The Resident Evil franchise has been around since 1996 when the first installment was released for the PlayStation console platform. Now decades later the IP is still thriving with new thrilling video game installments. That doesn’t mean there weren’t some changes made along the way to keep veteran fans coming back for something new and fresh, but also appealing to newcomers as well. One of the bigger changes came just with this last mainline installment release, Resident Evil 7.
After the rocky reception of Resident Evil 6 with developers making a more action-packed gameplay sequence than keeping things more tense or atmospheric. As a result, Capcom went back to its roots with Resident Evil 7 with a focus on making the game a very atmospheric survival horror experience. This also came with a significant change up with the game bringing out a new perspective for players to partake in. Players were dropping the third-person perspective for a first-person viewpoint giving players a bit more immersion to the in-game world.
However, when IGN spoke with Resident Evil Village director Morimasa Sato, his boss told him to start preparing for the next Resident Evil entry about six months before Resident Evil 7 was released into the marketplace. This resulted in the team building up another first-person perspective experience, but there was plenty of anticipation on whether they would continue on a narrative that would feature Ethan, the main protagonist of Resident Evil 7, or if it would be a different direction.
Fortunately, fans took to Resident Evil 7 and it made development for Resident Evil Village quite a bit easier to deal with. It would be interesting to see just how Resident Evil Village would have changed if fans were not thrilled about the first-person perspective. In the meantime, it looks like fans can get their hands on Resident Evil village for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S platforms this May 7, 2021.
