Player Spots 'Village' Reference In 'Resident Evil 7' That's Either Huge Coincidence, Or Sheer Brilliance

Resident Evil Village has a number of twists and turns in its storyline, and one of them is hidden in plain sight in the pause menu for Resident Evil 7. Sort of. Let me explain.

Spoilers for Resident Evil Village follow, so click off now if you're yet to jet off to gloomy eastern Europe with Ethan Winters.

At the start of Resident Evil Village, it's clear that Ethan and Mia's marriage is strained owing to their unresolved trauma over the events at the Baker homestead. They're arguing at the dinner table when Mia is suddenly fatally shot by Chris Redfield and his team of mercenaries. He then takes their baby Rose and knocks out Ethan, yet the convoy crashes in the snow soon after they leave. When Ethan comes to, the soldiers are dead and Rose is gone. In his desperate search, the Duke informs him that the container he found after defeating Lady Dimitrescu is actually Rose. Mother Miranda ordered the baby to be crystallised and split into four fragments for her ritual that would bring her own deceased daughter back to life.

Oof. That's a lot to deal with. Lady Dimitrescu has one part of Rose, as does Donna Beneviento, Moreau and Heisenberg. Of course, Ethan is able to retrieve these and ensure that Rose is not a victim of Mother Miranda's twisted ambitions, but he has to sacrifice himself in the process. At the end of the game, the player sees words on the screen: "the father's story is now done."

Over the course of 25 years, Resident Evil has transformed again and again, each entry iterating on the classic conventions to offer up something fresh... but not every game has stuck the landing. Check out our video on the evolution of the survival horror series below.

There's a rumour that Resident Evil 7 and Resident Evil Village are two chapters in an eventual trilogy that culminates in Resident Evil 9. Though connected, Resident Evil 7 and Resident Evil Village are like chalk and cheese, with the former being a claustrophobic slow-burn with a tragic story and the latter offering an action-horror experience with fantastical enemies. Yet, there's evidence that Capcom laid the groundwork for Village with a sneaky reference in its predecessor. When pausing the game, the player is given four options on the menu: "Retry," "Options," "Stats," and "End." The first letter of each of those words spell out "ROSE". It's also split into four, like she was in the story of Village. Morbid.

This discovery was shared by videogamessuchbutt on Reddit, and depearce weighed in on whether this is purely coincidental or if this is a nod to the game. "I did some snooping and found they used 'quit' in both RE2 Remake and RE3 Remake's pause screens. And I even looked at the pause screen for Village where they use 'quit game,'" they said. "So yeah I feel like the use of 'end' is no coincidence and is definitely intentional."

As the rest of Reddit keenly points out, this reference only really applies in the English version of the game, because different languages will have different words for each of those options. Well. It's still cool, in my opinion. Others compared it to Dead Space where the first letter of every narrative chapter in that game spelled out a very pertinent plot point. Now that was a wild one. Resident Evil Village is out now for PC, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One and Google Stadia.

Topics: News, Resident Evil, Resident Evil Village, Capcom