Resident Evil Requiem looks scary. Really scary. I know that shouldn't be surprising, and yet recent previews of the game shocked me more than a zombified dog crashing through a mansion window.

This was supposed to be the action-y one. Resident Evil 7 was terrifying, and for most of its runtime, exhilaratingly disempowering. Resident Evil Village had a foot in each world, with moments of pure horror and blood-pumping set pieces where you had to go all Rambo on Victorian ghoulies. Previous final entries in RE trilogies have prepared me to expect Requiem to double down on the double barrel. But everything seems to indicate Capcom is going back to the 7 well. That's fine with me — the water there is tasty.

Itchy, tasty that is.

Finding My Fear In Resident Evil 7

Resident Evil 4 was my introduction to the series, but it was over a decade old by the time I played it. It was wonderful, but outside of a few key moments, it mostly wasn't scary. Leon's European vacation is a fantastic action-adventure game, but the camp and carnage drown out the chills.

When I picked up Resident Evil 7 shortly after its 2017 launch, I was unprepared for how frightening it would be. I've played a ton of horror games in the eight years since, but at the time, I was coming off a four-year-long break from gaming, and before the hiatus, I hadn't really played much horror, anyway. I’d played a few hours of Dead Space here and there, but otherwise my experiences were more horror-adjacent. BioShock, Call of Duty Zombies, Lavender Town in Pokemon Red and Blue, and some choice moments from Batman: Arkham Asylum might be spooky or share iconography with the genre, but they weren't all-out horror.

So RE7 was the first modern RE game I played, and my first real foray into interactive horror. I remember feeling a really palpable fear as I first booted it up— despite the fact that I was playing during the day in my well-lit living room with multiple roommates watching.

The opening finds Ethan Winters — the milquetoast hero who is the weak link of 7 and Village — traveling into the Louisiana bayou in pursuit of his missing wife, Mia. This brings him to a plantation deep in the wilderness, surrounded by dense foliage.

As you approach the house, you realize that the place is in a state of severe disrepair. Exploring further soon reveals that the Bakers, the mild-mannered family who occupied the estate, have been driven monstrously mad. It's unclear what has caused the change, but with the chainsaw-wielding patriarch Jack bearing down on you, you don't have much time to think about logistics. You only have time to run.

Powerless And On The Run

Most of the game maintains a similar level of terror. Your weapons are weak, low on ammunition, or both. Enemies can tank a ton of shots and some will just heal from whatever you throw at them. The house creaks, even when no one is around. The dark is really dark. You might just want to find the animal-shaped statue you desperately need to open a door, but tough luck, there are slow, sludgy monsters standing in the way.

As violent as things get once you enter the house, I remember the scariest moment of my initial playthrough being the long, slow walk through the woods. Horror fans know that the monster in your imagination is always scarier than the monster developers or directors render with polymer or pixels. And, during those long minutes, as I walked the perimeter, and procrastinated entering the premises, it was the mystery of what the house could hold that was most horrifying.

Now, I'd just walk in. But, at the time, I wasn't so accustomed to horror. And video game horror can be scarier than movie horror because you have to become the final girl. You can't just watch someone enter a building they shouldn't enter, shouting, "Don't go in there, moron!" You have to be the moron and you have to go in there if you want to finish the game.

I would love to see the trilogy end on a similar note of terror, rather than leaning too far into action. Thankfully, it looks like that's exactly what Capcom's doing.