Resident Evil: Revelations

• 1. Introduction

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  Resident Evil: Revelations is a 2012 survival horror game from Capcom, made for the Nintendo 3DS. It opens with agent Jill Valentine searching an abandoned cruise ship, the Queen Zenobia, for her missing colleague Chris Redfield. Chris vanished while chasing rumors that a terrorist group was active again. Whoever sent Jill to that ship may not have told her the truth.

  Three questions run through everything that follows. How do you make a player feel hunted on a screen small enough to hold in one hand? What happened to a Mediterranean city that set this whole conspiracy in motion? And why would a Resident Evil game deliberately limit how fast you can move and how much ammunition you carry?

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• 2. The Fall of Terragrigia

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  Terragrigia was a Mediterranean city that drew its power from a solar energy relay, which sent electricity down from a satellite in orbit. The story begins shortly after the events of Resident Evil 4 in 2004. A bioterrorist organization called Il Veltro attacked the city with biological organic weapons, known as BOWs. The group opposed the relay system and wanted it stopped.

  The Federal Bioterrorism Commission, or FBC, tried to hold the city together. This American government agency had been created after the destruction of Raccoon City. The attack overwhelmed it. FBC director Morgan Lansdale made a drastic choice and used the same satellite to scorch Terragrigia with intense solar energy.

  Two FBC agents, Parker Luciani and Jessica Sherawat, supervised the evacuation of their organization's base. They escaped before the solar rays destroyed the city. A year later, both agents joined the Bioterrorism Security Assessment Alliance, an international NGO known as the BSAA.

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• 3. A Ship Full of Liars

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  Clive R. O'Brian, head of the BSAA, handed out the assignment that sent Jill into trouble. Jill and Parker had just investigated a possible return of BOWs near the ruins of Terragrigia. O'Brian then told them that Chris Redfield and Jessica had gone missing while checking on Veltro. Their last known position was the cruise ship.

  On board, Jill and Parker were lured by a false sign that Chris was being held in a room, and they were knocked unconscious. Elsewhere, Chris and Jessica found that Veltro was working from an airstrip in the mountains. O'Brian realized that the intel he had given the first pair was false. He ordered Chris and Jessica to find Jill and Parker, and he sent agents Quint Cetcham and Keith "Grinder" Lumley to the airstrip.

  When Jill and Parker woke in separate rooms, they met FBC agent Raymond Vester, who would not say why he was there. A video from Veltro then laid out a plan to infect one-fifth of the Earth's oceans with the T-Abyss, a new strain of T-virus. The group called it payback for the FBC wiping out their forces at Terragrigia.

  Chris and Jessica reached the ship and joined the others. Raymond confronted them disguised as a Veltro agent, and Jessica shot him. Jill and Chris went on to the laboratory where the T-Abyss was made and neutralized it. Lansdale appeared on a video link and admitted he had worked with Veltro during the Terragrigia panic. His aim was to raise the FBC's funding and international influence.

  Parker, meanwhile, had learned from Raymond that Jessica was an FBC mole. He turned his gun on her. She answered by triggering the ship's self-destruct sequence and fleeing.

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• 4. Evidence and Aftermath

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  Jill and Chris got off the ship before it blew up, but Parker slipped off a catwalk and was lost. Then O'Brian revealed that he had staged the whole ordeal. He wanted evidence that Lansdale was behind the Terragrigia attack. Keith and Quint recovered data showing that Lansdale had sunk a sister ship in the city's ruins to bury incriminating proof. Lansdale responded by arresting O'Brian.

  The broadcast brought consequences. O'Brian was freed, Lansdale was taken into custody, and the FBC was dissolved. The epilogue adds twists. Parker was found a month later in Malta, because Raymond had faked his own death and rescued him. O'Brian resigned as BSAA director of his own accord to protect the organization.

  Chris and Jill end the main story about to infiltrate the mansion of Umbrella founder Oswell E. Spencer. That scene leads into "Lost in Nightmares", a prequel add-on for Resident Evil 5. A final scene shows Raymond handing Jessica a sample of the T-Abyss at a cafe. Asked why he saved Parker, he answers only, "I have my reasons."

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• 5. Scarcity by Design

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  Three firearms is the most Jill can carry at once, alongside grenades and the standard combat knife. Ammunition and health are limited, and so is her speed. She can run, climb ladders, and swim or dive, but only for a limited time underwater. Weapons range from handguns to shotguns, submachine guns and rifles. Aiming shifts the view from third person to first person or over the shoulder, depending on the platform.

  Director Koshi Nakanishi, who had worked as a game designer on Resident Evil 5, set out to bring back the content and horror of the series' roots while modernizing how it played. A cruise ship suited that goal because its narrow corridors are claustrophobic and the open ocean leaves the player helpless. The ship's main hall took inspiration from the Palais Garnier opera house in Paris.

  Sound does much of the scaring. Enemies moan and make awful noises before they come into view, so players can tell which one is approaching from sound alone. Rather than classic zombies, the team built "water-logged" creatures with deformed bodies to widen the series' range of monsters.

  Unlike earlier Resident Evil games, this one lets the player move and shoot at the same time. Producer Masachika Kawata said the feature had been avoided before because it made a survival horror game too fast. The team compensated by slowing the player down. Enemies also move in a complex and spooky way, "as if they're trying to avoid your attack."

  Players can upgrade Jill's firearms with special items. They can finish off a stunned enemy with a melee attack, and a device called Genesis scans the surroundings for hidden items. An automap helps with navigation. The campaign is split into short, varied scenarios grouped into episodes, a format chosen to suit a handheld console. Most star Jill on the ghost ship, but a few put other characters in other settings.

  Raid Mode strips away the slow pace. One or two players fight through altered versions of campaign scenarios and earn experience and battle points to spend on weapons and items. Progress unlocks tougher scenarios and extra characters, each with different abilities and a different melee attack. StreetPass lets players trade items. The designers wanted people to carry the game to a friend's house and "enjoy it with friends face to face, as they talk".

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• 6. Console Graphics in a Pocket

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  The Nintendo 3DS was chosen because the team believed its 3D capabilities could create a "tense, scary experience with a realistic atmosphere that could make players feel like there could be something lurking around every corner." The engine behind that atmosphere was a ported and downsized version of Capcom's own MT Framework. It had originally been built for high-definition titles such as Devil May Cry 4 and Lost Planet 2.

  The game was made at the same time as Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D, and experience from that project helped the technical side. The team was not involved in making Resident Evil 6. Nakanishi credited his engineers: "It was thanks to the tremendous efforts of our technical team that we were able to get console-quality graphics from portable hardware."

  Several shortcuts kept the hardware from choking. The Genesis scanner reduces the complexity of what appears on screen. Some creatures got simple skeletal physics and no HD textures. Early on, someone proposed that Jill wear a pair of glasses in place of the scanner.

  Controls were a priority from the start, so the developers backed the Circle Pad Pro accessory as soon as it was conceived. In December 2010, a report said only 20% of the game was finished. Time and budget forced cuts. One casualty was a special underwater weapon that Chris was to hand over at the end of the eighth episode. Another was the land visible in the distance from the ship in the first episode. It was meant to host the final episode, where Jill would have found something from her past.

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• 7. Release and Reviews

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  Revelations was announced at E3 2010 in June 2010, and a playable version appeared at the Nintendo World 2011 event that January. A short demo with Jill on the ship came bundled with The Mercenaries 3D. At E3 2011 the game earned a Best 3DS Game nomination from IGN, which later named it among the 30 most anticipated games of 2012. A second demo reached the Nintendo eShop in North America and Europe in January 2012.

  Just before launch, Capcom shipped the first North American copies with the title misspelled on the spine. It offered buyers a corrected cover. The game came out in Japan on the 26th of January 2012, in Europe on the 27th, and in North America on the 7th of February. It was the first 3DS game to support the Circle Pad Pro outside Japan, and Europe received an exclusive bundle with the accessory. Nintendo handled distribution, sales and marketing in Europe and Australia.

  Media Create counted 296,040 copies sold in Japan in 2012. In the United States, the game ranked among the 25 best sellers of February 2012 and sold 122,000 units in March. Those numbers were good for a 3DS game. Even so, Capcom had hoped for "a little more" given the large development costs.

  Metacritic summarized the reviews as "generally favorable". GameSpot called the game "a thoroughly successful crossbreeding of old-school chills and new-school action". GameRevolution praised the spooky setting and sound direction and said the game works best played in the dark with headphones on. IGN's Richard George called it a handheld game that "recaptures a long-forgotten spirit of a classic franchise". He faulted the scenarios set away from the ship, however, and said the constant switching of characters and gameplay held it back from "true greatness".

  Many critics ranked the visuals among the best on the 3DS. Eurogamer admired the lighting and particle effects, and GameSpot singled out the character models of Jill and certain monsters. Game Informer liked the episodic pacing of the story but judged Quint and Keith the worst characters in series history. Edge gave a mixed verdict and said the episodes interrupted the immersive exploration.

  Jonathan Deesing of G4 compared the ship's exploration to Super Metroid, but he found the controls frustrating and the computer-controlled companions useless. IGN agreed that having a partner makes the game less scary. Raid Mode drew praise, and Eurogamer said the 3DS game "executes it with conviction".

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• 8. Awards and the HD Return

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  At the 2012 Golden Joystick Awards, Revelations was nominated for Best Handheld Game, Ultimate Game of the Year and Top Gaming Moment. The 16th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards nominated it for Handheld Game of the Year, but Paper Mario: Sticker Star won. At the NAVGTR Awards it lost to Far Cry 3 in one category and Assassin's Creed III in another, after nominations for Graphics, Technical and Game, Franchise Adventure.

  IGN editors gave it Best 3DS/DS Graphics and nominated it for Sound, Story and Game. GameSpot editors nominated it for Handheld Game of the Year. Pocket Gamer named it Best Action/Arcade Game and 3DS/DS Game of the Year.

  The "Unveiled Edition" reached Windows, PlayStation 3, Wii U and Xbox 360 in North America on the 21st of May 2013, and in Europe three days later. It added sharper graphics and lighting, extra Raid Mode weapons and characters, and a new difficulty mode that reshuffles enemies and items in the campaign. It dropped the 3DS's 3D effect. The Wii U version supported Miiverse and used the GamePad for dual screen play and Off-TV Play.

  PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions followed on the 29th of August 2017 in North America and Europe, and on the 31st in Japan. A Nintendo Switch release arrived on the 28th of November 2017.

  Critics were cooler on the remaster. IGN judged it "simply out of its element" because of dated graphics and uneven controls. Eurogamer disliked the slow character movement but said the game still stood out against earlier main entries. The edition topped the UK charts for the week ending the 25th of May 2013. Across all platforms it sold more than two million copies. In 2016, readers of Famitsu voted it the sixth most memorable PlayStation 3 game. Resident Evil: Revelations 2 followed in 2015.

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