Ex-Capcom producer Miguel Corti says that Resident Evil 7's flaws were apparent during the game's development but were ignored.
In a thread on Bluesky, Corti says "It's great to see this game still generating critical discussion some 10 years later," and that while its flaws stand out compared to the remakes and sequels that followed over the years, he explains, "I can say a lot of the flaws were vividly present at the time, and roundly ignored."
Kicking off a long thread, he says a lot of Resident Evil 7 can be traced back to the critical and fan reception of Resident Evil 6.
"Capcom higher-ups were more than happy with RE6," Corti explains, "but the devs wanted the critical acclaim other games were garnering, especially since many of them were obviously influenced by RE." Notably, The Last of Us, with "a few iterations" taking inspiration from Naughty Dog's title. Corti notes that despite how convoluted the plot of Resident Evil 6 got, the original plan for its sequel was more convoluted nonsense: "It was so all over the place, I lost track of the versions."
Corti notes that a major reorganization at Capcom is how we got the Resident Evil 7 that released: "A mandate came down to redo RE7 from scratch," and, as such, a new dev team and director were attached. One that Corti describes as "very hands-on with the development" was ultimately the one who gave the team the "bombshell of an idea" to make the game first-person. He adds, "A lot of the crazier ideas in RE are just random things that someone on the dev team cottons onto."
While Resident Evil 7 revived the series in the hearts of many, it initially underperformed – at least compared to the panned duo of Resident Evil 5 and 6. Corti notes, "RE fans were confused by it, and non-fans either didn't want to touch horror or weren't sure what to make of it. Capcom was disappointed." And in fact, it was actually "Village and all the memes it generated" that helped the game earn "an RE4-level of reputation."
This prolonged development is also "One of the reasons I'm against genAI in games," Corti notes, saying "If the art director and EP could've had everything they envisioned out the gate, it would have been a terrible game" and that it was the back and forth around the game that made it what it was in the end.
