Ranking the mainline Resident Evil games by sales figures

When you think of horror gaming, chances are you picture Resident Evil in one of its many forms. From its humble beginnings as a puzzle-based zombie game that took cues from Alone in the Dark and Sweet Home, Capcom’s survival series has become almost the final word in scary video gaming. There’s not much that comes close to it in terms of worldwide success and brand recognition.

With that, I’m going to attempt to rank all the mainline Resident Evil games that have been released over the decades (almost 30!) based purely on their sales figures. Now, there are a couple of things I want to clear up before I get started.

First off: there seems to be some debate about whether the likes of Revelations and Revelations 2 count as “main games” in the series. As such, I won’t be discussing them, as no one seems to agree. However, Code Veronica is unanimous when it comes to classing it as a canon RE game. So, in the list it goes.

As for the sales numbers themselves, there doesn’t appear to be a consensus on that, either. It would make sense to use Capcom’s own figures, but they don’t match up with what other sources say. For example: it lists RE4 (the original) numerous times, depending on the platform and release version. Given this, I’ll pull information from a number of places, but I will try to keep this as accurate as I can. Also, it ultimately doesn’t matter in the end. We’re all just trying to get through the week, yeah?

Code: Veronica (2000) – 2.54 million

Taking place just before the military destruction of Raccoon city, Code: Veronica is smack-bang in between Resident Evil 2 and 3. The Wikipedia entry for the game refers to it as the “fourth main installment” in the series, though if you’re not familiar with the franchise, you’d be forgiven for thinking it’s a spinoff, seeing as it’s not a numbered game. I’ve made that mistake in the past.

It’s also considered one of the strongest entries, with pretty much universal acclaim across the board. Metacritic shows a review score of 94 and a user rating of 9.1 for the Dreamcast version. You’ll sometimes see it on lists of the top Resident Evil games of all time. With such praise, it’s no wonder there are high hopes that Capcom will remake Code: Veronica at some point.

Resident Evil 3: Nemesis (1999) – 3.50 million

I still have fond memories of being in my teens and playing the 1999 release of Resident Evil 3. I loved the second game, and the third entry was just as fantastic to me. I was terrified of the prospect of bumping into Nemesis at unexpected intervals, but my sweaty hands and greasy face (teenager, remember) fought bravely. And that was the last time I truly felt free. Sigh.

Anyway…three and a half million in sales is definitely noteworthy, especially for a time when gaming wasn’t quite the behemoth industry it is today. Nemesis was the third-best game in Japan for 1999 – where it was called Last Escape – according to data originally published by Famitsu. That placed it ahead of Gran Turismo 2 and Dino Crisis.

Resident Evil 2 (1998) – 4.96 million

Now we come to my favorite Resident Evil game of all time. Is this a nostalgia thing? Almost certainly, yes. But I still recall being blown away by its visuals and the fact that the game dropped you right in the middle of the action. Unheard of at the time, when I think about it. I played this game to death when it first came out, even attempting to unlock the ability to play as Tofu.

Coming just a couple of years after the original, RE2 seemed to fall just shy of its predecessor in terms of sales. But it absolutely (in my eyes, at least) took what made the first game such a hit and upped just about everything. Yes, two and a half decades later, it’s dated, but it’s a classic. But that first time Mr. X burst through a wall will go down as one of the most frightened I’ve ever been while playing a game.

Resident Evil (1996) – 5.08 million

There’s some debate about when the “survival horror” genre actually began. One thing that most would agree on is that it didn’t start with the original Resident Evil. However, it’s generally considered the first game to be described as a survival horror. Some would consider 1992’s Alone in the Dark – which influenced RE – to be the first. But the term can retroactively describe even earlier releases, it seems.

That aside, it doesn’t detract from Resident Evil‘s impact on the gaming world. Its blend of exploration, puzzle solving, and a zombie infestation combined to make it one of the scariest games ever released at the time. For that alone, it’s gone down in the history books as probably the most important horror game of all time.

Resident Evil Remake (2002) – 5.25 million

You could argue that this reimagining of the first Resident Evil installment was what kick-started Capcom’s keen interest in remaking the older games from scratch. However, this came out some 17 years before the RE2 remake, which is a fact that hammers home just how long the series has been going for.

This 2002 do-over of RE kept the third-person perspective and tank controls of its ancestor, but gave a boost to the visuals. It was a much darker version than the original, I found, but it retained the franchise’s position in the limelight a good few years before the fourth game would come along and absolutely smash the boundaries of survival horror.

Resident Evil Zero (2002) – 5.45 million

With the release of both a remake and a brand-new entry, 2002 was evidently a good year to be a Resident Evil fan. If you wanted to play the games in chronological order based on timeline, Zero would be the one to start with. Covering the events before the 1996 game, this one is a prequel and sees you playing as both Rebecca Chambers and convict Billy Coen.

Sadly, I never finished this one, though I did enjoy the fact that you could switch between both characters at a moment’s notice. This was something of a departure from previous Resident Evil games, where you typically played one campaign before playing the story again as someone else. Novel.

Resident Evil 4 Remake (2023) – 7 million

The numbers are starting to climb up, but we haven’t yet reached the tens of millions. Also, given that Resident Evil 4 Remake is the latest installment to be released – launching in March 2023 – this number is only going to change as time moves on. The previous entries on this list are probably not shifting many copies now, given their general ages.

The original RE4 is easily considered one of – if not the – best game in the series. So, you can imagine the pressure Capcom was under to make the remake nothing short of stellar. Fortunately, the studio pulled it off, bringing everything fans loved about the 2005 release, but — actually, you don’t need me to tell you how good it is. No doubt many of you have played the remake already.

Resident Evil 3 Remake (2020) – 8.70 million

Don’t be too surprised that this has (so far) sold more than RE4. Remember, the latter has only been out just over a year, while the remake of Resident Evil 3 has had a good while longer to rack up the numbers. It’s not quite as high in terms of sales figures as some of the other games, but it’s still a sizeable chunk, especially for such a short game.

That was largely the main criticism of RE3. That, and it dialed back the puzzles a tad. But even for a short horror title, it was able to capture the essence of its 1999 counterpart and inject some much-needed modernity into the mix. Of course, it also kept the Nemesis antagonist, which would have been criminal to leave out.

Resident Evil Village (2021) – 10 million

Now we’re into the juicy numbers. It was very recently that Capcom announced Resident Evil Village had smashed 10 million copies, and is the fastest game in the whole series to achieve this. Much like RE4 Remake, we can expect the eighth installment to keep racking up those figures over time. But we can already see how successful the series continues to be after all these years.

Village is – in a way – the second installment that is trying to do something different with the franchise, much like RE7 before it. Gone are the classic zombies and third-person camera angles. Replaced instead by a much more involved perspective, grittier visuals, and a return to form for gamers who just want to ogle a digital matriarch.

Resident Evil 6 (2012) – 13.10 million

This one might be a surprise to some. If you know the general trajectory of Resident Evil quality, you’ll be familiar with the sixth game’s reputation. Pretty much tacking on horror as an aside, the series was, by this point, almost entirely about bombastic action than tension. This 2012 installment is typically regarded as one of the weakest of the mainline games.

Or so I thought. The fact that it’s sold over 13 million copies must be a testament to how well it did upon release, or some time after it. Steam shows it as “mostly positive” for reviews, while Metacritic has it down as 67 out of 100. It seems weird, then, that the sales figures appear to be at odds with the overall reception of RE6. But that’s show business, baby!

Resident Evil 4 (2002) – 13.20 million

I’m going to confess something right now. Please don’t hate me for this, but…I don’t consider the original Resident Evil 4 to be the best in the series. I know, I know. It’s sacrilege. But I think it’s because I played it many years after it was released. By this point, the control scheme felt outdated and the voice acting felt too cheesy for something that had moved into darker and more sincere territory.

That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy it. It’s a great Resident Evil game. Just not my favorite. But I could still see why everyone loved it so much. Its switch to an over-the-shoulder perspective was genre-defining and while being more action-orientated would be the later games’ detriment, it worked out pretty nicely in this case. It’s just a shame I was late to the party to truly appreciate it.

Resident Evil 7: Biohazard (2017) – 13.30 million

When I first saw the teasers and trailers for this, I was massively excited. Capcom was rewriting their own rules for Resident Evil 7 and it was a decision that helped breathe new life into the waning series. It had lashings of P.T. (long-dead by this point) and Outlast, which did nothing to quell my thirst for this game.

Going back to its horror roots, Biohazard seemed to be a way to undo what the last two or three entries had done. While Resident Evil 2 is my favorite overall for both its gameplay and trip down memory lane, RE7 is easily my favorite of the modern games.

Resident Evil 2 Remake (2019) – 13.90 million

While we mustn’t forget the 2002 remake of Resident Evil, the 2019 modern take on RE2 can be said to be the start of a new era for Capcom in terms of remaking classic games. Nearly 14 million in sales over the past few years is probably all the evidence you need to understand just how huge this game was upon release.

Obviously, the game itself played a huge part in that popularity. Had it been a straight remake of the 1998 release, it probably wouldn’t have been as well-received aside from some appeal to older fans. But bringing back the over-the-shoulder camera from RE4, adding Mr. X from the offset, switching the puzzles and overall level design around to keep things fresh are the hallmarks of a great remake that still hits that nostalgia spot.

Resident Evil 5 (2009) – 14.60 million

Much like RE6, I was surprised to see that not only had the fifth Resident Evil game sold so many millions of copies, it’s actually the highest-selling entry in the series. Right at the start of this article, I posted a link to Capcom’s list of its top releases. I went through to double check these numbers. It turns out, yes, it does indeed add up to 14.6 million when you include all versions of the game.

I never played RE5 beyond the demo. The fact that it had a co-op mode – in Gears of War fashion – was a neat idea, but it’s shift towards heavy action was off-putting for me. Still, you know my views on Resident Evil 4, so what do I know, eh? The numbers speak for themselves.