Later this year, a Resident Evil Village accessibility update is coming, and it'll add all kinds of features from larger subtitles to a permanent targeting reticle on screen. However, there's one major accessibility feature that will still be locked behind a DLC paywall when the update lands.
What feature is the Resident Evil Village accessibility update missing?
In October, Resident Evil Village is getting some pretty big DLC in the form of Winters' Expansion. It'll add new stages and characters to the Mercenaries mode (including everyone's favorite tall vampire mommy Lady Dimitrescu), as well as new story content. Alongside that DLC, a free accessibility update is also launching for the game, adding subtitle options, closed captions, and more. However, as pointed out by gaming journalist Laura Kate Dale, the accessibility update is missing one key concern: motion sickness.
As Dale points out on Twitter, the Resident Evil Village third-person mode, which she describes as "an accessibility feature for players with severe motion sickness", is locked behind the Winters' Expansion paid DLC pack. This means that if you're someone who suffers from serious motion sickness, it'll effectively cost you $10 to be able to play Resident Evil Village, on top of the amount you'll pay for the base game (assuming you don't buy the Gold Edition, which bundles them both in). While the third-person mode might not have been included as an explicit accessibility feature, there are certainly a lot of folks with bad motion sickness who will use it for that, so it seems a little mercenary (no pun intended) to make those players pay extra for the chance not to feel ill while playing. Resident Evil Village also doesn't have an FOV slider, which would be another thing to help with motion sickness in first-person, although enterprising modders have created mods to add one in the PC version (sorry, console gamers).
Accessibility in gaming is becoming a more widespread concern
Of course, there have always existed gamers who were unable to play games because of their lack of accessibility options, but those gamers' voices are becoming louder and more prominent. Games like Dead Cells and God of War Ragnarok are either introducing accessibility updates or focusing on accessibility options from the get-go, and companies like Xbox pride themselves on expanding their accessibility programs and introducing more ways for gamers with different kinds of needs to play games.
It remains to be seen whether Capcom will recognize that the Resident Evil Village third-person mode is a key accessibility concession for those with motion sickness and adjust its strategy accordingly. Hopefully, Capcom understands that this really does make or break the experience for some gamers, but I'm not sure it's particularly likely that this will happen. Regardless, we'll bring you more on Resident Evil Village as soon as we get it, so stay tuned to TechRaptor for more info.