Resident Evil 6 is out in a matter of months, but there’s still so much of it shrouded in mystery. Who are your enemies? Which characters are your allies? And what’s the bigger conspiracy? By the end of the 3DS game Resident Evil Revelations we noticed a surprising amount of hints to the series’ future. You just have to know where to look and you can make more than a few educated guesses…

Obviously, we’re going to be analyzing the end of Resident Evil Revelations and all the important plot points so fair warning SPOILERS AHEAD. If you plan on playing Revelations, finish that first before reading.

RER’s biggest threat came from the leftovers of the bioterrorist organization Veltro threatening to destroy society with a new weapon known as T-Abyss. The disease is a concoction that combined the strange Abyss bacteria found deep beneath the sea with the infamous T-Virus. Jill and Chris destroy seemingly all that was created on the cruise ship Queen Zenobia, but one vial survived.

What this tells us about RE6: This surviving form of the virus is what’s being used by the unnamed enemy of RE6. That would explain how the terrorists are creating previously unseen types of BOWs that are popping up all over the world. And T-Abyss is known for rapidly transforming living tissue, which we saw multiple times in the RE6 trailer.

Who got the T-Abyss to the terrorists? It had to be Jessica Sherawat, a BSAA agent that turned on her team to steal the T-Abyss, a vial of which is delivered to her in the final scene of RER. She also tried to kill multiple BSAA agents, betraying many that trusted her, including her current partner Chris Redfield. That kind of history and those sociopath qualities makes her a perfect fit as a future heavy.

What this tells us about RE6: In the RE6 trailer Chris is incredibly angry at a specific woman and the reason for his outburst is referred to as a “personal vendetta.” After her history of betraying Chris’ loyalty for bioterrorists, what other woman would elicit that reaction? Furthermore, why would Capcom spend all this time setting up Jessica’s femme fatale persona in RER if you’re never going to see her again?

Revelations introduced Resident Evil fans to Veltro, a bioterrorist organization responsible for the death and destruction of an entire island city. A group of madmen inspired to mass murder by Dante’s Inferno (the 14th century poem, not the game), they continually reference the tome and carry copies of the book during attacks. Seemingly the last remnants of Veltro were wiped out by Jill and Chris, but RER’s finale says otherwise…

What this tells us about RE6: Jessica, who we strongly believe will be a primary antagonist of Resident Evil 6, is seen reading Dante’s poem when she’s given the T-Abyss. This implies that her secret benefactor in her operation was Veltro or an offshoot of it, a group that could easily be the big bad of RE6. The type of worldwide terrorist panic on display in the reveal trailer is of a similar brand with what Veltro employed, only on a much larger scale.

When we started Revelations, we were surprised by the number of new characters featured in the game alongside Jill and Chris. Aside from Jessica, there was Jill’s partner Parker, the BSAA leader Clive, and comic relief tech experts Quint and Keith. Multiple times it seemed like all of them were killed in RER, but the epilogue reveals that the seemingly dead Keith, Quint and Parker survived, still working for the BSAA. Why keep all these characters alive in a side game?

What this tells us about RE6: Resident Evil doesn’t have a big supporting cast, so Capcom needs to build it up with characters you’re invested in. After spending all that time with these characters (and with the BSAA playing a huge part in RE6) we think it’s safe to say some, if not all, of these characters will make an appearance in the next game.

Though Jill Valentine is the star of the game, the one who goes through the biggest transformation in Revelations is Raymond. We see him go from injured rookie to secret agent for Veltro, then it’s revealed his version of Veltro is a fraud and he’s a double agent for the BSAA. After we finally felt like we knew Raymond and we watched him save Parker’s life, the epilogue had one more twist: he was working with Jessica all along to collect a T-Abyss sample!

What this tells us about RE6: Raymond’s shifting loyalties and striking character design make him a memorable character and one we bet will return. Despite handing Jessica the virus, he doesn’t seem to be her partner in the cutscene, instead coming off as a delivery guy. Should Raymond appear in RE6, his loyalty will no doubt be further tested, but will we get the answers we want?

In the end how do we know any and all of these theories aren’t meant to point to RE6 but instead to a direct sequel to Revelations down the line? Based on descriptions of the development cycle, Capcom was already hard at work on RE6 when creating Revelations. Despite Revelations being set chronologically between RE4 and RE5, it creates too many new backstories and characters that don’t answer any lingering questions from previous games.

Instead, RER creates a whole new world for Resident Evil, tons of new characters and plot lines that are left dangling by the end. Raymond’s cryptic final statement above (said after Jessica predicts future trouble from the BSAA) points players to the future, and the future of Resident Evil is RE6. Capcom left a breadcrumb trail pointing to the plot of their next release, you just have to follow it.

Think we’re right? Wrong? We miss anything? Let us know in the comments! And if you want more RE6 speculation, check out our features on everything we know about RE6's mystery third character, our initial impressions of the RE6 reveal trailer, and GR's extended video breakdown of the first RE6 trailer.