The Resident Evil: Re:Verse closed beta released to a select number of fans this week, and I had the opportunity to play it for a few hours over the past few days. Fans weren’t nearly as excited for the Re:Verse reveal during the recent Resident Evil stream as they were for Lady Dimitrescu and her daughters. I was in the same boat, as the game looked decidedly cheap with gameplay that clashed with the subject material at first glance. As I stated in a previous article, I don’t understand Capcom’s insistence on creating multiplayer modes that are so at odds with the core games’ tone, but my heart (somewhat) softened after playing the Re:Verse beta.
Undeathmatch
Re:Verse‘s main mode is a six-person deathmatch. At its base level, it plays out like any free-for-all. Once you load in, you have five minutes to duke it out. The player with the most points when the timer runs out, wins.
However, Re:Verse has more depth than just shooting in an opponent’s direction. The beta had six characters available to play as:
- Ada Wong
- Chris Redfield
- Claire Redfield
- Hunk
- Jill Valentine
- Leon Kennedy
Each of these characters has a unique default loadout, a passive skill and two active abilities. This essentially makes each one their own class, each with a different playstyle.
Leon, for example, spawns in with his pistol and shotgun. He has a roundhouse kick that can knock down enemies, the ability to dual-wield pistols with high accuracy for a certain amount of time, and the Rookie Spirit Passive Skill that partially recovers lost health over time. This makes him a great close-in fighter and promotes an aggressive playstyle.
On the flip side, there’s Hunk. He has Active Camouflage, which cloaks him from sight and masks his footsteps. Hunk can pair this with his Assassinate ability, which is a powerful short-range stab, for bonus damage. His passive, Tragedy of the Reaper, extends Active Camouflage duration for each kill with Assassinate while cloaked. Hunk makes for an excellent scavenger character. He’s best used to skirt around the edge of the area and sneak in to pick off wounded players.
Creature Feature
One of the more unique aspects for Resident Evil: Re:Verse is that when your character dies, you have a chance to get revenge as a BOW. When your human character’s health hits zero, they’ll collapse and mutate into one of the enemies found throughout the series. By default, you’ll spawn as a Fat Molded, but if you pick up virus vials while playing as a human, you’ll get the opportunity to play as more powerful creatures.
I have to say, it did feel cool playing as Jack Baker, Nemesis, and the Super Tyrant. In contrast to the human characters, the bioweapons rely on primarily on melee attacks with the occasional ranged special ability. These creatures also differ in that your time with them is limited. Their HP gradually decreases starting when you spawn.
Flip that Asset
Of course, one of the more negative aspects of the game is the asset recycling. Aside from a few of the item pickups, I didn’t recognize a single new model. All the characters are ripped straight from the Resident Evil 2 and 3 remakes and Resident Evil 7. Even the arena is just the first floor of the RPD from RE2 and 3 with some slight modifications. The comic book filter somewhat obscures the rampant reused of models and textures, but once it’s turned off, it becomes immediately apparent that visually, there’s nothing new with this game,
I’d better understand the asset flipping if Re:Verse was a title that spoke to the fanbase. As it stands, I have no idea why Capcom made it. Resident Evil: Resistance was panned when it was released alongside the RE3 remake, and it was closer to a survival horror existence than Re:Verse. I’d even get it if Capcom was being greedy and trying to load it up with microtransactions, but there were no apparent progression systems at all in the beta.
There wasn’t any reward during the beta when getting first place other than being head honcho on the results screen. I would hope there’ll be some sort of currency or unlockables in the final product. There’s plenty of possibilities for cosmetics, even if they’re just more flipped assets.
Resident Evil: Re:Verse preview | The final verdict (for now)
The biggest issue with Resident Evil: Re:Verse is not that it’s a terrible experience. I had fun during the beta, but there’s nothing about the game that’s uniquely Resident Evil. You could drop any franchise into Re:Verse‘s framework, change the models and flavor text, and you’d never know that it had anything to do with RE.
I’m not sure why this project was approved. Capcom could have instead done a bite-sized Mercenaries mode or a single-level Outbreak-type game. Both of these are concepts that fans have repeatedly expressed interest in. As it stands, from what I saw in the beta, RE fans won’t hate Re:Verse for what it is, a bland deathmatch with a few unique features. Instead, they’ll hate it for what it could have been.
