Resident Evil Revelations 2 Could Be the Peak of Resident Evil Design

How a spinoff showed up its predecessors

There’s going to be a lot of Resident Evil and survival horror talk from me for the next two months as I continue to write my next book on horror design and the genre. In a previous post, I spoke about how the downfall of Resident Evil occurred around the time of Resident Evil 6. Following RE6, a spin-off named Revelations was released which performed well enough to garner a sequel.

The first game was just so-so and emphasized the worst aspects of the action-horror design that led to the purported downfall of the series. With the second game, however, it’s a far more interesting beast that I think represents the very best interpretation of what is Resident Evil design.

Revealing revelations

Before hardcore RE fans come at me with pitchforks like the villagers of RE4, Resident Evil Revelations 2 is by no means the best game in the series. What I want to talk about is how it represents what could be the best formula for Resident Evil game design.