Resident Evil multiplayer games have a tumultuous history. Resident Evil Outbreak, and later, Outbreak File 2, were solid and had some bright ideas. The RPD and zoo chapters in File 2 were especially great; likewise, the opening J Bar section from the original Outbreak. The only issue was that playing Resident Evil Outbreak with other people was often harder and less enjoyable than playing it alone – the in-game comms system made it difficult to effectively strategize, and managing keys and ammo between four people was normally a huge fuss. Resident Evil Resistance was a novel idea, but it was bundled with the neglected and unfairly maligned Resident Evil 3 Remake, so never really took hold. Taking cues from Dead by Daylight, Resident Evil Reverse, which arrived via a download code for RE Village, might also have been a contender – but just over one year later, RE Reverse hardly has enough Steam players to make a single game.
If Resident Evil pioneered and refined survival horror games, Dead by Daylight established multiplayer horror as a distinctive and popular genre. Like DBD, which throws together characters from dozens of series and movies, Resident Evil Reverse collects heroes and villains from across the whole history of RE, and casts them all in a six-person, competitive deathmatch. The premise is pretty strong – play as Nemesis, play as Ada, play as Hunk, play as Leon. But just over a year since its October 2022 release, Resident Evil Reverse is averaging fewer players that it needs to fill one game.
According to figures from SteamDB, on Monday, December 4, Tuesday, December 5, and Wednesday, December 6, Resident Evil Reverse saw an average Steam player count of just five people – one less than is necessary to fill up a single lobby. As of this writing, the horror game has nine players, and a 24-hour peak of 13. That means you could fill two lobbies with one player left over.
Steam Charts tells it slightly differently. There, Resident Evil Reverse has a 24-hour peak of nine players, with seven in game as of two hours ago. On Tuesday, December 5, the player count dipped to just two people. The rolling, 30-day average is 8.4 players, down 99.6% from the game’s all-time record of 2,080.
Nevertheless, Resident Evil is still going strong. Capcom recently confirmed more remakes are in the works, and a highly ambitious fan project, available to play, reimagines classic, fixed-camera Resident Evil in the Middle Ages.
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