Xbox Game Pass Is Adding the Perfect Horror Game Next Week

Xbox Game Pass has become one of the best places to try new games. The subscription price has recently increased, which makes it less attractive, but if you’re paying for it, Microsoft constantly rotates new games into the service. The team behind the service is also smart with new releases, often dropping old games in a series just before the next game launches, giving players a relatively easy way to catch up if they missed out. That’s true about a new game launching next week, which hits Game Pass about a month before the next game comes out. If you’re looking to catch up on the ongoing Resident Evil series, Game Pass has good news for you.

Resident Evil Requiem is due to release on February 27th, 2026. The next mainline game in the long-running series is set to take players back to Raccoon City for the first time in more than a decade (not counting remakes), and Xbox is capitalizing on that by dropping Resident Evil Village onto Game Pass on January 20th. The eighth game in the series came out in 2021, so if you missed it or need a refresher, this Game Pass release is coming out at a perfect time.

What is Resident Evil Village?

As mentioned, Village is the eighth game in the long-running Resident Evil series by number, but is technically the ninth numbered game thanks to Resident Evil 0, a prequel to the original game. Of course, there are several other games that many fans would consider “required reading,” most notably Code Veronica, but the point is that Village is the latest in the ongoing adventures of the Resident Evil crew.

However, it’s important to distinguish Village from some of the earlier games in the series. See, with Resident Evil 7: Biohazard, the team at Capcom did something of a soft reboot for the series. Most of the characters fans know and love were missing from RE 7. Instead, Capcom introduced a new protagonist named Ethan Winters.

Regardless of your opinions on Ethan (and to be clear, many fans don’t love him), RE 7 and Village are his story. In fact, you would be missing quite a bit of Village‘s story if you hadn’t already played through Resident Evil 7. Those two games are the Ethan Winters saga, for better or worse.

Importantly, Village takes the series closer to an open world. It’s not a true open world that you’re free to explore, but the hub-and-spoke design makes it feel a little less constricted than previous Resident Evil games. That’s important for Requiem, because it looks like that game is taking the series even closer to an open-world design. However, it’s worth wondering if you need to experience Village before jumping into Resident Evil Requiem.

Does Resident Evil Requiem Connect to Village?

This is a fair question for anyone interested in Requiem but not sure if they have the time to play through Village on Game Pass before February 27th. As mentioned, Village is Ethan’s story, and while I won’t spoil what happens, it is probably the end of Ethan’s tale. There’s always a chance he comes back (this is a series where death is generally a mere inconvenience), but it seems like Capcom is committed to moving on.

With that in mind, you’d assume you wouldn’t need to play through Village to love Requiem. That’s largely true, but it’s worth noting that Requiem seems to be heavily focused on exploring all of the previous games in the series. We know that one of Requiem‘s leads is Grace Ashcroft, who is the daughter of Ashley Ashcroft.

Now, if you aren’t a Resident Evil diehard, that information means nothing to you. However, Ashley was one of the characters in Resident Evil: Outbreak, an online multiplayer game from the PlayStation 2 era. If Capcom is digging that deep into its catalog, it’s impossible to guess what’s going to matter during Requiem.

On top of that, it’s worth remembering that Village ends with the series’ star, Chris Redfield, talking about going to Europe to confront the Bioterrism Security Assessment Alliance, which seems to be dipping its toes into something nasty. Of course, Requiem takes place in Raccoon City, which is quite a jaunt from Europe, but it’s hard to imagine Capcom wouldn’t follow up on that plot point.

At the end of the day, you can probably jump into Requiem without playing Village and be fine. You’ll miss the odd reference and plot detail, but if you don’t have the time, you should be fine. Still, I’d recommend playing through Village (especially if you’re already a Game Pass subscriber) because it’s one of the best games in the series’ long history. Here’s hoping Requiem lives up to its predecessor.

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