Reception
Chris Redfield's critical reception has been positive to mixed. In 2009, GameZone ranked Chris as fourth on a list of the top five "gaming gods" of the year for his new looks (according to PSU.com, "now a beastly, muscle-bound warrior with biceps the size of water melons"), calling him "one gorgeous hunk" with "a killer body and dreamy good-looks." That same year, Chris and his sister Claire were included in IGN's "Ultimate Zombie Strike Team", Chris for his "long, fruitful career killing zombies" that "proved that Umbrella's fearsome bio-weapons are no match for a lone warrior with guts." Also in 2009, Gameplanet stated that if Chris and Leon S. Kennedy would both appear in the next game it would be "awesome," adding that both are the main protagonists of the series. Chris was also repeatedly compared with Leon by IGN, both of them being regarded as the leading heroes of the series. In 2010, GamesRadar featured his team-up with Sheva in the article about the gaming's "most violent double acts" for their actions in Resident Evil 5.
Among negative criticism, Chris was ranked fifth in IGN's 2009 list of most overrated video game characters, with a suggestion that he should "ditch the 'roids and concentrate on getting the job done", and included in UGO.com's 2010 list of top ten out-of-luck game characters for his failures across the series. His new design in the Resident Evil 5, called by GameSpy to be "a cross between Colin Farrell and Hugh Jackman", in particular became a source of controversy and was often ridiculed. GameSpot gave Chris the special award for "character most likely to fail a performance-enhancing drug test" in the Dubious Honors awards in 2009, adding that "the man is clearly a walking pharmacy." Including him on the list of "ten game heroes who fail at the simple stuff" for his inability to shoot while moving in RE5, GameDaily recommended him "to spend a little more time on the shooting range and a little less time pumping iron in front of a mirror." Joystiq commented that possibly during The Umbrella Chronicles Chris started his "steroid abuse", which was also suggested by IGN. In 2011, BeefJack featured Chris among the five game characters who are supposed to be sexy but turned out awkward, as "he looks like the runner-up in a Popeye lookalike contest." On the other hand, when GamesRadar compared his Code Veronica and RE5 designs while trying to evaluate which would fit better for a zombie apocalypse, they found the latter to give better chances to survive to a zombie attack, also rating Chris from the original game to be "horribly ill-prepared".
In 2009, GameTrailers made a video focusing on the his evolution throughout the series. Game Informer explored the meaning of Chris Redfield's name.
Read more about this topic: Chris Redfield
Famous quotes containing the word reception:
“Aesthetic emotion puts man in a state favorable to the reception of erotic emotion.... Art is the accomplice of love. Take love away and there is no longer art.”
—Rémy De Gourmont (1858–1915)
“I gave a speech in Omaha. After the speech I went to a reception elsewhere in town. A sweet old lady came up to me, put her gloved hand in mine, and said, “I hear you spoke here tonight.” “Oh, it was nothing,” I replied modestly. “Yes,” the little old lady nodded, “that’s what I heard.””
—Gerald R. Ford (b. 1913)
“To the United States the Third World often takes the form of a black woman who has been made pregnant in a moment of passion and who shows up one day in the reception room on the forty-ninth floor threatening to make a scene. The lawyers pay the woman off; sometimes uniformed guards accompany her to the elevators.”
—Lewis H. Lapham (b. 1935)