My First Zombie Infested Mansion

No one ever forgets their first: first crush, first kiss, first love, first time I played a video game with a zombie infested mansion that still makes me feel like a scared little child.  That last item may be a little more specific than the rest, but you get the picture.  “Resident Evil,” is the first horror game I ever played, and to this day I still have trouble sitting down and playing it.  The claustrophobic nature of the mansion and being restricted to tight corridors with ridiculously clunky controls makes for a terrifying, tension filled game.  Before I get into the description of the first moment that caused uncomfortable warmth below my waist, I need to set the mood.

                I play my horror games in a very particular way.  It seems wrong to play a game that is supposed to frighten you in the middle of the day.  Playing a scary game with sunlight shining outside is like watching “Halloween” with “The Muppets” soundtrack playing.  Picture it in your mind.  Michael Myers slowly chasing Laurie Strode down a hallway while the song “Man or Muppet” blares from the speakers.  It completely takes away from the experience and is not conducive to building tension.  So at a young age I made a decision to only play horror games in the dead of night far away from the distraction of people.  This makes for a more immersive experience especially when playing a game that relies heavily on atmosphere, such as “Resident Evil.”

                “Resident Evil” begins with a cutscene showing how odd, grisly murders began popping up in a place called Raccoon City.  These murders seem to have originated from a stereotypically huge mansion on the outskirts of the city.  As my team approaches the mansion, they are attacked by zombie looking Dobermans that desire nothing more than to eat our flesh and bury our bones. To avoid being dog food, my team sprints for the mansion and then the horror begins.

The mansion of my nightmares.

                Now there are many things inside this mansion that cause terror and shrill screams to be a common thing, but one of the worst parts is the fact that the dogs who chased me in here continue to be a nuisance throughout the game.  They enter the courtyard or garden areas of the house and chase me.  In one of my more embarrassingly stupid moments, I even opened the door to the outside that the dogs had just chased me through in the cutscene before.  I don’t know what I expected to happen, but I can say with certainty that I didn’t expect the dogs to just be waiting outside the door.  It was a pitiful moment for me and video games, but the worst moment with the dogs came about an hour in to the game.

The hallway...

                I entered a room with a long hallway that was built like an L curve.  The room was well lit but very silent.  As I ran past the first window a tiny chipping sound was heard as a piece of the window fell onto the floor.  Immediately, I flipped around with my gun raised expecting the worst, but nothing happened.    

I am so ready for this!

Any moment now...

Well, I guess nothing's there...

             After what was probably ten minutes of waiting, I shrugged my shoulders and continued on my merry way through the rest of the mansion.  At a certain point, my mind let me forget about the odd chipping noise from that window and as I backtracked through the hallway all hell broke loose.  My fear of the hellish dogs was well founded because somehow the zombie Doberman had learned to jump through windows!   

OH SWEET JESUS!

The first time this happened to me, I was 12 years old.  It was like 12 year old me had sat down on a thumbtack.  I screamed and jumped violently in my seat as I tried to make my character run for her dear life.  Needless to say, the dogs mauled me.

This scene had two consequences: one, I wet my pants, two, I will never trust any windows ever again.  “Resident Evil” has forever ruined windows for me along with many other things, but we’ll get to that in later posts.  For now, just remember to never trust Dobermans or windows.

Before I finish, please watch these videos.  Start the "Resident Evil" intro cutscene first and at about 25 seconds hit play on the "Man or Muppet" video with the cutscene muted.  You'll get a feeling of what I mean by having the wrong mood.  Enjoy!