well when i restarted it, i basically went through the same thing. You are basically in the middle of the village, and they are everywhere, and house i ran into is the nearest one. I run inside, and same thing happens, they break in and i run upstairs. I died before only b/c i got ambushed from behind. So i look and see that the monsters raise ladders to reach the windows upstairs to get me. So i blast the ones coming up the stairs, and then run to the windows. The zombies are climbing up the ladder to reach me, but i push it down lol. they all fall down. i focus back on the ones coming up the stairs, but they keep raising the damn ladder behind me, and i keep knocking it down. so finally, i let them climb the ladder and come in through the window, knock down the ladder, then jump out the window

so basically, they are all on the 2nd floor of the house, and the rest that i was holding off are on the first floor stairwell, and since i knocked down the ladder b4 i jumped out, they cant climb back down. Knowing how the AI is in this game, i didnt stick around to see if they would jump out the window to get to me. i just ran.
Yea, i fought the monster in the lake. It was great, my anchor got caught on him, and man did i get dragged around.
I strongly suggest you get the GC version, the PS2 vers wont come out till end of 2005/start of 2006. The dood was sad b/c he promised GC exclusivity to the title, and b/c of that he developed the game for GC's specs. To port it to the PS2, and to avoid all slowdowns, the graphics will have to be downgraded alittle. I agree, PS made resident evil what it was. I still play Resident Evil : Director's Cut every once in awhile.