We are once again about to take a dive into the territory of “sources claim.” So, remember to take everything here with a grain of salt. As happens a lot in the games industry, there are sometimes projects that, while not officially confirmed, are surely in development somewhere. One of those projects is a remake of Resident Evil 4. After the success of the Resident Evil 2 remake (and to a lesser extent, the Resident Evil 3 remake) you’d be crazy to think Capcom wouldn’t go back to its golden goose eventually.
Reports have alleged that the project has been being worked on since 2018. The project was also apparently being led by M-Two, which is led by Tatsuya Minami, the former head of Platinum Games. The studio had a big hand in the development of the Resident Evil 3 remake, and Minami was an executive producer on the project himself. However, it now appears that, once again according to unnamed sources from within Capcom, that M-Two’s involvement in the Resident Evil 4 remake has been greatly reduced.
A report from Video Games Chronicle claims that, after some of the criticisms of the Resident Evil 3 remake, M-Two wanted to make a much more faithful remake of Resident Evil 4. Despite how you feel about the Resident Evil 3 remake, one way or another it took some serious departures from the original game. However, it seems that the higher ups at Capcom didn’t like that idea. Capcom allegedly wants to use the original Resident Evil 4 as more of a template, and go in different directions with certain elements — a la Mr. X and his expanded role in RE 2.
From one Village to another
There are merits to both sides of these design philosophies, of course. On one hand, you do want to remain faithful to the original, but not slavishly so. However, change can also be good. Those aforementioned changes to the Resident Evil 2 remake turned out great. Either way, it appears that M-Two’s involvement in the project has been drastically reduced because of this disagreement ,and the game is now being partially rebooted. The majority of development will now be reportedly handled by Capcom Division 1. This is the in-house studio that handles development for the mainline Resident Evil games, as well as Devil May Cry.
According to VGC’s sources, the restructuring may have pushed the remake’s launch from 2022 to 2023. I suspect it will be quite some time before we hear anything “official” on the Resident Evil 4 remake, as far as actual confirmation by Capcom itself anyway. In the meantime, you can check out what Division 1 is doing with Resident Evil Village. Which, I am sure not coincidentally, shares many similarities with Resident Evil 4.
