Starting with CV:X is when Capcom started getting lazy with the franchise, yes, and were clearly b*lls deep into getting content out there for wealth accumulation and not putting much thought into weeding out internal contradictions and also forcing in elements from other survival horror franchises.
...actually, C:V (C:VX is an afterthought) is one of the two installments where they actually crafted the game around the plot and not the other way around. The other was RE0, which, along with Veronica and 4, was supposed to be part of Sugimura's Progenitor Trilogy. I don't know who came up with the silliest ideas (I love C:V deeply, but I despise 0), but all I can say is that a lot of the things most people hate were not part of the "script" - for example, Alexia's first transformation wasn't supposed to go Parasite Eve-style...the text just says that she turns into a monster. I reckon her clothes burning spontaneously and all the rest were either game director Hiroki Kato's ideas or something the CG videos director came up with.
EDIT: I called the character "Alexia", but in the documents, she's called Hilda Von Kruger (as Alfred was named Hilbert - but this is stuff a lot of people already know)...actually, early on, she's referred to as "Lady Veronica". Back in the day, Shinji Mikami used to say the title CODE:Veronica referred to an actual character within the game - I guess she was it (especially since, in the script, there's no Veronica Ashford or cloning experiment - Hilda and Hilbert seem to be naturally-born siblings).
Zero (Which I think was actually conceptualized before CV:X) but then they dropped the bomb with RE4. Bear in mind I'm referring to the plots here, not the gameplay. The last person who will criticize the gameplay of RE4 is me, but I wish they didn't do that at the expense of challenging puzzles. Even in 2005 when I was high on RE4 I criticized them for lack of puzzles that require SOME brain cells to complete.
Zero (the N64 version) was born more or less around the time of C:V. Capcom fancied about making a RE game for the Nintendo console around the time of RE1, but the project didn't really move forward until after the release of RE2, whose success effectively spawned the series as a franchise and several games were put in development: RE 1.9 (later RE3), C:V, Gun Survivor, RE0 and RE3 (later RE4 and even later DMC - even though the early RE3 for PS1 was still a different game). Hideki Kamiya was briefly involved in Zero's early development. Capcom did drop the F-ing ball with RE4 - both story and gameplay-wise if you ask me. The two things go hand in hand, and you cannot make an effective horror game if the protagonist can round-kick anything that comes forward. Even as a shooter, I gotta say RE4 is not as fun as most people hail it to be - and I am not saying this to be gratuitously nasty. It is fun, but it's also very repetitive: the Castle bit really drags itself. And the Island part is ridiculous: you're supposed to face an army with controls that still try to go give off an impression of survival horror (which almost worked in the very early stages - almost). Hang me if you want, but I do find RE5 funnier to play - it still gets repetitive at times, but it's more varied...and the plot at least tries to tie in with the past games.
As for localization from Japanese games from that era in general, I don't think the issue was bad translation but the issue of removing key plot items and content that would have been considered offensive and 'bad' by an extremely conservative American population at that time period. This particular case in CV
@Hardware is referring to would not be classified as offensive so I'm not surprised it's authentic and not just a localization issue.
Don't know what you're talking about here. If you're referring to stuff like the Nazi imagery (which were not in the script - even though some lines kind of refer to stuff looking like they came out of WW2), I can see why they were removed and it wasn't just a matter of "conservative Americans": the game would've likely been outright banned in places like Germany had it contained that sort of stuff. I still like the fact the prison camp is modeled after a concentration camp in C:V - it makes everything more disturbing (especially if you've ever visited places like Auschwitz) and Umbrella looks even more evil. Also, a lot of content from the RE games was cut because of fear of local (i.e. Japanese) censorship or bad reception from the public: for example, in RE2 the first Licker was supposed to drop a severed head in front of the player during the early encounter (you can still see it in some trailers from the beta version online), but it was removed from the game because, around the same time, a bunch of school children were brutally murdered in Japan and the team thought it would've been in poor taste to keep such a graphic element in the game.
I have no idea what "Nazi imagery" you're talking about. That seems to something on your focal point of interest. I was referring to America's ridiculous social conservatism and prudishness at that particular time period, Australia had it as well, where everything was edited and censored fit American social norms and TV shows about police busting criminals were some of the top rated.