Resident Evil 9: How We Got Here
Resident Evil 9 Requiem was formally announced on June 6th and will release in February of 2026. How did we get to the point in the storied franchise?
The next installment in the survival horror franchise, Resident Evil 9: Requiem, was announced on June 6th, 2025, as part of the 2025 Summer Game Fest. The trailer gave fans a look at scenes and faces, some being familiar and some being brand new.
Although we don’t have all the details of the game released yet, and in true Resident Evil style, we probably will not know everything until the credits roll on the first playthrough, we can recap how we got here. Let’s run down what we know and how we got to Resident Evil 9 ahead of its February 27th, 2026, release date.
Resident Evil 9: What We Know and How We Got Here
The Last Main Entries
The last two main entries in the Resident Evil series put gamers in the boots of series newcomer Ethan Winters. After the mixed reviews of Resident Evil 5 and 6, which took the action-centered formula of the acclaimed Resident Evil 4 and built upon it, the series returned to the survival horror roots with Resident Evil 7 and 8.
Released under the names Biohazard and Village, respectively, gamers played through Ethan Winters’ journey first to rescue his wife Mia Winters, who had been missing for three years at a seemingly abandoned farm in Dulvey, Louisiana. Once Ethan arrives at the farm, he encounters the Baker family, who have been put under the control of the biological agent Eveline. He rescues Mia, only to learn she was a covert operative for the company that developed Eveline on board a tanker ship. When Eveline escaped, she took control of Mia and made her way to the Baker’s farm, where the events of the game unfold. The game ends with series’ mainstay Chris Redfield coming to the aid of Ethan and Mia after Ethan defeats Eveline and evacuates them from Louisiana.
Village picks up with Ethan, Mia, and their baby Rose, trying to return to normalcy after Chris assists in relocating them to Europe. One night, Chris and his squad break in and shoot Mia while taking Rose and Ethan hostage. Ethan is knocked out and awakens in a crashed transit with Rose missing. He makes his way to a strange village and learns the village is ruled by priestess Mother Miranda and her lords Alcina Dimitrescu, Donna Beneviento, Salvatore Moreau, and Karl Heisenberg. Miranda has separated Rosemary into 4 different flasks and given one to each lord. As Ethan recovers the flasks, he learns that Miranda has kept herself alive for years using the infected mold that created Eveline in Resident Evil 7. She gave this technology to Umbrella Corporation's founder, Oswell E. Spencer, which became the base for the T-Virus. He also learns that Miranda can disguise herself and has imprisoned Rose in the Village. The Rose that was taken down by Chris (or so he thought) was Miranda in disguise, and Miranda is responsible for taking down the transport. She wants to use Rose to bring her daughter back due to the mold infection in her DNA from Ethan and Mia. Ethan defeats Miranda but is killed in the process (technically a bit before, but the mold gives him some help) as Chris escapes with Rose and Mia.
Now, the DLC and post-game cutscene did make it seem like the next Resident Evil may have more to do with the Winters’ family. However, Capcom went in a different direction for Resident Evil 9.
Raccoon City
Raccoon City is a fictional midwestern mountain town that is home to the biological pharmaceutical company, Umbrella Corporation.
The first Resident Evil game took place in the Arklay Mountains just outside of RaccoonCity, where the Spencer Mansion incident took place. As the story unfolds, gamers find out that the RaccoonCity Police Department Special Tactics and Rescue (S.T.A.R.S) team was sent to the mountains to investigate a string of murders. The mansion turns out to be a research facility for Umbrella where the Tyrant Virus (T-Virus) is being produced to be sold as a weapon. The virus turns its victims into flesh-eating Zombies.
Although the game has multiple endings, the canon ending sees Chris Redfield, Jill Valentine, Barry Burton, and Rebecca Chambers escape the zombie-infested mansion as the sole survivors, with the mansion exploding as they escape via helicopter.
Resident Evil 2 and 3 occur two months after the events at the Arklay Mansion. They occur within 24 hours of each other inside Raccoon City. Resident Evil 2 follows Raccoon City Police Department rookie Leon Kennedy, who heads to the police department for his first day, only to see that most of Raccoon City’s citizens have been turned into zombies by the T-Virus. He also runs into Claire Redfield, who has come to Raccoon City to find her brother, STARS member Chris Redfield. The duo fights their way through the police station, sewers, laboratory, and more, eventually using an Umbrella train to escape the city as the events of Resident Evil 3 cross into the game.
While Leon and Claire are making their way through the police station, sewers, and lab, Resident Evil 3 follows Jill Valentine as she fights her way through Raccoon City while being chased by the bio weapon Nemesis, whose sole mission is to destroy the members of STARS. As Jill destroys Nemesis and escapes in a helicopter with Umbrella Biohazard Countermeasure Service (U.B.C.S.) member Carlos Oliveira, an experimental thermobaric missile wipes out Raccoon City, and the city has not been a setting in a mainline Resident Evil game since.
That is, until now, the trailer for Resident Evil 9 showed a decimated Raccoon City with a massive crater from the missile strike that leveled the town. The iconic RCPD building was shown being reduced to nearly nothing.
The Characters
A new main character was revealed in the initial trailer, but her last name is not new to the Resident Evil franchise.
Grace Ashcroft took center stage in the trailer for Resident Evil 9. Although she is a new character to the series, her mother has played a role in past games. We first see Alyssa Ashcroft in Resident Evil Outbreak. An episodic story game that follows different RaccoonCity residents through the events of Resident Evil 2 and 3 in different areas of the city. Alyssa is a reporter for the Raccoon Press who had her memory suppressed of the Arklay Mansion incident in an attempt to cover up the story. She continued to break stories of Umbrella’s wrongdoing, only to be suppressed by the federal government.
She is also mentioned in Resident Evil 7 as she covers the mysterious disappearances of multiple people in Dulvey Parish, Louisiana. Dulvey is where the Baker house and farm are located, where the events of the game unfold.
Her daughter, who is a Technical Analyst for the FBI, gets assigned to a new case at the Wrenwood Hotel. The hotel is where Alyssa was murdered eight years before the events of Resident Evil 9. Not much is known about the hotel or her murder, but from the trailer, we see Grace held captive at the hotel where a string of murders has taken place.
Although Grace is the only main character confirmed as of this writing, rumors are circulating that Alyssa as well as Leon Kennedy are playable characters in the new game. Given the Raccoon City return and many shots of the iconic RPD Station in the trailer, Leon’s return would fit right in.
Capcom will host a Capcom Spotlight event on June 26th, and the game will reportedly be playable at Gamescom in August. We will likely learn more from those events about the setting, characters, gameplay, and more.
Are you excited for Resident Evil 9? Sound off in the comments below.
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