Iwata And Kawata On Resident Evil: Revelations

Resident Evil: Revelations producer, Masachika Kawata, recently had a talk with Nintendo president, Satoru Iwata, about the two Resident Evil games in development for the Nintendo 3DS. Since both Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D and Revelations were being developed side-by-side, Iwata asked how Capcom coordinated the two.

“This time might have been an unusual example, but since we were making two games at once, we divided it up, taking care of the final action bits in Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D and making graphics and other aspects of presentation in Resident Evil: Revelations,” Kawata replied.

He elaborated further: “The plan for Resident Evil: Revelations was moving along first, but we were putting a lot of work into the scenario and other aspects of the game, so it was going to take a long time to complete.”

“However,” Kawata continued, “we wanted to release something soon after the Nintendo 3DS system hit the market, so we started making and testing Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D — the game system of which was already pretty much in place.”

Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D will release in the U.S. next week, but it’s Revelations which is the more ambitious game. Revelations, Kawata says, is being treated as if it were a console game, rather than a portable one, with regard to its production values. That said, since Revelations is on the 3DS, it will contain certain elements specific to portable gaming, although Kawata didn’t reveal what these would be.

“Since we were making Resident Evil for a handheld, we were careful about adding elements specific to handheld gaming,” he revealed. “It’s hard to talk about anything we haven’t disclosed yet, though.”

Revelations will be a more traditional Resident Evil game, focused more on scaring the player than recent games in the series. “Some who have played the series on a home console may be worried. But I think you can experience the horror and enjoyment in a way unique to handheld,” Kawata assured.

You can watch the latest in-game footage of Resident Evil: Revelations here.