This Simple Change Makes 'Resident Evil Requiem' Even Better

Resident Evil Requiem is finally here, and it’s earned high praise across the board—that includes my review, where I gave Capcom’s latest effort a nine out of 10. The game features split protagonists with Grace Ashcroft featured for the game’s more methodical, horror-based sections and Leon S. Kennedy for the cathartic action.

Beyond the difference in tone, Requiem defaults to different points of view. Leon’s action-heavy areas are played in third person, while a first-person POV is utilized for Grace, heightening the tension and driving home vulnerability. While that’s the intended way to play, it isn’t required, and that led me to revisit the campaign after finishing it to experiment by playing Grace’s sections in the third person. The results were shockingly good.

If you played the patch for Resident Evil Village that allowed you to control Ethan Winters from a third-person POV, you know it wasn’t great. Clearly the game was designed for the native first-person perspective, and switching felt tacked on and clunky. That isn’t the case here. Both POVs are fully fleshed out, and in Grace’s case, it makes Requiem an entirely different—and I would argue even more enjoyable—experience.

Related: Where Does 'Resident Evil Requiem' Rank in the History of the Long-Running Series?

Now, this is going to be a “your mileage may vary” situation, and it really comes down to what you want from Resident Evil. If you want the most unsettling version of Grace’s story, complete with jump scares and claustrophobic escapes, first-person is the way. It’s the creepiest the series has been outside of perhaps Resident Evil 7: Biohazard.

Conversely, if you came up with the original trilogy as I did, you may find third-person Grace to be the most old-school Resident Evil has felt since the series made the switch for Resident Evil 4. Exploring the Rhodes Hill Chronic Care Center feels like a trip back in time to the 2002 remake of the original Resident Evil, where you need to manage resources and consider how best to deal with zombies in your path. You also must weigh whether it’s worth revisiting areas where corpses can reanimate at any time in search of resources you missed—or just gained access to.

With Classic Mode, which reintroduces the need to use ink ribbons to save your progress, the traditional Resident Evil vibes become even more pronounced. If you hold any affinity for the series’ origins, I strongly recommend taking the time to play Grace’s campaign from the third-person point of view and seeing if it generates the same level of nostalgia for you that it did for me.