The Weekly WTF: Resident Evil 4‘s Ashley, Gaming’s Biggest Pain in the Butt

As we all know damn well, women aren't meek damsels in distress. They don't cry for studly dudes to rescue them from the top of dodgy towers. There are no poisoned apples or wicked witches, because our fine ladyfolk don't have time for any of that BS. Not in real life.

If Bowser attempted to kidnap Peach in reality, she'd mace him and/or kick him right in the big ol' green mansack. Because women are utter badasses who will not and cannot be stopped. They could kick our asses, that's for damn sure.

Which begs the question: why is Ashley so effing effingly effing useless?

Resident Evil 4 was a defining moment for the series. It marked that paradigm shift from creaky, static camera angles to a full-on, balls out, TPS sort of affair. This was the game that did that transition right, before the more critically-questionable Resident Evil 5 and 6. Less admirably, it was also the one that brought us more high-pitched howls of LEEEEEON! Heeeelp! than you could possibly fathom.

Our hero with the wanky Bieber hair was dispatched to a small European village, on the trail of the president's daughter. Ashley Graham has been kidnapped on the way to her university, which just goes to prove the old saying: crazy-ass cult dudes really need a better screening process for the people they abduct.

Some people, you just don't want in your pervy little underground lair. Particularly not if you haven't soundproofed the place. At the very least, check that their name isn't Shrilly McShrill, the shrillest-voiced woman in Shrilltown, Shrillville.

You first encounter Ashley early in the game, incarcerated in the Los Illuminados church. After dicking about with insignia locks, minor puzzles and beardy bastards trying to kill you RIGHT IN THE FACE, she could at least be grateful to see you. Instead, crap is thrown at you, and you have to waste precious moments coddling her.

When furious albino monks are brandishing crossbows at your crotch, what do you not need? That, right there. And that's pretty much the theme of her existence throughout.

Over the course of Resident Evil 4, she'll be stolen again, liberated and stolen again repeatedly. At one point, by big ol' acid spewing invisible insects. Just so you know the kind of mofos we're dealing with. Anywho, this ass-pain of a situation leaves you enduring about a quarter of the game with her in tow.

Completely defenseless, Ashley gets a health bar alongside your own. Indeed, it's attached to yours, growing out of it like the large-boobed parasite this girl is. Just another middle finger from the game, when it hurls a canyon full of homicidal mutants at you: while stopping the horde from setting your ass alight, you've also got to keep watch over her. It's instant game over if she's killed, or carried away by an assailant into the next ‘zone.' Or if you directly damage her at all in any way.

Verbal abuse about sucking ass isn't a factor, thankfully.

Redeeming factors? Let's think... her own brief section is quite tense. It's only a few rooms' worth, but being pursued by those clanky knights in the dark gave us the willies. That was Ashley's only positive contribution to the game, beyond her inspired sexual innuendo about doing overtime with Leon during the ending.