Resident Evil Requiem Review – Raccoon Returns with Hugely Ambitious Horror
A candid look at Resident Evil Requiem: gorgeous path-traced visuals, tense dual-protagonist gameplay, and a launch marred by FOV controversy and day‑one hiccups. Is it worth your survival kit?
I jumped into Resident Evil Requiem with the same mix of excitement and dread I reserve for old friends who might bite. Capcom promises a two‑headed experience: Grace’s claustrophobic, investigative horror and Leon’s action‑leaning, gun‑heavy playstyle. On paper it reads like RE7 and RE4 had a dramatic, photorealistic baby—and a lot of that promise comes true. Still, the launch felt like a haunted house with a few creaky doors: gorgeous one moment, glitchy the next.
Stalking Through Shadowed Hotels
Playing Grace feels like being invited to a party you never RSVP’d to — except the host wants to eat you. Her sections lean heavily into investigative tension: slow walking, note‑picking, audio cues, and the kind of puzzles that reward patient observation. First‑person amplifies the horror; I found myself holding the breath button (yes, please let that be a thing) and inching around corners. Resources are precious and fights are terrifying when they happen, because many encounters punish loud mouths. Switching to Leon flips the script: third‑person, cover‑style movement, heavier guns and a more kinetic pacing that scratches the itch RE4 players have been starved for. Both characters let you toggle between first and third person, which I appreciated for accessibility and for when my stomach couldn’t handle Grace’s tight camera.
When Old Tricks Are Given New Teeth
What separates Requiem from just another nostalgia trip are the blended systems. Grace’s stealth and investigative beats sit beside Leon’s ruthless encounters, and the game uses that contrast cleverly in level design: the same map can feel like a hunting ground in Grace’s hands and a battlefield for Leon. The Deluxe Kit cosmetics and the Letters from 1998 add fan service that’s actually fun to collect rather than just a store checklist. Inventory management feels satisfyingly tense — I legitimately played Tetris with ammo and herbs more than once — and puzzles have that classic Resident Evil cadence of ‘think, backtrack, survive’. Quality‑of‑life options are deep in some places (per‑character camera sensitivity, multiple upscalers) but glaringly absent in others — most notably, no official first‑person FOV slider at launch, which frustrated a lot of PC players and accessibility advocates.
A Photoreal Nightmare (and Sometimes a Bug Report)
Technically, this is perhaps the showpiece of the RE Engine so far. Path tracing, lighting, and texture fidelity produce scenes where rain on a neon car looks like a photograph and a hallway can read as horror cinema. Sound design deserves its own trophy; footsteps, distant growls and the silence before a scream are used like instruments. Performance is a mixed bag depending on hardware: many praise the Steam Deck support and surprisingly good scaling, while others report crashes during shader compilation, frame‑generation problems, and odd UI issues (Xbox icons on DualSense, forced 1080p in multi‑monitor setups). Ultrawide cutscene handling and some stuttering in outdoor scenes also popped up in reports. My personal play sessions alternated between jaw‑dropping visuals and sessions where I had to tweak settings to stop crashes — a frustrating but fixable launch pattern if Capcom follows through with patches.
Resident Evil Requiem is a bold, often brilliant return to Raccoon City that blends classic survival horror with modern, cinematic presentation. I loved the dual‑hero structure and the technical highs are jaw‑dropping, but launch‑day stability and accessibility issues hold it back from perfection. Recommended for fans willing to tolerate early patches; others might wait for the dust to settle.
Pros
- Stunning path‑traced visuals and top‑tier sound design
- Two distinct playstyles (Grace investigative, Leon action)
- Flexible first/third‑person toggles and deep QoL options in places
- Strong Steam Deck support and impressive optimization for many rigs
Cons
- Day‑one technical issues: crashes, shader compile problems
- No official first‑person FOV slider at launch; some accessibility misses
- Ultrawide/cutscene quirks and occasional stuttering outdoors
Player Opinion
Player reactions are loud and split: many reviewers gush about the visuals, sound design, and the emotional punch of playing Grace and Leon in alternating segments. Longtime fans call it a love letter to the series, praising the blending of RE7’s tense horror with RE4’s gunplay. At the same time, recurring complaints dominate the forums: crashes on launch, shader compilation hangups, and the conspicuous absence of a first‑person FOV slider that makes portions unplayable for some. Performance reports vary wildly — some hit buttery 60+ fps even on mid rigs, others see instability or odd UI bugs. If you’re sensitive to motion or need strict accessibility options, check community fixes and patches first.