Feb 27, 2026
3 min read
As the result of experiments conducted in the underground laboratory of the Umbrella Corporation, Resident Evil Requiem successfully combines two different genres of survival horror into one new and infectious adaptation.
On the streets of a horrible sanitarium, Resident Evil Requiem's opening hours were the scariest encounters I've encountered in the series to date.With headphones on and off, the ninth big adventure in Capcom's long-running horror story forced me to endure a stressful and long time, but I didn't know how long it took. I stopped breathing, but instead held my fists in the air as I cleaned out as many sacks of undead as D-Day in World War Z.In an attempt to appease horror survivors and horror advocates alike, Resident Evil Requiem cranks up the up-soaked-saukie thrill.
Unlike 2023's Alan Wake II, Resident Evil Requiem initially focused on a young FBI agent, in this case new series Grace Ashcroft (Angela Sant'Albano), a newly minted analyst sent to investigate a series of mysterious deaths among Raccoon survivors decades after the 1998 outbreak. The gloom in the shuttered hotel is finally short-lived, but since she's captured by Victor Gideon (Antony Byrne), Requiem's main antagonist, the air is dangerousface, hideous face and greasy glasses look pale.A mansion full of all kinds of carnivorous monsters, but running thanks to help in the form of veteran series uber star Leon S. Kennedy (Nick Apostolides).
Survival horror's most iconic himbo has clearly seen better days - the strange bruises on his skin suggest he's battling some sort of ailment potentially linked to exposure to the T virus, while the shiny new Porsche he drives suggests he's not immune to a midlife crisis.But it is Grace who stands out here.Resident Evil characters have historically displayed an over-the-top quality that injects a heavy dose of stupidity into their bloodstream, but for my money, this inexperienced FBI agent is by far the most relatable human heroine the series has ever had.Her evolution from constantly on the edge of panic attacks to confident enough to fight back made for a journey that I found as captivating as it was consistently scary.
Requiem allows us to control each other Grace and Leon through certain plot twists throughout the approximately 10-hour campaign, but it is the beginning of the mostly stealth that is undoubtedly the most fear-inducing.Grace's quest to escape the horrors of Victor Hospital, depowered and under constant threat from twisted ghoul stalkers who could drop from the rafters at any moment, is a terrifying piece of survival horror.There is very little ammunition that there is a meager amount of a hole in the inventory to find, and Grace moves at such a slow speed that makes the timing of a careful squat to prevent a swarm of stalking zombies an exercise in the right way, especially if you don't have a rare broken bottle to throw away as a distraction.In the meantime, you have to solve a series of stimulating puzzles based on body parts and cleverly locked doors, not knowing when you're going to turn a corner and face a flabby-faced, grotesquely huge golem that insists on squeezing its way down the hallway towards you.
I spent a lot of time trying to avoid the many threats, so I was impressed when Grace was forced to face the answer.When played in the claustrophobic first-person perspective, the gunfire is very impressive and every precious pistol shot has a great impact.The bullets tear the blistered flesh from the zombie's face, leaving the eyes hanging from the stalks, and stained with blood.wall and continues even if you return to the area later.
Not to worry, Grace has a blood collection device that allows her to siphon the infected plasma that collects around zombie corpses and mix it with other scraps to make vital items like medicine and disposable hemolytic syringes.The body can jam into the spine of an unrecognized undead animal, causing its entire body to swell and explode in the most spectacular blood-soaked fashion for the stealthiest kill possible.but you can also use it to effectively get rid of a body you've previously dropped.I found this to be a good move for places I knew I'd be revisiting, as Requiem's zombies also have an uncanny habit of reviving and transforming when you least expect it.(Actually, these guys change and come back more often than The Eagles.)
Grace's quest only gets more intense as it takes her into the suffocating shadows of the hospital's basement and beyond, but moving at a snail's pace through Requiem's danger-filled surroundings not only kept my nerves on edge, but allowed me to observe and appreciate Capcom's efforts to improve the troubling behavior of its troubling army.They are no longer the whining, foot-dragging losers found during the original Raccoon City outbreak, but instead retain traces of humanity that make them more reptilian than the more animalistic monsters of Resident Evil Village.Like the ones who lazily flick the lights on and off like bored children, or who wander around muttering and laughing to themselves before suddenly kneeling down to greedily feast on the corpse of one of their former friends.
Leon: Expert
While Grace's situation is boring and deliberately creepy, making me second-guess every shade, everyone's favorite ex-RCPD prop is trying out a not-so-subtle rescue mission, and when I switch controls to Leon, a brutal ultrasound crackles.Surprisingly, Requiem quickly pushes Resident Evil 4's over-the-top madness to Resurrect the Dead level, allowing Leon to use his chainsaw to carve through hordes of zombies.Leon's segments are so over-the-top and creepy that they leave me confused, and almost every major zombie Leon sends out is met with some oddly-planned dad jokes.
Where Grace must use the scarce food in her environment to craft her own deadly knives, Leon buys a powerful ax that can be easily maintained with a battery that lasts forever.While Grace carefully counts each bullet with her small pistol, Leon enjoys the countless metallic rattles of the guns.Also, if Leon isn't satisfied with his own weapons, he can use someone else's;after killing a zombie, destroy a fire ax or pipe, you have the option to inflate it and throw it at another nearby enemy, much like the threat and satisfaction of the same sword in Yotei's Ghost last year.can be installed in a real ATM for weapons to buy useful weapon upgrades, ammo additions and body armor.
Simply put, there's nothing wrong with Leon's ass-kicking switch - his gun is John Wick-style and bloodier than ever - and in addition to quickly killing hordes of zombies, a number of Requiem's appropriately epic boss encounters also take place within Leon's levels.From new behemoths to cleverly reimagined threats from previous Resident Evil stories, there's plenty of fighting to be had here, and no man equals Del Lago among them.A hunk meets a haunted house during the story I really like how the sleaze changed my expectations of how a Resident Evil boss fight should play out.Of course, being tasked with blasting the glowing weak points surrounding a predatory beast's body is nothing new.That is, until you realize that puncturing each swollen bubble not only damages the monster, but also releases streams of infection from surrounding zombie underlings, quickly turning them into tough support types to deal with.Leon may be armed to the teeth, but that's where Requiem ups the ante.It doesn't mean he doesn't find his creative ways.
Shun was scared
As much as I love Leon, when the story moves beyond the Rhodes Hill campus to the rest of Raccoon City, I think the episodes could be a little too much if Requiem goes into an action-packed groove in the second half.Let me be clear, Resident Evil 4 is my favorite of the series, so it's definitely a return to military-grade armor and a skull-crushing ending with the series' most cunning assassin.It moves.There's plenty of violence that seems straight out of a Call of Duty campaign, from full-highway chase sequences to heavy weapon attacks.But like Leon, after playing the five-hour stretch leading up to Requiem's conclusion, I wanted to get a few more tastes of Grace's great nerve-wracking stealth rooms as a routine change from Leon's relatively horror-free carnage.
That desire was finally satisfied to some extent at the end of the game with a moving run through some really dangerous monsters that return from the previous series, but given that the story ended soon after that, my opinion of Requiem is that it was a game of two halves.instead, Requiem is like ordering whiskey and coke and serving them in two separate glasses instead of mixing them into one.
To be fair, Grace's absence from the core of Requiem is reasonable in the context of its story, and overall it's a fairy tale that makes me harder than the raw ghost nurse biting me.Familiarize (benefit, obtain) modern techniques that have come from Transcendental Meditation.Some of these memorabilia are crucial to unraveling the intriguing secrets behind Grace's kidnapping and the truth about her past, while others are a genuine joke to help ease the tension.I was amused by the disclosure of the doctor's report that examined her for 'vital signs'.
There's also an iconic location that Leon explores, and I'm reluctant to spoil it here (even though it was teased in the pre-release trailers), which is full of fun easter eggs that made it fun to revisit as someone who's been enjoying Resident Evil adventures since the T-Virus made its original CD PlayS debut.
