It is rare for a game to evoke the sheer level of anticipation I felt leading up to Resident Evil Requiem, a feeling I haven’t experienced since the launches of Final Fantasy XVI and Elden Ring. Despite knowing almost everything about the game prior to release, this is an experience I have been waiting over a decade to get my hands on. For me, Resident Evil is inextricably linked to my childhood. It transports me all the way back to the days of crowding around the TV with my brothers, relying on them to read Arabic walkthrough guides just to tell me how to beat Resident Evil 2 because our English was practically nonexistent. The nostalgia is heavy, and the hype is monumental. However, as the opening cutscene rolled, I forced myself to put that child in me at rest. The goal of Ermis reviews is, and always will be, strict objectivity. So, stripping away the nostalgia, we have to ask the ultimate question: does Resident Evil Requiem actually justify its ten-year wait?
Grace Ashcroft, Standing Toe-to-Toe with a Legend:
From the very moment the campaign kicks off, you are immediately hit by one undeniable truth: Grace Ashcroft is an absolute standout. As an FBI analytical agent thrown into a nightmare far worse than the traumas of her youth, she shines in a way few protagonists ever have in the survival horror genre.
When Resident Evil Requiem was first announced, we all were understandably cautious about the introduction of a brand-new lead. That skepticism only grew when it was revealed she would be sharing the screen with Leon S. Kennedy, let alone they even told us that both will have 50/50 split of their play time. We all know the colossal fanbase Leon controls, and introducing a newcomer to a series notorious for its fiercely loyal attachment to legacy characters—especially beloved heroines like Claire Redfield and Jill Valentine—is a massive gamble.
But, oh boy, did she deliver. Powered by a brilliant performance from Angela Sant’Albano, Grace doesn’t just hold her own in the deeply established Resident Evil universe; in many scenes, she completely outshines her veteran co-lead. She effortlessly cements her place as a phenomenal addition to the lore. I know I’m not alone when I say I would absolutely welcome a standalone game featuring her in the future. Grace didn’t just meet my expectations; she obliterated them, serving as a powerful reminder that video game performances deserve far more mainstream accolades than they currently receive.
Mastering the Resident Evil Formula:
Before diving deeper, I need to clarify hiw I played this game: simply, I played Resident Evil Requiem on ‘Standard Classic’ mode. This difficulty setting is noticeably more unforgiving than the Standard Modern experience, largely because it bring back the classic limited ‘Ink Ribbon’ save system for Grace’s segments. But let me tell you, opting for this mode was a perfect choice. Yes, it was genuinely frustrating to die and have to replay substantial chunks of the game, but stripping away the safety net of modern auto-saves reintroduced a level of pure, unadulterated anxiety I haven’t felt in years. I found myself calculating every single footstep, counting every bullet and meticulously hoarding every drop of collected blood just to survive. The resource scarcity was absolute—I was constantly running on fumes while playing as Grace—but I savored that harrowing experience from start to finish, I loved it and I enjoyed to the fullest.
True to its marketing promises, Requiem masterfully splits its campaign between its two leads, offering distinct flavors of survival horror. Grace Ashcroft’s chapters are pure, classic horror. Her sections trap you in a massive, terrifying escape room filled with abomination of monsters that refuse to die. It’s a slow burn of solving environmental puzzles and uncovering the dark narrative secrets of your surroundings. Grace’s gameplay introduces a brilliant new mechanic to the franchise: the Blood Collector. This tool allows you to gather blood and craft essential survival items, from ink ribbons to healing injections. The absolute highlight of this system, though, is the Hemolytic Injector. Without venturing into spoiler territory, this item allows you to sneak up and permanently finish off incredibly resilient zombies. It’s a wildly useful addition that perfectly channels the classic Resident Evil 1 Remake ‘Burn the Zombie’ tactic, adding a vital layer of strategy to Grace’s stealth and survival.
Leon S. Kennedy’s half of the campaign, on the other hand, shifts gears into high-octane action. While thrilling, his gameplay is where I noticed a bit of clunkiness. The action is undeniably fast-paced and addictive, especially when the game opens up into the massive streets of Raccoon City, but certain mechanical choices hold it back. For instance, the new chainsaw mechanic feels slightly too sluggish, and the melee execution attacks lack streamlining. Instead of executing them on purpose, I often found them happening ‘occasionally’ by accident. They look incredibly cool when they trigger, but a dedicated button prompt would have made the combat flow much better.
Despite those minor gripes, Leon’s chapters are an absolute blast. He takes on the game’s massive main boss fights—including a particularly memorable encounter with a bloated zombie—which highlights his action-hero status. Leon also regains access to a shop system, allowing you to spend points earned from kills to buy and upgrade weapons. However, by the time the credits rolled, I felt that this weapon variety and upgrade progression didn’t have quite the same satisfying impact as it did back in Resident Evil 4.
Ultimately, Resident Evil Requiem serves as a masterclass celebration of the franchise’s 30-year legacy. It seamlessly weaves together the haunting, claustrophobic escape-room tension of Resident Evil 1 and 2, the accelerating, blockbuster action of Resident Evil 4 and 6, and the immersive choice between first- and third-person perspectives that made Resident Evil 7 and 8 shine. This is the definitive Resident Evil gameplay showcase, and I doubt any future installment will easily match the sheer variety on display here.
Smarter Zombies, Deeper Horror:
One of the most compelling aspects of Resident Evil Requiem is its introduction of a brand-new strain of the T-Virus. While I will leave the lore implications for you to discover on your own, the resulting enemies—specifically within Grace’s chapters—are on a level I haven’t seen before in the survival horror genre. These are not your standard, shuffling corpses; they are incredibly dangerous, surprisingly smart, and boast an unprecedented level of behavioral variety.
Admittedly, this innovation takes a slight dip during Leon’s campaign, where the zombies revert to a more basic (albeit frustratingly hard-to-snipe) horde. However, the zombies in Grace’s section are a constant source of terrifying surprises. Delivering perfectly on the game’s marketing promises, these zombies retain fragmented memories and habitual loops from their past lives. You’ll encounter a chef still obsessively lingering in a blood-soaked kitchen, a housekeeper desperately trying to scrub bathroom mirrors, and a concierge who insists on keeping his domain in the dark.
This memory mechanic completely transforms the gameplay loop. It’s no longer just a matter of walking into a room and shooting everything that moves. Instead, you can use these residual habits to bait and outsmart your enemies. Flicking on a hallway light switch, for example, will compel the concierge to shamble over and turn it back off, granting you a precious window to slip past unnoticed or execute a stealth kill from behind. This level of environmental interaction and distinct enemy behavior is an absolute masterclass in game design. It sets a new gold standard, offering a profound lesson in enemy variety for the rest of the industry to follow. It is brilliant, deeply engaging, and absolutely terrifying in execution.
The Perfect Shift:
The intertwined gameplay is a brilliant concept, and its pacing is meticulously crafted. Grace’s chapters—which take place across two primary locations, including a highly unsettling care center—deliver some of the most gruesome and terrifying moments in the entire series. You are constantly on edge, dealing with relentless stalker enemies, unkillable zombies, and monsters that can end your game in just two slashes.
Just when the tension becomes almost unbearable, the rhythm breaks, shifting control to Leon. Here, the horror gives way to pure, cathartic action. You are suddenly smashing enemies’ heads against walls, carving through crowds with a chainsaw, and tossing explosives to bring entire structures down with everyone on it. While I do wish Grace’s campaign featured a few more boss encounters, the scarcity of these fights makes sense given her limited arsenal. She relies primarily on a standard handgun and ‘The Requiem’—a magnum whose sheer stopping power is rivaled only by a rocket launcher.
Where Grace’s gameplay truly shines is in its puzzles and that claustrophobic, escape-room atmosphere. Writing this review a little while after the game’s release, I know the general ‘word on the street’ is that Requiem is a bit light on puzzles. Honestly, I have to disagree; I found it strikes the perfect balance when compared to classic Resident Evil titles. The Blood Collector upgrades function as intricate puzzles in their own right, and there is still plenty of classic problem-solving, examining items, assembling pieces, and figuring out where they belong.
Leon’s campaign largely abandons these puzzles, but that is entirely by design. Much like Resident Evil 4, you trade the creeping stealth and escape-room tension for a massive arsenal of weapons. Even the inventory management beautifully reflects this divide: Grace uses the classic, limited storage bags reminiscent of Resident Evil 2, while Leon utilizes the expansive, action-oriented storage case from Resident Evil 4.
This intertwined experience is unlike anything I have ever seen in a dual-protagonist game. The title completely transforms depending on who you are controlling. Grace’s journey is contained, intimate, and horrifying, whereas Leon’s is expansive, action-heavy, and almost The Last of Us-esque in its open environmental design. It is a completely unexpected blend, but one that has been flawlessly executed by legendary developers who know exactly what they are doing.
A Masterclass in Nostalgia:
It is no secret that Resident Evil Requiem is a deeply nostalgic experience—and it is entirely designed to be one. From the very first glimpse of Raccoon City’s ruined skyline, I was fully prepared for the emotional weight of returning to where it all began. While some critics might view this heavy reliance on the past as a negative, for me, it breathed an incredible new life into the franchise in ways I hadn’t thought possible.
The narrative framework is also exceptionally creative, successfully laying the groundwork for the future of Resident Evil. With a terrifying new strain of the T-Virus unleashed and the looming shadow of Umbrella seemingly back in play, there is a wealth of fresh lore to uncover. Crucially, the game delves much deeper into the political fallout and the complex, bureaucratic realities of what truly happened to Raccoon City. This expanded world-building is a massive addition and positively impacted my overall investment in the plot.
But let’s return to that nostalgia. The sheer feeling of stepping back into the iconic R.P.D. building is indescribable. From the instantly recognizable musical cues to the heavy, oppressive atmosphere, I found myself navigating the station’s labyrinthine halls without ever needing to open the in-game map—decades later, the layout is still permanently burned into my memory. When I hear rumblings online complaining about the game relying on ‘too much nostalgia,’ I find myself vehemently disagreeing; frankly, I wanted more.
The team at Capcom has spent thirty years building a universe that defined our childhoods. I would have loved to spend even more time in those hallowed halls, uncovering new files about the aftermath or solving just one more intricate R.P.D. puzzle. However, I am still wholeheartedly satisfied by what the game provided. Unlike the massive narrative departures we saw in Resident Evil 4 through 8, Requiem doesn’t try to offer an entirely disconnected storyline and link it to the main one in the last scene. Instead, it anchors itself firmly in the events of the past, continuing and expanding upon that original legacy in a way that feels both brilliant and profoundly satisfying.
RE Engine’s Crowning Achievement
Speaking of how it looks is not only the most visually stunning Resident Evil title to date, but it is also, by far, the best-looking game of this entire console generation. The graphical fidelity across both claustrophobic corridors and sprawling open areas is genuinely breathtaking. The environmental variety is staggering; the Care Center, for instance, perfectly captures the sterile dread of a hospital merged with the livlineess of a hotel. Raccoon City itself is wildly beautiful, even in its absolute ruin, and the monster designs are meticulously detailed and genuinely terrifying.
Then there is the audio design, which easily one-ups most recent installments. The new tracks provide a fantastic modern kick, but the true heart-stoppers are the remade classic themes. When I finally stepped back into the R.P.D. building, I literally stopped playing. I didn’t even set my controller down; I just stood there in the game, completely frozen, listening to the remastered R.P.D. safe room theme. I was expecting it to be an emotional callback, but the sheer wave of nostalgia hit me incredibly hard.
Between the unparalleled visual performance of the RE Engine, the stellar motion-capture acting, and this masterful score, Resident Evil is at the absolute top of its game. This sets a new benchmark that the rest of the gaming industry will be chasing for a very long time. Your move, Naughty Dog.
When I first booted up Resident Evil Requiem, I made a promise to strip away my childhood nostalgia and approach this review with absolute objectivity. After surviving the unforgiving tension of Standard Classic mode, untangling the brilliant nostalgic-ride story, and marveling at the sheer graphical powerhouse of the RE Engine, that objective conclusion is clear: this is a masterpiece.
Capcom has accomplished the impossible by flawlessly intertwining two radically different eras of the franchise. In Grace Ashcroft, we have a phenomenal new lead who anchors the claustrophobic, puzzle-heavy, escape-room dread of the series’ origins. In Leon S. Kennedy, we get the explosive, high-octane catharsis of its modern action-heavy era. By merging these two distinct playstyles, expanding the lore of Raccoon City, and setting a new industry standard for visual and auditory presentation, Requiem serves as the ultimate celebration of the franchise’s 30-year legacy.
Did it deserve the ten-year wait? Yes, and then some. I can confidently say, both as an objective critic and as that kid who spent his childhood playing Resident Evil: Resident Evil Requiem is, without a shadow of a doubt, my favorite Resident Evil game ever made.
- Backed by a phenomenal performance from Angela Sant'Albano, Grace is a brilliant new lead who easily stands toe-to-toe with series veterans.
- The memory-retaining zombies change the entire flow of survival, forcing you to use their past habits against them.
- The intertwined campaigns flawlessly balance the claustrophobic, escape-room dread of classic RE with the high-octane, cathartic action of the modern era, making the perfect Resident Evil.
- From the expanded political lore to the heart-stopping remastered music of the R.P.D. safe room, returning to the roots of the franchise has never felt more satisfying.
- Leon’s melee executions and the new chainsaw lack streamlined button prompts, making them feel occasional rather than intentional.
- While understandable the horror-focused chapters could have used a few more standout boss fights.
- Leon's shop and upgrade system are a fun callback, but they don't carry the same weight or satisfying impact as they did in Resident Evil 4.
