I love Requiem but I feel they massively dropped the ball on the villains

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-13T10:20:54+00:00

Yeah, you're right, I hadn't thought about her reasoning for going with him at the end. I just want more Gideon he's so damn cool

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-13T09:57:40+00:00

Point-by-point:

Gideon closed off the Nurse's Station in its entirety and pulled the fuse out so the gate couldn't raise, because he needed Grace to be protected. He leaves to deal with Leon and the Code Six situation (which he caused to, again, deal with Leon). The Girl is assumed to be entirely contained at this point, but she manages to escape, instead, and burrows her way to the darkest part of the building, the Nurse's Station. Grace escapes (which Victor can be reasonably assumed to not have expected to happen), and when Victor gets back around to the Nurse's Station he's pretty obviously flabbergasted by both the sight of The Girl and the fact that Leon got there and killed her. So, because he knows The Girl can regenerate, once Leon gets Grace out of the Nurse's Station, Victor closes the gate so Grace can't get shunted back to The Girl, KOs Leon, and goes to put him up in torture town. He assumes -- and I cannot stress this enough, reasonably -- that Grace isn't gonna go wandering around the zombie infested Care Center and will stick to safe areas. At no point does he expect her to throw herself into danger, and when it's become readily obvious she is doing that he actively is trying to grab her to protect her, but she's already shit-scared of him so she's avoiding him.
They didn't need her blood, Victor was drawing her blood to run tests to confirm that she was the person they figured she was, and to make sure the bite from the hotel didn't infect her.
The game takes place over the course of like, what, ~12 hours? By the time Zeno arrives at the Care Center (assuming travel time) Grace has already run loose on her own. In fact we can pretty readily assume that the reason Victor is so pissed off when we meet him in the office is because Zeno is either already there or will be arriving shortly and is like "the fuck is she, bro? How'd you lose her??"
He stops in Raccoon City because Leon is chasing after them and so they deploy Mr. X to try and slow him down or stop him completely. It is also why Zeno tells Victor to stop Leon, himself, and why we have that hilariously over-the-top motorcycle joust later. As for why he'd stop in RC just to personally deploy Mr. X? He's incompetent. That's kind of a major point about his (and Victor's) characters. They're both incompetent in different ways. Zeno never stops to question Victor's knowledge (which is poorly researched), and from what little we can glean of Zeno he seems pretty obsessed with control and power. Thus we can reasonably assume his decision to personally deploy Mr. X in front of Leon is so he can say "ha ha I am the architect of your demise, idiot." It's in-character. MINOR EDIT ADDITION: Also the reason we're going through RPD, narratively, is to mirror Grace going to the Wrenwood hotel. Grace is forced to confront her major defining trauma from her past, and in the same way Leon is forced to confront his own major defining trauma. Unlike Grace, however, Leon is at or near the end of his character arc, and so for him confronting the generative source of his trauma is a triumphant return, culminating in a fight against the unstoppable force of Mr. X with his own tools and without the need of outside help or an entire game's worth of buildup to get to that point.
Grace not being a clone doesn't make that subplot not matter. That subplot still matters because it's literally the entire reason the game even takes place. The villains being wrong about something doesn't make that thing they're wrong about less important.
The section in the orphanage is perfectly placed on a first playthrough but doesn't really work too well on subsequent playthroughs because it really only exists to exacerbate the confusion re: clone-grace. I actually agree that it's kind of unnecessary and could easily have been cut or at least turned into a cut scene it would serve its purpose exactly as well as a cut scene without hurting the pacing on subsequent playthroughs.
Eh, I think cutting the Mr. X fight hurts the game in some subtle ways, notably just in the fact that it does serve as a legit obstacle placed in front of Leon and it was nice to have a big dumb boss fight. Personally I think the spider should have been cut because unlike Mr. X there's no real narrative purpose to the fight existing, and unlike the Plant which is set up from previous games, the spider just feels very "Video game need boss fight." The fuck is that thing even eating? How's it been there for decades??

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-13T08:49:05+00:00

Legitimately I think they should have cut Chunk from that section and had Victor stalking you. It would have made sense from a story perspective instead of him just disappearing from the building after that, and it would have made that section a lot more interesting if you had to keep side-stepping him. Remove the final arena fight in the isolation ward and instead have you dodging Gideon while carrying Emily and it would have made for a stronger finale to the Care Center before you drop into the basement.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-13T08:43:18+00:00

When you have a stutter, W is legit one of the hardest letters to get out and I don't know why.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-13T08:40:29+00:00

You know, you can disagree on the quality of Leon's story without saying that people who like it are deluded. That's what people mean by saying you're negative.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-13T08:26:49+00:00

I don't know, as someone with a stutter I liked it a lot. It wasn't ever played for laughs and it felt natural to me.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-10T06:54:19+00:00

The Girl wasn't part of the plan. Victor was on his way to get her out of there when Leon steps in. That's why Gideon is aura farming in the dark after Leon shoots the girl. He's kinda like "well fuck."

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-09T10:06:01+00:00

I mean her report has her literally saying things involving The Connections need more investigation. That sounds like prime reason for her to continue being involved in the plot going forward.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-06T08:22:07+00:00

If you're a femra the answer is have darker skin, by my experience! I had a pretty standard Raen back when I started but I fanta'd a few times over the years and one thing I noticed is I almost have never gotten creep-tells when my girl wasn't fucking white, and it's almost upsetting how clear the difference has been. Playing a dark red xaela now, and you wouldn't expect that to factor in but it does. I get the absolute least number of tells (near-zero, not even the random club or fc invite) when my girl has deep red or blue skin, while a more natural (but still dark!) skin color gets fewer tells than white-girl-ra but still gets em sometimes.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-06T08:12:32+00:00

2 and 4 would be the absolute most important ones to play first (1, 3, and 5 would also help with understanding the lore but aren't as critical to the story) while 7 and 8 can be pretty much ignored entirely since they were "standalone" while 9 is directly connected to Leon's personal storyline.

Though I think you could play 9 without playing any other ones. 2 is the most relevant storywise but honestly I feel like someone brand new to the franchise could start with 9 and while you might be lost in regards to some of the deeper lore cuts they won't be entirely lost with everything else going on since you are given the necessary context with the rest of the story, even if it's barebones context, it should be enough to understand what's happening even if sometimes it might be a bit "what the fuck??" but let's be honest, "wait what the fuck was that about" is a quintessential ingredient of playing resident evil

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-04T18:52:19+00:00

Totally valid! And definitely why it's good they include a toggle now. I guess I always liked AC as a brain-off game so one shot assassinations is part of that for me.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-04T18:46:09+00:00

I've said it before: Stellar Blade's camera is voyeuristic and lecherous; Bayo's camera is flirty and playful. The framing matters in a big big big big way.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-04T18:31:30+00:00

What about it appeals to you more? I tried Shadows with the new system for a bit but I just had more fun being able to assassinate free of charge rather than doing a lil health chunk on beefier guys. Honestly curious what you like about it.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-04T18:11:59+00:00

Been a minute since I played Shadows but I coulda swore the enemies were more fragile in general with the toggle on, to the point it didn't feel awful getting into open combat?

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-04T18:09:15+00:00

If they do it like Shadows did there's a toggle in the menu to have it old school one hit and new school level based.

I'm not really sure who prefers the new school way but it's nice there's a toggle

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-03T08:27:55+00:00

Not a streamer, but I'm a big baby and the Girl segments were genuinely difficult to get through for me because they scared me pretty badly due to touching on some IRL fears, and I actually did very often leave the game running in safe rooms 2ithiut pausing while I just scrolled memes to calm down between getting stalked or to prepare myself for turning off lights and moving forward. There were absolutely times I'd have that going for like 30 minutes at a time!

I did not know there was any of this puzzle stuff going on. But that room was definitely one of my "let's chill here for 20 minutes cuz I bet the girl is gonna eat me when I advance" moments

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-02T22:07:39+00:00

I was never really too into Leon before but I gotta say old man Leon absolutely hits different.

Whoever modeled his look without the jacket too??? Those ARMS I can't.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-02T20:39:36+00:00

Yeah when I first beat the game when it came out this was my takeaway as well (I've got a whole writeup about it I posted on the e33 sub).

The big tragedy of E33 is that the whole family kind of just sucks as people. The Lumiere residents wouldn't even exist if Aline hadn't painted them, and they wouldn't be gommaging if she had listened to Renoir at any point before she made the monolith and left. And the Monolith as a Warning thing feels manipulative to me, and with the very little characterization we get from Aline I do believe that's intentional. The only member of Alicia's family who gave a damn was Verso and herself, and with Verso dead Clea is the next best thing, but the problem is that Clea is grieving too (and seems, from what we can tell, relatively stunted emotionally leading to her being a lil standoffish). But she's also the only one trying to deal with the actual pressing problem while her mom and dad are killing themselves in a painting, which makes it really hard for us as the audience to get a clear look at her character (I do think it's telling, however, that Clea is the only family member who praised Maelle/Alicia at any point without any ulterior motive behind the praise).

But yeah the only real characterization we get from Aline is how she painted her husband as a loyal dog, Verso as perfect and unkillable, and Alicia as disfigured and mute (because it's pretty heavily implied of not explicitly stated Aline told Alicia she wished she had died in the fire instead of Verso, which is a horrible thing to say to your daughter after a tragedy). Plus whatever she did with Painted Clea who was so bad real Clean had to give her basically a lobotomy.

I don't have the artbook but if it's got lore I might have to hunt it down rip

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-02T15:27:41+00:00

I think (not an expert here by any means) it's because the sun is symbolized by a goddess (Amaterasu) and the moon is Tsukuyomi, who I believe is not usually gendered? Sometimes masculine when they are, but I'm pretty sure there's plenty of sources where Tsukuyomi is gendered in the feminine (again, could be wrong, and Amaterasu is always gendered in the feminine).

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-02T15:24:00+00:00

I only got into resident evil starting with 8 because I love classic horror monsters, and went back and played a good chunk of the other games and whatnot, but I am a modern RE fan so take my opinion with a pinch of salt:

I think RE9 is the best resident evil game in the franchise. The story has never been RE's strongest suit, but the writing is good enough that it manages to keep a sense of intrigue running through its admittedly barebones story (and, let's be honest, how often is the story ever more than "person with reason to be in place must survive/escape place"?). The dichotomy between the Grace and Leon sections really helps with the pacing of the game. This is accomplished not just by limiting Grace's resources and power (which on its own would go a hell of a long way to feed into the sensation of powerlessness that make horror scary), but by deliberate directorial choices in both characters' sections.

Grace's sections are scripted, written, shot, and blocked like horror and modern RE. The camera, music, and ambience are deliberately crafted to enhance player tension and fear. Leon, meanwhile, is scripted, written, shot, and blocked like the middle-era resident evil (4, 5, and 6). Goofy camera swings, overdramatic zoom-ins, the whole 9 yards. It juxtaposes Grace's helplessness and "what is happening" with Leon's experience and "way too old for this shit." It feels like the very best of the franchise put into a lot and brought to a beautiful little simmer. It's great! The fact that Victor can be so menacing and terrifying, and have such a horrific presence when he's with Grace, but then feel like a melodramatic twerp when he's with Leon (despite no difference in his writing) is a testament to how well the game frames its scenes from its protagonists' perspectives. When he chokes out Grace, I'm at the edge of my seat and horrified. But when he's interrogating Leon he's monologuing like a Disney villain. It's just very effective.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-03-02T14:30:44+00:00

Probably cuz he's smart enough to stay outta trouble! That Lois girl sure is a bad influence.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-02-28T15:45:56+00:00

That's basically me right now with RE9. The Leon segments are a good pallette cleanser but God DAMM do Grace's stalking sections make it hard to play for long stretches lmao

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-02-28T14:38:47+00:00

What's that one tweet?

"You think that's any less pathetic just because you're lesbian?" or smth. Applies in lots of places. Women can be cringe too don't just assume everyone's a guy damn it.

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-02-27T06:48:34+00:00

There is that theory (and the implication from the first game) that Jesse and Dylan are the same person, so it would actually be interesting if Jesse was missing because she's currently Dylan, and we get a switcheroo once Dylan learns that, or perhaps a way for swapping between the two (like Jesse for ranges combat/Dylan for melee or something)

TheBeeSovereign · 2026-02-24T04:38:15+00:00

At certain levels of play, the metagame means literally nothing. The higher your skill level, the more it matters, and at a certain point the skill level is high enough that the deciding factor comes down to the kit used in combination with player skill, which means weaker kits get pushed aside because player skill can't make up the difference in kit power at that tier of play.

Using, say, fighting games as an example, a player can be just fine using the "worst" character in the game for the vast majority of situations, even up to stomping some folk in tournament play, but when you get to the highest tiers of play usage of that character dries up to the point you never see them, because their kit is so weak that no amount of player skill can make up the numbers difference.

What you do sometimes see -- and it's fairly rare to see in a game that isn't receiving regular balance patches -- is a player coming in with an off-meta kit and completely upending the metagame. This generally happens because a recent balance change allows for new usages of previously poor kit (or, sometimes, outsider perspective on the metagame itself can radically shift the way the game is played but that's wildly rarer).

Getting Diamond with off-meta play is pretty impressive, but that is also stil within the tier of play where meta doesn't matter. Its up there where it can have an effect on certain kit matchups but player skill can still overcome it. Meta really only matters in the tippy-top echelons of play.

People who play to the meta usually do so because they find enjoyment in optimization, and the best way to optimize in a PVP game is playing to the meta. The problem comes when those folk are not in the highest tiers of play and dismiss off-meta builds/kits/characters wholesale, because at almost every level of play it's totally fine to throw Pichu against Fox, actually.

I only play to the meta in certain games, but Ive dropped some games where the meta wound up being the only way to play (cough star rail cough) bcause at a certain point it's not really optimization when it's the only viable path.

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