Resident Evil Requiem preview — The making of true fear

At Capcom’s Summer Game Fest booth, we were privy to a presentation for Resident Evil Requiem. Starting things off, we were told that Requiem marked a “bold evolution” for the franchise in the ninth entry, with that survival horror feel but also plenty of action. Requiem’s new main character Grace Ashford will have to conquer her fears throughout the events of the game.

Color me as someone who sees plenty to be afraid of. Our demo opened with Grace strapped upside down to a medical table, a scene you’ve seen if you watched the reveal trailer. After cleverly finding a way to free herself, Grace is hurt and needs to find a way out of wherever the heck she is. In accordance with the other two of the recent trilogy, the attempts in this preview were in first-person, the scariest of all perspectives.

Immediately, you’re struck by the visual fidelity and detail. Requiem is a technological achievement from Capcom, with better hardware assisting them to that end. The entire presentation was captured on PlayStation 5 Pro, and the team knocked the look out of the park. A dark room is creepy, but there’s a difference between dark in video games and in real life. Somehow, even the darkness looks graphically impressive, with a realistic feel that isn’t matched by anything else.

Everything revealed by light is an aesthetic marvel as well. The room you open in seems to be some sort of doctor’s office, and the detail between the desk, armchair, and fireplace all make you feel like you’re standing in the room as Grace. To make a horror game work, you have to be immersed in its world, and Capcom has nailed that in Requiem.

Walking out of the office and into a pitch black hallway, the gameplay is immediately unsettling. Not only are you walking through a dark corridor, with some occasional flickering lights depending on what switches actually work, but Grace’s exasperated breathing and labored footsteps makes for a lot of tension. It makes it harder to concentrate on the task at hand, something I’m sure is intentional. Given your previous experience with the franchise, the assumption that something could be around the next corner or behind you at the same time makes any new distraction disconcerting. At any rate, the atmosphere is horror perfection

Moving through the building, Grace will need to find different items to continue forward. In line with other Resident Evils, finding things like keys, fuses, and more will aid you in getting to the next task. You’ll also come across the medical injector, Requiem’s method for regaining health.

Unfortunately, moving forward means eventually discovering some sort of monster. As Grace opened a door, a body suddenly came at her, only to find it to be a dead doctor. Grace took a moment to check for any signs of life, before a massive set of claws reached down to pick up the corpse. A deformed head bit through the doctor’s skull, and in that shower of blood Grace made a break for any sort of safety that could be found. This sequence is reminiscent of recent games; you’ll spend more time running than fighting. 

The monster is also grotesque in all the right ways, seeming like an enlarged and disfigured little girl… if you could call this thing human at all. Hearing its unnerving, guttural sounds left me in terror, watching it contort as it moves through a doorframe is unnatural. If Capcom’s goal in this presentation was to make us sick to our stomachs, consider it done.

Eventually, Grace makes it out, although not without several stressful sessions of hide and seek with the creature. The worst part of hiding is your emergence from where you’ve stowed away; you have no idea where your worst nightmare has gone. In those final seconds of the demo, the intensity of sprinting away from the monster is on full display. This is Resident Evil Requiem: a sense of dread and panic each time you press the start button.

Capcom did have one extra surprise for everyone. Third-person perspective will be arriving in the game. It’s also accessible at any time, meaning you can change over to it on the fly. Watching Grace get chomped on by the monster in the short third-person reveal was disgusting – although I do hope that perspective might make it easier for me to tolerate the trepidation. Resident Evil Requiem arrives on February 27th, 2026 for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series consoles.