Capcom says it has a plan for when it runs out of Resident Evil remakes
Producer reveals he’s been preparing for Resident Evil’s remakes and mainline entries to converge since Village.
Resident Evil executive producer Jun Takeuchi says Capcom already has a plan for when its remakes catch up and ‘crossover’ with new entries in the series.
For the past decade, Capcom has released new entries in the series, like 7, Village, and Requiem, alongside remakes of early games like 2, 3, 4, and the upcoming Veronica.
It’s previously been reported that remakes of Resident Evil 0 and the first game in the series are in the works, which would leave 5 and 6 as the only mainline games left to work on.
Speaking in a recently published Japanese anniversary magazine, Capcom producer Takeuchi said the company has been anticipating a ‘crossover’ between the two series once its remakes end.
“The current Resident Evil series is being developed along two tracks: the numbered titles allow players to experience the ongoing story of the series, while the remake series allows them to experience the past,” he said, via RE News.
“Someday, the remake series will catch up with the era of the numbered titles, and we are already thinking about what we will do when that happens. In fact, we have been gradually preparing for that since around Resident Evil Village.
“The appearance of names such as Umbrella and Spencer, as well as the return of Raccoon City in Requiem, are also in preparation for a ‘crossover’.”
According to Takeuchi, recent new entries in the Resident Evil series have deliberately included ties to the older games, in anticipation of their timelines connecting.
“One of the reasons we regard 7 as a turning point for the series is that it was also the title where we began working on this kind of setup,” he explained. “At first, we included these elements with the sense that they were fan service, but users were far more delighted by them than we had imagined, and they even began analyzing the thoughts that the development team had privately kept to itself.
“So, as a series, we decided to respond to users’ expectations and pushed this setup further in Village and Requiem.”
Speaking to VGC this summer, Resident Evil Veronica producer Yoshiaki Hirabayashi said that Capcom is remaking the upcoming Veronica because it feels that it’s just as important as the numbered entries in the series.
“We respect the original title very deeply. And that goes for all aspects, including the title ‘Code Veronica’,” he said. “However, to us, Code Veronica is just as vital and important as a numbered Resident Evil entry. So, the discussion that arose in the development team was, what’s something we can do to communicate that to our audience?”
