The New And Old In Resident Evil Zero’s HD Remaster

While a lot of people are hyped about the upcoming HD remaster of Resident Evil 2, many may have forgotten that another Resident Evil is getting the good old HD upgrade.

Today at TGS I sat down and spent the better part of an hour playing through part of the mansion portion of Resident Evil Zero HD Remaster. Controlling Billy and Rebecca, I solved a few puzzles, killed a few zombie monkeys, and watched Rebecca fall to her death when I realised I had no idea where the boiler room was. So yeah, Resident Evil Zero in a nutshell.

The Resident Evil Zero HD Remaster is based on the Wii port of the original GameCube game. Thus, all the enhancements to that version remain — i.e., widescreen support and alternative (non-tank) controls.

The updates are mainly cosmetic. According to Capcom representatives, most of the HD textures are the original source files for the game — which had to be massively down-ressed for the GameCube release. However, some have been updated — especially signs and the like which were unreadable in the original by design.

Unfortunately while the environments look great, the cutscenes are un-updated and look as poor as you’d expect. The voice acting is likewise dated and the lip movements in cutscenes don’t match the voices.

While I didn’t get to play it, a Capcom representative told me about the brand new additional content in the game. When you finish the game normally, you unlock “Wesker Mode.” Like Resident Evil 2’s “Tofu” this allows you to play as a new character — in this case the series’ main villain Wesker. In Wesker mode, he takes the place of Billy as Rebecca’s partner and Rebbecca herself gets a Wesker-ish costume makeover. The pair also will have some “special powers.”

Resident Evil Zero HD Remaster will be released on the PS4, PS3, Xbox One, Xbox 360, and for Windows in early 2016.