Capcom’s Resident Evil video game franchise has been going on for a very long time, actually the first game in the series came out back in 1996. Capcom is celebrating the series’ 30th anniversary this year, a year in which it has also released its latest Resident Evil game. And the Japanese company recently revealed that Resident Evil Requiem had sold more than 5 million copies since it launch on February 28 in a press release (via IGN).
The latest Resident Evil game is the first blockbuster game of the year, and it’s not that hard to see why. Besides the game’s obvious quality (its Metacritic score stands at 89 at the time of writing), it also brings back fan-favorite character and series’ stalwart Leon S. Kennedy.
Also, the debate about whether the Resident Evil games are better in first or third person is laid to rest here, as players can chose between both perspectives in the game… Nonetheless, Leon’s parts are action-heavy and meant to be played in third-person, while those of co-protagonist Grace Ashcroft are stealth-based and work better from a first-person perspective. FBI detective Grace is a new addition to the franchise, and a very good one at that too.
Digging deeper, though, it’s clear the franchise has millions of fans worldwide, while the fact that many successful movies based on the games have hit cinemas means the brand is instantly recognizable across the globe, so more people are likely to pick up a Resident Evil game these days. This is especially true after a string of game releases over 30 years has made the series synonymous with survival horror (and action too as of late) in gamers’ minds.
Besides being a very good game overall, Resident Evil Requiem also features astounding visuals to boot.
But for some the speed with which the game got to 5 million copies sold will be hard to fathom – it is the fastest game in the series to reach this number of copies sold by a mile. Actually, the top-selling game in the franchise to date (which is 2019’s Resident Evil 2 with almost 17 million copies sold) got to the 5 million mark in a year, according to Forbes. Meanwhile, Resident Evil Requiem has done that during its first week in the market (the first 5 days to be exact).
The only Resident Evil game that compares is 2023’s Resident Evil 4 remake, which sold 5 million copies in 3 months, reaching a total of about 12 million to date.
Of course, there’s also the possibility that Requiem’s impressive run continues and that it ends up being the franchise’s top-selling game, something which can’t obviously be ruled out taking into account its superb sales performance during its first week… Time will tell whether it can sustain momentum, but for the time being it’s clear that millions of gamers worldwide are having a blast with Capcom’s latest game, and that can only be a good thing.
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