One of the most pleasant surprises of E3 this year was Resident Evil 7, which completely took us aback with just how great it looks, and how thorough a reinvention of the franchise it looks to be (this sort of seemed to be a theme this year at E3, to be honest). The fact that we could get a taste of what the game would be like by playing a demo right now, instead of having to wait for the final game was icing on the cake.
And that demo was excellent- so excellent, that all the bad sentiment around the Resident Evil franchise for the last few years seems to have been forgotten. In fact, it appears as though even Capcom did not expect the demo to be received as well as it was. Resident Evil 7 director Koushi Nakanishi and producer Masachika Kawata mentioned that the feedback they all received was truly spectacular, and that it blew away Capcom’s expectations in an interview with GameReactor. He added that the team was encouraged by the positive response, and is now eager to deliver a final product that lives up to everyone’s expectations.
He did, however, hasten to add that the demo was not fully representative of the final game. “It’s an upfront feeling of how the horror taste of the game is going to be but the final game is going to have more of the key elements of classic Resident Evil in there as well, so this is just a teaser and a taste of the tone of the game,” he said.
Well, it certainly did its job- we are now more positive and optimistic about the future of Resident Evil than we have been in years. Resident Evil 7 launches next year in January on Xbox One, PS4, and PC.
