Resident Evil Village is bringing back The Mercenaries for first-person arcade action

Resident Evil Village
(Image credit: Capcom)

Resident Evil Village The Mercenaries is officially part of the game, reviving the fast-paced arcade action mode after it was absent from the last numbered title.

Capcom highlighted Resident Evil Village The Mercenaries in its big Resident Evil Showcase, bringing in game director Morimasa Sato to introduce the returning mode and what's new for Village. It still sets players on combo-counting, time-limited rampages through environments pulled from the standard story mode, but it also infuses the action with some fresh changes that should make for even more replayability.

For starters, you'll be able to head to The Duke's Emporium to go shopping between stages. He'll sell you helpful supplies and weapons, and you'll also be able to upgrade your weapons to fit your playstyle for each run. On top of that, you'll be able to find artifacts out in the field that let you choose new abilities: a few of the examples Capcom showed off during the demo included increasing your movement speed, more damaging long-distance attacks, slight HP recovery when attacking, with a gun, and beyond.

Sato said Resident Evil Village The Mercenaries will be full of surprises and special rewards "for players who persevere," so it sounds like you'll have plenty to work toward beyond the satisfaction of honing your perfect vampire-slaying build.

Before re-introducing The Mercenaries, Capcom debuted a new story trailer for Resident Evil Village as well as another demo coming this weekend on PlayStation.

Hopefully Resident Evil Village will be an instant lock for our list of the best horror games as soon as it arrives in May. 

Connor Sheridan

I got a BA in journalism from Central Michigan University - though the best education I received there was from CM Life, its student-run newspaper. Long before that, I started pursuing my degree in video games by bugging my older brother to let me play Zelda on the Super Nintendo. I've previously been a news intern for GameSpot, a news writer for CVG, and now I'm a staff writer here at GamesRadar.