Resident Evil Requiem Confronts The Past To Save The Future

"Resident Evil Requiem, particularly in the moments where players control long-standing franchise hero Leon Kennedy, is deeply anxious about this weird horror game business. We've been doing this awhile and all that lore, all those games, have created a kind of spectre that, at least in estimation, is holding back new possibilities."

"Central to the plot is a complication arising decades later for characters exposed to the original T-Virus: Raccoon City Syndrome. The trauma of Raccoon City, the inescapable draw of that event, is literalized into a slowly creeping necrosis that is killing Leon, Sherry, and other survivors. Leon's central motive, equal to stopping the bad guys, is to remove this stain from his body."

Resident Evil is deeply concerned with its own legacy and the burden of decades of accumulated lore and franchise history. The game literalizes this struggle through Raccoon City Syndrome, a disease affecting survivors including protagonist Leon Kennedy, which represents the franchise's inability to escape its past. Leon's quest to remove this stain parallels the series' need to break free from the gravitational pull of its foundational event. The game functions as a meta-reflection on what has driven the franchise forward and what changes are necessary for its future. By confronting this accumulated baggage directly, the game attempts to clear the path for new creative possibilities while acknowledging that previous attempts to move beyond the past have consistently failed.

Read at Kotaku