Is It Time To Headshot Resident Evil?

Capcom I love you, but you’re bringing me down.

Last week you got a lot of attention when you announced you were remaking my favourite Resident Evil A.K.A Resident Evil 2. I’m happy for you Capcom, really I am. I’m going to give you my money for that remake. I’m a fan.

Remember that. I love Resident Evil dearly.

Because the problem is you keep treating the franchise like one of its zombies. I know it looks like the Resident Evil you used to love. We used to laugh together at the shoddy voice acting, screamed in terror as one when a once killed enemy came back to life and gnawed at my ankles. We’ve had nearly 20 years of happy memories.

But you can't see what it's doing.

The franchise is undead now, infected with a virus and shambling forwards to devour all your good work. It’s time to load your grenade launcher with acid rounds and put this series down for good.

I know it's hard, but with our tongues firmly in our cheeks, let’s talk about why.



You Don’t Have Many Good Games Left To Remake

Seriously. Resident Evil 4 still runs great on my PC and soon I’ll be able to have 1 and 2 running alongside it. That leaves 3, Code Veronica X and maybe Outbreak as the only titles they can realistically rework, unless there's a strong fan base out there waiting for a Resident Evil: Survivor remake.

Resident Evil released 4 fantastic games, and I'd struggle to fault any of the first 4 entries in the series: not many franchises can say that with a straight face.

But they've now remastered 2 of those 4 for the current generation. How many more times can they go to the well?



The Resident Evil 2 Remake Can't Possibly Be Good Enough

Resident Evil 2 is my favourite. It really is.

Here’s the thing though. Resident Evil 2 director and serial twitter blocker Hideki Kamiya works with Platinum now, and he had a large part in making RE2 the game it is.

Resident Evil: HD Remake added a whole bunch of new toys and areas to the grounds that made the remake an essential purchase. This was built off the back of the stellar GameCube remaster which was lucky enough to have original game director Shinji Mikami involved just 6 years after the original game was released.

It’s complicated because Resident Evil 2 is hard to acquire at this stage and even harder to play when you look at the aged control system. A remake opens it up to a new audience and potentially a control system that doesn’t feel like i’m driving a truck, but without the original games director involved I’m worried what might happen if they start trying to mess with the theory.

All I’m saying is that if I’m going to get a remake, I’d feel better with the original director back in the hot seat. Look at Robocop, they changed the director to remake it and it was terrible.