It has been one heck of a roller-coaster couple of weeks for one so invested in the Resident Evil Remakes. Things kicked off not that long ago with rampant unexpected leaks detailing the existence of this project, how it would be 'not exactly what we were expecting', and, of course, the box art leak from the other day. At this point it was no longer a question of if we would see the game but rather when we would see it and through which big upcoming gaming event. The obvious choice was the 'Game Awards' given that it is the biggest gaming event outside of E3, but those rumors were shot down by the organizers themselves who admitted that they had no plans for revealing RE3. The spotlight then naturally moved to the 'Jump Festa' event to which Capcom were the guests of honour, surely that would be the date of announcement.
But we were bamboozled. Even whilst I mourned the extra two weeks we'd have to wait to get a glimpse of RE3, I completely forgot about another gaming event happening sooner than even the games awards. And to be fair, why wouldn't I completely forget about an event as small as the Playstation state-of-play. They are hosted regularly enough, robbing the event of it's 'exculcive' allure, and they are mostly just pimp their own exclusives, which is why it would be strange to debut a multi-platform title on their stage. But Xbox was kind enough to reveal Cyberpunk 2077 in E3 2018, so perhaps Playstation just say this as paying off the debt. Whatever the reason, the consequence is that we finally got a full reveal of the gorgeous-looking Resident Evil 3 Remake through way of developer brief, tiny gameplay snippet and full-on trailer. (Be still, my beating heart!)
As expected, Resident Evil 3's Remake leans off of the beautiful RE:Engine in order to produce a truly stunning rendering with strong, malleable lighting. We see this straight away in the reveal trailer as we flash through the events of the RE2 remake, creating that link and letting everyone know that if they liked that masterpiece than they were in for another treat. Time then flashes back to September 28th as we are put behind the eyes of S.T.A.R.S. operative Jill Valentine as she dashes away from a shrouded figure clad in darkness. Clearly invoking the image of Mister X, but those of us who have experience with RE3 know that we're really seeing something much worse. This is 'The Persuer' or as he would come to be known; Nemesis. Funnily enough the footage that has been revealed thus far has specifically gone out of it's way to not give us a glimpse at Nemesis' new mug, despite the fact that we've already seen it courtesy of those leaked box art. Still, it would be nice to see his face in action, as then we'll see just how effectively frightening it all is.
An interesting point to note at the beginning of this trailer is the way in which it all takes place in first person. The First-person approach might be popular in modern horror games, but Resident Evil famously never tried it until Resident Evil 7. Their first 5 games (1,2,3,0, Code Veronica) utilized a fixed-camera perspective, whilst subsequent entries opted for over-the-shoulder action. Even once the Resident Evil 2 Remake finally hit shelves, we saw that game had gone for the over-the-shoulder approach over the outdated fixed camera model. Indeed, we can see from the extra footage released that Resident Evil 3: Remake will follow those footsteps with the over-the-camera approach, and yet the first minute of the trailer is entirely in first person. This might have been an artistic choice, but looking at some of the movement (specifically the stabilization of the camera bob) makes it look like genuine gameplay, and that has me wondering. We know that the RE engine is capable of rendering a great First-person experience (a-la Resident Evil 7) and there were some modders who managed to get a flawed version of that working for RE2. Then there is the, still unexplained, comment about how this remake was 'not what you would expect', and I'm left with the idea that RE3 may have a choice between playable perspectives, similar to GTA V and Red Dead Redemption 2. (Or maybe I'm just reading into nothing...)
This trailer also afforded us our first look at the new Jill Valentine model rendered actively in the RE Engine. This new face of S.T.A.R.S seems to look a little different from the boxart, wherein she faintly resembled Ruby Rose, and actually a little softer in the jaw in a manner that's more similar to Chyler Leigh. (You can guess what kind of TV I'm watching these days, huh...) Additionally, out of the plethora of locations that we rushed through in the cut scenes, only the outdoor sections seemed similar to what we've seen from the RE2 remake. Which is absolutely astounding considering the fact that RE2 only came out in April of this year. For those who don't know, the original RE3 was put together a year after the original due to a tight development schedule and a recycling of a lot of the assets used for RE2 as well as the scrapped assets for what is now known as RE 1.5. Somehow this resulted in a fine game being released in an incredible time frame. Nowadays game design has become a lot more complicated so even if Capcom used the same 'reuse, recycle' stratagem for this title it would be unreasonable for them to pull of a one-year development cycle. And yet Resident Evil 3 announced it's release date as April 2020. If the team manage to pull that off and still put out a quality product, then I'll consider that one of most amazing feats of game design ever accomplished. (as well as a great way to show up the rest of the industry.)
The only problem that I see arising from this reveal has absolutely nothing to do with the trailer itself, but to do with the source material. You see, 'Resident Evil 3: Nemesis' was a fine game at it's release, but it was never as iconic as the RE2. This is due to the fact that the game itself is missing many of the iconic characters that made RE2 so memorable, there's no Sherry, Chief Irons, William, Ada, etc. I joked about this briefly when going over the box art, in the way that I completely brushed over the redesign of Carlos, but it is a problem; Jill Valentine is the only memorable character from that game. I'm unsure if the team will make any effort to amend this, like maybe giving us some more time to know and get invested with side characters similar to how they did with Marvin, but with the breakneck speed at which the original narrative moved along, I wouldn't be surprised if they simply don't have the time to dedicate to such pursuits. I suppose we'll just have to trust the team, which isn't hard seeing how talented and dedicated that they've proven themselves so far.
Resident Evil 3 isn't the only present that we shall be receiving next April, and I'm not just talking about the fact that Cyperpunk 2077 launches later that month. (Imma have a busy Birthday month, it seems.) You see, that other Resident Evil title that Capcom revealed a while back; 'Resident Evil: Resistance', is being bundled in with RE3 to serve as it's Multiplayer addendum. 'Resistance' is the game wherein players have to endure a asymmetric matchup with one team trying to complete objectives whilst the other controls various different Zombies around the map alongside a trademark 'boss' monster. This sort of thing didn't really feel like it had the legs to last on it's own, but by attaching it with RE3, Capcom might have done exactly what they need to give this title a chance at life. Alongside this reveal Capcom also unveiled two new survivors, who I don't care enough about to look up, and a new 'Mastermind': (Zombie controller) Annette Birkin. She has the ability to summon G to the field, which paints an interesting trajectory for where this game mode could expand to if it becomes a hit, which I am now hoping that it does.
As you've likely deduced, I am a rampant Resident Evil fan and lore nut who loves to devour every snippet of the zombie franchise thrown my way. With the great sobering that I have gone through these past few years, it is rare for me to fall into the familiar trap of rabid fandom, and so I embrace the feeling wholly. After watching this reveal trailer, several times I might add, I'm ecstatic beyond measure and my December has been made whole. I'm so excited, in fact, that I don't think I can wait the scant four months until the title launches and instead will be filling my time on getting up to date with the franchise itself. Sometime soon I want to launch a series of investigative blogs wherein I want to go into detail through all of the Resident Evil games (Sans 3) where I explore everything from lore, gameplay, structure, and pacing in a very methodical way. I've settled on framing these as 'play session' blogs, wherein I'll go through enough of the game until I have something worth writing about reflecting an aspect of the game and then share that with the blog. I look forward to seeing how this plays out in the future, as well as giving myself an excuse to binge my favourite horror franchise. Until then, however, I shall get to setting my calendar. Screw Christmas, only 114 days to go until Resident Evil returns.
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