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[IbizaPocholo]

The original scrapped version of Resident Evil 2 (Resident Evil 1,5) with Elza Walker and the beta police building.

 

[Alexios]

The recent Digital Foundry Retro: Resident Evil 2 episode showed a lot of that stuff already (with insight on the development process and everything rather than just showing gameplay).


Prototypes of the game have been leaking the last 5 years at least (the known "November build" in 2013), what makes this particular look special, is it a build with more restored content or something else?

 

[Northeastmonk]

It's crazy how long this game has been out and footage like this becomes available for viewing. I'm glad I am ordering the digital deluxe edition for the extra costumes.

I'm glad they scrapped this for the police station tbh.

 

[thesaunderschild]

The costumes are in the remake...

 

[stranno]

 

[thesaunderschild]

2 more lousy weeks to go...

 

[Red Crayon Aristocrat]

I've always loved this piece of art.

 

[Aggelos]

The first public debut of Biohazard 2 (now 1.5) back in late July/early August 1996 at the V-Jump Festival.
With director Hideki Kamiya presenting the game.




https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hideki_Kamiya

 

[thesaunderschild]

In some preview I read today, Tofu apparently now uses a rifle.

Blasphemy! A giant piece of food does not use a gun.

 

[Aggelos]

a plethora of magazine coverage back from 1996 when Biohazard 1.5 was in development
https://residentevil.fandom.com/wiki/BIOHAZARD_1.5/gallery





This is how I learned about Biohazard 1.5:
I bought my GamePro magazine back in December 1996 and boom!..... There it was, the announcement for the sequel.
It looked so creepy and scary that my hands started shaking. It just freaked me out.
Previously, from Sep 1996 to Nov 1996 I had gone through my worst nightmare (as a gamer) playing Resident Evil 1. It scared me to death, it totally freaked me out. Eventually I was just left without much of a choice but to abandon it.
The final version of RE2 that I laid my hands on in 1998, wasn't so creepy and scary. At least the Police Station when compared to 1.5.
There were some jump-scares here and there, but overall it was just a blast to play and immerse yourself into. Judging by the experiences that I had as gamer back then from RE1 -> RE2 and seeing RE1.5 in magazines back at the day, I would say that comparing RE1.5 with the final version of RE2 its like comparing apples to oranges.

 

[thesaunderschild]

The old Resident Evil games (prior to 2005) were the best. Honestly, all the shooter-ish ones like 4-6 just get on my nerves. The shitty action elements totally debunk those games as being true sequels. To me, they are just sequels that have the primary characters and a major lack of horror elements makes them feel uncharacteristic of the PlayStation ones.

They aren't even what I would call proper Resident Evil games either, yet they are unfortunately still a part of the franchise. More so, I would say they are all along the lines of science fiction and all of them yielded way too much Hollywood style action scenes. Which I guess, is fine, if you like that sort of game, and I suppose it was supposed to cater to fans of other games like Call of Duty. But to us old-school fans, we just were not keen on that direction at all.

So I think Capcom getting back to basics is fine. However, I want to see that for sequels and not just remakes, as I pointed out already.

 

[TheDuskwalker]

In some preview I read today, Tofu apparently now uses a rifle.

Blasphemy! A giant piece of food does not use a gun.

Tofu with a gun? #NotMyTofu

 

[thesaunderschild]

Well, HUNK eats Tofu anyway!

https://residentevil.fandom.com/wiki/Tofu

 

[Aggelos]

http://shmuplations.com/residentevil2/

Early design of Claire Redfield

—When you say you scrapped everything, I assume you’re talking about the legendary Resident Evil 1.5, which was discussed very briefly in game magazines last year.

Kamiya: We had Sugimura, a professional screenwriter, take a look at the completed scenarios from 1.5. That was actually his first point of contact with the development. Anyway, when he read them, he said “You should probably re-write these again.” Resident Evil 1.5 was actually about 70% complete then… (laughs)



—What were some of the specific problems you saw with the story/scenarios in 1.5, Sugimura?

Sugimura: It was all too realistic. The ominous atmosphere from the first game, as represented in things like the Spencer Mansion itself, the armor room, key items like the jewelry box and gemstones… all that had been removed. The Police Station, too, had been changed to a very modern building. As a result, everything felt too modern and strangely sterile. “This doesn’t feel like Resident Evil…” Of course, wiping the slate clean and going back to zero on a project that’s already 70% complete is no mean feat, and in that sense, I think it was a very brave move on the part of the developers.

Kamiya: To be sure, there was also a lot of excitement from everyone when we learned we were redoing it: “this time we’re going to get it right!” As a result we had to speed up the pace of the development after that. (laughs)

Sugimura: Once it was decided we’d re-do everything, I had a meeting with Kamiya, and it was at this point that he really settled on the idea of the Zapping system, I think. However, for awhile we didn’t know how to make it work. Then I suggested that it should be possible to use the data on the memory card to link the stories together, and from there we took off. To tell you the truth, I was actually opposed to the Zapping system. I knew how much work it was going to be to weave together multiple narratives… but Kamiya wouldn’t back down. “This is what I want to do in Resident Evil 2.”

Kamiya: I was like, “Let’s do it, let’s do it!” and Sugimura eventually conceded, “Ok, fine, we’ll do it.”

Sugimura: Hey, now you’re just exaggerating. (laughs) Anyway, it is true though—Kamiya is the type who, once he gets a clear idea of what he wants to do, will stubbornly push for it until he gets his way. Now that I think of it, besides the Zapping, the Tyrant scenes were also added on his insistence.

Kamiya: We originally had no plans to bring the Tyrant back, since he was the final boss of the first game. I was saying we should make him the perfect, invincible Tyrant this time. (laughs)

Sugimura: But after talking we realized that making the Tyrant so strong would render the existence of the G-virus meaningless… to solve that problem we came up with the idea of the Tyrant having a mission to retrieve the G-virus. Also, one of the consequences of having players go through the same scenario twice was that, by the second time, they’re used to things and it’s too easy. For that reason we decided to have the Tyrant appear in Scenario B, as a way to raise the difficulty.




—Why didn’t you bring back Chris and Jill for Resident Evil 2?

Kamiya: Well, unlike the Street Fighter II series, the Resident Evil series doesn’t have a lot of character stuff going on. That being the case, we thought we’d add some new characters for the sequel.

Sugimura: The original Resident Evil was just a survival/escape game. Jill and Chris’ motivation was simply to escape the zombie-infested Spencer Mansion, so they weren’t given any independent characterization or motivation. That made it hard for us to give them big dramatic arcs. That’s why for the sequel we decided to create new characters, with suitable motivations for the dramatic plot, like searching for her brother, or a romance sideplot.

Kamiya: The characters changed a lot between 1.5 and 2 as well. For example, there’s Marvin, the black detective who you meet in the police station. He’s just a side character who, after a brief conversation with the protagonist, becomes a zombie. But originally we planned to use him much more. He was going to be a support character like Ada or Sherry, who would work with you in the final act. Ada, on the other hand, was originally a researcher and wore a white lab coat. She wasn’t at all like the cool female spy she became. (laughs)





—In both Resident Evil 1 and 2, there’s a variety of guns, but no melee weapons. I think it could be interesting to have them too… how about it?

Kamiya: Actually, when we were making 1.5, there was a steel pipe…

Sugimura: I think space and distance are very important to Resident Evil. That’s why we didn’t add melee weapons. We want players to feel fear and dread, like danger is just around the corner—even if you can’t see it on-screen, you can hear the footsteps of licker or the groaning of a zombie… should you flee, or fight? But if we go and give the player a steel pipe that can be used over and over, then we’re giving that player a reason to approach the zombies! And then the player will no longer be afraid. The Resident Evil world must always hold true to the idea that approaching the enemy == danger. And even if you do choose to fight, you run the risk of expending your precious ammo…

 

[IbizaPocholo]