Resident Evil Village has officially been out for two weeks now, with players finally having the chance to dive into the latest mainline iteration of the popular horror franchise and battle against hordes of vampires, werewolves, and other terrifying monsters. Reviews of the game have been generally positive, with critics celebrating its tense combat, creepy set pieces, and familiar callbacks to Resident Evil 4.
However, it seems the game could've been perceived very differently if it wasn't for a few last-minute changes during the sequel's production. Revealed via a new behind-the-scenes video on the franchise's official YouTube channel, Capcom has detailed a series of interesting tidbits regarding the development of Village, including the fact that QA testers were initially not fans of the game's combat.
According to Resident Evil Village's Creative Director Morimasa Sato, the original intention was to make the game feel like a "struggle to survive," with the team wanting to ensure players felt the odds were stacked against them. In an effort to try and capture this concept, Capcom flooded the game with hordes of aggressive enemies, overwhelming players and forcing them to react quickly. Some early footage featured in the video highlights these brutal encounters, showcasing crowds of Lycan enemies approaching the player and ruthlessly attacking them.
Capcom quickly realized that the approach wasn't going to work for Village, with QA testers simply not enjoying the game's frustrating combat scenarios. Project Manager Tatsuo Isoko even calls the earlier builds "a slog," claiming that despite the fact the game was in the late stages of development, the team knew it was a significant issue that had to be rectified. The more vocal QA testers were allegedly brought into a meeting with the development team, as Capcom committed to re-examining the combat and trying again. According to Sato, the answer was to make players "paranoid about if and how they're going to be attacked, and worry what the next enemy will be."
Once the team realized that correcting the pacing was the key to fixing the issue, Sato claimed that it "started to click," leading to the combat that eventually made its way into Village's final release. The story definitely alludes to a much different Resident Evil game than the one fans eventually got, with intense battles that relied less on scares and more on tough enemy encounters.
For those who haven't been following Village, the game centers on returning protagonist Ethan Winters, who must battle against the mysterious Mother Miranda and her four children in an effort to rescue his daughter. Along the way, players will have to face an array of terrifying monsters and uncover the haunting mystery behind the game's titular village.
Resident Evil Village is out now on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X|S.
