In addition to it’s being one of the more overlooked games in the main series, Resident Evil 0 serves as a good starting point for determining when the series first started developing an interest in leeches. Giving mucous vampire snakes such a prominent role in the game might’ve felt gimmicky — as they did in Resident Evil 5 — had Capcom not been so inventive in their use.

Like any prequel story, anyone who’s familiar with the series will know how it ends, and in this case, the GameCube remake had reminded everyone of that ending when it came out earlier that year. A successful prequel answers questions, fixes problems and puts its own twist on what we loved before. Resident Evil 0 achieved this in a few ways, but it’s most evident in its cast of monsters.

The creepy crawly theme made the enemies seem new enough to be unpredictable and frightening without straying too far from what was established in the game it’s set mere hours before.

With officer Rebecca Chambers as one of the two leads, we finally learned what happened to the members of the S.T.A.R.S. Bravo team that weren’t found dead in the Spencer estate. Pairing Chambers with the former soldier-turned-prison convict and possible serial murderer Billy Coen made for one of the more memorable partnerships in the series.

The “partner zapping” mechanic took that dynamic a step further by giving players the ability to switch between Chambers and Coen so they could experiment with the subtle differences in each play style. Chambers, for example, is a medic so she has a kit to combine herbs in, but her health is low compared to Coen, whose man strength allows him to move heavy objects.

It’s strange how much this has in common with Resident Evil 5, seeing as they’re separated by a an entire series’ worth of games. Leech monsters, a misfit pair of characters who can be played simultaneously and a male co-lead who enjoys pushing heavy objects.

Both games are even known for what they changed about the inventory, albeit with varying levels of criticism. Resident Evil 5 was lambasted for throwing out the endlessly satisfying grid inventory that was such a delight in the series reboot, even though it wouldn’t have worked in a multiplayer game.

Resident Evil 0 got rid of another series staple when it rendered the static storage boxes obsolete by saving the location of dropped items so they could be picked up hours later. This added a layer of strategy that would not have been available before.

No significant alterations were made to the core gameplay with this remaster, which is only slightly more ambitious than the HD remake we got last year.

The presentation benefits greatly from the added support for 5.1 surround sound, higher resolution textures, and a full 1080p 16:9 widescreen viewing mode that can be reverted to the original 4:3 ratio, should you feel so inclined. I enjoyed the tweaked control scheme, but if it’s not your cup ‘o tea, it can be swapped out for the original controls.

An all-new Wesker Mode puts an exciting and occasionally silly twist on New Game Plus by replacing Billy Coen with the super-powered Albert Wesker from Resident Evil 5, before that hilariously awful volcano bit. Playing through the campaign again as Wesker is kind of a big deal for a series that’s spent a long damn time teasing us with the idea. He’s joined by an evil alternate reality version of Rebecca who plays the same as she did before for some reason.

If you were impressed by last year’s remaster of the Resident Evil remake, this is more of that. It took considerable experimentation — mostly with Resident Evil 4 — for Capcom to find their groove, and since they found it we’ve gotten two of the best remasters in quite some time.

The Final Word: This is another terrific remaster from Capcom that’s easy to recommend if you never played the original, or if you’re merely itching for more classic Resident Evil.