Much like the hordes of shambling, reanimated corpses that await us, Resident Evil is a series that refuses to die. Since its debut thirty years ago, the franchise has always wavered on some glorious highs and forgetful lows. Until now, culminating in the ninth numbered main entry, with Resident Evil Requiem.
A continuation of many long-tangled storylines, Requiem seems players take on the split-storyline action of newcomer Grace Ashcroft and old hound Leon S. Kennedy. Together they face a new foe, one with old ties, and a vested interest in sinister, biological research. Because what else would a Resident Evil game be?
Is this the swansong of a muddled yet fascinating franchise, or is does it sing new life into a series that just won’t quit whilst it’s sometimes ahead? Well, toughen that resolve as we’re about to find out.
Just How Big Is This Umbrella?
The story, in as much as I’m allowed to mention and won’t spoil, is actually one of the more cohesive Resident Evil stories. Granted, it’s got another Umbrella scientist at the helm, because apparently everyone in Raccoon City worked there at some point. Must have had a good pension.
A story told across two characters, Resident Evil Requiem sees us put into the shoes of Grace Ashcroft, rookie FBI agent and daughter of Alyssa Ashcroft. Newcomers may not recognise the name, but the latter was a character in the online-focused Resident Evil Outbreak from 2003. Grace is investigating a new batch of mysterious dead bodies, one such that leads here back to a place she’d rather forget.
The other is DSO bloodhound Leon S. Kennedy, far from the fresh-faced rookie of 1998, now more grizzled and weary from his presidential daughter rescuing. Leon is sent to investigate one Dr. Gideon, the aforementioned former Umbrella scientist who is up to no good… because it’s a Resident Evil game, we need a framing device.
Unlike Revelations, the two aren’t kept from each other by different time periods. They meet early enough, but circumstances contrive to split them up rather than make it another tagalong, co-op adventure.
Think more Resident Evil Zero, but with fixed swapping points. But perhaps it’s better to break down their own gameplay sections…
She Is Grace
Much like the subjects it splices together, Resident Evil Requiem is a collaboration of old and new styles of play. Grace’s, for instance, is very much a continuation of the first person survival horror seen in Biohazard and Village (or Resident Evil’s 7 and 8).
Grace is nervous, thrust into a situation she wasn’t expecting and needs to escape. The setting is, whilst not exactly the same, very similar to the Baker house in Biohazard. Swapped out for a clinical setting, but still lots of elaborate puzzles and backtracking nonetheless.
There is gunplay, but it’s made very clear that Grace is more of an analyst than an assault-class mercenary. There’s a persistent threat that lurks about, but don’t think Nemesis. Think Alien from Isolation: comes and goes, usually at the worst time.
Personally, I hate FPS horror (despite Alien: Isolation being an all-time favourite, ironically). Yet the reason why I hate it is because, especially in instances like Requiem, it puts me too on edge. Almost like I need some over-the-top, Leon-based action to balance it out.
Is Leon’s Middle Name “S Rank”?
Fortunately, Leon’s sections are the over-the-top yang to Grace’s horrible yin. What Grace lacks in military training, Leon more than makes up for with aplomb. Yet whilst some of you may be fresh from the Resident Evil 4 remake, it actually plays more like RE6…
Wait, don’t leave! That’s not actually an insult, and probably the only nice comparison I’ll make to that game. But yes, Leon plays with the 360° fluidity that was seen in 6, rather than the stilted, over-the-shoulder rigidity of its predecessors.
Armed, initially at least, with a pistol and a hand axe, Leon’s sections are more fight-focused from the off. Over time the gameplay becomes familiar, with your “standard Resident Evil” armoury becoming available.
The hand axe is permanent, and has a means to sharpen it that never diminishes, but that’s not all. Environmental weapons, such as the ones dropped by enemies, can also be used against them. Rebar, chainsaws, IV drip stands: if it’s coming at the player, it can be parried and swung at/thrown back at an enemy.
Which probably has you thinking, “Since when can zombies use weapons…?”, right? Better yet, since when could they talk?
Un-Life… Finds A Way
Considering the thirty years it’s had trying to scare us, Capcom have done some impressive spins on zombies. We’ve had zombie classic, Crimson Heads, parasitic variants, leech-types and the Majini… and spiders, Tyrants and everything in between. This time around, we have… well, more zombies, sort of.
Albeit it these are the freshly dead and as such, still retain some essence of human behaviours. A bit like how the zombies in Land of the Dead remember how to do menial tasks. However, these ones are vocal too.
It’s as if the development team watched the 28 Days… franchise and cribbed some ideas there. So this time, rather than standing in corridors doing nothing, zombies will be trying to turn off light switches (they don’t like bright lights). Or a reanimated maid, or reani-maid that I just made up, will be trying to clear a mess.
On the whole, it’s not a massive reinvention of the zombie wheel. But it does add a little bit of dynamic flare, that some undead will occasionally break patrol, or can be distracted by certain objects. There are, of course, other evolving nasties in Resident Evil Requiem that I won’t spoil. What I am allowed to tease, though, are the Blister Heads. They make Crimson Heads look like Dead Rising zombies.
Paid In Blood
Crafting in the series is nothing new, as veterans are aware. Yet whilst Resident Evil Requiem does retain that process used in Biohazard, it does add a new element: blood. In Grace’s sections, she acquires an item that allows her to extract infected blood from sources.
In crafting terms, it can be combined with scrap to make bullets, which makes no sense but roll with it. It continues the resource and inventory management we’ve come to expect, nothing new there. I played through on Normal, and I can tell you now: there is not enough ammo to kill everything, trust me.
But what is a neat mechanic, to pair with the sneaky side of things, is crafting a hemolytic injector. In layman’s terms, it’s a coagulant that makes zombies burst. Literally, no exaggeration, like Blade does to Deacon Frost. Or like Tetsuo does to the hospital staff in Akira.
It also works on once-downed zombies, to stop them becoming Blister Heads. So again, do you try and make more ammo? Do you instead stock up on injectors and pray nothing you’ve killed before comes back as a super-zombie? See, Capcom, this is why I hate first person horror. Well done.
There’s Beauty In Death
Please appreciate, dear reader, that I am not so shallow just to praise a game for merely looking good. Instead remember that I am a fan of this series, and as such, have seen the leaps and bounds it’s made from terrible voice acting and LEGO hands. So I can say without hyperbole that Resident Evil Requiem looks beautiful.
In both Grace and Leon’s sections, which can both be played either first or third person (the game recommends as I’ve mentioned earlier), I spent so much time enthralled at the environments. From pristine clinical walls to murky basements, it’s everything we’ve come to expect but still feels fresh. Hell, I spent thirty seconds walking back and forth to check out some ray tracing/water puddle effects. Bear in mind I reviewed this on a PlayStation 5 Pro, your experience may vary depending on system.
Monster design is equal parts fascinating and gross. As well as seeing where limb damage takes now, very few zombies are alike. Some have their heads split up (presumably causing the original death), whilst others still look like they’ve just napped in their suits.
The weapon and combat feels weighty too, if that makes sense? Scoring headshots with Grace feels like effort, but in a good way. Whereas kneecapping them and hoping for a melee attack prompt is equally satisfying. As is Leon’s parts, decapitating zombies with his axe, or watching heads pop through a rifle scope.
It May Mutate, But It’s Still Got Its Hallmarks
The thing about Resident Evil Requiem is that it oxymoronically feels fresh and rehashed at the same time. Which sounds like I’m being negative about it, but really I’m not. What makes a Resident Evil great is how familiar it is, and what is does to improve on that.
For example, we all know that the room with the seemingly inactive heavy machinery will suddenly activate at the worst moment. We know the pile of “dead” bodies is going to be a mini-horde/timed survival moment. A whole bunch of ammo and a save point? I smell a boss fight…
Yet whilst it’s formulaic, it’s what we’ve come to love from the series. Requiem is no different, and again, it’s why I’m enjoying it so much. It’s that idiosyncratic comfort in the familiar, whilst at the same time, pulling out jumpscares and tense moments.
The new enemy types are a nice change, as it fits the overall theme of defying mortality, albeit unconventionally. The puzzles are more of the same, but that’s what we’ve come to enjoy.
Even the dual gameplay mechanic is literally “Resident Evil 6 & 7 mashed together”, if one wants to be churlish. But it all fits, it’s the sum of its parts that makes it great.
Don’t Get Up
Even if I were to have any negatives of the game, or series attitude on the whole, Resident Evil Requiem absolves them. It’s not the best Resident Evil, that’s Resident Evil 2 (the 1998 original, by the way), but it’s certainly vying for the top spot.
The only major criticism that I can honestly say, as a fan, is one for other fans. If you didn’t like the FPS switch from Biohazard onwards, or the action stylings of 6, then you may not gel with this. But again, don’t read that as “This has copied the bits from 6 I didn’t like”. If players of the very original, fixed camera and tank control games didn’t like newer iterations, then this will be a hard sell.
My only fear is that, at present, I don’t see any microtransactions/store prompts. I said that about the Resident Evil 4 remake, then had egg on my face when were added post-review period. But as this has no multiplayer tacked on, any transactions will be solely for personal benefit so… I guess call it even.
Any personal criticisms I have about story or pacing (which I won’t say to taint your perception) are drowned out by the scope of the game itself. Honestly, it’s a long and worthy campaign. Not only that, but the in-game challenges make replayability a strong factor.
Is It A Swansong?
So, this is going to be a glowing recommendation, but it’s a difficult one. Not because I can’t put into words what I want to sing praise about, I’m just not allowed to. My only advice is to play it.
As I said, it all depends on how much players gel with the concept of change. Well, the concept of change whilst those key Resident Evil features stay the same. It’s not reinventing the wheel, but Resident Evil Requiem is giving us another shiny wheel to upgrade the ride with.
And I love this, as a long-time fan of the series. So yes, it may come across a little biased. But I didn’t like Biohazard and Village that much, I felt they were a deviation from the core stories I love. So that Requiem brings it back (really hard not to spoil) feels like a love letter to me, personally. As it will to anyone in the same boat.
Where can Capcom go from here? It’s anyone’s guess, really. I still think 6 is a massive misstep, but Biohazard rectified that and brought a new wave of fans in. Will Requiem do the same? I think it has potential, but even as a stand-alone game it’s still an incredible feat of tech and gameplay.
Resident Evil Requiem is available from 27th February on PlayStation 5 (reviewed on PS5 Pro), Xbox Series S|X, Nintendo Switch 2 and PC via Steam.
Developer: Capcom
Publisher: Capcom