I wouldn't have thought it possible after the absurdly over-the-top Resident Evil 6, but I'm really looking forward to Resi 7, which appears to be returning to the roots of the series and then some. James Davenport seemed to enjoy his time with the E3 demo, which is not part of the main game but is instead meant to act as a sort of taster sample, minus the combat and puzzles that will almost certainly be included in the main event.
Some things that won't be in the main game, however, are quick-time events. Introduced into the series with the fourth game, these button-mashing/whacking/failing sequences reached a nadir in Resi 6, its lengthy, ridiculous cutscenes interrupted frequently by overly harsh QTEs.
You know what though? They won't be in Resident Evil 7. Hooray! In an interview on Capcom's Capcom Unity blog, Resident Evil 7 producer Masachika Kawata stated, with a laugh, that "there will be no Quick Time Events in Resident Evil 7. I know there are a lot of people who will be relieved to hear that".
If you're under the impression that Resi has abandoned the Umbrella corporation and virus outbreaks in favour of ghosts and murderous families, maybe don't be, as game director Koshi Nakanishi says in the same interview that they "haven’t just thrown out Resident Evil as it exists and turned it into a ghost story. It will all make sense in the end".
Resident Evil 7 will be out on January 24, 2017.
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Tom loves exploring in games, whether it’s going the wrong way in a platformer or burgling an apartment in Deus Ex. His favourite game worlds—Stalker, Dark Souls, Thief—have an atmosphere you could wallop with a blackjack. He enjoys horror, adventure, puzzle games and RPGs, and played the Japanese version of Final Fantasy VIII with a translated script he printed off from the internet. Tom has been writing about free games for PC Gamer since 2012. If he were packing for a desert island, he’d take his giant Columbo boxset and a laptop stuffed with PuzzleScript games.