Capcom gives Resident Evil 6 a $1300/820 special edition. Extravagant celebration, or huge self-parody?

There is an upper limit on how special a special edition can be. They can all be special in different ways of course. Some come with toys. Some come with DLC built in. Some come with special shiny box art that flickers and glows like the dying embers of the once mighty funeral pyre for a legendary and much-loved Viking lord. But however they may be special, there is an upper limit to how special that specialness can be.

And that upper limit usually cuts off way below the eight-hundred quid point.

Fortunately though, we have companies like Capcom. Companies with the pioneering spirit and devil-may-care attitude toward convention to really push this industry forward. Companies happy to put out three full-price, insanely expensive, marginally-tweaked versions of Street Fighter II on the same 16-bit format over the space of a couple of years. Companies happy to do the same with Street Fighters III and IV, despite the advent of DLC in the latter case. Companies happy to riddle said second sequel with in-game purchases, and then repeat the whole incremental update process with Marvel vs. Capcom 3 a year later, and hold back a couple of old favourite characters as on-disc DLC. You get the idea.


Above: You could play this while wearing a special Resi jacket for around the same price as four current-gen consoles. Bargain!

In the cause of squeezing pint upon pint of fresh warm blood out of the same old stone, Capcom is one of our most progressive leading lights. A round of applause for those guys please. They do important work. And now, with the advent of its exciting new semi-reboot of Resident Evil with RE 6, Capcom is, fittingly, rebooting the whole concept of the special edition with a bundle clocking in at the equivalent of $1300/£820. It contains a set of four character-themed tablet covers and a real wearable replica of protagonist Leon Kennedy's jacket. It's a quite nice jacket, but one which - even if made up the uppermost top quality, which it no doubt is - would probably retail for a noteable chunk less than £800.

I can only assume that the disc is carved from crystalised unicorn tears.

Interested? Let me know in the comments. And don't forget join us next week when we reveal that two of Resi 6's three parallel campaigns take the form of paid-for on-disc DLC. Maybe. But probably not. Hopefully.

David Houghton
Long-time GR+ writer Dave has been gaming with immense dedication ever since he failed dismally at some '80s arcade racer on a childhood day at the seaside (due to being too small to reach the controls without help). These days he's an enigmatic blend of beard-stroking narrative discussion and hard-hitting Psycho Crushers.