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As part of an interview in the latest issue of GameInformer (spotted via GamesRadar), Capcom producer Masachika Kawata outlined the resurgent Japanese publisher’s approach to Resident Evil: Quality and quantity, with remakes bolstering the process and helping fund the development of more adventurous projects.
According to Kawata, Capcom would like Resident Evil to be a fully annual franchise, but “producing a new entry in the Resident Evil series every year would be quite an undertaking and a difficult task.” That’s where the remakes come in.
“Being able to revisit older games and remake them helps Capcom meet that goal of releasing a Resident Evil title each year, but it also allows the team to continually challenge themselves and hone their craft,” said Kawata. “That’s not to say the remakes are any less important. In fact, they’re just as important as the mainline titles.
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“Capcom is lucky enough to have found this cycle that can continue to provide us with the financial resources to create things like new entries in the Resident Evil series and completely new IP like Pragmata. So there is that relationship there.”
Phrases like “every year” tend to get my dander up when it comes to game development, but Capcom has a track record as perhaps one of the most successful and, crucially, healthy game publishers of the 2020s. After a mixed decade-plus in the late aughts and early ’10s, it’s been hit after hit since the one-two punch of Street Fighter 5 in 2016 and Resident Evil 7 in 2017.
Even its less beloved recent games—like the RE3 remake or Monster Hunter Wilds—have their defenders (not to mention profitable sales figures). Other publishers and developers at Capcom’s scale have sloughed off staff and struggled to release games in a timely fashion, but the long-lived giant just keeps trucking.
As GamesRadar pointed out, though, we’re running out of runway on Resident Evil remakes after this year’s Code Veronica. The OG RE1 GameCube remake was a perfect game I don’t think you could improve on—though that didn’t stop Capcom from trying with RE4. After that, you’ve got some pretty mixed reputation entries up for grabs in Residents Evil 0, 5, and 6. I’m not a fan of the three, but as PCG news writer Joshua Wolens has pointed out, why not remake flawed games into good ones instead of mucking up something that already works? Though, the less said about Resident Evil’s real stinkers like Survivor or Dead Aim, the better.
