Anonymous edits have been disabled on the wiki. If you want to contribute please login or create an account.

Resident Evil

From PCGamingWiki, the wiki about fixing PC games

This page is for the original game. For the remake, see Resident Evil HD Remaster.

Resident Evil
Resident Evil cover
Developers
Capcom
Publishers
Japan Capcom
Japan (Reprint) MediaKite
North America, Europe Virgin Interactive
Russia Akella
Release dates
Windows December 6, 1996
Reception
IGDB 79
Taxonomy
Monetization One-time game purchase
Modes Singleplayer
Pacing Real-time
Perspectives Cinematic camera
Controls Direct control
Genres Survival horror
Art styles Pre-rendered graphics, Realistic
Themes Contemporary, Horror, North America, Zombies
Series Resident Evil
Resident Evil on IGDB
Resident Evil guide on StrategyWiki
Resident Evil on MobyGames
Resident Evil on Wikipedia
Resident Evil 1996
Resident Evil 2 1999
Resident Evil 3: Nemesis 1999
Resident Evil Survivor 2002
Biohazard 2 (Sourcenext) 2006
Biohazard 3: Last Escape (Sourcenext) 2006
Resident Evil 4 2007
Resident Evil 5 2009
Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City 2012
Resident Evil 6 2013
Resident Evil: Revelations (series)
Resident Evil 4 Ultimate HD Edition 2014
Resident Evil HD Remaster 2015
Resident Evil Zero HD Remaster 2016
Umbrella Corps 2016
Resident Evil 7 Teaser: Beginning Hour 2016
Resident Evil 7: Biohazard 2017
Resident Evil 2 (2019) 2019
Resident Evil 3 (2020) 2020
Resident Evil Resistance 2020
Resident Evil Village 2021
Resident Evil Re:Verse 2022
Resident Evil 4 (2023) 2023

Key points

Capped at 30 FPS.
Poor compatibility with modern systems.
Very poorly programmed. It is tied to the CPU speed, which results in the game moving very fast, and scripts are bugged when running the game on a faster CPU than recommended by the official requirements.
Doesn't include content from the Director's Cut version.
No installation required. The game can run directly from the CD.

Availability

Source DRM Notes Keys OS
Retail
Disc check (requires the CD/DVD in the drive to play)
Simple disc check
Windows

Essential improvements

Resident Evil Classic REbirth

Removes the need for configuring the compatibility mode to Win95 or Win98/ME, fixes all frame rate issues, adds full compatibility with XInput, RawInput, and DirectInput controllers, adds several new resolutions and a borderless fullscreen mode, replaces Registry configuration with an INI file, removes the need for a physical CD-ROM drive, adds support for loading movie files from Hard Drive, and translates the Japanese version into English.
Provides extended mod support, required for most mods.
Requires a Japanese release with the version 1.01 EXE file. The MediaKite release is 1.01 out-of-the-box.
Non-MediaKite releases can be made compatible by applying the 1.01 patch.
Non-Japanese releases are not compatible.

High Quality Audio

Replaces the original audio with higher quality sounds and includes FMVs.
Includes an older version of the REbirth Patch and the Japanese MediaKite 1.01 executable.

Seamless HD Project

Replaces textures and the original FMVs with higher quality MP4 files that have reduced artefacts, smooth interpolations to 30 FPS, and better compression.

Game data

Configuration file(s) location

System Location
Windows HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\capcom\RESIDENT EVIL[Note 1]
For the MediaKite version: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\capcom\BIO HAZARD.

Save game data location

System Location
Windows <path-to-game>\savedat*.dat[Note 2]

Video

Launcher options menu.
Launcher options menu.

Graphics feature State Notes
Widescreen resolution
Multi-monitor
Ultra-widescreen
4K Ultra HD
Field of view (FOV)
Windowed
If running the MediaKite version, press F7 and/or F8.
Borderless fullscreen windowed
Use Resident Evil Classic REbirth to add support for borderless fullscreen mode.
Anisotropic filtering (AF)
Forcing anisotropic filtering through your GPU driver has no effect in this game because of its 2D backgrounds.
Anti-aliasing (AA)
Forcing anti-aliasing causes artefacts (e.g. black lines).
Only tested with MSAA so far.
Vertical sync (Vsync)
See the glossary page for potential workarounds.
60 FPS
Gameplay runs at 30 FPS. Menus and door loading screens run at 60 FPS.
120+ FPS

Input

Audio

Audio feature State Notes
Separate volume controls
Surround sound
Subtitles
Closed captions
Mute on focus lost
Royalty free audio

Localizations

Issues fixed

"Jill Bug"

While playing as Jill, the image freezes during the encounter with Barry after killing the first monster. This bug is triggered if the PC specs exceed the game requirements.
To prevent this issue, it is necessary to decrease the FSB (Front Side Bus) frequency to reach a value that does not cause problems with the game, usually 100Mhz or 66Mhz.
For all those who do not have the possibility to configure this option, it's necessary to rely on 3rd party solutions such as "CPUKILLER" or "Resident Evil Classic REbirth".
Use Resident Evil Classic REbirth

"Failed to initialize the Graphic Hardware Device.(3)" error

This issue is caused by incorrect detection of Z-buffer formats on AMD cards.
Use Resident Evil Classic REbirth[citation needed]

"The game would only be able to run only when Windows95" error

Set the compatibility mode to Windows 95 for the following files: Checker.exe, launch.exe, ResidentEvil.exe, and Setup.exe.[1]
Use Resident Evil Classic REbirth[citation needed]

Installing the game

During installation, the installer goes fullscreen. Sometimes an error message pops up behind the background of the installer.
To view and then get rid of the error message by clicking OK, it is necessary to use Alt+Tab or the Task Manager.
Use Resident Evil Classic REbirth to bypass the original installer[2]

Notes

This makes the game fully portable.

Other information

API

Technical specs Supported Notes
Direct3D 3
Software renderer
Also supports PowerVR's PowerSGL and Rendition's RRedline APIs
Executable 32-bit 64-bit Notes
Windows

System requirements

Windows
Minimum Recommended
Operating system (OS) 95
Processor (CPU) Intel Pentium 90 MHz
System memory (RAM) 16 MB
Hard disk drive (HDD) 5 MB
Video card (GPU) 4 MB of VRAM
DirectX 3a compatible


Notes

  1. Applications writing to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE will be redirected to other locations based on various criterias, see the glossary page for more details.
  2. When running this game without elevated privileges (Run as administrator option), write operations against a location below %PROGRAMFILES%, %PROGRAMDATA%, or %WINDIR% might be redirected to %LOCALAPPDATA%\VirtualStore on Windows Vista and later (more details).

References

  1. Set the compatibility mode to "Windows 95" - last accessed on October 2023
  2. How to bypass the original installer - last accessed on October 2023