| Resident Evil (RE) is a third-person horror/survival video game series developed by Capcom. The franchise--which features hordes of slow-moving zombies--drew its influences from two main sources. The largest of these was George A. Romero's series of zombie movies, including Night of the Living Dead, Dawn of the Dead, and Day of the Dead. The other source of inspiration was the 1989 Super Famicom video game Sweet Home. The video game series takes place in the fictitious Raccoon City. The evil Umbrella Corporation controls the town economically and has some less-than reputable business practices. The Umbrella Corporation has been conducting illegal research into biological weapons, unwittingly creating a race of the walking dead in the process. As a member of S.T.A.R.S. (Special Tactics and Rescue Squad), players are sent to the outskirts of the city to investigate. The game play in Resident Evil video games consists of typical third-person action fare blended with problem-solving. RE's puzzles have been the bane of many players, as they can be quite difficult to solve and must be completed before advancing in the game. Due to the advanced nature of the series, and combined with the series' frightening scenes and vast amounts of blood and gore, the Resident Evil franchise is not recommended for children. The series was originally developed for the PlayStation console, but its great success saw ports to virtually every other console as well, including RE for PS2, and RE for Xbox. Since the first Resident Evil video game, a large number of sequels, prequels, and updated versions have been released. The series became such a phenomenon that it broke into mainstream culture, and a line of toys, comic books, and a popular franchise of films were also developed. |