Summary
TheResident Evilgames have never been afraid to evolve. With their first-person exploration in Grindhouse and Hammer Horror-inspired settings—a radical departure from the previous trilogy’s third-person-shooter gameplay and B-movie aesthetic—Resident Evil 7andResident Evil Villageestablished a brand-new format for the franchise. Now, with rumors thatResident Evil 9will take the series open-world, it looks like Capcom might once again be pushing the franchise forward into uncharted territory. This could be good news for one particular subset of theResident Evilfanbase.
Released in 1996, the originalResident Evilwas groundbreaking. Fixed cinematic camera angles, tank controls, and resource management provided a template for a generation of survival-horror titles to follow. A decade later,Resident Evil 4’s radical new approachset the template for a generation of third-person shooters. WhileResident Evil’s tendency toward experimentation has undeniably caused missteps, it’s also why the franchise has remained one of the gaming industry’s most interesting and important IPs for almost 30 years. It’s also why the persistent rumor thatResident Evil 9will go open-world has a ring of truth to it.
An Open World Resident Evil Seems Like An Inevitability At This Point
Resident Evilis not a franchise that rests on its laurels. Each mainline entry in the series has iterated on previous games, adding something new, rather than simply falling back on a tried and true formula. Many fans are expectingResident Evil 9to once again do something completely new, and the persistence of the open-world rumor has gamers speculating about what such a radical change could mean for the franchise. While some have speculated thatan open-worldResident Evilrisks losing its identity—becoming just another open-world zombie shooter—others are more optimistic about what a more open environment could bring to the franchise, seeing it as the natural progression ofResident Evil 7andResident Evil Village’s renewed emphasis on exploration.
An Open-World Resident Evil Game Would Likely be Puzzle-Driven
With the first game tasking players with exploring a labyrinthine puzzle-mansion, andResident Evil 4being a coherent adventure through a single expansive environment,theResident Evilserieshas been at its best when giving players the sense of moving through a large cohesive environment, rather than a series of standalone levels. The recent first-person games have embraced this, focusing on providing intricate, interconnected, immersive environments for the player to explore, with puzzles and tasks that feel naturally integrated into the games' worlds.
An open-worldResident Evil 9could take advantage ofResident Evil’s exploratory tendencies. Developing on ideas present withinResident Evil Village’s central hub and combining them with the original trilogy’s core design ethos to create a small town (or section of a town),Resident Evil 9could feature a number of individual buildings, each serving as mini Spencer Mansions with their own challenges and mysteries. A series of locales—a mall, a police station, a cathedral—could function almost like dungeons with unique puzzles and gimmicks, able to be completed out of order, but each providing a piece of a key which would allow the player to progress into newer, more difficult areas.
Eventually, players would have everything they needed to enter a final location—which, if tradition was followed, would likely be an Umbrella research lab. Weapons and items found in the world could be used, in addition to keys and puzzles, to gate off certain areas and limit progression, taking an almost metroidvania approach to world design. NPC interactions and story progress could be non-linear, with various outcomes depending on how players chose to explore the world, rewarding multiple playthroughs and finally bringing to fruition the ‘dynamic conversation’ system that Capcom promised would be present inResident Evil 6.
An open worldResident Evilgame would likely take particular influence fromResident Evil: Code Veronica. The largest of the ‘traditional’Resident Evilgames,Code Veronicamade effective use of its varied, intricate world to set up a series of complex puzzles that often spanned the entire map.
Resident Evil 9 Going Open World Seems Like a Logical Next Step
MainlineResident Evilgames have always come in threes, and each trilogy’s third game has always attempted something bigger and bolder than what came before. With that in mind, an open worldResident Evil 9seems like the logical next step for the franchise’s first-person trilogy—and also the perfect way to pay homage to both the sprawling city-basedResident Evil 3, andthe messy but wildly ambitiousResident Evil 6.
Resident Evil 9’s open-world rumorsdon’t seem to be going anywhere soon, but theResident Evilfranchise is anything but predictable. While fans may be eagerly speculating about the prospect of an open-worldResident Evil 9, only time will tell what Capcom has up its sleeve for its beloved horror franchise.
Resident Evil Village
WHERE TO PLAY
Ethan Winters finds himself in an entirely new nightmare in Capcom’s latest installment of the acclaimed Resident Evil franchise. Whether you’re defending against Lycans in the grim dwellings of the village or exploring the lavish Castle Dimitrescu, the meticulously designed environments immerse you in this eerie world, powered by Capcom’s proprietary RE Engine. Run from, hide or face off against a diverse cast of terrifying village inhabitants in dream-like - no, nightmarish - situations and fight your instincts to push through classic horror-based sequences. Also, be sure to check out “The Mercenaries” that unlocks once you’ve finished the campaign, a fast-paced and arcade-like game mode which challenges players to blast away enemies against the clock.
