People Walked Out of the Resident Evil Movie and Bought the Games

Most game movies send you home talking about the cast. This one sent people to a store page.

Zach Cregger’s Resident Evil, out since September 18, has made about $245 million worldwide on a $75 million budget. Critics put it at 96% on Rotten Tomatoes, audiences at 91%. That is the boring part of the chart. The interesting part is what happened to the actual games.

PlayStation sales of the Resident Evil 2 remake rose 64%. On Steam the same game was up 11%. Resident Evil 4’s remake climbed 54% on PS5 and 14% on Steam. Some of that is a sale, the remakes have been sitting at $9.99 or less, but the timing lines up with the movie, and RE2 is the one that shares a city with it.

The film is not a Leon highlight reel. Austin Abrams plays Bryan, a courier trying to finish one last drop in Raccoon City while the outbreak is already eating the streets. Paul Walter Hauser turns up as an Umbrella employee who is clearly not built for this. There is a kid in an RV, a girlfriend named Michelle who has just found out she is pregnant, and Cregger himself as a voice on an intercom. Ninety-five minutes, then credits. People wanted the rest of the night.

That is the trick older Resident Evil films never quite landed. Bryan plays like a first-time player and like one of those journal entries you find on a desk. Two health sprays in a barn. A dog that does not want to be friends. Umbrella and Raccoon City are the familiar nouns. Everything else is new, sitting next to Resident Evil 2 rather than retelling it.

Capcom did not have to buy this advertisement. Cregger made a movie that feels like the first hour of a good RE game, the hour where you are still scared of doors, and the audience went and bought that hour.