Poor sales of Resident Evil remake led to series' action rebirth

If the GameCube-exclusive Resident Evil remake had sold better, the series may never have become so driven by action. Series creator Shinji Mikami, formerly of Capcom and now working on The Evil Within at Bethesda-owned Tango Gameworks, told IGN it was a natural result of broadening Resident Evil 4's development.

[wishingW3L]

of-course it wasn't going to sell, it was a GameCube exclusive! The console itself sold poorly and the only software that moved was the usual Nintendo franchises.

Is Capcom really this stupid? All their games like Resident Evil 0, the remake, Viewtiful Joe, P.N. 03... Everything flopped, even RE4, that's why they ended up porting it to the PS2 a year later.

[TOGC]

I have lost faith in Capcom...

[Anthotis]

Not too mention how unnecessary a remake was...

[Benjammin25]

Have you even played Resident Evil Remake? You wouldn't think it was unnecessary if you did. It's a masterpiece and one of the greatest Survival Horror games ever. Such a shame they didn't port it to the PS2. It would have sold millions. Could Capcom not figure out that most Resident Evil fans back then were Sony fans? The first three games were released for the original playstation after all. So why did they think it was such a good idea to switch to Nintendo? Madness.

[Ezz2013]

they lost it big time
the last thing i heard about them
that they will try to copy The Last Of Us with their next RE game

it's like they can't make their own games any more

[PoSTedUP]

sorry excuse for their poor choices. although re4 was damn good.
@benjamin. indeed, that was the best one imo. RE1 with sick graphics!? (for the time) Please and Thankyou.

[THamm]

I hate when they pull out remakes or ports of old games just to see if it justifies a sequels. Many Jap devs are guilty of this(konami) and it makes no sense to me. Not only are they rehashing something but also people who own a multi plat seller on one system will most likely not buy the same game twice. I remember when Metal Gear 2 was released on Xbox and they were expecting it to sell like crazy to release 3 on the system. Why? had it been a fresh game it would have done waaay much better IMO

[LackTrue4K]

"Poor sales"

I see it as, terrible game that changed it's real roots/great fan base, for a hippsters quick buck!!!

[ShadesMoolah]

Exactly, and Reseident Evil remakes being on GameCube was always something I was envious of at the time, had they become multiplatform or at least released on either PS2 or Xbox I'd have bought them instantly.

I love Nintendo, and they'll always have a special place in my memory from child-hood, but they are way behind the times. The sooner they go the way of the Dreamcast the better, I'd love to play their games on either of the new consoles, and have proper online support.

Seriously could you image a Mario or Zelda on either Xbox One or PS4, nostalgic Nintendo fans would go ape shit in buying. Unlike Sega however, I do ponder if either Sony or Microsoft will make an incredibly generous offer to ensure Nintendo's Ip's go exclusive to etiher PlayStation or Xbox platforms - whoever buys them out could win big, if they don't just go multiformat that is.

[dark-hollow]

Are capcom really that f**king dense this gen?

First they completely abandon megaman franchise, and even didn't include him in MvsC3 and they wonder why the franchise is losing it relevance!

Secondly they made DmC reboot that NOBODY asked for because dmc 4 kinda sucked. WELL GEEZ LOUISE if you didn't made the half of dmc 4 a %100 percent copy of the first half with the stupid backtracking then dmc 4 might not flop.

And now this shit! Cpapcom you have nobody to blame but yourself, and even rockstar listened to the fans criticism about gta IV and now gta V a freaking masterpiece breaking records. They could be f**king daft like you capcom and ignored the fans criticism but developers like rockstar knows better.

[Deadpoolio]

You know they ported both Viewtiful Joe 1 and 2 also? And they flopped because they weren't very good....Okami also flopped several times also PS2, Wii, PSN, XBLA, the DS sequel all flopped

[Brucis]

>Viewtiful Joe and Okami aren't good
You take that back. VJ 2 was kinda lackluster but the first one certainly was good and Okami was great.

[hollabox]

I purchased the Game Cube for the RE Series, with RE 0 being the best out the bunch. Stars Wars and the remake of Metal Gear Solid on the Game Cube was pretty good as well. GC had some great software but big N fans hurt their own system by mostly sticking to Nintendo published games. Oh well to each is his own, but I still expect Nintendo to do a Sega and release a system in 2015 if the sales drought continues into the 2nd quarter of 2014.

[oof46]

I think a more relevant question is how did the PS2 version sell?

[d3nworth1]

According to vgchartz the ps2 version sold 3.62 million just over double the sales of the gamecube version.

[Nerdmaster]

That's because Capcom said they would release it on PS2 before the GC version was released. People who would buy a GC to play it decided to just wait for the PS2 version instead.

[oof46]

So it did sell well. Unless it was below what they expected. Hopefully the critical and sales bust of the rebirth makes them realize why people love Resident Evil.

[Lunatic_Medic]

I know all of like 2 people who owned a GameCube...

[first1NFANTRY]

In my opinion Res5 and Res6 lost their way and joined the third person shooter genre. Don't try and force feed the fans with 13 year old scripted gameplay and over the top COD action.

[Lunatic_Medic]

I was actually a big fan of RE5 (Platinum'd it). Granted I never completed 1-4. I own 1-3, I just never beat them

[Wranglersofttop]

Uhhh well the "Action Rebirth" sucked huge ass.

[GraveLord]

RE4 was amazing.
RE5 was OK.
RE5 was bloody horrible.

[The_Truth_24_7]

Poke Jost.

[OrangePowerz]

You know, if the game wouldn`t have been exclusive to a console that had very bad sales it would have sold better.

Resident Evil 4 gets praised everywhere and for me that game didn`t do it especially not after seeing the videos of what Resident Evil 4 looked like originally. The original version of Resident Evil 4 looked awesome, the final result was for me not awesome. I don`t even want to get into the abominations that are Resident Evil 5 and 6.

And yes Dead Space is following the same approach aka it gets worse with every new game because it gets more and more action oriented.

[Benjammin25]

Overall, I would say Resident Evil 4 is a great game. It's biggest flaw however, is that it's not a true Resident Evil game.

[Nerdmaster]

RE4 is one of the best games ever! It's actually the only game I ever "platinued" (there weren't trophies, but I did everything there was to do in the game). But unfortunately it made Capcom think that people wanted more and more action, instead of keeping the fine balance RE4 has.

[OrangePowerz]

That right there. RE4 is a good game in itself, but it`s not a proper Resident Evil game. There are no Zombies, it`s not very scary and worst they removed all the puzzles.

[GraveLord]

M-rated game sells poorly on a Nintendo platform? And you think this means something other than Nintendo platforms suck for mature games?

No wonder Capcom is dying.

[DarkBlood]

either way resident evil zero,remake and once exclusive re4 are awesome games, for where i was at the time im glad 2,3 and veronica got ported to the gamecube, that was a large collection all at once for survivor horror genre on gamecube etc etc

[The_Truth_24_7]

Sweet. Now we get to blame Nintendo fans for the downfall of the RE series.

[Brucis]

It sold 1.35 million units compared to the original's 2.75. It got good reviews and actually did pretty well. Resident Evil 4, which introduced the more actiony parts, but kept the creepy tone and horror, sold almost 7.5 million units. The problem is Capcom saw how much more money RE 4 made and decided 'F*ck the balance of action and horror, let's go full action.' The other problem is that method worked, as RE 5 sold almost 8 million units.

[Deadpoolio]

And RE6 is currently siting somewhere around 7 million. The main problem is the butt hurt neckbeards and fanboys who trash 6 every chance they get, the game is a solid 8 and the mistakes it makes have nothing to do with it survival horror or not....It has more to do with it trying to hard to be everything to everyone and losing focus

[Nerdmaster]

Just by the fact that your partner don't die and don't waste your bullets, it makes 6 way better than 5 for me.

[u-bEttA-rUn]

I have to agree the Resident Evil remake was a beautiful game very intense... and if you mastered the first resident evil the remake will catch you completely off guard because you think you know what you're doing and then by the end of the game you're amazed

[Pancit_Canton]

Hopefully Sony will buy them and revive all their great franchise.

[paul-p1988]

MONSTER HUNTER!!!!

[DJrantz]

Its a shame, the remake has a spooky atmosphere that few horror games, if any, have been able to match. Not to mention the characters and story are well designed.

[mydyingparadiselost]

I'm sure RE 7 will fix the whole thing on mobile as a free to play microtransaction mess.

[Timmey]

nice one :D

[Evil_Ryu]

i hate too say this as they were my favorite developer at one point but seeing as they have sold there soul to the devil i think its time for capcom to go under.

[worldwidegaming]

Capcom is controlled by a bunch of old guys who should have retired with captain commando!
Talk about an evil slumlord of gaming!

[tiffac008]

I think the mechanics they had with RE4 was the best in the series. It had the proper balance of Action and Horror Survival but they went overboard with the Action part with RE5 and moreover with RE6.

The time when you can kill Zombies with Street Fighter moves kinda killed the Horror Survival part.

[TongkatAli]

I like my Resident Evil more old school. Resident 0, 1, 2, 3, Code Veronica and Outbreak series > 4, 5 and 6.

[MadMax]

That RE remake on the Gamecube is the best RE game of all time! If you have not played this version yet, get it or get the remake Wii version. Gamecube was actually a pretty good system with more power behind it than the PS2. The Rogue Squadron games were awesome on it.

[Neo-Axl]

Shame.. REmake is the best Resident Evil game made, truly a horror experience.