| Resident Evil Zero | |
|---|---|
North American box art depicting main protagonists Rebecca Chambers and Billy Coen |
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| Developer(s) | Capcom Production Studio 3 |
| Publisher(s) | |
| Director(s) | Koji Oda |
| Producer(s) | Tatsuya Minami |
| Writer(s) | Noboru Sugimura Hiromichi Nakamoto Junichi Miyashita |
| Composer(s) | Seiko Kobuchi |
| Series | Resident Evil |
| Platform(s) | Nintendo GameCube, Wii |
| Release date(s) | |
| Genre(s) | Survival horror |
| Mode(s) | Single-player |
| Rating(s) | |
Resident Evil Zero, known in Japan as Biohazard 0 (Japanese: バイオハザード0 Hepburn: Baiohazādo Zero), is a survival horror video game developed and published by Capcom for the Nintendo GameCube and released in 2002. It was the last of the main titles to use the original Resident Evil game system prior to the change in system ushered in by the release of Resident Evil 4.
The game's storyline serves as a prequel to Resident Evil, covering the events and ordeals experienced by the STARS Bravo team, including Rebecca Chambers, a few hours prior to the original game.[1] The game was released on November 10, 2002 in North America; November 21, 2002 in Japan; February 28, 2003 in Australia and March 7, 2003 in Europe.
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The main gameplay feature of Resident Evil Zero, dubbed the "partner zapping" system, is unique in the series in that instead of choosing a single character to play through the game, the player controls both of the main characters through the entire game: Rebecca Chambers, STARS Bravo team's medic from the original Resident Evil, and Billy Coen, an escaped ex-military convict. Both characters can travel together, with one character being controlled by the player and other by the computer, or split up and search separate areas each at the same time. This dual control is central to solving some of the puzzles in the game. The difference between the characters is that Rebecca can acquire chemicals with her mixing kit and can get into tight spaces, but has less health. In contrast, Billy can handle heavy objects, has a lighter and can sustain more damage than Rebecca, but cannot mix herbs.
The game also does away with the use of boxes placed in fixed locations for the player to store items in. Instead, the player can now drop items on the floor to make room for new ones, which they can later retrieve for future use. The locations of dropped items are displayed on the player's map.
On July 23, 1998, special police STARS Bravo Team is sent in to investigate a series of grisly murders in the Arklay Mountains region outside of Raccoon City. On the way to the scene, Bravo's helicopter malfunctions because of a sabotage[2] and is forced to crash land in the forest. The team soon discover an overturned military police transport truck, along with the mutilated corpses of two officers. The team split up and Bravo team's field medic, Rebecca Chambers, finds a train stopped in the middle of the forest.
Rebecca soon discovers that the train, the Ecliptic Express, is infested with zombies. After a little exploration, she teams up with the man the military police were escorting to his execution; former U.S. Marine Billy Coen and the two explore the remaining train compartments while combating the zombies, swarms of strange leeches, and a mutated scorpion. As the train begins speeding out of control towards a cliff, the two manage to apply the brakes and divert its course towards an abandoned research and training center.
The pair investigate the underground facility, being forced to defeat the Umbrella Corporation's experiments: mutated insects, spiders and primates. During their navigation, Billy reveals that his unit was forced to kill the innocent civilians of an African village in the midst of a civil war against his wishes, and he soon found that their actions were based on false information. They discover that the former operator of the facility James Marcus, along with Ozwell E. Spencer and Edward Ashford, discovered the Progenitor virus which, when combined with the ebola virus, created a strain that, despite being photosensitive, caused rapid mutations. Ashford originally wanted to use the virus to help the handicapped through its regenerative effects, but after his death Spencer and Marcus began research on its applications for bio-weapons, combining it with leech DNA which eventually led to the formation of the zombiefying T-virus. After a showdown with a gigantic bat inside a church, Billy is attacked by a T-virus infected primate and becomes lost inside an underground laboratory.
While searching for him, Rebecca meets fellow Bravo Team member Enrico Marini. He tells Rebecca about 'an old mansion which Umbrella uses for research' not far from the facility. Rebecca declines Enrico's offer to follow him there, instead deciding to continue her search for Billy.
Then Rebecca fights a released Tyrant before finding Billy washed up on a walkway.
After fighting the Tyrant together, the two eventually meet Marcus. It is revealed that both Albert Wesker and William Birkin were oblivious to the cause of the outbreak in both the Ecliptic Express and the mansion, and that the real culprit was Marcus, an employee of Umbrella who operated the facility until his assassination by Wesker and Birkin, on the orders of Spencer. During his dying moments, his pet queen leech entered his body and reproduced exponentially over ten years to absorb his DNA and memories to bring him back to life. Marcus proceeds to split into a mass of leeches, before chasing Rebecca and Billy through the facility. Birkin activates the self-destruct system as the Queen Leech, Rebecca and Billy continue to fight. After being injured due to a brief exposure to sunlight, the monster is paralysed when the overhead entrance to the laboratory is opened just as the sun rises. Rebecca throws Billy a Magnum revolver and he delivers the final shot to the Queen Leech.
As the facility crumbles, the two escape into the forest and come to a halt on a cliff overlooking the Spencer estate. They salute one another after Rebecca declares Billy "officially dead". Each goes their own way, with Rebecca heading towards the mansion to investigate the whereabouts of Bravo team. Immediately after the mansion would detonate or not. (depending on the different endings of Episode 1)
Developed by Capcom Production Studio 3,[3] the concept of a prequel to the original Resident Evil first blossomed shortly after the Nintendo 64DD's announcement in 1995, when the original game itself was still in development.[4] Early in the game's development, it was intended to be sold on a CD-ROM, with the possibility of an N64 cartridge-based version being researched in 1997.[5]
While the 64DD was intended to use CD-ROMs, Studio 3 instead chose to only use the cartridge-based Nintendo 64, as it was believed by the developers that the platform's cartridge-based media would be more capable in handling the item dropping and the unique 'partner zapping' systems proposed for the game than disc-based media, due to the lack of loading times.[4] This iteration of the game was first unveiled during the Tokyo Game Show in 2000. Only footage of the train stage, the Ecliptic Express, was used because the quality of the other stages was not considered good enough for preview.[4]
In contrast to other known Resident Evil prototypes, which have been known to go through massive changes during production, (one of the most dramatic examples being the original idea for Resident Evil 4, which was eventually released as the start of an entirely new series, called Devil May Cry) the actual game plan did not change as dramatically compared to the released version. Rebecca's original character design featured her wearing a beret instead of the red bandanna she wears in the original game (it is unknown whether this discrepancy would've been explained in the actual game). In the released GameCube version, she wears neither (as her character model in the game is based on REmake). The train in the beginning of the N64 version did not actually move until being activated by the player. Edward Dewey was originally scripted to lose his hand to a Cerberus before his death (which would later turn out to be the same hand found by Joseph Frost in the original game). However, this would prove unnecessary with the inclusion of Kevin Dooley in REmake. The N64 version's graphics were more in line with Resident Evil 2 and Resident Evil 3: Nemesis than any other game in the series.
Production of the game shifted from the Nintendo 64 to the GameCube as a result of the transition to sixth generation consoles; consequently the game was delayed so that the environments could be upgraded to match other 120-bit games of the generation.[4] Since the GameCube made use of a disc-based media, the programmers were forced to rely on clever programming methods to shorten the loading times.[4]
The storyline in Resident Evil Zero was originally supposed to lay the groundwork for the forthcoming Resident Evil 4 by introducing the Progenitor virus (beforehand known as the "Clay virus") which was to play a major role in RE4. Initially Resident Evil 4 had Leon S. Kennedy exploring an ancient castle in Europe that was owned by Umbrella and was reported to be where Umbrella's B.O.W. research began. At some point in the game, the Progenitor Virus is unleashed and infects Leon which makes him hallucinate at points in the game which fans have speculated is symbolic for his body trying to fight off the virus. Most of Resident Evil Zero's new storylines was rendered obsolete when Shinji Mikami took over directorial control of Resident Evil 4 and tossed everything out, intending Resident Evil 4 to have a completely new story, as a change of scenery (and enemies) to the previous Resident Evil games. The concept of exploring the origins of the Progenitor virus and Umbrella's research into it was later used in Resident Evil 5.
In late 2008, a Wii port was released solely for Japanese gamers. This port was criticized by gamers due to the lack of new features. The basis of which was due to many gamers using the Wii's reverse-compatibility to play the cheaper GameCube port. On March 12, 2009 Capcom announced that they will be releasing Resident Evil 0 and Resident Evil (REmake) on the Nintendo Wii in North America as the Resident Evil Archives. They will be released as the "classics collection" and are slated to hit stores at the end of June 2009 for $30.00 each. A "classics collection" and the release of The Darkside Chronicles is most likely to make up for Resident Evil 5 not seeing a Wii version. As with Resident Evil 4, the games will be outfitted with Wii pointer controls.
Due to an unexpected error on game transfer, the Wii version was pushed back to early December. The games official North American release date was December 1, 2009, making Resident Evil Archives: Resident Evil Zero the last game in the Resident Evil series to be released before 2010. Capcom has since released an upgraded version of Resident Evil Archives: Resident Evil Zero that comes with a literal Umbrella colored in the traditional White and Red of the Umbrella Corporation and has the Umbrella logo on two sides.
The Wii Port released in North America has received little to no change from the original GameCube Release, and was criticized for not fully using the Wii remote capabilities.
| Reception | |
|---|---|
| Aggregate scores | |
| Aggregator | Score |
| GameRankings | 84.15%[6] |
| Metacritic | 83[7] |
| Review scores | |
| Publication | Score |
| 1UP.com | B+[8] |
| Allgame | [9] |
| Eurogamer | 8 out of 10[10] |
| Famitsu | 38 out of 40 |
| Game Informer | 9.25 out of 10[11] |
| GamePro | [12] |
| Game Revolution | B[13] |
| GameSpot | 8.0 out of 10[14] |
| GameSpy | [15] |
| GameZone | 9.3 out of 10[16] |
| IGN | 8.2 out of 10[17] |
| X-Play | |
| Rotten Tomatoes | 8 out of 10 |
The game was well received by critics and has sold 1.25 million copies worldwide.[18]
A Wii version of Resident Evil Zero was released in Japan on July 10, 2008 as Resident Evil Archives: Resident Evil 0.[19] The Wii version is a direct port of the original GameCube game with added support for the Wii Remote and Nunchuk (without pointer controls) and the Classic Controller in addition to the GameCube Controller. It was also released in North America on December 1, 2009.
IGN gave the Wii version a "poor" 4.5/10, while IGN Australia gave it a "mediocre" 5.4.[20]
Zero Hour is a novelization of the game written by S. D. Perry. It is the seventh and final Resident Evil novel written by Perry, but precedes the others in chronological order. It follows the same continuity as Perry's previous novels based on the series.
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