Geoff Keighley’s annual Summer Game Fest is running right now, dousing the internet in trailers for new video games—interspersed with other, non-trailer commercials for video games, because truly, games media is an artistically fulfilling space. There’s some undeniably neat stuff climbing out of the pile, though, including one pretty massive reveal: The existence of Resident Evil 9: Requiem, the latest installment in the legendary zombie game franchise.
Requiem didn’t just get an announcement, though: It got a full-blown trailer, one that came with some interesting X-Files vibes, as it focused in on a new apparent protagonist, FBI agent Grace Ashcroft. (She’s not quite sequestered down in the basement, but her ramshackle, paper-strewn cubicle in a corner of the FBI office gives some definite Spooky Mulder vibes.) After setting the character’s slightly goofball tone with a confrontation with her boss, the trailer wastes little time in shoving her into peril; we get the requisite shots of zombies chowing down on people, but also plenty of indications that the series is shifting back to more global plots, after the hyper-focused Resident Evils 7 and 8. (What’s not clear, from the trailer, is whether the series will also be returning to a third-person perspective, after two games that pulled a lot of their resurgent horror by putting you directly behind your protagonists’ eyes.) Oh, and it seemingly confirms that the franchise is returning to the nuked remains of original outbreak spot Raccoon City, with a shot of the iconic (and now demolished) police station from Resident Evil 2.
And, sure, we could maybe do without all the portentous monologuing from an unseen figure, because these games have generally not gotten better the more their villains talk. But the vibes here are pretty clearly on point. Resident Evil has been on an extremely solid run for nearly a decade at this point—basically, since it ditched out on its more expansive mindset after the largely derided Resident Evil 6—so it’s currently rolling with a pretty hefty amount of the benefit of the doubt.
