I know, I know... "Another Resident Evil blog? Are you addled?" Yes, yes I very much am. And that is due to some incredibly troubling 'news' that I heard today. (See those quotations? I hope they mean this is just a rumour) I'm being serious when I say this is 'pace around the room biting my nails' news for me, 'stare at the wall and get no sleep' sort of dread is building right now. What could have me so rattled, you ask? Well according to 'video game chronicle', various independent sources of theirs have confirmed that Capcom have built up a team and dedicated them to penning a brand new remake of Resident Evil 4 due in 2022. (Good god, please tell me I'm dreaming.)
This actually all started not too long after the release of Resident Evil 3, at which point Capcom wasted no time surveying their Resident Evil Ambassadors about whether or not they'd be willing to play another remake. (Seriously Capcom? You're going to start upsetting all of your creative writing staff at this rate.) Now us plebs could merely speculate at what this could mean, with folk like me hazarding a guess at that rumoured Dino Crisis remake that was whispered once upon a moon. No, apparently this has to be a RE game; okay then 'Code Veronica: X' makes the most sense, right? It's the last game that really leaned on the horror routes of the franchise, it featured Claire and Chris finally reuniting, and it featured actually honest-to-god zombies, so the RE Engine will be right at home. There's no way it could ever be Resident Evil 4. Right? Right!?
Of course nothing has been confirmed as of yet. We could be on the verge of an actual zombie pandemic that threatens to end all civilised life as we know it, and Capcom would still hold out to December 2021 to tease us about this game. Unless something changes in their philosophy and Capcom management themselves come out to unequivocally denounce these rumours, we're going to be spending the next 2 years with this nagging worry gnawing at the sinews on the back of our grey matter, prodding itself into our very subconscious. As for me, I cannot say that I completely believe it, but then I have no basis on which to refute these claims beyond common freakin' sense, and that's clearly gone out of the window if this is a discussion that's even being held. I mean, what's next? Are we looking at an entire reboot of the Resident Evil franchise? Is every mainline entry going to get the RE engine glow-up in order to bring things in order? Is this all just an elaborate attempt for Capcom to actually rewrite how stupid the story of RE6 was? (If so, I'd like to recommend that they also make heavy revisions to 5's plotline; practically everything in that third act needs to be scrapped in a volcano whilst being shot in the head by two rocket launchers at the same time.)
But here I am, giving into the rumours. No, I will not accept that this is being done, that anyone would ever approve of this decision. It makes absolutely no sense on every single level; and let me try to convey why remaking RE 4 is such a poor idea. After 'Code Veronica: X', the Resident Evil franchise was on something on a hiatus for the next half decade. This was all in an effort to reinvent what had steadily become a stale formula. Whilst the tank controls and stiff camera angles had worked in the beginning, (and I think still have a place in the franchise, just look at my 'in depth' series to get my full thoughts on that) modern games were starting to look very different from that and Resident Evil was under threat of becoming 'bland' and 'pastiche'. Resident Evil 4 would be their chance to change the trajectory of the entire franchise for better or for worse, and that's exactly what they did. (Mostly for the worse, but there was a little better there to begin with.)
You've likely heard it before and you'll likely as not hear it again, but Resident Evil 4 is a very special game. It's no masterpiece but it is charming and unique in a manner that makes it distinct from just about every other horror game around it. It has a lot of silly moments, melodramatic scenes and scenery chewing out the wazoo. It completely abandoned the traditional sprawling interconnected level structure in favour of a much more streamlined level-by-level system. (Which, in fairness, is the same idea that RE3 used, so you could say that Capcom are getting in their practice.) It also had arguably the single most useless companion character in the entire franchise with Ashley Graham, and let me remind you that Resident Evil 2 starred an eight year old girl! And then Resident Evil 4 shows it's sillyness in it's enemies, it's setting, it dialog, it's cartoonishly over-the-top villains, and just about everything else that Resident Evil has since become renowned for.
But all those positives worked because of one thing; it was a game of it's time. I'm not saying that Resident Evil 4 couldn't work in today's day, I'm just wondering whether or not it even should, or if Capcom are even playing to their advantages by pursing it. I mean, what's the biggest new advancement that all these remakes have in common? The use of the modern RE engine that allows for the creation of realistic zombies who decay as they take damage in a way unmatched by any other zombie game today. (Sorry, Dead Island 2. Whenever that vaporware ever comes out.) So if that's your secret weapon, Capcom, why use it on a game with no zombies in it? That's right. Least you all forget, Resident Evil 4 has no zombies, only eastern European villagers who all get shot dead by an American secret service officer for no discernible reason. Even by the late game, when you figure out that weird insectile virus behind everything and your companion gets impregnated with one, (Why does that happen in so many Resident Evils?) all the enemies suddenly morph into mercenaries toting machine guns; there's not a single honest-to-goodness zombie in the entire game! (No, the Regenerators don't count. I don't know what the hell they are...)
At the end of the day I just don't think that Resident Evil 4 either needs to be remade or fits Capcom's apparent vision for the new direction of Resident Evil. From here it looks like Capcom have gone above and beyond to ensure the quality of each title and the cohesiveness of the storylines, sacrificing weird plotthreads where necessary to accommodate that. So if that's the idea you want to pursue then that's great Capcom, but why then focus on a game that's just one giant weird plotthread? Even more then just that, it's the one game that sent the entire franchise spiralling out of control into a slump that many folk, myself included, assumed it would never get out of. At this point I'm tempted to say that Capcom would be better served making Resident Evil 4 but completely changing every thing about it until it's a different, more spooky, game; but at that point why not just call it 'Resident Evil: Revelations 3' and be done with it?
Admittedly, I'm being a little alarmist right now but I am on edge. I've ignited quite a passion for modern Resident Evil and I don't want to see it all go down the drain so quickly before we've had the chance to see new things come out of it. (That and I just found out that FF7 is going to be an exclusive until April 10 2021, so I'm really reeling over here.) Perhaps Capcom have one of their transformative visions in mind that'll put all of us doubters to shame, or perhaps all these rumours are complete nonsense and Capcom are putting their team behind a Hello Kitty game universe. (stranger things have happened) Whatever the case, it won't be until the December after next where we hear official word on that, and by that time I'll have FF7 so I probably won't care as much.
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