There are logical reasons why you'd choose to wait for a PC version of a classic console game. In the case of Resident Evil 4 - a superb entry into the franchise and arguably one of the finest console games of the last few years - there's the chance to embrace a more natural PC control system, along with better graphics, faster loading and all the luxuries you'd expect from a PC version.

Resident Evil 4 on the PC, however, is one of the most downright disgraceful ports of a console game we've ever seen. Aside from ensuring that the code runs on a PC, it's as if the developers have made not one iota of effort on the conversion, and even a relatively low cost price tag can't hide the shamefulness of this effort.

You know you're in trouble fairly early on. The menus are clunky, the controls are a pig to set up and quitting out was something we could only achieve via the magical Ctrl-Alt-Del combination. But when you hit the game proper, it simply gets worse.

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For starters, there's no way you can use a mouse as part of the control system. The option's just not there. Instead, you can calibrate a gamepad or the keyboard. However, all references to the array of buttons you need to control the game, both within it and in the gamer's manual, are assuming you're playing with a PlayStation pad. Ignore the fact that there are at least 104 buttons in front of most PC gamers; instead you're told to press button 3, with no clue as to what button 3 actually is. It beggars belief.

But there's more. The graphics, somehow, appear worse than the aged GameCube edition and many of the graphical effects have been compromised. Forget the quality options onboard your modern day PC gaming graphics card, because there's simply no use for them here. It has a real effect on the mood of the game too, and not for the better.

So little effort, so little thought and so little common courtesy has gone into this, and it's even more surprising giving the amount of time it's taken to get to the PC. We're genuinely, genuinely shocked.

The actual game itself? It's outstanding, just not in its PC guise. Go for either the GameCube or PS2 version, and try to convince yourself that the PC edition doesn't exist. Because it seems that's just what the developers did.

If there's a worse console-to-PC port in existence, we'd be very surprised. A once great game in very poor clothes.