Kicking off several years later, the protagonist is a grown-up Rose Winters. Interacting with a piece of the Fungal root responsible for the mold, she ventures into the Realm of Consciousness and revisits several key locations from the base game. However, they have new mechanics, story elements, enemies, and puzzles.

In true Resident Evil fashion, some of these puzzles may bamboozle players. For tips on solving each puzzle, whether it’s acquiring the key to the cell initially, discerning what to do with the four busts, or locating all four masks, check out the videos below by Game Guides Channel.

Shadows of Rose isn’t very long – a completionist run will take about four hours, though you can finish it in three. For more details, check out our review of the Winters’ Expansion here. It’s available for Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, PS5, PC, Google Stadia, and Nintendo Switch.

The headline-grabbing addition here is obviously Shadows of Rose, a new story chapter set sixteen years after the events of the base game. Ethan Winters has been dead for a long time, and the focus here is squarely on Rose, his daughter. All grown up now, she’s desperate to live a normal life as a normal kid, which is obviously something that she can’t do thanks to her natural powers and abilities as a bio-organic weapon. When she learns of a way to get rid of her powers though, Rose instantly jumps at the opportunity, beginning a journey that takes her into the consciousness of the Megamycete, the superorganism that’s the source of the troublesome Mold that’s been torturing the Winters family (and many others) for years at this point.

"With all of its issues, Shadows of Rose ends up feeling like a largely forgettable ride, even if it is mostly a fun one. "

Shadows of Rose takes players to a number of locations that those who played the base game will be very familiar with (and really, given the chapter’s narrative setup, you really shouldn’t be playing it if you haven’t finished Resident Evil Village). It starts off with Rose in Castle Dimitrescu, where the imposing vampiric woman is nowhere to be seen, with a twisted version of The Duke instead casting his terrifying shadow on the location and everything that goes on in it. Beyond that, there’s a few other locations you visit, which are best left unspoiled. That’s because Shadows of Rose does a solid job of remixing familiar environments, and the dream-like state of its setting serves as a great jumping-off point for that. Meanwhile, some later sections also bring chilling horror sequences that take cues from RE Village’s best bits- which is all that I’m going to say about that. It’s best experienced on your own.

While locations are remixed and reused in Shadows of Rose, other elements of the new story chapter feel quite different from the base experience. There’s Michael, an unseen spirit companion who constantly aids Rose on her journey through glowing, ghostly words appearing on surfaces around her. As a gameplay mechanic, it feels like a gimmick at best, and can feel like it’s holding your hand too much, but Michael is also a crucial part of the story, which resolves in interesting (if largely predictable) ways.

Meanwhile, Rose is, of course, also equipped with special powers- though their implementation is not nearly as exciting as it may seem on paper. Temporarily freezing enemies in place and getting rid of obstacles in the environment is about the extent of her abilities, and they never really come into play in any way that makes them stand out (or at least not until the end, by which time it’s too little, too late). New enemies called Face Eaters also enter the fray, who have more than a few similarities to Resident Evil 7’s Molded, but they never really pose the kind of threat that, say, the base game’s Lycans did.

"Third person mode has clearly been made with returning fans in mind, so if you’re jumping into Resident Evil Village for the first time, you might want to stick with the first person perspective. For fans who’ve already played through the base game though, the new camera is an excellent way to experience the game again."

Other issues bring down the experience as well. Shadows of Rose is an entirely third person experience,  but movement feels a little clunky- which is a surprise, because Resident Evil has delivered some top notch third person titles, especially in recent years. The new chapter is also a much more linear experience than what you’d want from a Resident Evil game- backtracking and slowly unlocking areas bit by bit is a core tenet of the franchise, and it’s disappointing to see it de-emphasized here like it has been. Add to that Shadow of Rose’s short runtime – the entire episode is roughly three hours long – and with all of its other issues, it ends up feeling like a largely forgettable ride, even if it is mostly a fun one.

But of course, Shadows of Rose is only a third of what Winters’ Expansion brings to the table. Another major new addition – and probably my favourite of the bunch – is a new third person mode for the base game. Playing through Resident Evil Village with an over-the-shoulder camera puts a unique spin on the game, but the action still feels tense and satisfying. Similar to Shadows of Rose, movement is a little stiff as compared to the likes of Resident Evil 2 and 3, but the sheer novelty of seeing all of the game’s locations and getting to experience all of its offerings from a different perspective makes up for those issues.

Funnily enough, you still can’t see Ethan’s face – if you try to turn the camera around, he’ll simply turn around before you can get a proper look at the entirety of his face – while the transitions between third person gameplay and first person cutscenes never stop feeling jarring. Third person mode has clearly been made with returning fans in mind, so if you’re jumping into Resident Evil Village for the first time, you might want to stick with the first person perspective. For fans who’ve already played through the base game though, the new camera is an excellent way to experience the game again.

"The Mercenaries is still unlikely to blow anyone away, but it serves as a nice distraction for those who’re looking for more bite-sized and casual fun."

The third and final addition in Winters’ Expansion is The Mercenaries: Additional Orders, which, as its name suggests, adds new content to The Mercenaries mode. Resident Evil’s score-based mode has been a fan-favourite since its inception all those years ago, but its comeback in Village didn’t exactly pull up any trees. The consensus was that it was too light on content and lacked the endless replayability of past iterations of The Mercenaries- so it goes without saying that the addition of new locations and new characters, each with their own unique abilities, is a welcome one. The Mercenaries is still unlikely to blow anyone away, but it serves as a nice distraction for those who’re looking for more bite-sized and casual fun.

Resident Evil Village: Winters’ Expansion is a solid addition to Capcom’s beloved survival horror outing, even if it feels largely unremarkable. Shadows of Rose is a fun new story chapter, but it doesn’t do enough with its unique ideas, and it’s over too quickly, while The Mercenaries continues to feel inessential, even if it is admittedly a much better experience than it was when the base game launched last year. Third person mode, meanwhile, is an absolute treat, especially if you’re a returning fan looking to play through the game again from a fresh perspective. Taken together, the expansion might not be required reading- but it’s a decent stopgap to hold you over until Capcom drops the next meaty Resident Evil offering.

This game was reviewed on the PlayStation 5.

The company started off with a new trailer, which first showcased the Third Person Mode for the base game, before moving on to Shadows of Rose, the new story episode which will conclude the Winters family saga. An interview with the developers followed, with new footage showcased for both, as well as The Mercenaries: Additional Orders, with more new details also being detailed.

Interestingly, Third Person Mode will continue to show first person cutscenes. During gameplay, if you try to tilt the camera around to see Ethan’s face, he will simply look away- so yes, he’s going to remain faceless until the end of time. A new sequence from Shadows of Rose is also shown off, which sees a miniaturized Rose surrounded by massive, terrifying dolls.

Capcom has also confirmed that a demo of the Third Person Mode will be available starting today.

Resident Evil Village: Winters’ Expansion will launch for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, and PC on October 28.

The focus of the Resident Evil Showcase will be the upcoming Resident Evil Village: Gold Edition and remake of Resident Evil 4. The announcement also states that there will be more, but whether this means more DLC announcements for Resident Evil Village or a new game announcement is currently unknown.

Resident Evil Village: Gold Edition, set to release later this month, will include the base game along with the upcoming Winters’ Expansion DLC, which brings to the game a third-person mode, The Mercenaries: Additional Orders, and the new Shadows of Rose expansion.

The remake for Resident Evil 4 will see improved visuals. Scant other details have been revealed about the upcoming remake, however, aside from the fact that it will be out on March 24 next year, and will be coming to PS4, PS5, and PC. While no statement regarding an Xbox release has been made, it will likely also come out on Xbox One and Xbox Series X/S.

https://twitter.com/RE_Games/status/1582129468134473728

PlayStation Game Size on Twitter notes that the expansion is 6.997 GB on PS5. The user monitors the backend of the PlayStation Network and has been pretty accurate with install sizes in the past. Lest we forget though, the base game required less than 28 GB on PS5, so this is pretty much in line with expectations.

Retailing for $20, it provides about four hours of new story content in Shadows of Rose (which also features new mechanics). The Mercenaries Additional Orders provides three new characters to play around with, two new stages, and some 20 unlockables. Finally, Third-Person Mode is a brand-new way to play, which took as much effort as creating a new game as per the developer.

Resident Evil Village – Winters’ Expansion launches on October 28th for Xbox One, PS4, PS5, PC, and Xbox Series X/S. Stay tuned for more details in the coming weeks.

https://twitter.com/PlaystationSize/status/1580771118855913472

The latter adds three new characters into the score attack mode – Lady Dimitrescu, Karl Heisenberg, and Chris Redfield. Each has unique abilities and play styles. Perhaps more interesting, however, is that they can seemingly unlock new abilities. Speaking to Polygon, game director Kento Kinoshita revealed that all three new characters can buy items and weapon upgrades from The Duke.

“Unlike Ethan, they aren’t able to purchase weapons, but they can acquire abilities, which makes playing even the same character feel new depending on what you’ve obtained,” said Kinoshita. He also confirmed the addition of 20 distinct unlockables, “including new stages and abilities, while also adjusting the difficulty and frequency of these so there would be no loss in motivation when continuing to play.

“The LZ Answerer could be quite difficult to unlock in the original game, but with The Mercenaries Additional Orders, it’s possible to obtain it while using the newly added characters. If you weren’t able to unlock it before, why not give it another try?”

Of course, how these will affect each character’s play style remains to be seen. The Winters’ Expansion arrives on October 28th, along with Resident Evil Village Gold Edition. An accessibility update, which features settings for subtitle size and closed captions, will also go live for all players. For more details on the expansion, head here.

Third-Person Mode

As the name implies, Third-Person Mode will let you play Resident Evil Village from a third-person perspective. The action is similar to the Resident Evil 2 and 3 remakes and features animations that weren’t present in the base game’s first-person mode. If you’ve ever craved that perspective or wanted to see Ethan’s face while he’s being devoured by Lycans, then Third-Person Mode is an interesting way to replay the game.

A New Game (Sort of)

In terms of the effort required, Third-Person Mode felt like making a new game, according to producer Masachika Kawata when speaking to IGN. This is somewhat of a stretch because it’s still the same game. Nevertheless, the work required goes above and beyond simply shifting the perspective given the number of player actions compared to Resident Evil 2 and 3.

Director Kento Kinoshita said, “You know, we felt we had to make something as good or better than RE2 and RE3. Compared to the previous games in the series, Resident Evil Village has an exceptionally large variety of player actions. You can guard, you can move while crouching, and there is a lot of examining objects. We made thorough adjustments to ensure that those unique animations would look completely connected and that it would be playable at a good tempo.” So if everything feels smooth and works as it should, then that’s due to the work put in by Capcom.

The Mercenaries: Additional Orders

The Mercenaries offers a hefty amount of new content and updates courtesy of Additional Orders. It adds two new stages and three new playable characters – Chris Redfield, Karl Heisenberg and Lady Dimitrescu. Each has unique abilities and powers that can radically alter the gameplay, and even lead to some new strategies.

Abilities for Chris, Heisenberg, and Dimitrescu

For instance, Chris Redfield possesses “top-class gear” and can use a Target Locator to call down support fire on a group of enemies. He also has the Straight Punch, which delivers a strong blow to enemies (though it can leave him open). Defeating an enemy with Straight Punch fills the Onslaught gauge – when full, the attack is faster and deals even more damage.

Heisenberg can hit enemies with his hammer to build up charge and then slam it down to discharge that energy – the more the charge, the wider the area of effect. He can also summon a Soldat Jet to rush forward at enemies and explode when hitting a wall. His Magnetic Field can pull enemies together and further empower his magnetic attacks, like tossing scrap at foes (at the cost of movement speed).

Finally, there’s Lady Dimitrescu, who can rip enemies apart with her claws and use Lady’s Lipstick to increase her power and movement speed. She also has a Thrill meter increased by attacking or using lipstick. Along with increased stats, it also grants access to moves like grabbing an enemy and slamming them down (and catching any nearby enemies in this increases Thrill further). Once her Thrill is at its max, Dimitrescu can summon her daughters for some added pain.

The Bloody River and Bloody Village

The two new stages added to the mix are The Bloody River and The Bloody Village, for a total of 10 stages in the mode. The former seemingly takes place near Moreau’s reservoir while the latter is closer to a windmill. Both have a variety of elevations and different foes waiting to tear you apart, but what else they bring to the table remains to be seen.

Shadows of Rose Story

Taking place 16 years after the conclusion of Village’s story, Shadows of Rose focuses on Rosemary Winters. While seemingly leading a normal life, her powers are still very much present. She finally decides to seal them away by delving into the mind of the Megamycete, the source of the Mold that appears in the village. This leads to a different version of the village, a “realm of consciousness” created from memories absorbed by the Megamycete. Played in the third person, it’s been confirmed that a single attack in this world can be fatal for Rose. However, she can also use her powers to freeze enemies and take them down quickly.

Four Hours Long

Shadows of Rose has been in development since at least June 2021, and as such, will offer one of the longest DLC experiences in the series yet. Speaking to IGN Japan, director Kento Kinoshita said it would be roughly four hours long. It’s understandable given the scale and scope of the story, from building Rose’s character to chronicling her battle inside the Megamycete’s mind and perhaps setting up the series’ future. Regardless, fans should get their money’s worth.

Several Locations to Explore

Even more interesting is that in the same interview, Kinoshita confirmed that Shadows of Rose would feature several locations. The footage thus far has only showcased an altered Castle Dimitrescu, but again, given that it’s not the real version and how the world inside of the Megamycete can shift on a whim, it makes sense there would be other places. The village itself, and maybe the Ritual Site seem like safe bets, but it should be interesting to see where else the DLC takes us.

Accessibility Update

Along with the launch of the Winters’ Expansion and Gold Edition will be an update to the accessibility settings. These include a permanent reticle, closed captions, displaying the speaker’s name in Story Mode subtitles, adjusting the subtitle size, and toggles for subtitle color and backgrounds. Unfortunately, it’s not confirmed whether there will be controller remapping or better colorblind settings.

Street Wolf Outfit for Rose

Preordering the expansion nets the Street Wolf Outfit for Rose. It can be equipped while playing through Shadows of Rose and features the logo of Chris’s Hound Wolf Squad from Village’s campaign. A nice little nod to the connection between the two, though it’s unknown whether Chris himself will make an appearance in the DLC.

Concluding the Winters’ Saga

Whether you’ve been a fan of the Winters’ family saga or not, one thing is certain – Shadows of Rose will finally conclude it, as per Kinoshita. Of course, producer Masachika Kawata told IGN Japan that Capcom could “absolutely not” reveal anything about the future of the series. Will you play as Chris in future entries? Will Leon make a return? What about Jill or Claire? Maybe there will be a new cast of characters or a soft reboot. Your guess is as good as ours at this point, but Capcom isn’t telling (at least, not before the expansion is out). Regardless, the Winters’ chapter will be closed, hopefully with a happy ending for Rose.

Resident Evil Village Gold Edition

The Winters’ Expansion is a standalone purchase for current owners of the game. However, newcomers who want everything in one bundle can purchase Resident Evil Village Gold Edition. For $50, it includes the base game, the Trauma Pack DLC (which includes goodies like a Resident Evil 7 Found Footage Filter, the Samurai Edge – AW Model-01, and Village of Shadows difficulty unlocked), the Winters’ Expansion and the much-delayed multiplayer mode Resident Evil Re: Verse. All of this, for just $50. Considering the Winters’ Expansion costs $20 on its own, it’s not a bad deal, especially for someone who wants all the content in one place.

In an interview with IGN Japan, director Kento Kinoshita has provided further details on the story episode- specifically where its length and scope are concerned. According to Kinoshita, Shadows of Rose will be roughly four hours long, which would make it one of the biggest Resident Evil expansions to date in terms of runtime.

Meanwhile, the director also confirms that the story episode will feature several locations, even though Castle Dimitrescu is the only one we’ve seen in pre-launch footage so are. Seeing as the DLC is set inside the mind of the megamycete, you can expect all those locations to be distorted versions of their real selves.

Resident Evil Village: Winters’ Expansion launches for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, PC, and Stadia on October 28.

Speaking in an interview with IGN, producer Masachika Kawata revealed the same, while director Kento Kinoshita explained that given the greater number of player actions available in Resident Evil Village as compared to third person titles like the Resident Evil 2 and 3 remakes, making all the animations work in a third person perspective was a complicated process.

“That took about as much effort as creating a new game,” Kawata said. “Even the same game can be a very different experience when played in third-person.”

“You know, we felt we had to make something as good or better than RE2 and RE3,” Kinoshita said. “Compared to the previous games in the series, Resident Evil Village has an exceptionally large variety of player actions. You can guard, you can move while crouching, and there is a lot of examining objects. We made thorough adjustments to ensure that those unique animations would look completely connected, and that it would be playable at a good tempo.”

Of course, one would imagine that there’s some level of exaggeration there, but there’s no doubt that making a game that was developed as a first person experience work just as well in a third person perspective would have been a tricky process.

Resident Evil Village – Winters’ Expansion will launch for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, PC, and Stadia on October 28.

Resident Evil Village’s upcoming Winters’ Expansion promises to be a meaty one, and while its new third person mode for the base game and additional Mercenaries content are obviously notable additions, the expansion’s “Shadows of Rose” story DLC is, of course, going to be the star of the show. Set 16 years after the events of the base game and the death of Ethan Winters, Shadows of Rose will star his daughter Rose Winters as protagonist- though you can expect this new chapter to conclude the Winters family’s involvement in the series’ larger story.

The same was confirmed by director Kento Kinoshita in an interview with IGN, where he said that the development team is “creating the Shadows of Rose story to conclude the Winters family saga.”

What can we expect from the series’ future then? Producer Masachika Kawata says that Capcom can “absolutely not” share any details on what lies ahead for Resident Evil, so whether the next mainline game in the series will star completely new characters or bring back familiar fan-favourites remains to be seen. It should be particularly interesting to see what route Capcom takes, given the fact that the series has suddenly jumped forward by 16 years, which means series mainstays like Chris, Leon, Claire, Jill, and others are going to be a hell of a lot older.

Previous leaks have suggested that development on Resident Evil 9 has been ongoing since as far back as 2018, and is unlikely to launch before 2024 at the earliest. Of course, before that, 2023 will also see the launch of the Resident Evil 4 remake.

A Resident Evil Showcase has been set for sometime in October, where Capcom will talk about Resident Evil Village: Winters’ Expansion and the aforementioned RE4 remake.

Resident Evil Village: Winters’ Expansion launches for PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, PC, and Stadia on October 28. The game will also launch for the Nintendo Switch via the cloud on the same day, with the expansion arriving for the platform in December.