One Avocadoan’s journey delving into the realm of survival horror.

“But Blip,” you might be asking, “you played the remakes of the first two Resident Evil games. Why are you playing the original version of Resident Evil 3?” The answer is, fittingly, three-fold. Firstly, I really wanted the chance to play the original version of one of the first three games, and the first two remakes sounded too good to pass up. Second, I’ve heard that the third remake is the most controversial and truncated of the remakes. And finally, the original RE3 was cheaper than the remake at the point in time when I picked it up. I might play the remake at some point, but for now this was the clearest choice for me.

Resident Evil 3: Nemesis (RE3) is something of an odd duck, to the point I’ve frequently seen it referred to as the black sheep of the original trilogy. Even the development had some twists and turns (which you can read about in more detail here). Essentially, the success of Resident Evil 2 (RE2) prompted Capcom to greenlight several more Resident Evil games simultaneously, including a mainline RE3 for the upcoming PlayStation 2, Code Veronica for the Dreamcast, and what would become Resident Evil 0 for the Nintendo 64 (eventually shifted to the GameCube). Unfortunately for Capcom, the PS2 was still a few years away – meaning a relatively large gap in the series on Sony consoles, the first home of the franchise. It was decided to rectify this by releasing a spinoff on the original PlayStation in the meantime, a spinoff with a shorter development time, smaller budget, less creative restrictions, and a smaller and less experienced team of developers. This game was originally meant to focus on a trio of mercenaries from the Umbrella Corporation attempting to flee Raccoon City at the start of RE2’s virus outbreak. (If you’ve played RE3 before, this may sound familiar…)

Midway through development, it was decided to switch this up and have the main character be Jill Valentine, one of the player characters from the first Resident Evil (RE1), with the three mercenaries being shifted to supporting roles. This was not the only big change, though. With only two months left before development was supposed to wrap up, the game’s producers suddenly decided to officially brand it ‘Resident Evil 3’, moving it from a spinoff to a mainline series entry. (This was thought to be due to further delays with the originally intended ‘RE3’ for PS2; apparently that game eventually morphed into Devil May Cry). This necessitated some frantic additions to the game to ensure that players wouldn’t feel that it was too short to stand up with RE1 and RE2. Everything after the clock tower, as well as the park area, was developed during this condensed time span. Despite these late-development swerves, the game released in late 1999 to critical acclaim and commercial success – a nice bonus for Capcom, given the game’s comparatively small budget.

Many of the things that make RE3 a strange entry in the series – for good and for bad – can be traced back to that unusual development cycle. One such aspect is the game’s setting. RE1 and RE2 each take place largely inside a single building. RE1 has the Spencer Mansion, while RE2 has the RPD Headquarters. As a result of its origins as a spin-off intended to give a different look at the ongoing zombie apocalypse, however, RE3 occurs mainly in the labyrinthine streets of Raccoon City. There are some ‘mini-dungeons’ of sorts throughout the game, including the Post Office, the RPD HQ, the park, and the clock tower, but it is the city itself that serves as the main setting. I found this to be quite an inspired and welcome choice. Not only does it give us a change of environment from the previous two games (well, their remakes in my case), but it also helps to deepen the story of the original trilogy. By showing us firsthand how rapidly the city is collapsing the game really drives home how monstrous Umbrella’s actions have been. It doesn’t hurt that, despite the game’s age, the pre-rendered backgrounds still look great. The storefronts, the burning cars, the trash and litter everywhere – there is so much detail that makes the city feel alive. (Well, formerly alive.) I will also note that I was very pleasantly surprised to find that the RPD HQ has pretty much the exact same layout as in RE2make, albeit with more areas blocked off to make it smaller. This is due in large part to the short development time, which required the developers to re-use some assets from the original RE2, but it’s a fun bit of continuity all the same.

Another interesting deviation from the formula of the series is RE3’s focus on randomization and branching paths. Due to the game’s short length and the lack of time needed to develop fully separate dual scenarios like the first two games had, these gameplay components were introduced as a means to add replayability. Weapons (most notably the grenade launcher and Magnum) will swap places on different playthroughs, or different groups of enemies will be found in different locations. Meanwhile, at various points in time when Jill encounters an imperiling situation, the game will switch to slow motion and you will be given two actions to choose from. For example, when confronted with a powerful enemy you might be asked to run inside the nearest building or stand your ground and fight. Choosing either option – or not choosing one at all before time runs out – will frequently have noticeable effects on the game’s events moving forward. I actually played through the first half of the game twice (more on that later) and saw some of the differences due to randomization and branching choices firsthand. I loved these mechanics for how they keep you on your toes even when you are already familiar with the game.

Throughout the game Jill is hunted by a monster known by fans as Nemesis. (He isn’t named in the game itself.) Like Mr. X from RE2 (and a certain boss from RE1), Nemesis is a Tyrant, an intelligent zombie super-soldier created by Umbrella. It’s quite interesting to compare Nemesis to Mr. X. From what I understand, Mr. X in the original RE2 was largely scripted; he would always show up in the same location at the same time. This made Nemesis a pretty radical departure. While certain of his appearances were scripted, he would frequently show up at random and without warning (besides his grunted catchphrase of “S.T.A.R.S”, a reference to the elite squad Jill was part of in RE1) to terrorize Jill. If you would try to escape him by going through a door into a building or another street, there was a good chance that he would actually follow you. This does feel a little less special when, like me, you played RE2make rather than the original RE2, as this is very similar to how Mr. X operates in RE2make. In fact, I have little doubt that they were inspired by Nemesis when making that change to Mr. X in the remake. It’s still cool that they were able to pull that sort of thing off back in 1999, though, with both the limitations of the time and the truncated development cycle. (Interestingly, I’ve heard that Nemesis in RE3make essentially went the opposite route of Mr. X, becoming more scripted instead of less so.) Nemesis further differentiates himself from Mr. X by being quite a bit more aggressive. Mr. X seems to follow you at a pretty leisurely pace and appears to remain calm even when attacking. Nemesis, in contrast, will frequently charge head-on at Jill, only stopping occasionally to gloat with a roar. It makes his encounters extremely anxiety-inducing, especially when he has his secret weapon – a rocket launcher. Yes, you sometimes have to evade a nearly invincible zombie wielding a rocket launcher. He only has three shots during each encounter, but they can do a massive amount of damage if not avoided.

Outside of Nemesis, there is only one other boss in the game (called the Grave Digger, which you encounter twice). Both bosses exemplify both the good and the not-so-good of one of the game’s other major changes to the RE formula – an increased focus on action. Advancements in the RE engine allowed the developers to include more enemies onscreen at the same time compared to previous games. This was used somewhat selectively but to good effect to make certain situations feel overwhelming. New mechanics were added to the player’s moveset, including an instant 180 degree turn (which, if I recall correctly, was later used again in REmake) and a dodge. Nemesis, the Grave Digger, and even the normal enemies are all quite aggressive compared to the enemies and bosses from the previous RE installments. Environmental hazards were even added that could be used against enemies, such as explosive barrels and exploding boxes attached to walls. (I have encountered a similar use of hazards in other, later developed survival horror games, most notably for me being Crow Country.) All of these added action elements help to make the game feel a bit more cinematic and dynamic and give it a unique atmosphere.

The problem is that the game’s controls, which are largely the same as in RE1 and RE2 (judging by REmake), are too clunky to fully take advantage of the new action focus. The exploding barrels and boxes are useful in dealing with difficult enemies or large groups of enemies, but the aiming doesn’t feel quite precise enough to reliably trigger them. Several moments (including the first Grave Digger encounter) require very quick changes in direction that just aren’t really feasible with the slow tank controls (even with the new 180 degree turn). Nemesis’s aggressiveness creates some great panic-inducing moments, but one of his main attacks can be incredibly frustrating to deal with. (He can pick Jill up and toss her to the ground a few feet away. It takes her so long to get back up that he’ll frequently grab her again before you have any chance to do anything and keep repeating the process until his AI randomly decides to do something else.) And the dodge is frequently more trouble than it is worth; it activates automatically if you press the trigger button while an enemy is close, and you have no control over which direction Jill goes. Sometimes she’ll dodge straight into a group of enemies and end up in an even worse position than she started. I can appreciate what the developers were going for with all this, but it seems like their ambition sometimes exceeded what the engine is capable of.

Despite the noticeable alterations made to the previous games’ gameplay, there are still plenty of staple Resident Evil elements to be found. Puzzles remain a large component of the game, with the clock tower in particular having some fun examples. And resource management is very much still a core component of RE3. As with RE2make and Jill in RE1/REmake, you start with only eight item slots to hold any weapons, ammo, health items, and key items. You can increase the number of slots like in RE2make, but it is only done once (bringing the total to ten slots). This feels like the perfect amount to me, enough to make managing all your items a challenge but not so few that it becomes a complete slog. The game also does some interesting things with ammo; rather than only finding boxes of specific ammo lying around, you can collect two types of gunpowder that can be combined in different amounts and combinations to make ammo of your choice. It’s a great bit of customization that I first encountered in RE2make, but it appears that it was the original RE3 that first introduced the mechanic.

In terms of the availability of ammo and health items, the game pulls something of a bait-and-switch around a third of the way through that took me by surprise. Up to that point the supply of both is relatively plentiful; you are constantly moving forward to new areas and finding more items to use. It led me to be a little careless with my resources, but I should have known better. You eventually reach a point where you have to go on a scavenger hunt back through pretty much all the areas you had already explored, with newly respawned enemies but little else when it comes to new supplies. Because I had already used up much of what I had found, it ended up being a grueling experience that ground to a halt at my first encounter with the Grave Digger. I had to make the difficult decision to restart from the beginning, making sure to conserve whenever I could. Luckily that second playthrough went much more smoothly and I was able to finally progress past the Grave Digger. Ammo becomes less scarce again in the second half of the game, although still not in as much supply as in the first third.

There are certainly some parts of RE3 that feel dated aesthetically – the game is nearly three decades old at this point after all – but that ends up giving the game a sense of charm. The voice acting is often over-the-top and lacks the polish of, say, RE2make. The cutscenes can occasionally lean towards the goofy side of things. But it still can muster something of an epic feel when it needs to. (I do really like the unskippable pre-menu cutscene posted near the top of this column, although it kind of becomes annoying the thirtieth time you have to sit through it after dying.) And the soundtrack on the whole is quite strong and more noticeable to me than REmake’s or RE2make’s, with the save room theme being a standout:

Overall, I loved RE3 more than I predicted going in. It makes some notable swings when it comes to the series formula – many hit, some missed – and creates a unique little niche for itself. It might not be my favorite in the series up to this point, but it holds up pretty well and didn’t disappoint.

Survival horror and adjacent games I hope to cover (in no particular order) – Resident Evil 4 (original), Resident Evil 7: Biohazard, Resident Evil: Village, Silent Hill 2 Remake, Silent Hill 4: The Room, Amnesia: The Dark Descent, Amnesia: Rebirth, Amnesia: The Bunker, Tormented Souls, Alien Isolation, Yomawari: Midnight Shadows, The Evil Within, The Evil Within 2, Alisa, Dead Space (2008), Alone in the Dark 1, Alone in the Dark 2, Alone in the Dark 3, Alone in the Dark: The New Nightmare, Curse: Eye of Isis, Dino Crisis, Darkwood, ObsCure, Cold Fear, Lempo, Stasis, Stasis Bone Totem, System Shock 1 and 2, Metro 2033, Look Outside, Fear the Spotlight, Heartworm, Little Goody Two-Shoes, SOMA, Empty Shell, Bendy and the Ink Machine, Clock Tower: Rewind, White Day: A Labyrinth Called School, Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse, Condemned: Criminal Origins, Sorry We’re Closed, Fragile Reflection, Bioshock 1, Bioshock 2

My Current Survival Horror Ranking:

1. Resident Evil (HD Remaster) (9.5/10)
2. Signalis (9/10)
3. Resident Evil 2 Remake (9/10)
4. Resident Evil 3: Nemesis (8.5/10)
5. Crow Country (8.5/10)
6. Silent Hill f (8/10)

Up Next: Resident Evil 4 (2005)

Header image courtesy Game Rant.