It’s been 30 years since the S.T.A.R.S. team stumbled into the Spencer Mansion, and a generation of gamers was given new nightmares in Resident Evil.
Few game series get to go on that long and remain relevant, but Resident Evil has endured hard times and baffling decisions to be more popular than ever.
To mark the occasion, GameWatcher is taking 30 games from 30 years of Resident Evil history, and ranking them. Understandably, you might not agree with where your favourites (and least favourites!) are placed, but isn’t that what ranking lists are for?
30 - Resident Evil Re: Verse
The Resident Evil series is littered with failed attempts at multiplayer spin-offs. Some were ahead of their time, while others simply weren’t good. Re: Verse was so underwhelming that it barely got a chance to exist before being quietly put in a locked drawer somewhere in Capcom towers.
29 - Resident Evil: Umbrella Corps
At the lowest point in the Resident Evil series, there exists Umbrella Corps. A warfare-style online shooter that epitomised the shift towards gung-ho action the series had taken. All fine and well if it had at least been a competent shooter spin-off. But like so many multiplayer Resident Evil titles, it had all the impact of a peashooter against a Tyrant.
28 - Resident Evil Survivor
Given that the House of the Dead games were arcade favourites, a Resident Evil-themed spin on that sounded great. Unfortunately, the original PlayStation wasn’t the best place to try that out.
Interestingly, it did give us a story set immediately after the events of the original Resident Evil trilogy, and mixed enemies from all of those games in with some new variants. It’s just a shame the game was such a slog to experience.
27 - Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City
Time has been a little kinder to Operation Raccoon City simply because there have been far worse attempts at Resident Evil spin-offs since. But its alt-history take on the events of the original games wasn’t enough to mask a trudging bore of a co-op shooter.
Co-op could be fun, but you can say that about even the worst co-op games out there (Hello, Aliens: Colonial Marines).
26 - Resident Evil Resistance
Of all the modern stabs at multiplayer Resident Evil games, Resistance had the most potential. An asymmetrical survival horror experience inspired by Dead by Daylight, but with a distinctly Resident Evil flavour? It had the ingredients to be a decent distraction, having been bundled in with the Resident Evil 3 Remake.
Sadly, a lack of dedicated servers, poor game balancing, and technical hitches gave it a rough start to life. Capcom chose not to turn that around.
25 - Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D
The Mercenaries mode has shown up in various Resident Evil games over the years, but the 3DS got a whole standalone version.
It wasn’t the best platform for it, however, and with better examples available, The Mercenaries 3D felt a little pointless.
24 - Resident Evil Survivor 2 Code: Veronica
Once the Resident Evil lightgun series moved to PS2, it started to improve. Survivor 2 actually got an arcade version for a start, but the generational upgrade made the console version a step up from its predecessor.
It’s essentially a retread of Code: Veronica as a first-person lightgun game, but a twist in the plot gives us some new bits, such as a Nemesis Tyrant pursuing Claire and Steve throughout.
23 - Resident Evil Gaiden
Portable Resi adventures were a rare breed before the days of Nintendo Switch and the Steam Deck, and the results were mixed. Yet Resident Evil Gaiden offered a novel approach to survival horror on a seriously underpowered platform.
The Game Boy Color title flits between a top-down perspective for movement, while combat is in first-person. It’s a clunky mixture, but the idea remains interesting. Plus, it gave us the rare fruit that is Barry Burton as a protagonist.
22 - Resident Evil: Dead Aim
The capper to the Resident Evil lightgun trilogy (we did get a Dino Crisis-themed game too) is the best of the lot. It gives us the best of both worlds with a competent lightgun shooter and an original story.
None of them were great, but the improvement from entry to entry is visible. The ability to move and shoot at the same time was a novelty back in 2003.
Dead Aim is set 4 years after the events in Raccoon City, and takes place on an Umbrella-owned ocean liner. When Capcom isn’t setting Resi games in puzzle box buildings, it doesn’t half love shoving you onto a boat. I’m fine with that, though, and it’s probably why I have a soft spot for Dead Aim.
21 - Resident Evil 6
Yes, Resident Evil 6 is the weakest of the mainline games. There are some bright spots, of course, but it was the tipping point in the series’ shift towards blockbuster action.
Looking at everything that has come since, it’s hard to deny how, despite its financial success, Resident Evil 6 was the low point of the 30-year history of Resident Evil.
20 - Resident Evil Outbreak File #2
The Outbreak games were such forward-thinking ideas that, sadly, the world was nowhere near ready for. Actual online classic Resident Evil action, where you could team up with other survivors to escape the impending doom of Raccoon City.
The problem with the Outbreak games is that the PS2’s internet infrastructure required to play online was a real niche. Europe didn’t even get that much.
Despite the online focus, a solo mode with AI partners was included from the start for File #2, which helped, but not exactly the intended experience.
19 - Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles
Lightgun shooters in the world of Resident Evil had seemingly been buried after Dead Aim, but the hand-waving wonder of the Nintendo Wii saw the spinoff resurrected as an on-rails experience.
It’s a greatest hits retelling of early Resident Evil stories, but it did feature fresh details and some new material in its finale. It’s a far more pleasant trip down memory lane than you’d expect, and features a host of protagonists from the Raccoon City saga to blast away mutant freaks as.
18 - Resident Evil Outbreak
The original Outbreak gets to be higher than its sequel simply because of how tragically ahead of its time it was. A side story to the original Resident Evil 2 and 3 from the perspective of relatively normal citizens, but as an online cooperative experience.
Long forgotten, 2026’s Resident Evil: Requiem shone a light on it by including Outbreak protagonist Alyssa Ashcroft and her daughter, Grace. It’s not exactly a happy return for Alyssa, though.
17 - Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles
The second Chronicles lightgun shooter is the one I prefer simply because it features two of my personal favourite entries in the series and gives us a bit of backstory behind the rivalry between Leon Kennedy and Jack Krauser.
It also just plays better than Umbrella Chronicles thanks to Quality of Life changes that make the shooting just as intense, but far more flexible.
16 - Resident Evil 3 Remake
Of all the remakes we’ve had so far, Resident Evil 3 Remake suffers the most from what came before. The original Resident Evil 3 was a beefed-up expansion of Resident Evil 2, but the early introduction of the Nemesis and a slightly more gung-ho playstyle ensured it was justified as a full sequel.
Resident Evil 3 Remake is a beefed-up expansion of Resident Evil 2 Remake, but this time, it felt far more like cut content from the preceding game. A short playtime, the dilution of stalker sections with the Nemesis, and the fact that the stalker role had been done better with Resident Evil 2 Remake’s Mr. X made it underwhelming.
But you know what? Played in tandem with Resident Evil 2 Remake, this is still a really fun time. That opening section where Nemesis crashes in every five minutes and the hospital section with Carlos are among the best things in modern Resi.
15 - Resident Evil Revelations
I have a real soft spot for Revelations, and if it were just based on my personal feelings, it’d be a few places higher on this list. I like it when Resi goes to sea, and this, in many ways, is the ultimate aquatic horror adventure in the series. Plus, we got Jill Valentine as a protagonist again (Chris too, sadly), which continues to be a rare treasure.
It started life as a 2012 Nintendo 3DS game, before getting ported to consoles a year later. That scaled back the spectacle of Resident Evil 4 and 5 somewhat, and the action was a tad generic, but the bite-sized chapters still packed graphical oomph on 3DS.
14 - Resident Evil 0
When news of a prequel to the Resident Evil series first emerged, it was met with mixed feelings. Code: Veronica had taken us past the Raccoon City incident, but there was still a longing to return there. Resident Evil 0 ended up caught in the middle of the desire for freshness and nostalgia for what had come before as Rebecca Chambers and Billy Coen investigate an abandoned Umbrella training facility before the events of Resident Evil.
It had some novel ideas. Two protagonists once again, but now you can switch between them throughout. Storage boxes were stripped out, but now you could just drop items on the floor to be picked up later.
For some, this was a breath of fresh air whilst retaining a comforting familiarity. For others, it was a frustrating mixture of problems old and new. One of the few older games in the series that might benefit from a remake.
13 - Resident Evil 5
Look at Resident Evil in 1996 and look at it in 2009. It’s truly remarkable how different the series felt. True, the fixed-perspective older games with their tank controls had begun to feel a touch dated as time went by, but Resident Evil 5 is somewhat of an overcorrection.
Chris Redfield picked up his ongoing beef with former teammate Albert Wesker and took it to Africa, where Redfield and new partner Sheva Alomar are investigating a terrorist threat with bioweapon-based shenanigans abound.
It’s not a particularly good Resident Evil game, but Resident Evil 5 is to this day a blast in co-op. In fact, it’s probably the zenith of multiplayer Resi action because it’s accessible, challenging, and well…pleasant to play with a friend.
It’s also the ‘final’ showdown between Chris and Wesker, which has been the source of much memery over the years, so it’s memorable in a way Resident Evil 6 could only dream of.
12 - Resident Evil Revelations 2
If you can’t put me on a boat in a Resident Evil game, I’ll take an island setting. Give me Claire Redfield as a protagonist, too, and that’s even better.
Thankfully, there are two such games in the Resident Evil universe, and Resident Evil Revelations 2 is the most underappreciated outing of the two. This console-centric follow-up to the 3DS revelations came at a time when the series’ reputation was in the mud, but you could argue it was the true start of the series’s resurgence.
An episodic adventure with multiple protagonists and co-op, it perhaps bore too many surface-level similarities to Resident Evil 6, but this was a horror-led entry with a greater emphasis on puzzles. A compromise between what Resident Evil was and what it should be.
11 - Resident Evil Code: Veronica
Another one I would put higher if it was just my feelings on it, but it’s difficult to deny just how badly time has treated Code: Veronica on a mechanical level. Its structure is sloppy compared to previous games, and it’s a game stuck in a limbo period where Resident Evil’s style was garnering criticism and fresh ideas were proving hard to implement (which did mean experiments led to fascinating runoffs like the creation of Devil May Cry).
However, there’s plenty to love about Code: Veronica. The Euro Horror vibe, the monster design (Bandersnatch!), and the post-Raccoon City story of existing characters and their fight against Umbrella. It had the potential to be a perfect junction between the original trilogy and what would arrive next with Resident Evil 4.
A remake really would help people to see the potential Code: Veronica had. Seems like we’ll get that in the near future.
10 - Resident Evil 3: Nemesis (2000)
These days, a sequel shunted out less than two years after the last game that featured lots of reused assets and locations would be viewed in hugely cynical terms. So it’s to Capcom’s enormous credit that it did enough to make Resident Evil 3: Nemesis feel like a proper sequel.
While it revisits locales from Resident Evil 2 and features a lot of the same underlying mechanics, a few tweaks make Nemesis stand out. The faster pace brought on by a slightly greater emphasis on confrontation and escape from the titular Nemesis is key to it.
The stalking foe is a big upgrade from the brief chases in Resident Evil 2, and makes a familiar playground feel unsafe once again.
9 - Resident Evil (1996)
Yes, we wouldn’t even be here discussing the best Resident Evil games if it weren’t for the success of the 1996 original, and it’s honestly this high up because of that impact it had. As a game, it’s been left in the dust by not only its immediate successors but also its sublime remake.
Still, you can’t talk about Resident Evil without bringing up the magic of the original. Barry’s line delivery, the cheesy live-action opening, the first zombie encounter, and the dogs crashing through the bloody windows are burned into the brains of longtime fans.
The Director’s Cut is probably the preferred way to play it these days if you’re going for a release order replay of the mainline series.
8 - Resident Evil Village
With Resident Evil back to its best after Resident Evil 7 and Resident Evil 2 Remake, hopes were very high for the next mainline Resident Evil game. Capcom stumbled upon something when it introduced the world to Lady Dimitrescu in the initial reveal of Resident Evil Village.
Sadly, the giant vampiric lady was not the actual star antagonist of Village, but she was followed by one of the most frightening Resident Evil sequences of all time (you know the one).
A common complaint with Resident Evil games is that they falter in the back half, and Village’s incredibly strong start does show up its late-game melodrama and revelations. I must say, though, playing it all over again in VR did wonders for my appreciation of it.
7 - Resident Evil 4 Remake
By the time Capcom got around to remaking Resident Evil 4, it had been on a hell of a roll. The modernization of the formula in the Resident Evil 2 & 3 remakes felt like the most natural fit in the world for Resident Evil 4.
The conundrum was how to top what the original did when it still plays incredibly well to this day. The answer was to supplement what was already there with deeper mechanics and rework one of the weaker aspects of the original (Ashley).
Unlike the overhaul needed for the previous remakes, this one was about polish and refinement without souring the feel of the original. As such, Resident Evil 4 Remake is almost as miraculous a project as Resident Evil 2 Remake.
6 - Resident Evil Requiem
The newest entry in the series probably has a bit of recency bias attached to its spot here, but looking at the games around it, there’s a good reason it’s so high.
A celebration of Resident Evil history that isn’t anywhere near as cynical as that sounds, it’s packed full of greatest hits-style moments that bring almost everything you could want from a Resident Evil game. It’s scary, gory, melodramatic, and full of classic Resi puzzle-based goodness.
The only real grumble is that the end leaves a bit too much on the table.
5 - Resident Evil 2 (1998)
My personal favourite, but I can admit that’s based on nostalgia to some degree. Still, this is a perfect example of a sequel taking everything from the original and drastically improving it. After the confined haunted house style of the Spencer Mansion, Capcom gave us sprawling apocalyptic chaos.
Claire Redfield and Leon Kennedy have particular flavours to their campaigns, and the cherry on top is how different they are in secondary playthroughs, introducing new elements and with the foreknowledge of that first run, a quicker pace.
Of the original trilogy, it has the most impressive structure and the strongest visual identity. It has had a massive influence on both the series and beyond. All these years later, the Licker is one of the most impactful monsters in the series, and Leon Kennedy has become the de facto star player.
4 - Resident Evil 2 Remake
Overhauling a then 21-year-old game made for consoles several generations back is tricky business. Trickier still when said game holds a special place in the hearts of many horror fans. How exactly do you modernize something like that respectfully?
Such is the miracle that is Resident Evil 2 Remake. Yes, Resident Evil 7 had restored confidence in fans that Resident Evil could be the survival horror series of old, but one great game doesn’t necessarily mean the start of a fresh winning run.
Yet here stands the benchmark for respectfully remaking a beloved decades-old game. Resident Evil 2 Remake has the core ideas and structure that made the original so spectacular, but it brought enough to the table that it felt like playing a brand new game in the series.
3 - Resident Evil 7: Biohazard
Could Resident Evil 7 be the most important game in the series? There’s an argument for that because of what it represents to a then floundering franchise and the pathway it put it on. But this isn’t doing justice to representing how good Resident Evil 7 is anyway.
Resident Evil 7 is a back-to-basics approach to survival horror, injected with the freshness of a changed perspective and a fresh feeling of mystery that the series had been lacking since the 90s.
A memorable, tragic set of antagonists, an uncomfortable, greasy plantation setting, and little nuggets of information connecting these fresh events to those of old rekindled fans’ love for the series.
Yes, the games that followed it have a bit more under the hood by comparison, but Resident Evil 7’s survival horror is so exquisitely pure that it remains closer to the series roots than almost anything else in the last 20 years.
2 - Resident Evil Remake
Before remakes were a common thing in video games, Capcom was out there showing how it should be done. Resident Evil is an undeniably crucial part of horror game history, but the accelerated pace of gaming technology in the late 90s and early 2000s quickly turned it into a bit of a relic.
So six years on, Shinji Mikami, director of the original game, took the reins on a remake for the Nintendo GameCube, looking to create something closer to his original vision.
And so one of gaming’s greatest remakes was born. Everything that made the original so special, including the fixed perspective and pre-rendered backgrounds, but boosted by a massive visual and mechanical overhaul.
The game featured the addition of previously cut aspects, which further elevated Resident Evil Remake. New areas, enemy types (the terrifying Crimson Heads, especially), and an entire subplot that gave us a tragic monster fans hold dear to this day in Lisa Trevor.
The only downside is that it makes the original version far less enjoyable to go back to. If we get another remake of it, will the same end up being true of this version? Probably not, as this is such a distinct kind of remake that serves as a strong reminder of the series roots.
1 - Resident Evil 4 (2004)
A grumpy part of me had long held a grudging respect for Resident Evil 4. I wanted Leon Kennedy back, and I wanted new adventures away from Raccoon City and Umbrella. This game gave me that, but it transformed the series into a different beast. One that was more action-oriented and less reliant on the trudging terror of tank controls. It was a great video game, but not the Resident Evil I wanted.
The passage of time changed that. Yes, Capcom learned the wrong lessons from its success and sent the series down a path full of broken glass and dog turds, but it doesn’t make Resident Evil 4 any less of a masterpiece.
There’s a quicker pace and an action-heavy focus, but the threat meets you on those terms. Enemies crowd you, instant death situations arise, and every time you get comfortable handling the Las Plagas menace, new monsters are thrown at you.
Resident Evil 4 is also the most consistently great game in the series. The infamous back half crawl present in many games on this list is given a shot of adrenaline to ensure it crosses the finish line like a bug-eyed madman on fire.
For the latest gaming news, follow GameWatcher on BlueSky, check out our videos on YouTube. We sometimes include affiliate links in our posts, which grants us a small commission, thank you. Please support independent Games Media. ❤️
