'Resident Evil 3' was released on this day in 1999.
A whopping 20 years ago today, on November 11, 1999, Resident Evil 3: Nemesis was released in North America. With it, gamers received a whole new take on Raccoon City’s zombie apocalypse, and demand for it showed immediately: it became the best-selling PlayStation game in the country that month.
It’s been a long 20 years for the title; following this year’s take on Resident Evil 2, RE3 is the only core entry in the franchise to miss out on a remaster, reboot, re-release or even backwards compatibility during the last two console generations.
Resident Evil 3, which was set 24 hours prior to the events of RE2, introduced the titular Nemesis character–arguably the franchise’s most iconic enemy–as well as a major gameplay shift for the series.
While RE3 took familiar and well-loved elements of Resident Evil 2, such as the pre-rendered backgrounds, recognizable settings and most of its gameplay mechanics, it also escalated the action–something that became obvious from the combat-heavy introduction FMV.
Ammo was more plentiful, encouraging you to go on the offensive; the player had the regular ability to choose to fight or run, offering different styles of play; while the addition of the guns-a-blazing Mercenaries mode, unlocked by finishing the game, only boosted the game’s exhilarating credentials.
Shoring up this emphasis on excitement, speed and action was RE3’s introduction of two important mechanics: the ability to dodge attacks and the opportunity to perform a quick 180-degree turn, an act that was sorely lacking from the game’s two predecessors.
Yet no factor made the game as action-packed as the Nemesis-T Type himself. One part tank and another part overpowered assassin, Nemesis was deployed by the evil Umbrella Corporation following the events of the first Resident Evil to kill all members of the Special Tactics and Rescue Service (S.T.A.R.S.), before the company’s activities could be exposed.
As such, the player–as series regular Jill Valentine–first stumbled upon Nemesis as he killed S.T.A.R.S. helicopter pilot Brad Vickers in front of the iconic Raccoon City police station. From this point, gamers were given the choice to fight him or run away.
'Resident Evil 3' offered "fight or flight" situations regularly.
So began countless run-ins and, as Nemesis took more damage over the course of the game, he evolved in a similar way to William Birkin in RE2: ever more gruesomely and threateningly.
Alongside RE3’s brilliant story and excellent puzzles, Capcom broke Resident Evil’s seemingly consistent rule by focusing on one specific antagonist. While the debut RE game offered plants, spiders and a final pseudo-boss in the form of a relatively lackluster Tyrant, most people probably remember the first zombie more than anything, despite it looking like a fridge in a green jacket. Meanwhile, Resident Evil 2 cycled Mr X–who later evolved into a Tyrant himself–alongside the mad Chief Irons and ever-changing William Birkin.
The return of this superbly ugly, fear-inducing baddie to modern day consoles may be a pipedream for now, but all is not lost. As reported by Destructoid earlier this year, Capcom producer Yoshiaki Hirabayashi told delegates at GameWatch that “as long as fans ‘voiced their enthusiasm,’ the company would look at updating the third game in the series.”
Until then, you’ll have to settle for the 20-year-old version of Resident Evil 3. That’s not a huge problem, though; as far as original PlayStation games go, it’s aged better than most, and it just as playable now as it was back on this day in 1999.
