Resident Evil
Resident Evil (originally known as Bio Hazard in Japan), developed by Capcom, is the name of a successful franchise of horror-adventure video games that are credited with popularizing the "survival horror" game genre, in which the goal is to avoid being killed by monsters and assorted evil creatures bent on attacking you.The games take place in the fictitious Raccoon City, a typical urban setting which has fallen under the control of the evil Umbrella Corporation. As a result of the corporation's experiments with a kind of virus, its residents have turned into mindless zombies (and sometimes even stranger mutants) prone to acts of random violence. Throughout the series, you control several members of STARS (an elite law enforcement group) as they try to reconcile the situation, and then eventually escape as their efforts come to no avail. Other characters that have not fallen prey to the virus may assist you, including a member of the military, a mercenary and even a small child.
As of April 2004, the following titles have been published:
- Resident Evil Zero (Nintendo Gamecube)
- Resident Evil (PlayStation, PC, Gamecube)
- Resident Evil 2 (PlayStation, PC, Sega Dreamcast, Nintendo 64, Gamecube)
- Resident Evil 3: Nemesis (Japanese title: Bio Hazard: The Last Escape) (PlayStation, PC, Dreamcast, Gamecube)
- Resident Evil: Code Veronica (Dreamcast, PlayStation 2, Gamecube)
- Resident Evil: Gun Survivor (PlayStation)
- Resident Evil: Gun Survivor 2 (PlayStation 2, Arcade)
- Resident Evil Gaiden (GBC)
- Resident Evil Dead Aim (PlayStation 2)
- Resident Evil Outbreak (Playstation 2)
The success of this franchise has spawned a comic book series, a novelization, and a Hollywood action film based loosely on the video game storyline. Like most game adaptations, they lacked continuity with the source material and were thus generally panned by Resident Evil fandom. The Resident Evil series is also controversial, as Capcom has made a deal with Nintendo to make the Resident Evil series exclusive to the Gamecube. However, this exclusivity does not seem absolute, as the Resident Evil Dead Aim game was released for PlayStation 2 in 2003.
Most of the games in the series are played from a third-person perspective; that is, players view the character they control from a generally overhead camera angle, as the character moves through pre-rendered environments (essentially static background paintings as opposed to 3-D backgrounds that the camera itself can be moved within). The Gun Survivor entries in the series deviate from this and are first-person shooters, and also happen to be the most poorly received Resident Evil games.
See also: Resident Evil (film)
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