sisslethecat
Get out your salt shakers, boys and girls.
For about a week now, Reddit user AvidExpert has been teasing that he got the chance to speak with a Capcom employee (who he cannot reveal the name of, wishing to protect their job) who shared details on Resident Evil VII: Biohazard with them, and that they would be divulging this information on YouTube. Obviously, this throws up all kinds of red “My Uncle Works For Nintendo” kind of flags, but r/residentevil moderator chofortu confirmed that they were shown evidence that this was indeed on the level, and vouched for the authenticity. Avid also emphasies how small his channel is, and considering that if all of this turns out to be false he could be looking at loosing any following he has, I guess that’s also a pretty good vouch for its authenticity. Again, take this with a grain of salt, like, a huge grain of salt, but also, just on the off chance that this all turns out to really be true-
SPOILERS
Like, massive, massive spoilers. Turn back now if you want everything to be revealed over the course of Capcom’s own schedule.
Alright, let’s charge on ahead. In his video, Avid first goes over mechanical spoilers, talking about how the game is played, and how it will change the story, etc. Some of these are pretty surprising.
MECHANICAL SPOILERS
- A moral and dialogue choice system will feature prominently, and will change the course of the game, including the ending.
This is a pretty big one. While Resident Evil as a series has never dealt with anything close to a Mass Effect style choice system, the original trilogy did feature choices fairly prominently. In Resident Evil, it was actually fairly complex, the smallest decisions would greatly affect who lives and dies throughout the game, from actual yes or no questions to not playing fast enough to save characters. This was present in all three versions of RE1 (Classic, Director’s Cut, and REmake), and Resident Evil 3: Nemesis twisted the concept even farther by having on-screen, timed choices that would impact the direction the game would take, as well as having which path you choose first change the story as well. RE2 didn’t really feature something as robust as the other two, but there were two alternate versions of the story played over four campaigns, and there were a handful of choices that would affect your next playthrough on the B scenario.
It’s also interesting that Avid describes this as a morality system. The previously mentioned choices weren’t really moral ones (well, save for one in particular), as most of them were simply choices of who should go first into a room, or whether to jump or run, etc. Calling it something so complex as a morality system is very interesting, making me think of something more along the lines of BioShock. I don’t expect this system to be as black and white, yes or no, either, but rather perhaps based on our own in-game actions, ala Spec Ops: The Line (which is interesting, considering Spec Ops‘ lead writer is lead on this as well). That’s my own speculation, tho.
It is pretty exciting, considering that multiple endings used to be a staple of horror gaming, but have since died out over time. In recent memory, the only RE games with multiple endings are Darkside Chronicles and Revelations 2, and even then it isn’t exactly alternate, just a very binary good/bad ending. The possibility of multiple endings is very enticing and doesn’t sound that far-fetched considering that Begining Hour, the PS4 exclusive demo, has multiple endings.
- Your first weapon will be a Swiss Army Knife.
This isn’t really a big thing, but it might be a good way to tell whether this is accurate right away when we get our hands on the game come January, or possibly sooner if it’s shown off before hand. Considering RE7‘s emphasis on the “everyman” aspect, this makes perfect sense. It wouldn’t make a whole lot of sense for a normal person to be carrying around one of RE‘s massive combat knives (in all honesty, it’s pretty silly that Claire has one strapped to her motorcycle vest in RE2). However, a Swiss Army Knife is super common, even I have one (and I’m in no way “handy”). Not a great weapon, and essentially zero reach, but it’s better than nothing.
- Emphasis on close-quarters weapons, no long-range firearms like sniper rifles.
Again, not really a huge surprise, but interesting never the less. At least some of the game’s weapons were outed a few weeks ago by an ESRB rating description, which detailed that we’ll basically be handling the original RE’s weapons loadout, with the inclusion of melee weapons (like the axe in Begining Hour) as well as finally getting our hands on a chainsaw as well (although we really have no way of knowing for how long). Considering this RE is falling back to the claustrophobic horror of the original entries, there simply wouldn’t be enough room for those types of weapons (a sniper does appear in Code: Veronica, but only very briefly and cannot be reloaded).
- There are cutscenes, but they’re very limited; used to highlight essential information, and the camera will still be movable.
Again, this seems pretty par for the course. About a month ago it was revealed that RE7 would not be including cutscenes in the traditional sense. The story will instead play out in real-time in front of the player, similar to Half-Life or Outlast. Revealed here, however, is that there will be pre-animated moments that will essentially be like cutscenes, where we can’t move our body buy can move our field of view. This feels very similar to Dead Space, which will occasionally take direct control away from the player in order to provide information. Not a huge deal, a pretty standard game design thing, if you ask me. Better than just hoping that we were facing the right way for certain things, which is a problem other games have run into. Technically, the ending of Begining Hour could be an example of this- we can move our head slightly, despite it being otherwise uncontrollable.
- The VHS tape segments will be used to solve puzzles and more
This was essentially already confirmed when the Lantern trailer was being shown off, but we might as well talk about it in a little more detail here. The VHS segments appear to be a modern extension of classic RE’s notes and journals, giving us vital information and background to the section we’re in while not stopping gameplay. Instead of just reading about something, we’ll be living it. Found-footage horror is a favorite of mine (despite its tendency to be pretty shit overall). There’s a lot of possibilities that can be done with it in a gameplay sense, and I’ve always been surprised a game has had yet to tackle this concept head-on, and having a camera viewfinder filter on half the game in Outlast doesn’t count. One of the essential elements to “found footage” is the operative word in its name, found. The events we witnessing have already happened, they’re immutable, they’re in the past.
We can already see evidence of this in Begining Hour, where we are able to learn valuable information from Clancy Javis’ recording that helps us not only discover an ax, the key to the backdoor, but also the demo’s second ending. Considering we’ve already talked about multiple endings and a choice system, this makes me very excited for the possibilities here. The choices made not just by Ethan (the main character we’re playing as), but also potentially the choices we make as the characters in the VHS sections can have massive connotations as well. The first thing that comes to mind is Saw 2: Flesh and Blood. You don’t mind if I spoil that game do you? Of course, you don’t. It’s Saw 2: Flesh and Blood for God’s sake. At the beginning of that game, we play as one character trying to escape one of Jigsaw’s trap labyrinths, and regardless of whether we succeed or fail, we leave the character and switch over to someone completely different for the entirety of the rest of the game. But, if you did manage to successfully escape during that opening segment, at the very end of the game you learn that his escape dooms the character you’ve been playing as otherwise. It’s a sudden and shocking twist similar to the ones that make the film series what they are, and it’s something I would love to see in RE7.
STORY SPOILERS
- The characters shown during the CEDEC Photogrammetry presentation are not Ethan or Mia.
While it was just speculation to begin with, Avid confirms (grain of salt, remember) that these people are not Ethan or Mia (who was the woman we play as in the Lantern demo, and presumably Ethan’s missing wife). They are important to the story, but how exactly is anybody’s guess. We do know that the Sewer Gators crew aren’t the only people to have gone missing in Dulvey, Louisiana, so maybe these are other survivors we’ll come across (or witness the final moments of in VHS segments).
- Massive mutant bosses return, including one that is submerged in water
Avid describes this one as having a “ridiculously large body, a huge underwater behemoth”. RE’s had some pretty big bosses for sure, from Plant 42 and Gravedigger in the original games to Del Lago and HAOS in the modern games. So cool. We’re getting more.
- The person in the wheelchair from the Desolation trailer is a woman named Camile
There’s been no end to the speculation surrounding this shadowy person, thoughts that maybe it was somehow Oswell Spencer, an aging Albert Wesker, or my own theory that maybe it was the man Wesker was named for (the mysterious person in charge of Project W, which gave birth to Albert and Alex), but it looks like we’re all wrong. According to Avid, it is an elderly woman named Camile. So yeah, we’re back to square one then, since this would be an entirely new character. Whoever they are they do certainly seem menacing, so I’m going to leave my chips on “evil”.
- Lucas Baker, son of Jack and Marguirette, will feature prominently in the game
Considering he’s described as a “bad seed” by Andre in Begining Hour, yeah, I think this one is kind of a no-brainer, too. It’s very possible that he may be the central force behind everything going on here, starting the outbreak of the W-Virus (that’s the Whatever Virus, as I’m calling it until it has an official name).
- Classic Resident Evil characters will be returning
No shit? Despite fan outcry at Capcom’s own declaration that we won’t be playing as a returning hero- nothing is stopping a classic RE character from actually appearing. The wording that we won’t be playing as a returning character, and an emphasis that this is still taking place in the RE universe, might as well spell out that at least someone will be returning. They have never, not once, said that we simply will not see a returning character. While Avid said in the video that he would be keeping it a secret unless he was directly asked, he was directly asked in the video’s comments, where he revealed that at least one of these returning characters will be (grain of salt, remember!!!) Chris Redfield. Apparently, he was shown a selection of images, and Chris was in one of them on accident. I don’t expect that Chris, if he really will be making an appearance, will be a major character in any way, if anything I’m getting visions of him and a squad of BSAA soldiers bursting in at the very end of the game just as you manage to crawl out of whatever hell you’ve been trapped in, possibly even as we’re taking our final breaths (wouldn’t that be a grim ending). That’s (again) just my own speculation.
Avid says that he won’t confirm if any more characters will be returning, but he does it in such a wink wink nudge nudge manner that I’m just going to go ahead and assume that’s a yes. Jorge and I have been speculating that this character will be Rebecca Chambers, both from the above image seen in the Desolation trailer, but also because she’s the most likely candidate for being set in this more grounded, horror-focused entry. While every other RE character went on to become a super soldier, or at the very least a professional monster hunter, Rebecca has largely kept a distance, now working as a BSAA advisor, and even shown to genuinely have sort of PTSD-esque trouble with fighting the living dead in Resident Evil: The Stage. Rebecca is also making an appearance in Resident Evil: Vendetta, a direct-to-DVD film set in between RE6 and 7, which will be getting its first trailer in just a few days at TGS.
So that’s it. He does talk about a few other things in his video, but, by and large, they’re things we already know about, having been confirmed through official sources. We have no way of knowing how legit this information is until, basically, we’ve got the game in our hands. We can expect some new information very soon, as Resident Evil VII: Biohazard is taking center stage for Capcom at TGS, which starts on the 15th of this month, where we’re expecting at the very least some combat footage as well as maybe an answer to what the hell that finger does. We’ll keep you up to date of course, and we shall see how much (if any) of this turns out to be the real deal.
