Resident Evil 9: Capitalism Doesn't Care About You

Resident Evil Requiem released on February 27th, and has lived rent free in my brain ever since. It seems to be that way for many others too, surpassing 5 million units sold as of March 4th. I love this series with all my heart. It's goofy, has cheesy one liners, and (un)necessary backflips. However, what draws me most to the series is how great its commentary really is. The main villain of the series is not just one person, but a pharmaceutical company called Umbrella, which engineered the T Virus that began the initial zombie outbreak in the fictional Raccoon City. Requiem allows players to control two characters: FBI analyst Grace Ashcroft and Raccoon City survivor Leon Kennedy. Both face the Umbrella Corporation once again, and the legacy it leaves behind decades after the fall of Raccoon City.

Resident Evil Requiem begins with Grace investigating the deaths of multiple Raccoon City survivors, visiting the abandoned hotel where her mother, journalist Alyssa Ashcroft, was killed years earlier. She finds that she's being watched, and is kidnapped by a man named Dr. Gideon and taken to his clinic. From there she fights her way through a zombie outbreak within the clinic, and finds a little girl, Emily, locked away in a cell. The little girl is blind, and is the subject of experimentation by Umbrella. Throughout the remainder of the game, Grace finds out that Emily is one of many clones created as part of Umbrella co-founder Oswell Spencer's grand quest to create the perfect genetic human. He was a eugenicist. The viruses created by Umbrella, the mutants, the insane monstrous bosses that players of the series have fought time and time again were all results of Umbrella's efforts to create the perfect species. 

Through Spencer's mission, the U.S. government gave Umbrella support in exchange for new bioweapons. When the outbreak in Raccoon City happened, a missile was launched under the guise of containing the virus. However, the missile was really meant to cover up the lab, ARK, that headquartered the bulk of Spencer's research. A criminal organization, The Connections, lobbied the government to launch the strike so that they could seize the assets and the government could lay blame for the outbreak at the feet of Umbrella, hiding how complicit they were in its activities. ARK continued to produce bioweapons and sell them to the highest bidder, while Spencer disappeared from the public eye along with his knowledge of his biggest project, Elpis. Elpis was later discovered to be an anti-viral drug, though originally thought to be another bioweapon. Spencer said it would disrupt the balance of every military power, which may be the first and only case in which I nodded and thought, "well, he's right."

The whole of Requiem emphasizes how little corporations and the imperialist U.S. government truly care about you. They funnel boundless funds into weapons research. They perpetuate racist ideals. There's a superiority complex and a lust for power, and who takes the fall when whatever they pursue backfires? The citizens. In 2025, President Trump passed the Big Beautiful Bill which both cut funding for important domestic policies like Medicaid, while increasing funding for the Department of Defense, now named the Department of War (the original name prior to 1947).

Last month, the U.S. also began its war with Iran. There are two big things that I want to highlight from this stupid waste of human life and resources:

1. On February 28th, a girls school in Minab, Iran was the victim of a U.S. - Israel joint missile strike that murdered 165 children and staff. On the same day, Trump said in a speech that, "The lives of courageous American heroes may be lost, and we may have casualties. That often happens in war." There is no care as to who dies in this war, nor is there ever going to be a good reason for the deaths of children. It's cruel, sporadic violence at the whims of the fascist sitting in the Oval Office.
2. In recent years AI has become a big industry, one that the United States economic growth has come to lean heavily on. The Department of War has used Palantir, a data analytics company, as well as AI tools to help direct weapons usage and development. Sam Altman, founder of OpenAI which created the unfortunately popular ChatGPT, announced on February 27th that the Department of War would utilize OpenAI models. Now, It's no secret that companies have benefitted from war before, as evident by defense contractors such as Raytheon and Lockheed Martin. However, AI has been peddled to people as an everyday tool to help empower those to learn, create, etc. Of course, to many this may seem like the most obvious lie. That gen AI is not only a plagiarism machine but the environmental impacts are never worth the promises companies make, even if they were deliverable. I hope that their war profiteering not only makes the lie more obvious to those that are still bought in, but how common it is under the current economic system we have.

The discovery of ARK does exactly that, exposes the lie in all its glory. The lie that a capitalist government would ever place people before profit. That an imperialist one would care who lives or dies. When these two things merge, it creates a system that only emboldens the worst humanity can offer, and trains people to think that this is all there is. Yet Requiem, along with the whole series, does something else. It gives the player the power to fight back. There's a, "It's never too late," mentality that it has. Whether it be Leon kicking the shit out of a monster with bad knees and an Umbrella Virus in his veins. Grace doing whatever it takes to save a little girl from experimentation and give her a normal life. Oswell Spencer revealing that he had created an anti-virus and adopted a daughter as an apology for what he did, even if his actions were completely unforgivable (He killed millions! He's evil!).

Not only is it not too late, but change requires constant effort. Leon has been fighting for decades since the original outbreak in the 90's. The fight carries on and across generations as shown when Grace takes it on herself. I think there's a misconception among people that if we wait long enough there will be one decisive battle that'll loosen the grip of the oppressor. In reality, it's a bunch of little fires ignited everywhere. Progress is communal and it takes time. Resistance is a struggle, a collection of acts that push the line forward ever so slightly each time. Resident Evil is and always will be a reminder of this to me. I hope Requiem displays just how little capitalism cares about you, and what kind of future it's creating for your children. That's the scariest part of the game, really.