Resident Evil 2 tapped for current-generation remake
Last week, Resident Evil producer Yoshiaki Hirabyashi took to social media, looking to gather support for a remake of Resident Evil 2. It wasn’t quite an announcement, but rather a rallying call – proof that the masses hungered for a return to Raccoon City.
Well, it sounds like the call has been heard. Hirabyashi himself announced that the project has been green-lit by Japanese developer Capcom, and is now starting production. While this may have seemed like an obvious step after the success of RE1 on current-gen machines, the work for 2 looks to be far more substantial. The recent release of the first game was actually an HD touch-up job on a previous remake of the first game for the GameCube.
RE2 has never received such a treatment, so this new version will be starting from scratch.
RE2 has had a place in fans’ hearts for many years, as it expanded upon the first game’s concept in some massive ways. The two playable characters (Claire Redfield and fan-favorite Leon S. Kennedy) had meaningfully different paths throughout the campaign. The setting shifted from a stuffy mansion to iconic Raccoon City and set the standard for zombie fiction in gaming.
While the game has been ported to a handful of systems, the core visuals have never been retouched, and the same tank-like controls have plagued every version. If this remake is anything like its predecessor, expect a far more visually impressive and responsive experience.
No release date has been announced for the project, but keep an eye out for details as they emerge.
EA insists you likely won’t play single-player campaign in Battlefront
Star Wars: Battlefront is still a few months away from being released, but we already know quite a great deal about what the reboot will contain, and what it will leave out. One of those omissions happens to be a single-player campaign and a staple of DICE’s first-person shooter games for decades. While Battlefield‘s campaigns have never been anything to write home about, the prospect of a flashy cinematic campaign set amongst the iconic Star Wars backdrop sounded alluring. So why did EA choose to leave out a single-player campaign for Battlefront? They doubted that you’d even play it.
In an interview with Gamespot, EA CEO Peter Moore commented on the issue saying, “Very few people actually play the single-player on these kinds of games. That’s what the data points to.”
It’s long been assumed that fans of multiplayer shooters like Battlefront, Call of Duty and Battlefield simply skipped past the single-player campaigns of these titles, but this seems to be the first time that data has informed how a developer structures a game.
Follow Chris Berg on Twitter, @Mushroomer25