previous games which makes his character serve more as a vehicle of fan service rather than being an actual meaningful character in the story. It's almost as if the story would be better if the only antagonist was Victor Gideon, who also needed more development especially with the end but still got enough for me to be more content with his character as he was more developed than most antagonists in this series.
I like the approach to the zombies with them having different personalities and using that in the strategy of the game to avoid them. Examples of this are like zombies who turn off lights so turning on lights would distract them or others who sing who act as mini bosses. The ones who sing are so creepy when working your best to avoid them as Grace as they tend to be more chaotic with how they move around but especially when they laugh randomly that always got under my skin.
I like how the strategy also continues into the new game+ where with Leon in the game you earn points later in the game for killing enemies which can be used at the store to upgrade his weapons and buy other ones but in the new game+ you get the points from the beginning of the game and this makes it so when playing as Grace, even though you can get more weapons to making killing enemies easier with Grace, killing them actually hurts the parts where you play as Leon because then he has less enemies to kill which means less points than the total he can potentially earn throughout the entirety of the game on subsequent playthroughs.
Overall I'd recommend this game to any Resident Evil fan and honestly to most gamers in general. It does a great job with finding balance between the horror and action aspects of the game so it doesn't drift too much with one or another.