Capcom has indicated that a perpetuation of Resident Evil’s more action-oriented route is likely for the series going forward, especially in North America.
Speaking to Gamasutra, Masachika Kawata, producer on Resident Evil Revelations, believes the series’ survival horror origins just isn’t a viable option anymore, and wouldn’t generate sufficient numbers in a market dominated by blockbuster action games like Call of Duty.
"Especially for the North American market, I think the series needs to head in that [action-oriented] direction," said Kawata-san.
"RE4 started in that direction, and RE5 kept going in that direction. And I think that especially for the North American market, we need to keep going in that direction, and take that a step further.
"Looking at the marketing data [for survival horror games] … the market is small, compared to the number of units Call of Duty and all those action games sell," he observed. "A ‘survival horror’ Resident Evil doesn’t seem like it’d be able to sell those kind of numbers."
The Capcom producer went on to suggest that the numbered games may adhere to more mainstream action conventions, while spin-off titles such as Revelations would be able to provide a more classic Resi experience.
"I can’t really speak for Resident Evil 6, but I don’t think that it necessarily has to go all the way in that [action-heavy] direction, the Call of Duty direction. It doesn’t have to be a straight up shooter. But my impression is that Resident Evil 4 and 5 aren’t shooters, per se,” he explained.
"So we have our numbered series, and we can say we have a more adventure-oriented version, like a Revelations-style game. And we also have Operation: Raccoon City, which is a third-person shooter.”
"So I think that by extending the market in this sense, we can still have the numbered titles keep their identity about what Resident Evil is supposed to be, but still expand and hit other markets as well."
Resident Evil 6 is due out on PlayStation 3, PC and Xbox 360 in November 2012.