The Winters family has moved to Europe at the behest of series mainstay Chris Redfield, who showed up to rescue the pair at the end of Resident Evil 7 the couple has since had a child named Rose, and they’re trying to live a normal domestic life. Its first unsettling moment happens during a conversation between the game’s protagonist Ethan Winters and his wife, Mia. įrom the jump, Village invites the comparison between Resident Evil’s horror and action moods. If you want curated lists of our favorite media, check out What to Play and What to Watch. When we award the Polygon Recommends badge, it’s because we believe the recipient is uniquely thought-provoking, entertaining, inventive, or fun - and worth fitting into your schedule. Polygon Recommends is our way of endorsing our favorite games, movies, TV shows, comics, tabletop books, and entertainment experiences. When Resident Evil 4 adopted its landmark behind-the-shoulder perspective and rewarded headshots (and subsequent games refined the shooting even further), it raised the question: Can something that empowers the player this much still be a horror game? The first few games definitely had their share of ridiculous plots, but the exploration-based gameplay kept the focus on horror.

Resident Evil has always had these kinds of fluctuations between slow horror creep and bombastic action. Then, a couple of hours later, I was in the thick of the most absurd, over-the-top boss fight I think I’ve ever played in a Resident Evil game. I wasn’t frightened of them, but I was a little unnerved. They’re never brought up or explicitly addressed again, these goats.

There’s no cutscene that announces them, no shriek of a violin to indicate they’re supposed to scare you. As I did my rounds to see if any new items had cropped up since my last search, I noticed them: a couple of ominous black goats now grazing just outside the graveyard. After defeating a boss to get the item I needed to move forward, I returned to the titular town for the fourth time, basking in the gorgeous streaks of sunlight that pelted the abandoned houses I would skulk around at dusk.

One of my favorite moments in Resident Evil Village is small enough that I almost didn’t notice it.

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