Capcom’s Jun Takeuchi has shot down claims suggesting that Resident Evil 5 was redesigned after a number of critics accused the game of displaying racist imagery.
Controversy arose following the E3 2007 trailer of the forthcoming survival horror outing, attracting a number of complaints, most notably from Newsweek’s N’Gai Croal.
However, the recent CAPTIVATE 08 trailer displayed a more ethnic diversity among RE5’s enemies, as well as introducing a young African woman, who serves as a partner character to game’s main protagonist, Chris Redfield.
When asked by Kotaku whether or not these changes were applied with criticism in mind, Takeuchi replied, "No, not really,” stating such complaints "didn’t have any effect on the game design."
"We wanted Chris to have a partner who was familiar with the environment. She’s been in there since pretty much the beginning," Takeuchi said of the female mercenary.
"In terms of the reaction, we’re in the business of entertainment… We didn’t set out to make a racist game or a political statement. We did feel there was a misunderstanding about the initial trailer," he said.