Capcom’s recent and upcoming game slates look good with titles likeMonster Hunter Wilds, a remaster ofOnimusha 2, and the newOnimusha: Way of the Sword, but there is a notable name missing from these proceedings.Resident Evil 9has been spoken of online for years, especially since the launch ofResident Evil Villagein 2021, and the subsequent release ofResident Evil 4’s remake in 2023, but it still hasn’t been officially announced. While Capcom’s work onResident Evil 9behind the scenes is a given, by 2025, it feels like some news concerning it is long overdue.
Allegedly,Resident Evil 9is an open world title running on the RE Engine, and was internally considered to be part of an open world batch of games consisting of itself,Monster Hunter Wilds, andDragon’s Dogma 2. Now that the latter two games are out andOnimusha, historically considered a sister series toResident Evil, is back, news of thenext mainlineResident Evilinstallmentshould be just around the corner. According to a May 2025 leak from an established source, there is a reason for all of this, even though what it truly means forResident Evil 9remains to be seen.
Unpacking Resident Evil 9’s Latest Leak
Dusk Golem, also known as AestheticGamer, is a well-known Capcom insider from X, even if they’ve held back on actually leaking games in recent years. Still, they have expressed an interest in behind-the-scenes game development stories, and that is the form their latest information took on May 22. According to Dusk Golem,most of theResident Evil 9rumorsthat have cropped up over the past few years are untrue, but a few are merely outdated.Resident Evil 9has taken an unknown form after a development reset, and the details of this make up the bulk of this new leak.
How Leaks Describe The History Of Resident Evil 9
The originalResident Evil 9allegedly began development in early 2017, afterResident Evil 7’s launch sales had disappointed Capcom, but before its long tail picked up and made it a big hit.RE9was conceived as a direct response to the apparent failure ofRE7’s first-person horror focus, with the series seemingly returning to the co-op formula ofResident Evil 5and6. This time,REveterans Leon S. Kennedy and Jill Valentinewere supposed to embark on an open-world multiplayer adventure set on a fictional island based on Singapore. A “pretty heavy” reboot interrupted that in 2021 around the launch ofRE Village, and that’s where the story ends for now.
What Resident Evil 9’s Reboot Could Mean
Rebooting Could Be Just What RE9 Needed
Some other details Dusk Golem revealed were that Leon is still the main character ofRE9, and aResident Evil Revelations 3starring Rebecca was canceled in 2022, but the main takeaway is that four years ago,Resident Evil 9reset. Four years of development since then, with some assets and gameplay ideas already present, is decent progress for a modern AAA game, enough that fans could potentially see a teaser within the next year, but it’s a huge delay for a project supposedly started in 2017.RE9is coming along, but it isn’t in a hurry.
It could be argued that feeling less pressure is both the main cause and benefit ofResident Evil 9’s reboot.Resident Evil 7andRE Villagehave proven capableof keeping the series afloat, as have the remakes ofResident Evil 2,3, and4. There’s no need forRE9to chase trends or mold its identity around reacting to a prior entry, because the issues it originally responded to no longer exist. For fans, this also comes with the downside ofResident Evil 9’s status being a total mystery, but as Dusk Golem insinuated, Capcom can reveal the game on its own time.
