It's official: Leon S Kennedy is back for Resident Evil Requiem. The upcoming horror game was already one of my most-wanted titles of 2026, and with a recent showing at The Game Awards 2025 confirming a pre-show leak, courtesy of PlayStation, that a more mature Leon Kennedy of Resident Evil 2 fame will be co-starring in RE9, it's safe to say the anticipation has reached new heights.
After eight years of waiting and rumors swirling around the possibility of seeing Resident Evil 9, Requiem at last answered our hopes during Summer Game Fest 2025. Not only is it set to follow the best Resident Evil games in bringing players back to Raccoon City some 30 years since the events of the first game, Requiem will also feature a stronger lean on the "horror" end of "survival horror".
Resident Evil Requiem release date
The Resident Evil Requiem release date has been set for Friday, February 27, 2026.
The news came as part of the official game reveal at Summer Game Fest Live 2025, where Capcom finally gave us a first look at Grace Ashcroft's journey. We now know that fan favorite Leon will be returning to the fray alongside her come February, as revealed at The Game Awards 2025. And yes, he has a chainsaw again.
Resident Evil Requiem platforms
According to the official Capcom website, Resident Evil Requiem will launch on PS5, Xbox Series X, and PC platforms in February 2026.
It's a bummer for anyone still rocking a past-gen console, but I can't lie - it's looking pretty special in the RE Engine, and all that juicy raytracing will likely make all the difference in a horror franchise like this.
Resident Evil Requiem trailers
The first Resident Evil Requiem trailer shown at Summer Game Fest introduces us to Grace Ashcroft, the confirmed daughter of Resident Evil Outbreak File 1 and 2 protagonist Alyssa Ashcroft. She appears to be working as an FBI agent in the wake of a virus outbreak that is sweeping the continent - which should have every Resi fan's skin tingling - as she's urged to face her past.
A series of flashback stills play out as Grace struggles to compose herself, interspersed with shots of a decimated Raccoon City following the events of Resident Evil 2 and 3, before she suddenly finds herself strapped to a gurney and screaming for help. Then, a man sits with his back to Grace, telling her that she's the one he's been looking for - "the special one." Talk about chilling.
The story is still nebulous at best, judging from this trailer, but it's the perfect way to whet our appetites for "a heart-stopping experience that will chill you to your core," according to the official website.
We recently got a new trailer for the game at Gamescom Opening Night Live 2025, which you can also see for yourself down below:
In this clip we see Grace with her mom walking through a manor house at night. The two end up running for their lives after figures in black hoods break in and start swinging weapons around with murderous intent. It's obvious from the surprise on Grace's face that her mom has never really told her about her past. We are excited to see what story ramifications this could lead to in the future!
The most recent Resident Evil Requiem trailer gives us more context on the story to come. It turns out that a man named Victor Gideon has been searching for Grace, and he believes her to be "special". As if those rotting gnashers and terrible complexion weren't reason enough to be creeped out by him. We learn that Gideon has ties to Umbrella and purchased a building after the fall of Raccoon City, which is where Grace has pulled up to investigate. Oh, sorry, I mean, doctor Gideon.
Most excitingly, the latest RE9 trailer gives us our first glimpse of Leon's role in the upcoming survival horror. He's back doing what he does best: saving damsels in distressed with a well-timed bullet to a zombie brain, performing a roundhouse kick or two, wielding a chainsaw, and dropping some crisp one-liners the whole time.
Resident Evil Requiem protagonist
As we first saw in the reveal trailer, the Resident Evil Requiem protagonist is Grace Ashcroft. During the Capcom Spotlight showcase 2025, the team gave us a little more insight into the kind of character she is from director Koshi Nakanishi.
"The protagonist this time is an intelligence analyst for the FBI, Grace Ashcroft," Nakanishi says. "She's introverted and easily scared, which is a new type of character for the Resident Evil series. We wanted someone that experiences horror from the same perspective as the player. She learns to overcome her fears throughout the course of the story, but she's also an analyst for the FBI who's trained with guns, and is able to act with calm, deductive reasoning."
Now that we know Leon is back in the picture, it makes all of Capcom's sneaky side-stepping of the fact earlier this year almost funny. First, Nakanishi spoke on Kennedy by saying: "We always thought about making Leon the protagonist, but making a horror game based around him is difficult." Nakanishi points to the fact that Leon doesn't scare easily, which means he isn't the right fit for this experience. Then producer Masato Kumazawa hinted that a leaked image of Leon was AI. "There has been a photo lately of Leon with an eyepatch, and just basically saying there's a DLC or a new costume for Leon," Kumazawa explained, "but just to make sure, these are all fake news."
The eyepatch leak might have been fan-made (who knows?) but we know for sure now that Leon was always going to show face in the new game. With Grace being our horror touchstone and Leon bringing the action, Requiem seeks to deliver the perfect mix.
Resident Evil Requiem story and setting
It looks like Resident Evil Requiem is bringing us back to the series' roots: the Raccoon City disaster. To be precise, it's now been confirmed that the story will take place "about 30 years after the missile strike on Raccoon City" in the Resident Evil timeline.
Speaking with GamesRadar+ during Gamescom 2025, game director Koshi Nakanishi shed some light on what it was like to approach bringing the city back to life in the aftermath of the disaster, when years have passed by.
"I won't say we went into a physics simulation of exactly how it was affected by the bomb," Nakanishi began, "but we were like, 'Okay, well, this is where the bomb landed in the city. Then this would be the blast zone, you know, the shock wave would maybe travel into these areas, and that's how they'd be affected.'" While the director kept quiet about the exact locations we'll get to visit in the city, the team did "essentially start with the existing design and layout of Raccoon City" that was seen in the Resident Evil 2 and 3 remakes.
In terms of the story, Grace Ashcroft, our protagonist, is the daughter of Alyssa Ashcroft from the Resident Evil Outbreak games on PS2, who made an appearance during the Gamescom Opening Night Live 2025 trailer. It seems Grace will have to delve back into her own dark past to confront personal demons, specifically regarding her mother's death at the Wrenwood Hotel eight years earlier, though what the gameplay itself might look like is yet to be seen. We don't know much about the story just yet, save that Grace certainly has a lot of trauma to unpack. Oh, and now she has to reckon with the supremely disturbing Dr Victor Gideon, a man who seems to have captured Grace in his medical facility.
There are also suggestions that we might have some kind of split timeline in Resident Evil Requiem, given all the shots of Raccoon City interspersed with indoor locations that certainly don't look nuked, as well as various voices referring to an ongoing catastrophe. In short, these conversations sound like what the initial survivors of the Raccoon City Disaster might have discussed as they grappled with the unravelling events.
At this early stage, though, that's about all the RE9 speculation we can go on. Paired with Capcom's dedication to technological advancements, we're told to expect "a story with rich characters and gameplay that's more immersive than ever before."
Some eagle-eyed fans have managed to spot Requiem references in Resident Evil 7, so whatever's coming our way on February 27, RE9 has clearly been thought out for a long time now. If you're looking to step into the series ahead of Requieum, be sure to check out our Resident Evil Beginner's guide.
Resident Evil Requiem gameplay
Resident Evil Requiem's gameplay looks like a mix of all of the series' greatest hits. Capcom has confirmed that players will be able to fluidly swap from first to third person perspectives as Grace Ashcroft, as seen in our hands-off Resident Evil Requiem preview, off the back of a popular post-launch RE8 update that let players do the same during Ethan's last adventure and that of his daughter, Rose, in the DLC.
This was also reiterated during the Capcom Spotlight Showcase 2025, with producer Masato Kumazawa saying, "you can either experience the horror up close, with tense, realistic gameplay through first-person perspective, or an over-the-shoulder camera in third-person perspective".
Whether you opt for a more Resident Evil 2 and 4 vibe or go in Baker House style of Resident Evil 7, Resident Evil Requiem will still feature a lot of survival horror gameplay staples. I'm talking about chases, of course, with a grotesque humanoid wall-walking creature pursuing Grace through narrow hallways before our heroine finally makes her escape. It's great to see RE9 riffing off the cat-and-mouse likes of Mr X, Jack Baker, Lady Dimistrescu, and Nemesis, a heavily RE-coded move that's got me psyched to be scared all over again.
In a creator's message video on the Resident Evil Requiem website, the dev team also revealed that they were "exploring many different systems during development", including experimenting with "things like an online Resident Evil, or an open-world Resident Evil", but it wasn't "what fans wanted to see or play", which is why Requiem is sticking to the series roots as a single-player offline game.
Another key aspect of Resident Evil Requiem's gameplay? Puzzles galore, as seen in all the best Resident Evil games, to balance out combat and narrative beats. The combo is emblematic of survival horror at its finest, and with the latest shots of a decidedly classic Resident Evil 4-like UI for Leon's fancy shooting and melee skills, Requiem looks pretty much like every fan's dream come true.
Resident Evil Requiem hands-on preview
Our first hands-on with Resident Evil Requiem put me in the driver's seat of Grace Ashcroft's harrowing adventure. The demo covered the same small section of the game we saw hands-off at Summer Game Fest, where Grace wakes up at Rhodes Hill Chronic Care Center in Raccoon City to find herself strapped to a gurney upside down.
I gave each of the game's perspectives, third and first-person, a test drive across the 35-minute session. This led to a new discovery: that Resident Evil Requiem has third-person "exclusive animations" you won't see if you play it in first. Namely? Grace trips and falls while being chased through the narrow corridors by a terrifying light-sensitive monster. It can also burrow through the ceiling to make a quick escape, meaning a clear corridor doesn't always mean you're totally safe...
Given how terrified Grace is throughout this segment, with no weapon to help protect her from the creature, I'm still not convinced that she will be RE9's one and only protagonist. I mention in my preview writeup above that the demo felt more like Sherry and Ashley's sections in RE2 and 4 respectively, but whether that hunch is accurate, we'll have to wait and see.
Can you pre-order Resident Evil Requiem?
Yes, you can pre-order Resident Evil Requiem right now! Digital deluxe and standard editions are available from all major platforms, while physical steelbook copies can be purchased from retailers local to you. Use the above link to source your copy now and take advantage of a range of pre-order exclusive goodies including five costume variants for Leon and Grace.
For more recommendations, check out our lists of the best horror games and the best survival horror games of all time.
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