Resident Evil Requiem was originally planned as an online game before Capcom scrapped the idea and shifted its focus to horror, according to producer Masachika Kawata.
According to Circana data analyzed by Mat Piscatella, Resident Evil Requiem was the best-selling game in the U.S. and worldwide during the first eight months of 2026. The game sold 5 million copies in its first five days, reached 6 million sales by mid-March, and later surpassed 8 million units globally. The game also set a new Resident Evil record on Steam, reaching 344,214 players at the same time during its opening weekend.
Kawata revealed the original plan in Biohazard 30th Special Mook (magazine book), a 124-page fan book covering the franchise’s history, creature genealogy, and developer interviews. He said that game director Koshi Nakanishi initially developed the game as an online title.
According to Kawata, the game development involves continuous trial and error, with developers exploring different ideas before settling on the final direction. The team ultimately moved away from the online-game concept to focus on the horror experience in Resident Evil Requiem.
Kawata said, “Every game is a continuous process of trial and error. For example, with Resident Evil Requiem, [game director Koshi Nakanishi] initially went so far as to develop it as an online game.” He added, “However, the results of research conducted partway through development were not favorable, so we decided to prioritize the horror concept once again and abandoned the online direction.”
Kawata revealed another major development detail in the mook, explaining that Leon was the team’s first choice for the protagonist. However, the developers worried that players cutting through zombies too easily would lean too heavily into action, making the game less frightening.
Leon was the first character confirmed to appear as a protagonist in Resident Evil Requiem. Capcom felt that Leon’s strong combat abilities could make the game lean too heavily toward action, reducing its horror elements. The development team decided to introduce Grace as a new character to help maintain the game’s horror focus.
“We determined that with Leon alone, who excels in combat, ‘horror would no longer work,’ so it was decided to introduce Grace as a new character,” Kawata said. He added, “By keeping the full picture of the game, which would develop along both the horror and action sides, until the very end, we were able to successfully maintain interest in it up until release.”
Nakanishi’s original plan to develop Resident Evil Requiem as an online game was not entirely surprising, as Capcom had previously considered adding multiplayer and microtransactions to Resident Evil 7 during its conceptual phase.
In 2022, franchise producer Jun Takeuchi revealed that Capcom management had pushed developers to create games based on what players were asking for. Takeuchi said directors faced pressure to include features such as online multiplayer, downloadable content, live-service elements, and microtransactions.
Takeuchi said, “The idea of multiplayer got killed off pretty quickly. If we could properly put it together, we could make an exciting horror multiplayer game, but we didn’t really have any good ideas, so we set it aside. We went down the list, chopping them out, until we had marketing’s worst nightmare — a regular old single-player horror game.”
Capcom is focusing more on Resident Evil after a successful year for the series. The new live-action film, Resident Evil (2026), directed by Zach Cregger, was released on September 18, 2026. It earned a 96% score on Rotten Tomatoes and grossed $280 million worldwide on a $75 million budget. Meanwhile, the Resident Evil Code: Veronica remake could arrive in February 2027, but its release date has not been officially confirmed.
Capcom’s Resident Evil Requiem is now available for Nintendo Switch 2 players.
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