Every Resident Evil Game, Ranked by Most to Least Frightening

Resident Evil 7 was a departure from what the franchise, up until this point, had been known for. Instead of the insane action and borderline-ridiculous creature design of the fifth and sixth entries, Resident Evil 7: Biohazard took a page from Hideo Kojima’s P.T. (Playable Teaser), opting for a first-person perspective, no zombies, and a Texas Chainsaw Massacre-inspired storyline. 

The result is an incredibly tense, anxiety-inducing experience that carries well for the majority of the game. There are few horror games that will actively cause the gamer to stop and question if they should be playing or not. This is one. 

When the game launched on the Nintendo Gamecube in 2002, it set the benchmark for what a “remake” should be. 

From the incredible 3D video-rendered backgrounds to the redesigned Spencer Mansion, the game took everything that made the original great and added more than a new coat of paint; it made the game what it should have been. 

It also has numerous truly frightening moments, including the entire Lisa Trevor side-story. The game has stood the test of time and remains an incredible piece of interactive horror storytelling.

The original Resident Evil 2 was where the series really took off. The increased production values, the dual character campaigns, the G Virus, and the choice to move things to an urban environment, all resulted in a game that was as action-packed as it was frightening. 

Though it might lack the impact today that it had back in 1998, the game had many a jump scare. From the first encounter with a Licker, the whole William Birkin G virus transformation, and Mr. X’s pursuit of the player, Resident Evil 2 achieved the delicate balance between action and horror.

It goes without saying, this was the one that started it all. The remake blows the original out of the water, and you should play that game before moving to this one. However, the original stands up as a piece of video game history. 

This was the game that terrorized so many gamers, at a time when there weren’t many horror-driven games to choose from. It inspired an entire genre of survival horror. It also still has some of worst voiceover ever lent to a video game. Going back to this one is a lot like going back to Night of the Living Dead: It’s got its charm, but those true horrors are now long-gone.

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Some may want the 2019 Resident Evil 2 remake to be higher up in the rankings. but the game ultimately falls short in a number of categories. 

Criticism has been placed on how short the campaign was, with so much of the police precinct being so shrouded in darkness that it was tough to even know what was going on, much less to be scared of anything. However, the game still does offer those moments of jaw-clenching terror. Mr. X really shines in this one; hearing his footsteps on the floor above you while you cower in a room was masterfully done.

This was the game that redefined survival horror, emphasizing survival rather than horror. Leon Kennedy returns from Resident Evil 2, tasked with recovering the kidnapped president’s daughter from a maniacal cult in the middle of nowhere. 

The premise is ludicrous, but works as a foundation for the sheer amount of action to come. The game remains one of the “greatest of all time” and with good reason. It was the first of its kind to nail the balance of limited inventory management and an unrelenting number of enemies. 

Resident Evil 4 creates a sense of anxiety and panic that's palpable, but it comes from a back-against-the-wall sense of worry that you might not make it out of this one.

Village is dripping with charisma. The village itself is its own character, with an incredible variety of locations that almost leaves the player breathless.

Mother Miranda and her minions (including the internet favorite Lady Dimitrescu) really shine as well, with awesome character design and performances. The entire game is dripping with quality, and yet it does lose a tremendous amount of terror in all its AAA Hollywood-style theatrical moments. 

So much of the game is about those set pieces, that the gamer barely has any real time to feel anything. It’s unfortunate because the village had the potential to  be as ominous and layered as Resident Evil’s Spencer Mansion.

The star of the show, Nemesis, really makes this remake stand out. In the game’s opening moments, Jill Valentine encounters the Nemesis, who will quite literally chase you for the entire game. It would be exhausting if the game weren't so short. 

Similar to the Resident Evil 2 remake, the RE3 remake runs fast, and the game ultimately feels more like an expansion pack to the RE2 remake. Though there will undoubtedly be some apprehension drawn from the uncertainty of when and where Nemesis might pop up as you traverse Raccoon City, Jill is pretty well equipped and can dodge any dangers that might cross her path. 

The game ultimately feels like fan service to the original, which is also tied here, holding the same spot. 

There are some truly unsettling set-pieces in Code: Veronica, including a mansion backdrop with a multiple-personality antagonist seemingly watching at every step, that hearken back to the original Resident Evil. 

However, there are also a lot of taxing moments. For instance, many gamers might find themselves stuck and forced to reload from an earlier save. The game ultimately loses its emotional charge due to this imbalance. 

Though the Revelations games aren’t considered main entries in the franchise, they do carry a lot of the same atmosphere of the numbered games. Both games focus on mechanics a little left of center, with Revelations 1 frequently switching between characters (series favorites Jill Valentine and Chris Redfield) and Revelations 2 offering two simultaneous characters to play with a larger cast (including Resident Evil 1’s Barry Burton and Resident Evil 2’s Claire Redfield). 

The games are structured like a television show, with quick episodes followed by recaps. Though they contain the jump scares, interesting monsters, and curious settings of the franchise’s best, the games also feel like a repeat, something we’ve seen before, when it was done better. In this case, Revelations is code for Repetitions.

The Outbreak games were online-collaborative horror experiences plagued with some technical deficiencies, sure, but they also induced true terror. The terror was relative, though. 

If you managed to have a few friends that could play the game, working together through the stages, there’s a big chance that you would be able to experience some sheer moments of panic and perhaps even some scares. It’s just too bad, really, because Capcom had some genuinely compelling ideas strewn across its levels. Who knows—maybe there’s a remake in the works?

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The Resident Evil remake used amazing 3D video rendered backgrounds to supplement the terror. Zero does the same. It tosses gamers into a previously-cancelled entry in the franchise (the original version was in development for Nintendo 64), with Rebecca Chambers and Billy Coen working together to figure out what went wrong in the woods outside Raccoon City. 

The game followed a lot of what Remake did, except for one key departure that became, for many, a game-breaker: the loss of item crates. Typical of a Resident Evil title is an emphasis on item management; players have crates to drop items they might not need at the moment. 

Zero decided to do away with crates, and allow for items to be dropped at will. On paper it made sense—a player didn’t need to run to item crates to retrieve items. This design choice actually made things worse, though. Now gamers had to remember where they  dropped items, often playing an arbitrary game of tag, going from room to room, switching between Rebecca and Billy, to hand off items in order to move on. 

It’s a game mechanic that nullified a lot of the game’s impact, including the possibility of any sort of horror, even some jump scares. The weird slug-sucking creatures didn’t help, either.

Capcom decided to keep the focus on action for the fifth game. Chris Redfield is no longer with STARS, and instead has become an agent of the BSAA, a bioterrorism alliance. He is sent to Africa to partner up with Sheva Alomar to stop a bioterrorist named Ricardo Irving from launching a bio-organic weapon. 

This is all a backdrop for a lot of combat and a game built around cooperative gameplay. It was also the first time many fans of the franchise realized that Resident Evil had finally lost all of its horror leanings. 

Resident Evil 5 has a lot going for itself, especially if you have a friend playing (the AI-controlled partner is so limited they essentially become a glorified human item crate). But Resident Evil 5 was also when Capcom moved away from horror in hopes that they could continue to capture the massive success that was Resident Evil 4.

Just don’t play it. Save your time and money. The scariest part of the sixth game in the series is realizing you wasted your time playing it.