The team at Capcom behind Resident Evil have confirmed they’re working on a secret new project, and they want fans of the survival horror franchise to playtest the game.
The publisher sent out a series of emails in Japan (as translated by Resi fan site Biohaze), requesting the help of “Biohazard Ambassadors” to test out a currently in-development title. Fans will of course know that Resident Evil is known as Biohazard in Japan.
While this could certainly imply that Capcom is cooking up a new Resident Evil title, the email doesn’t explicitly that confirm that the secret project is a return to the popular zombie-slaying series. Requesting the help of Resi fans could just mean it’s a brand new survival horror IP, and they want the opinion of gamers that are well-versed in one of the most well-know survival horror franchises around.
Then again, given just how ridiculously well Resident Evil 2 Remake did at the start of the year (it shifted 4 million copies worldwide within a month of being on sale), it would make sense that Capcom would want to get moving a little sooner on a new Resi entry.
Nothing has been confirmed, but there have been rumblings that Capcom is planning a Resident Evil 3 remake in addition to Resident Evil 8, which is said to be dropping the first-person perspective of Resi 7 following the strong feedback from Resi 2’s return to third-person action.
Resident Evil 2 director Yoshiaki Hirabayashi said back in 2018 that a Resident Evil 3 remake was a possibility if fans wanted it enough, but prior to that there were some pretty solid sounding reports that a just such a remake was already in development at Capcom.
If I’m being really hopeful, I’d like to think that this mysterious new project will either be the Resident Evil 3 remake, or the much-desired (but highly unlikely) Dino Crisis remake. I suspect it’s much more likely that the project will be either Resident Evil 8, or an entirely new IP.
Whatever it ends up being, Capcom has had a pretty phenomenal run over the past year so I’m fully down to see whatever it’s cooking up next.
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Ewan Moore is a journalist at UNILAD Gaming who still quite hasn’t gotten out of his mid 00’s emo phase. After graduating from the University of Portsmouth in 2015 with a BA in Journalism & Media Studies (thanks for asking), he went on to do some freelance words for various places, including Kotaku, Den of Geek, and TheSixthAxis, before landing a full time gig at UNILAD in 2016.