The second pack of new DLC content is finally out for Resident Evil 7: Biohazard [Review: 9/10] in the form of the Banned Footage Vol. 2 compilation. The first Banned Footage DLC offered up an excellent replayable Nightmare mode and an escape-the-room style experience called Bedroom, both of which featured VR support. The tougher Ethan Must Die game mode was incredibly difficult, but didn’t feature any VR integration at all.
Similarly, Banned Footage Vol. 2 has two new small pieces of content in the form of 21 and Daughters, both of which feature VR support, as well as Jack’s 55th Birthday, a more robust new game mode that’s just as silly as it is bizarre, but unfortunately it does not support VR right now. Here’s what we thought of each.
21 (VR Supported)
This feels like the most random, uninspired, and mostly useless piece of new content thus far. For all intents and purposes, this is just a Blackjack simulator themed as a Saw-style torture game orchestrated by the demented character form the core narrative, Lucas. There’s not much else to it.
Things start out dastardly enough and it does a good job of building up suspense. Losing results in the loss of fingers and lots of blood, so you’ve got good incentive to place your bets wisely, but the stakes never feel high enough to really make it worth investing any time into. You can win some fancy ability tokens, but without some overarching impact on the core game or narrative in some way, it feels like wasted potential.
Daughters (VR Supported)
The Bedroom mode from Banned Footage Vol. 1 delivered an exhilarating and clever take on the escape-the-room style puzzles that have popped up in increasing popularity over the past couple of years. You begin strapped down to a bed, being force-fed a disgusting meal, and tasked with figuring out how to escape. Daughters starts off in similarly intense fashion, but ultimately devolves into a game of seemingly blind trial and error.
You’ll take on the role of Zoe, one of Ethan’s allies from the core game, as a prequel story showing the devolution of the Baker family and what happened prior to the main game’s start. It’s chock full of pulse-pounding moments as you creep around the house trying to find a way out, but it never escalates to the point of anything truly exciting. You’ll stumble into death scenes over and over until you happen to discover the exact correct path. There are multiple endings, but they hardly feel worth discovering through the tedious repetition.
In the end it feels too short and too shallow, a far cry from the well-balanced Bedroom and Nightmare modes of the first Banned Footage DLC pack.
Jack’s 55th Birthday (No VR Support)
Finally, Jack’s 55th Birthday is easily the best part of Banned Footage Vol. 2, but as it stands, it doesn’t offer any VR support at all. Instead of making your skin crawl with terrifying moments of panic and horror, this new game mode instead opts for campy, cheesy, and often preposterous moments juxtaposed with intense gore.
It’s Jack’s birthday and instead of running for your life from him, you’re tasked with feeding him delicious food. The food you collect takes up inventory space, which is shared with items and weapons, but the more food you bring him each time the higher your score will be. This creates a delicate balance of priorities.
As you get a higher score, you unlock better items and abilities, feeding into an addictive gameplay loop. It’s all very wacky and feels more like a standalone arcade game experience in some ways. It delivers something fresh and unique — unlike the other two options in Banned Footage Vol. 2 — but without VR support it’s tough to recommend for fans of the PSVR iteration of the Resident Evil 7 experience.
Overall, if you just can’t get enough of Resident Evil 7: Biohazard, then I recommend getting the Season Pass. It costs $29.99 and will net you the previous and generally better Banned Footage Vol. 1 ($9.99), this new pack, Banned Footage Vol. 2 ($14.99), and a third, paid, story-based DLC that’s not out yet. Another story-based DLC will be released at some point as well to everyone for free. Overall, you’ll save money on all of the DLC combined if you get the Season Pass.
If you don’t get the Season Pass though and are just passively interested in seeing more of what the game has to offer, Banned Footage Vol. 1 is cheaper, more robust, and generally a better purchase from my perspective. It’s a shame Jack’s 55th Birthday isn’t available separately and doesn’t include any VR support at this time.
Have you tried any of the Resident Evil 7 DLC yet? Let us know your thoughts down in the comments below!
