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INTRODUCTION
In 1996 Capcom released Resident Evil to great critical acclaim. Lauded for its cinematic quality graphics and sound, impressively rendered backgrounds and the very real ability to scare, it was the start of one of the most successful game franchises in computer game history.
Created by Shinji Mikami, the game set the benchmark for future action-adventure games and also created a new genre - Survival Horror. To date the franchise has spanned across a series of six titles and five different platforms, selling over 35 million copies worldwide.
The franchise has also broken into other areas of media including Resident Evil comic books, action figures, a live Resident Evil Mansion attraction and three movies.
RESIDENT EVIL
Release: 1996
Platform: PSone
Characters:
* Chris Redfield
* Jill Valentine
* Albert Wesker
* Barry Burton
* Rebecca Chambers
Background
It all began in 1996 when Resident Evil hit the new PlayStation console. At the time of the title's release, it was lauded as the best 3D adventure game ever. Impressively rendered backgrounds, unprecedented cinematic quality in graphics and sound, and the rare ability to provide very real tension and genuine scares.
Borrowing stock horror-movie elements such as flesh-hungry zombies and mutated creatures and featuring a story that changed depending on how the game was played, the game quickly became a favourite of players and lead to the creation of a new genre: survival horror. Resident Evil became a best seller and is now part of the PlayStation's Platinum series, and every new instalment of the game has been met with high anticipation, huge sales, and no small amount of praise.
Story
In a Midwestern US town called Raccoon City strange reports come in from locals about missing people and unusual sightings of doglike monsters. After the remains of a mangled woman, bearing wounds that seem to have been inflicted by a wolf or grizzly bear, are fished out of the river, local police barricade the entrance to the mountain road, and Raccoon City's own S.T.A.R.S. (Special Tactics and Rescue Squad) is informed of the situation.
S.T.A.R.S. unit Bravo Team is sent to investigate the situation, but a helicopter engine failure leads to all contact being lost with the group. Alpha Team is sent in to investigate the forest area, locate and rescue Bravo Team members, and bring the situation under control. However, when the team lands, it is suddenly attacked by a pack of grotesque dogs. Abandoned by their terrified helicopter pilot, the remaining members of Alpha Team are chased to a nearby mansion. It transpires that hideous experiments have taken place here and a virus has been released that turns people into the living dead...
RESIDENT EVIL DIRECTOR'S CUT
Release: 1997
Platform:PSone
Background
About a year after the release of the first game, Capcom released a Director's Cut version of the original Resident Evil. Besides giving late purchasers of the PlayStation and converts of RE2 a chance pick up the title, Capcom planned to retool the game with the complete Japanese intro (which was censored in the original's US release) and other FMV sequences.
RE Director's Cut features an arrange mode and beginner mode (decreased difficulty) in addition to the original game. The new arrange mode features tougher enemies, changes in item and enemy placement, a few new camera angles and new costumes to add an extra element of freshness.
RESIDENT EVIL 2
Release: 1998
Platform:PSone
Characters:
* Leon Kennedy
* Claire Redfield
* Ada Wong
* Sherry Birkin
Background
Resident Evil 2 is considered by many to be the best game of the series. The sequel makes substantial improvements on the original in the graphics department, especially in the way of character models and improved animations, such as head tracking.
You again have the choice of selecting one of two characters, but the item and weapon differences and stories vary greatly depending on what order you play. What you do in one game can have an effect (although a very limited one) on your next game, and there are two extra-tough scenarios and other secrets to be found.
Detailed files and photos flesh out the story, making RE2 more detailed and involving than the first game. For many, Resident Evil 2 is still the pinnacle of survival horror.
Story
Set after the events that occur in Resident Evil, Resident Evil 2 starts with the virus having spread to Racoon City. Rumours began to spread, and the town was overcome with odd occurrences. Unidentifiable creatures appeared out of nowhere, and mysterious deaths happened at an alarming rate. Word got out about a severe accident at a mountain lab, the secret laboratory Umbrella. No one knew what was happening to the quaint town...
The Police Department, in an effort to calm the growing fear among locals, recruited several new officers. Leon S. Kennedy is one of the promising recruits. As Leon prepares to join his new unit, he attempts, without luck, to contact the captain who hired him. Unfazed, he continues into Raccoon City to begin his new job.
On the other side of town, a distraught Claire Redfield searches for her missing brother Chris. Claire begins her search in Raccoon City, the last known location of her brother nearly two months ago, only to learn about the 'accident' in the forest. Is Chris still in Raccoon City?
Neither Leon nor Claire is aware of the overwhelming world of horror and despair they are about to enter...
RESIDENT EVIL 3: NEMESIS
Release: 1999
Platform:PSone / Dreamcast
Characters:
* Jill Valentine
* Carlos Oliveira
* Mikhail Victor
* Nikolia Ginovaef
Background
The first half of Resident Evil 3: Nemesis takes place just hours before the events in RE2; the second half takes place after those events and helps flesh out the overall story and provides a highly polished survival-horror experience.
RE3 represents the first major tweaks in the Resident Evil control scheme, not all of which carried over to the next Resident Evil, RE: Code Veronica. Some other changes include noticeable improvements in character models and new control tweaks, such as a 180-degree fast turn and a dodge feature, along with an improved auto-aim system.
Story
Set in and around the same time period as Resident Evil 2, Nemesis drops you into the thick of the action in Racoon City. As the G-Virus outbreak wreaks total havoc on the city, you take control of Jill Valentine, a S.T.A.R.S. member and survivor of the first incident at the mansion. As Jill makes her way through the devastated city trying to understand what has happened, she is stalked by Nemesis, the real reason behind Umbrella's research into the virus.
Nemesis is a biological weapon, in this case programmed to seek out and destroy S.T.A.R.S. members. In a neat twist, Jill is helped throughout the game by members of Umbrella's clean-up squad who appear to be as much in the dark as she is. Or are they...?
As mentioned earlier, the first part of the game takes place before the events in RE2, and the second part takes place after. So while Jill is fighting desperately for her life, so are Claire and Leon...
RESIDENT EVIL: CODE VERONICA
Release: 2000
Platform:Dreamcast
Characters:
* Claire Redfield
* Chris Redfield
* Steve Burnside
Background
Far from being simply another Resident Evil title on a new platform, Code Veronica was been hailed as the best Resident Evil to date. The game harnessed the power of the Dreamcast to produce the most believable and detailed graphics the series has seen to date, with the pre-rendered backgrounds being replaced by beautifully textured polygons that allow dynamic camera movement similar to Capcom's Dino Crisis. The game also features truly spectacular CG movies that are seamlessly blended with gameplay to create an amazing effect.
The story and gameplay are also up to Resident Evil standards, and the controls have remained largely unchanged from Resident Evil 2, with the addition of a quick 180-degree turn. Once again, there are two main characters, although their adventures are not totally separate. One small but worthwhile detail is the game's use of the Dreamcast VMU to display your health.
Completing Code Veronica will unlock the hidden battle mode, where you play a timed mission with several secret characters (including an alternate version of Chris Redfield and a familiar face from the first Resident Evil). Code Veronica also has a hidden first-person mode, which you earn by picking up the sniper rifle.
Story
Three months after the events in Resident Evil 2, and after surviving the horrific onslaught in Racoon City, Claire continues to search for her missing brother, Chris. Following new clues regarding her missing brother and Umbrella Corporation's insidious activities she arrives in Europe but soon finds that her terrifying ordeal is far from over...
In her search, she is captured for trespassing in the Umbrella Paris HQ, and sent to an isolated prison on a desolate South Atlantic island. While it remains a mystery how Chris, one of the original S.T.A.R.S. team members, appears in Resident Evil: Code Veronica, players will be reacquainted with his iron will, body of steel and munitions expertise to seek the truth behind the dreaded Umbrella bio-toxins.
RESIDENT EVIL: SURVIVOR
Release: 2000
Platform:PSone
Characters:
* Ark
* Lot
* Lilly
Background
For the first time the Resident Evil series strays from the path of 3rd person perspective in this first person shoot-em-up designed for use with the light gun peripheral.
Story
First there was Raccoon City, but unknown to the rest of the world another town is also mutating into a chaotic nightmare from the deadly T-Virus. Attempting to flee the carnage, a solitary helicopter loses control and crash-lands in the heart of the chaos. As one lone survivor comes to, the sound of screaming and other monstrous sounds surround him. Dazed and unsure where he is or why he is there, he embarks on a nightmarish adventure where cunning and quick reflexes are the key to survival.
RESIDENT EVIL: CODE VERONICA X
Release: 2001
Platform:PlayStation 2
Characters:
* Claire Redfield
* Chris Redfield
* Steve Burnside
Background
Essentially, the same as the previously released Dreamcast title, this PlayStation 2 version offers improved graphics and additional background to the motives of the Machiavellian Albert Wesker.
RESIDENT EVIL SURVIVOR: CODE VERONICA
Release:2001
Platform:PlayStation 2
Characters:
* Claire Redfield
* Steve Burnside
* Chris Redfield
* Rodrigo Juan Raval
Story
Once again the franchise returns to a first person perspective, this time set in the Code Veronica universe. Nemesis, one of the franchises most fearsome enemies is also back to terrorise gamers.
RESIDENT EVIL
Release: September 2002
Platform: GameCube
Characters:
* Chris Redfield
* Jill Valentine
* Albert Wesker
* Barry Burton
* Rebecca Chambers
Background
At a joint Capcom/Nintendo press conference on September 13, 2001, Shinji Mikami, the creative mastermind behind the Resident Evil franchise announced that the series was moving to the new Nintendo machine. This will start with a remake of the original PlayStation title released in 1996.
While retaining all that made the original game such a landmark title the power of the GameCube has allowed Mikami san and his team to realise their vision. Some of the most realistic and breathtaking visuals ever seen in a video game, combined this with new areas to explore, puzzles to solve and enemies to defeat make Resident Evil on GameCube more than just a simple remake. It is in effect a rebirth.
Story
The story remains true to the original PlayStation title (outlined above), but with some subtle new twists and turns.
RESIDENT EVIL ZERO
Release:Spring 2003
Platform:GameCube
Characters:
* Rebecca Chambers
* Billy Coen
Background
Set before the action of Resident Evil, this title features an all new gameplay system - 'partner zapping'. This allows the player to switch between control of Rebecca and Billy at the blink of an eye. As well as acting on their own Billy and Rebecca can also be teamed up to co-operate in various ways.
Story
Resident Evil 0 begins in July of 1998 in the suburbs of Raccoon City, a small town located in the Midwest. Several reported incidences of people being eaten by a strange creature have surfaced. The Raccoon city police department viewed the terrible murders as a top priority and quickly dispatched a special task force, the S.T.A.R.S Bravo team, to investigate. As the team heads to the scene of the murders, the helicopter transporting them begins to have mechanical problems, eventually crashing deep into the forest surrounding Raccoon City.
While the Bravo Team was successful in escaping from the crash, they lost all of their equipment and weapons. As they began to gather their wits, the team saw a shocking image. Before them lay a half-destroyed, over-turned transport truck with corpses of several navy officers that had been gruesomely killed and mangled.
Under orders from Commander Enrico, the Bravo Team began investigating the disappearance of Captain Billy Coen, one of the officers who was supposed to be in the over-turned transport yet his remains could not be found. Little does the Bravo Team know that this investigation is the beginning of a horrific nightmare.
RESIDENT EVIL 4
Release:Spring 2005
Platform:GameCube/PS2/Wii
Characters:
* Leon S. Kennedy
* Ada Wong
Background
It is six years after the events of Resident Evil 2 and Leon Kennedy is now working for a government agency charged with the protection of the President and his family. When Ashley, the President's daughter, is kidnapped Leon tracks her down to a mysterious European village, where the local inhabitants give Leon a welcome he will never forget.
RESIDENT EVIL 5
Release:March 13, 2009
Platform:Xbox 360/PS3
Characters:
* Chris Redfield
* Sheva Alomar
Background
The biohazard threat has not ended: Just when it seemed that the menace of Resident Evil had been destroyed, along comes a new terror to send shivers down player's spines. Chris Redfield, returning Resident Evil hero, has followed the path of the evil literally around the globe. After joining the BSAA, Chris heads to Africa.
Here he is joined by a new partner, Sheva Alomar, who lends her strength, intelligence and sharp-shooting skills to the mission. In order to survive, Chris and Sheva must work together to take on the challenges of discovering the truth behind this evil plot. Utilising a revolutionary new co-op mode of gameplay, players will be able to assume control of either Chris or Sheva and experience Resident Evil in new ways.
