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Resident Evil

Shinji Mikami, director of the original Resident Evil, in 2013. Photo Antonio Fucito, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

Resident Evil

13 traced influences · 5 sources

dig Resident Evil

What it took directly

  1. statedResident Evil took from Tokuro Fujiwara's 1993 request for a horror game built on the systems of Sweet Home"He said that he wanted us to make a horror game using systems from Sweet Home, which was a horror game for the Famicom that he had directed." Shinji Mikami, director, to Scott Butterworth, GameSpot (March 2016)
  2. statedResident Evil's fixed camera and pre-rendered rooms took from Alone in the Dark"That was when we took a look at Alone in the Dark. The environments were pre-rendered, and the characters and such were in real-time 3D." Shinji Mikami, to GameSpot (2016). Producer Tokuro Fujiwara, in 2003, also said he used it as a reference
  3. statedChris, Jill, Wesker, the Umbrella Corporation and the T-virus took from Kenichi Iwao's rewrite of a draft whose characters were cyborgs"I ended up redesigning the characters who would wind up having defining roles in the game, like Chris, Jill, and Wesker, as well as creating the Umbrella Corporation as an enemy, and concepts like the T-virus." Kenichi Iwao, scenario writer, to Heidi Kemps, Gaming.moe (January 2016)
  4. statedThe scene where Jill overhears Barry and Wesker behind a door took from the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks of Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson"There’s one cutscene in the game where Barry is talking to Wesker behind a door, and Jill can overhear him. I got that idea from these gamebooks." Kenichi Iwao, to Gaming.moe (2016)
  5. statedThe name Resident Evil took from a company-wide naming contest at Capcom's US office, won by a designer at Capcom Digital Studios"the head of marketing held a company-wide contest to come up with a new name for the game." Chris Kramer, Capcom US, to GamesRadar (2009)
  6. inferredThe first zombie's slow turn to face the player took from the man who turns around in Sweet Home"You might be onto something, there. I like scenes where you ask someone what they’re doing, and when they turn around…" inferred — an interviewer put the link to Tokuro Fujiwara in 2003; he answered only "You might be onto something"

What it learned to do

  1. statedResident Evil's item management learned from Sweet Home"The item management aspect of survival horror is very much similar to how Sweet Home handles it, and I definitely remember being told, "Play Sweet Home!" when I first joined the team." Yasuhiro Ampo, Capcom, to GameSpot (2016)
  2. documentedResident Evil's two playable characters learned from Alone in the Dark"another borrowing from Alone in the Dark - two playable characters." Rich Stanton, Eurogamer (March 2016)
  3. statedShinji Mikami (as Resident Evil's director) learned from Tokuro Fujiwara, who gave him the project because Mikami hated being scared"People who aren’t afraid of anything don’t understand what’s frightening. In my view, you can’t make a horror game if you don’t have any fear." Tokuro Fujiwara, producer, in CONTINUE vol. 12 (2003; English translation by GlitterBerri)

The tradition it sits in

  1. statedResident Evil comes from Sweet Home (Capcom, Famicom, 1989), a game Fujiwara directed"The basic premise was that I’d be able to do the things that I wasn’t able to include in Sweet Home." Tokuro Fujiwara, in CONTINUE vol. 12 (2003; translated by GlitterBerri)
  2. statedResident Evil comes from horror films and zombie movies, the director's main influences"The director's influences came heavily from horror flicks and zombie movies" Yasuhiro Ampo, Capcom, to GameSpot (2016)
  3. statedKenichi Iwao (Resident Evil's scenario writer) learned from the British horror of the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks"I was definitely influenced by the Fighting Fantasy gamebooks by Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson. The British horror concepts really left an impression on me." Kenichi Iwao, to Gaming.moe (2016). He says Clock Tower, a similar game, did not influence it

Where the whole form comes from

  1. statedSweet Home (the 1989 game) comes from Kiyoshi Kurosawa's film Sweet Home, whose studio Fujiwara toured"Only because I was able to use the movie as a reference. I got to see the movie and take a tour of the film studio, and use whatever essence I thought would work in the game." Tokuro Fujiwara, in CONTINUE vol. 12 (2003; translated by GlitterBerri)

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