Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City
Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City is a third-person, team-based shooter developed by Slant Six and Capcom as a spin-off of the Resident Evil Franchise. Operation Raccoon City stars, in a change for the series, a squad of six of Umbrella Security operatives, who are tasked with advancing the corporation's goals. The game is set during the Raccoon City incident, the setting of previous games such as Resident Evil 2 and 3. The Umbrella Troops will have more to do than simply fight zombies; they're additionally assigned to kill high-value targets, including the heroes of previous Resident Evil games, such as Leon Kennedy.
Here is a trailer for the game.
- Actionized Spinoff: The game features the squad mowing down dozens of zombies with fully automatic weapons. It's stated that zombies are more of an environmental hazard than the real enemy, but can be used to the player's advantage (or harm), such as allowing zombies to finish off or distract wounded US Army specialists.
- Alternate Continuity: What if Umbrella had yet another elite squad sent into to Raccoon? And what if they encountered the various heroes and villains of the RE universe in Raccoon City at the time? Unfortunately it's very limited in how much you can affect the continuity yourself as was advertised; you only have the option of killing or defending Leon S. Kennedy and your encounters with Jill and Carlos are relegated to DLC already on disc.
- Alternate Reality Game: Apparently one right here. It leads to this site.
- The "Save Raccoon City" campaign falls a little flat when you consider that the game ran in 2012, and Raccoon City has canonically been a radioactive crater since 1998.
- Artificial Limbs: Beltway's legs. He apparently owes something to Umbrella because of that.
- Artificial Stupidity: Your AI teammates won't heal you, help you if you're incapacitated, and seem more concerned about the architecture and driving bullets into walls than, say, helping you fend off the enemy. In fact, the only thing they're useful for is gunning down your character should you turn into a zombie.
- The game is sort of hit and miss in this regard. Notably, the healers Bertha and Harley will be really smart with keeping you alive as well conserving supplies, often by hitting 2-3 people with a single first aid spray even in the middle of intense firefights. They will also haul ass if the player character is getting ready to drop.
- Your teammates will also do pretty well in close- to mid-range firefights even without your help, they're just so much slower than you. Snipers will throw the AI for a loop, however.
- AI Vector is quite effective in CQC
- Another Side, Another Story: The Spec-Ops campaign is DLC and roughly the same size as the main campaign, and considered by many to be even better in quality if not characterization. Spec-Ops covers parts of Resident Evil 2 and 3 trying to defend against and later lock down the viral outbreak. The biggest difference lay in character designs, where all of Spec Ops are generally heroic.
- Awesome Anachronistic Apparel: Of a sort. The game is set in 1998, but the US military personnel in Raccoon City are seen to be wearing the same sort of PALS-based tactical webbing and body armour as the BSAA operatives from Resident Evil 5, over 11 years later in-universe, when the Pouch Attachment Ladder System itself wasn't even introduced until 2001 (they still seem to be wearing M81 Woodland camouflage though).
- Badass: While every member of the Wolfpack counts for one, special mention goes to HUNK who singlehandly takes on the G-virus mutated Birkin, rather than return to Umbrella empty-handed.
- Bad Boss: USS Command, who is Wolfpack's field handler, treats the team with disregard, almost never satisfied even when accomplishing the impossible and quick to blame them for failures for which they had no hand in. When Lupo wants to renegotiate their contract to triple their reward after capturing Leon, Claire and Sherry, USS Command goes insane with anger at the audacity, in spite of having already left the Wolfpack to die very recently.
- Blondes Are Evil: Bertha.
- The Brute: Beltway is the largest member of the squad, and specializes in demolition (mines, grenades, et cetera). In the trailer, he can be glimpsed kicking a zombie then curb-stomping it.
- Cutscene Incompetence: In the Triple Impact trailer, it takes the elite Umbrella assassination squad 5 minutes to kill two police officers, with a ridiculous amount of marksmanship that would make Lord Vader proud.
- In all fairness, they are in a running chase the whole time, conditions which are never actually seen in-game and aren't under the purview of an infiltration/assassination team. It's hard to drop a moving target while you're desperately trying to catch up with them.
- Cleanup Crew: The team's job is to cover up Umbrella's actions in Raccoon by destroying evidence and killing witnesses.
- Combat Medic: Bertha, Harley.
- Damage Sponge Boss: The parasite-infected Super Tyrant, which requires a Coup De Grace Cutscene after it's already been downed for the third and seemingly final time.
- Dark Action Girl: Lupo, Four-Eyes, and Bertha.
- Dark Chick: Bertha, the first female squad member to be revealed, has the non-combat role of a medic, and is dressed somewhat like a dominatrix. Four-Eyes is a field scientist, with the ability to temporarily turn BOWs friendly, and Lupo is the team's fiercely protective leader.
- The Dev Team Thinks of Everything: In each campaign, you have a four player team chosen from 6 characters. There are multitudes of differences in the cutscenes depending on those characters, including fully voiced dialogue for almost each and every character combination, what actions are taken in the cutscenes, and even little character interactions like high-fives and fist bumps depending on who's on the team.
- Distaff Counterpart/Spear Counterpart: The new character trailer all but states that each corresponding character between USS and Spec-Ops are opposite genders. The rundown is Vector = Willow, Beltway = Tweed, Harley = Bertha, Party Girl = Spectre, DeeAy = Lupo, Shona = Four Eyes
- Domestic Abuse: Lupo was in a abusive relationship for a long while. Her military discipline allowed her to tolerate it for the sake of the kids. Until her abusive husband put his hand on their kids, and she ended the abuse...with her bare hands.
- Elite Zombie: The BOWs.
- Evil Counterpart: The USS is this to the Special Forces.
- Faceless Goons: Except for Four-Eyes and Lupo, the USS forces conceal their faces. Subverted in the Triple Impact Trailer; the Special Forces soldiers seen fighting the Wolfpack have their faces visible.
- Finishing Move: They never fail to amuse.
- For Science!: Four-Eyes' background.
- Frau Doktor: Bertha.
- Gaiden Game: As the game features the player encountering characters that never met the Wolfpack in Raccoon City, areas from the games set in Raccoon City that look nothing like their original counterparts and the option of killing or defending Leon S. Kennedy at the climax of the game.
- Aside from Nicholai being visibly crazier than he was in RE 3 (seriously, ORC Nicholai comes off like he ought to be fighting Frank West), the first few missions in the Wolfpack's campaign fit relatively cleanly into the established RE storyline, although there are some of the usual issues with set design and clean-up. This completely flies off the rails in the last two missions and takes the campaign the rest of the way into gaiden territory.
- As for the Echo Six campaign, they blunder into the middle of RE 3 in the first free DLC level and it just gets less canon from there.
- Gas Mask Mooks: As they take inspiration from HUNK, all the Umbrella mercenaries wear them.
- Godzilla Threshold: [[BFG}|The Paracelsus]] Rail Gun. Though Spec Ops command wasn't really holding out, they didn't drop it until Spec Ops faced a hoard of Tyrants and Super Tyrants. In all fairness, it would be utterly over-kill otherwise.
- Human Shield: One would think using a zombie for this might be a bad idea, but apparently the Wolfpack are just that good.
- In the Hood: Vector, the team's stealth expert.
- Heel Face Turn: At the end of the game, half the Wolfpack betrays Umbrella to protect Sherry, Leon, and Claire. You decide which side your on.
- Helmets Are Hardly Heroic: None of the US Army special forces members are wearing helmets or anything face-concealing, compared to the USS.
- Invisibility Cloak: Vector has one of these, too.
- Karma Houdini:
- Last we see Nicholai, he made his escape while you were setting up those EMP explosives and fighting the US Army. You aren't given the option to kill him and there is no scene of him falling prey to the team.
- Also USS Command
- If you choose to kill Leon, and Claire in the process; considering you are the bad guy then you get away with it.
- Lack of Empathy: Four-Eyes' profile states she doesn't give a damn about anyone else - especially when it comes to scientific matters.
- Large Ham:
- Nicholai really enjoys chewing the scenery during your fights with him. His thrill from being completely psychotic and evil and the sheer lengths he goes to try and kill you (he straps motion sensor bombs to zombies) makes him steal every scene he's in.
- Bertha and especially Spectre, who chews the scenery like it's made of ham every chance he gets and just can't get enough of his ellipses and extending his lines as far as they can go no.
Spectre: I can see....eeeevveeerrrryything!
Spectre: I...find evidence...now...I watch it...buuuuuuurrnn!
- Machete Mayhem: In the E3 trailer, Bertha attempts to kill an RPD officer with a machete.
- Mad Scientist: Four-Eyes and Bertha.
- Mama Bear: Lupo is fiercely protective of her children, and works for Umbrella to support them. She also tolerated her husband's abuse when it was directed at her, but killed him when he went for the kids.
- Melee a Trois: The game will apparently feature three-way battles between the Umbrella Security Service, US Special Forces, and the various BOWs in Raccoon. There's also a part where it briefly turns into a four-way fight, with the aformentioned sides fighting each other as well as Nemesis.
- Multinational Team:
- Beltway is a Puerto Rican who served in the US Army, Spectre was a former Soviet spy, Lupo was a special forces soldier in France, and Bertha was an ex-German Soldier, Four Eyes is Japanese-American, and Vector is from Japan.
- The US Army Spec Ops qualify to a lesser degree. Their explosives expert is on loan from MI 6, and their scientist was born in South Africa and studied at Harvard.
- Mysterious Past: While the bios for the rest of the team reveal a bit of info about their pre-Umbrella backgrounds, all that has been revealed about Vector is that he was trained by HUNK.
- Mythology Gag: Most Resident Evil final bosses have a third party drop a super-strong BFG to actually dent the Nigh Invulnerable boss. At the end of the Spec Ops mission "The Places We're Meant To Die", you face up to four Tyrants, potentially mutated into a super-Tyrants, on your own. Eventually, Spec Ops command will lend you some aid in the classic "toss 'em a big gun" manner. However, instead of throwing you a bazooka like you'd expect, Spec Ops decides to airdrop a twenty foot laser turret right into the combat zone, roof be damned.
- Never Trust a Trailer: Zig-zagged. In the early trailers, it made the game look like half the point was tracking down Leon Kennedy and shooting him. In the E3 demo, which is apparently the first few minutes of the game, the mercenaries are pursuing Leon simply because he's wearing a police uniform, and not because of anything he specifically did. In actuality, both trailers are true. Initially, they try to hunt down Leon because of orders to eliminate the police, however, after learning about his possible ties to Ada Wong, who had infiltrated Berkin's labs, Umbrella fears that Leon has access to highly incriminating information as well as the only sample of the G-Virus, making him a priority target for Delta Squad. But the trailers are also a lie, in that this is only the last two missions. The 'first few minutes of the game' is actually the assault on William Birkin.
- Night Vision Goggles: Spectre, the team's sniper, has a pair. They're apparently thermal as well and can do some nifty things.
- Nostalgia Level:
- Essentially the entire game plays off of nostalgia for 2 and 3, with Mister X, Nemesis, Birkin, HUNK, Nicholai, Leon, and Claire all having a role in the game.
- A recent trailer revealed Heroes Mode, a team gameplay mode where the protagonists of 2 and 3 fight against HUNK, Nicholai, Ada, and Lone Wolf (the guy who choppered HUNK out in the 4th Survivor).
- Not So Different: In the Triple Impact trailer a group of Special Forces troops runs into the USS. They have comparable combat abilities, shoot first and ask questions later and stop to collect BOW samples like the USS. The only difference is that the Special Forces are trying to rescue survivors, while the USS is trying to kill witnesses.
- Psycho for Hire: The Wolfpack.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: While the rest of the team has had their real names revealed, Vector's identity is confidential.
- Red Eyes, Take Warning: While HUNK doesn't actually have red eyes, his gas mask does.
- Ret-Gone: Before release, the game was advertised as allowing you to radically alter RE canon by killing key characters. In-game, however, you can only select to kill Leon and Claire for Umbrella at the very end of the game, with no other chances to change canon and no look at the long-term effects.
- Selective Historical Armoury: While the M4 carbine that many of the Spec Ops are armed with was actually introduced in 1997, a year prior to the game's setting, the exact model used in-game, with its RIS barrel shroud, Aimpoint red dot sight and TAPCO shoulder stock, is somewhat anachronistic, to say the least.
- The presence of the SCAR rifle (the development of which began in 2006) really sends the weapon selection into the pits of anachronism.
- Shout-Out: A Badass black ops chick working for a high-tech company named Lupo.
- Six Bad Band: At least five of the six playable characters seem to fit this: Lupo is the Big Bad, Vector is The Dragon, Four-Eyes is The Evil Genius, Beltway is The Brute, and Bertha is The Dark Chick.
- Smurfette Principle:
- Averted, there is an even split between guys and girls in the Umbrella troops. Good to know that Umbrella are equal opportunity employers of psychotic mercenaries.
- The special forces unit in the Triple Impact trailer is also an aversion, with an even split between male and female characters.
- The Sociopath: Everybody on Umbrella's side.
- Special Attack: The six characters, Vector, Beltway, Bertha, Spectre, Four-Eyes, and Lupo will all have their own special abilities. For example, Beltway can lay mines, Four-Eyes turns BOWs temporarily friendly, while Vector can one-hit kill enemies while cloaked.
- Spy Catsuit: Averted with Lupo; while her catsuit is skintight and shows some skin near the breastline, it is not shiny, and no cleavage to speak of is visible. On the government side, Willow wears a tight top and loose pants.
- Stone Wall: Enemies will often become these if you're playing solo.
- Take Cover: Your character will plaster themselves against anything they come across, even if you don't want them to. Quite possibly the game's most irritating mechanic.
- Team Mom: Lupo is identified in her bio on the character selection menu as the team's leader. Her fiercely protective streak has led some of the other operatives to nickname her "Wolf Mother".
- Trick Bomb: Pheromone Bombs, which attract zombies and B.O.W.S. to it.
- Villain Protagonist:
- You play as a USS soldier, and you all know what Umbrella has done and is capable of. Hell, you actively wreck the US Army's operations in the process and get the chance to gun down some protagonists, heavily altering the timeline.
- Averted in the Spec Ops DLC; you and mission command are all pretty cool people. It's frankly jarring, after the main campaign.
- Virus Misnomer: A given, considering the genre.
- Waif Fu: Willow pulls this in the Triple Impact trailer, taking down a Licker with a knife.
- X Meets Y: Left 4 Dead meets RE4's The Mercenaries with a side of RE2's "Fourth Survivor", with a dash of Gears of War thrown in.
- Zombie Infectee: Player characters can be infected with the T-Virus, though unlike Outbreak, it requires being bitten, it causes zombies to ignore you and makes you impervious to everything but headshots. However, unless you have a medic on the team or an anti-viral spray to reverse the infection, you will turn into a full-blown zombie and attack your teammates.