Resident Evil PC Games (1996-2000)
Resident Evil Windows 95 1997
Capcom Co., Ltd released Resident Evil for Windows 95 in Dec. of 1996 in Japan and Sept. of 1997 in the U.S.A.
Resident Evil is survival-horror game whose action is presented in 3rd-person perspective, but from many different preset angles. Resident Evil renders 3D-animated character and monster models over 2D pre-rendered backdrops. Interactable objects (such as moveable placeables) are also 3D-rendered.
In Resident Evil players control Jill Valentine or Chris Redfield as they explore a mansion while killing monsters, solving puzzles and managing limited resources (such as ammo and health). In order to explore the characters are moved across the screen or away from or towards the screen. For example, holding down on the input device moves a character that is facing the screen towards the screen whereas holding up moves it away from the screen, into the distance.
The two controllable characters can walk around, backward walk, dash about, rotate on their axes 360° (turn around on the spot), draw their weapon, sheathe/holster their weapon and aim and fire forwards and upwards or downwards at 45°. For example, firing a shotgun upwards into a zombie in close proximity blows its head clean off, thereby conserving ammo. Characters can rotate on their axes while their weapon is drawn, but they cannot move in one direction while aiming or firing in another direction; indeed, characters cannot prep attacks or attack at all while on the move. In addition, characters cannot strafe, jump, crouch or go prone. Characters can climb onto and down from some objects, however. The game often takes control of characters during realtime cutscenes; during this time, characters are animated doing things that they cannot do in normal gameplay.
Characters turn on the spot slowly; no movement is cat-like: the dash is really just a jog; there is no dodge, no side-step; actions are deliberate and tank-like. Characters can walk in narrow arcs or circles or dash in wider arcs or circles, space-permitting.
Characters can also talk to NPCs, open doors and chests, pick up objects, push objects and examine environmental points of interest in order to gain clues via floated text. Characters gesture during conversations; they also have idle animations and other situation-specific and status-based animations.
Sometimes monsters can be avoided by running past them. Naturally, this saves ammo. Monsters cannot follow characters between rooms but remain a threat if players backtrack (since they do not despawn).
Resident Evil weapons include Combat Knife, Beretta, Magnum, Shotgun, Flamethrower, Bazooka and Rocket Launcher.
Items are stored in an 6/8-slot inventory (depending on character chosen) and 48-slot chest. The map-screen can be called up at any time, and games can be saved by collecting ink ribbons to use with a typewriter (there are eight save-slots).
Resident Evil features both FMV-based and realtime cutscenes. Doors are shown opening from a first-person perspective when transitioning between rooms; likewise, staircases when transitioning between floors. This was done to add suspense and disguise the Sony PlayStation's CD-ROM load-times; they can be skipped in the PC version.
Resident Evil voice-acting and storytelling is both hilarious and ridiculous; so many stupid things are said, and said badly. Even back in the day the game was a laughing stock in this respect; it was also extremely easy to beat. That said, Resident Evil is still a good game.
Sound effects are simple but serviceable. Zombies can be heard murmuring and shambling about even when they cannot yet be seen on-screen. Wind can be heard howling in the distance when standing on the balcony, and so on.
Windows Resident Evil displays in 16-bit color depth at square-pixel 320x240 or 640x480 resolution.
Windows Resident Evil requires Intel Pentium 90 MHz CPU, 16 megs of RAM, 3D video card with 4 megs of VRAM and 16-bit sound card, but Pentium 133 and 32 megs of RAM is recommended.
A full install of Windows Resident Evil requires 400 megs of free hard disk space, which includes 109 megs of scenery data, 45 megs of room data, 47 megs of misc. data, 87 megs of speech and 112 megs of music.
Windows Resident Evil explicitly supports 3Dfx 3D acceleration via Diamond Monster 3D and Orchid Righteous 3D video cards. In addition, it explicitly supports Matrox Mystique 3D acceleration as well as Rendition Vérité 3D acceleration via Canopus Total 3D, Creative 3D Blaster and Intergraph Intense 3D video cards. Windows Resident Evil requires DirectX 3.0a.
Windows Resident Evil controls support keyboard and controllers such as the Microsoft SideWinder gamepad.
Resident Evil 2 Windows PC 1999
Capcom Co., Ltd released Resident Evil 2 for Windows 95 in Feb. of 1999 in Japan/Europe and Mar. of 1999 in the U.S.A.
Windows Resident Evil 2 displays in 16-bit color depth at square-pixel 320x240 or 640x480 resolution.
Graphics-wise, Windows Resident Evil 2 features tailorable model detail and toggleable shading, bilinear filtering, palette-changing and perspective correction. In addition, transparency is switchable between mesh and alpha-blending, special effects and number of enemies are switchable between standard and reduced, and movie playback is toggleable.
Audio-wise, Windows Resident Evil 2 sound is toggleable and switchable between mono and stereo as well as between low, standard and high quality.
Windows Resident Evil 2 requires Intel Pentium 166 MHz CPU, 24 megs of RAM, 4x CD-ROM drive, 1 meg of free HDD space, 3D video card with 2 megs of VRAM and 16-bit sound card, but Pentium 200, 32 megs of RAM, 8x CD-ROM and 450 megs of free HDD space is recommended.
Resident Evil 2 requires DirectX 6.0, DirectX Media 6.0 and Indeo Video 5.06 installed.
A full install of Windows Resident Evil 2 includes 169 megs of sound data, 91 megs of common data and 75 megs of character data. The remainder of the data is read from CD-ROM.
Windows Resident Evil 2 explicitly supports 3D acceleration via Voodoo/2, Voodoo Rush/Banshee, Rendition Vérité V1000/V2000, Nvidia RIVA 128/TNT, ATI 3D Rage Pro, 3Dlabs PERMIDIA 2, S3 Savage 3D, Intel 740 and Matrox Millennium II/G200.
Windows Resident Evil 2 controls support keyboard and gamepads.
Resident Evil 3 Windows 95/98 2000
Capcom Co. Ltd and Hi Corporation released Resident Evil 3: Nemesis for Windows 95/98 in Jun. of 2000 in Japan, Nov. of 2000 in Europe, and Apr. of 2001 in the U.S.A.
Windows Resident Evil 3 includes the separate Mercenaries - Operation: Mad Jackal game mode. Mercenaries does not need to be unlocked (and nor do Jill Valentine's costumes need unlocking).
Windows Resident Evil 3 displays in 16-bit color depth at square-pixel 320x240, 640x480 and 800x600 resolution (and up to 1600x1200). Windows Resident Evil 3 is switchable between full-screen and windowed mode.
Graphics-wise, Windows Resident Evil 3 features toggleable movie playback, texture correction and texture completion. It is also toggleable between Voodoo2 and Voodoo3. Audio-wise, music and sound effect volume is tailorable.
Windows Resident Evil 3 requires Intel Pentium II 266 MHz CPU, 48 megs of RAM, 4x CD-ROM drive, 1 meg of free HDD space, 3D video card with 4 megs of VRAM and 16-bit sound card, but 64 megs of RAM, 8x CD-ROM and 350 megs of free HDD space is recommended (a full installation requires 420 megs).
Windows Resident Evil 3 requires DirectX 6.1, DirectX Media 6.0 and Intel Indeo 5.0 installed. The game will only run in Windows 95 if Internet Explorer 4.0 is installed (which adds system files that RE3 requires: Windows 95 was five years old when RE3 was released).
Windows Resident Evil 3 controls support keyboard and gamepads such as the Microsoft SideWinder.
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