Best Co-Op Modes In The Resident Evil Series, Ranked

Posted by By our-little-miss-is-home March 24, 2025 10 Views 17 Min Read
Best Co-Op Modes In The Resident Evil Series, Ranked
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Resident Evil is primarily known for its tense, nail-biting survival horror gameplay. However, it has also veered into action horror for a good deal of its history, and Capcom has maintained a fascination with having multiple protagonists.

Split image of Sheva Alomar, Sherry Birkin and Raymond Vester from Resident Evil.

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There have been many pushes to make Resident Evil a multiplayer experience, to the point that some games are clearly designed as co-op experiences. The multiplayer modes have had a mixed reception: some are popular, while others are reviled, and still others are forgotten. Here are all of them, ranked.

Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City was shut down and delisted in 2021, so it does not count.

14

Resident Evil: Resistance

A survivor shoots a zombie in Resident Evil Resistance.

Resident Evil: Resistance represents the bottom of the barrel for this series’ multiplayer component. It is symptomatic of creative bankruptcy and a bid to catch on to a trend dominated by one game. We know Capcom wanted some of that Dead by Daylight money, but this is not the way to do it.

RE: Resistance features a group of survivors on one side and a mastermind laying traps on the other. Whichever side you’re on, it’s not very fun, because there are no dedicated servers. It’s impossible to enjoy Resistance’s gimmicks with the laggy peer-to-peer connections this game mandates.

13

The Darkside Chronicles & The Umbrella Chronicles

Leon Kennedy and Claire Redfield stand in front of a hoard of zombies at night.

There’s not much to say about these Wii entries in terms of multiplayer. Local co-op is available, and it’s virtually identical to the single-player mode, except that a buddy can shoot zombies alongside you. It’s more about the person you play it with than the features on offer, honestly. It doesn’t make the game any harder to take the second light-gun into account.

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Emotionally, not biologically.

To allow a second player to join, sync up the Wii controllers and press the 1 button on the second controller. The co-op mode isn’t heavily advertised, perhaps due to its simplistic nature. With the right friend, it can be great fun, but truth be told, with the right friend anything can be fun. It’s still a nice feature to have, though.

12

Umbrella Corps

Operatives scout a building in Umbrella Corps.

Too little, too late, Umbrella Corps came and went without so much as a whisper in the wind. The lack of Resident Evil in the title alone should warn you that Capcom itself had little confidence in Umbrella Corps.

The game never had a high enough player-count for you to get matches consistently, and even if you do convince a group of friends to play it with you, there’s nothing to set this mediocre third-person shooter apart from the slew of similar titles on the market.

11

Resident Evil Re:Verse

Jill Valentine shoots multiple Nemesis monsters in Resident Evil Re:Verse.

Capcom’s second attempt to cash in on a multiplayer trend was just as misguided as the first. Resident Evil fans don’t want a generic PvP battle royale, especially not with the series’ control scheme. Resident Evil’s controls make for tense single-player campaigns, but they are completely out of place in fast-paced online multiplayer.

Nevertheless, Capcom pushed ahead with this companion piece to Resident Evil: Village. It’s not very fun, and it also cheapens the series’ dark presentation to see battle passes and virtual currencies shoved in.

Capcom announced that it would delist Re:Verse on March 3, 2025 and shut down its servers on June 29, 2025.

10

Predator Mode

Resident Evil 6

The Ustanak attacks Sherry in Resident Evil 6.

This was what Resident Evil: Resistance was trying to be and failed spectacularly at. Predator Mode in RE6 allowed you to become Ustanak, RE6’s unstoppable monster from Sherry and Jake’s campaign, while five friends would attempt to take you down.

Split image of Leon, Chris, Hunk, Jill and Claire from the Resident Evil series.

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Asymmetrical multiplayer wasn’t trendy in 2012, and RE6’s Predator Mode generated barely any discourse. It’s not great, but it’s better than Capcom’s later forays into the genre. There was one major flaw: some maps were clearly not designed to accommodate the Ustanak, and weren’t much fun to play this mode on.

9

Siege Mode

Resident Evil 6

Leon fights off zombies in Resident Evil 6.

Okay, so this is basically VIP mode from Counter-Strike but with zombies. You’re tasked with protecting one of your team members against the enemy team, who are all zombies. The zombie team doesn’t have VIPs, so it’s honestly more fun to play as the humans.

It’s unbalanced, and that’s the one flaw. However, Siege Mode in RE6 is certain to be a blast provided you have a big enough friend group to make it an engaging session. With random players online, you’ll have much less fun.

8

Agent Hunt

Resident Evil 6

A zombie dog hunts agents in Resident Evil 6.

Resident Evil 6 featured a massive multiplayer component that went underappreciated due to how disillusioned fans became with the game’s action elements. There was a variety of game modes, including Agent Hunt.

This mode allowed you to invade other people’s games online as a zombie and kill them. Yes, while they were playing through story mode. The same could happen to you, and it was always frightening to see that a real, intelligent human was going to control the zombies you were facing. Video game AI isn’t that scary in comparison.

If you do not wish to let others join, you can disable Agent Hunt visibility in the single-player settings at the start of each session.

7

Survivors Mode

Resident Evil 6

Jake and Sherry staring off camera in Resident Evil 6.

Someone needs to show Capcom the extra modes it made for Resident Evil 6 to remind the developer it’s already done everything. Survivors Mode is a free-for-all PvP battle royale that pits you against five opponents. The last person standing wins.

What makes this better than Re:Verse? Well, for one thing, Resident Evil 6 already has a downright goofy presentation, so it doesn’t feel as nonsensical. For another, there are no fake currencies or battle passes. And here’s the knockout: Resident Evil 6’s controls are honestly better for fast-paced, stylish combat.

6

Onslaught Mode

Resident Evil 6

Ada Wong with a crossbow in Resident Evil 6.

Imagine competitive Tetris 99 as a third-person zombie shooter: that’s Resident Evil 6’s onslaught mode. You go head-to-head against a friend, clearing out waves of zombies. If you manage to chain together a good enough combo, it would send a wave of zombies into your opponent’s game.

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Because nothing is quite as intense as a last-second sugarbeet harvest.

This mode is great fun, as it combines the fun of chaining combos in Mercenaries with the tension of surviving against hordes of zombies. If Capcom had to retain one multiplayer mode besides Mercenaries, this is the one we’d pick.

5

Mercenaries Mode

Resident Evil 5 & 6

Sheva Alomar with a sniper rifle in Resident Evil 5.

One of the most popular game modes in the series, Mercenaries has you kill zombies within a time limit while chaining together combos. There are crystals you can break for extra time, and some treasures increase your score multipler.

We’ll be honest here: while it’s okay with a friend, Mercenaries is far more fun alone. This is particularly true of Resident Evil 5’s Mercenaries, where the small maps mean that a friend also killing zombies will cramp your style and cause your combo to run out. There also isn’t much point in communicating while playing Mercenaries, resulting in silent and lackluster sessions.

Resident Evil 4’s Mercenaries mode does not have co-op.

4

Raid Mode

Resident Evil: Revelations & Revelations 2

Jill Valentine shoots zombies in Resident Evil Revelations' Raid Mode.

A Revelations staple and the second most popular multiplayer mode, Raid Mode is far more satisfying with a friend than Mercenaries. The maps are linear and organized, with a clear end point and no true time limit. However, your ranking is affected by your clear time and number of enemies routed.

Raid Mode is more satisfying with a friend because it throws gimmick zombies at you: extra large or small ones, fast ones and super strong ones, necessitating cooperation and creating hilarity. It has yet to appear outside the Revelations games, but we hope it does.

3

Resident Evil 6 Campaign

The main cast of Resident Evil 6.

The multiplayer component of Resident Evil 6 was so painfully ambitious that it hurts. Besides all the extra modes listed above, the game allows you to cooperate with up to seven other people: four duos working their way through the story mode, should your characters’ paths in the story cross. Yet the stars would have to align for that to actually happen. The best you can get is a few people joining your game as zombies using Agent Hunt.

A split image of Ada Wong, Jill Valentine, and Sheva Alomar in the Resident Evil series

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On the flip side, RE6’s multiplayer is infuriating at times due to the game’s myriad QTEs being performed only by a single player. You’ll spend a lot of time sitting on your hands, waiting for your friend to press the right button.

Resident Evil 6’s campaign multiplayer features in-game voice chat. If you’d prefer a Discord call with your partner, you have to either turn down your mic volume in-game to prevent echoes.

The game also has local co-op, but it is not split-screen. Instead, it displays two windows at a tiny resolution. Unless you have a very large monitor or TV, the game is unplayable this way.

2

Resident Evil Outbreak & File #2

An in-game screenshot of Resident Evil Outbreak depicting a ruined city.

Resident Evil fans have been clamouring for years for an Outbreak remaster, and for good reason: it’s one of the best multiplayer modes in the series. It takes the survival horror gameplay of the classic PS1 titles and imbues it with various gimmicks to keep it fresh and engaging. There’s a variety of characters to choose from, each with their pros and cons.

If Outbreak and its sequel had launched just one console generation later, they would have been massive hits that might have defined multiplayer horror. Unfortunately, the games are confined to the PS2, where most people didn’t even realize the console had an ethernet port and barely anyone used it.

Using emulation, you can now play Outbreak online on fan-hosted servers.

1

Resident Evil 5 Campaign

Chris Redfield punches the boulder in Resident Evil 5.

The pinnacle of co-op fun, Resident Evil 5 is one of the best games to play with a best friend or loved one who likes horror games. Yes, there are many criticisms of Resident Evil 5: you can complain about the action-horror vibe, the brown-tinted graphics, and the ridiculous plot. But it doesn’t matter when the game is this much fun.

Most people would point to It Takes Two as the best game for couples to play together. Well, Resident Evil 5 is It Takes Two for horror fans. The co-op component is so good that after you’re done with it, you’ll find the single-player mode bland. You’ll likely pester your partner for one more run: Resident Evil 5 is an infinitely replayable game.

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