How Impactful was Resident Evil 4?

Resident Evil 4 through it’s hilarious and memorable story and dialogue, staggeringly impressive graphics (for the time), and pitch perfect Action-Horror gameplay was one of the most popular games of the time and had game design and style so great that it’s influence lives on to this very day. An easy example of its influence is it’s camera. Although it wasn’t anywhere near the first game to have a third person camera (even in it’s own series), RE4 reinvented the idea with its use of the “over the shoulder” placement of it’s camera which is about as close to the protagonist the camera can get before it they start obscuring the view.

This managed to make you feel much closer to the protagonist while still being able to get a good look around them, but not good enough so that you could see directly behind them, leaving you paranoid of attacks from behind you. This Camera style ended up becoming incredibly popular being used in everything from Gears of War to God of War 4.