If you’re a fan of the Resident Evil series, you probably already know that these are really good speed games. Most of them have short campaigns, feature decent replay value, and they generally just lend themselves well to speedruns. The newly released Resident Evil 3 remake is no exception.
If you’re looking to get into the speedrunning community for Resident Evil 3, here are a few tips to get you started.
Decide On a Category to Run
Like with most games and their respective speedruns, there are usually a handful of different categories to choose from. For Resident Evil 3, the common ones are Any% runs, which basically just mean you have to beat the game in the fastest time possible with no other requirements.
With Any%, you’ll then need to choose your desired difficulty setting: Assisted, Standard, Hardcore, Nightmare, or Inferno. Virtually no one is running Assisted or Nightmare runs right now, and Standard would probably be the best place to start if you’re new to speedruns, or not quite familiar with the game just yet.
If you want to really challenge yourself, you can check out the Any% Inferno category, and then move up to NG Inferno, which means you have to beat the game without using any bonus items from the shop.
Get Your S Ranks
Once you’ve decided on a category, the first thing you’ll want to do is get an S Rank for the difficulty you’ve chosen. For instance, Hardcore S Ranks require you to beat the game in one hour and 45 minutes, and with a maximum of five save files.
One hour 45 minutes isn’t a great time for speedruns, but it’s a good place to start. The idea here is to get familiar with the game and learn where you need to go at any given point in time without having to look at the map, and memorize where all the important item pickups are.
Once you’ve reached the point where you no longer need the map, you’ll be one step closer to being able to speedrun this game effectively. And once you instinctively know where all your important item pickups are, you’ll be able to clear this game very quickly.
It’s also a good idea to try to cut down on your save files while speedrunning Resident Evil 3, as saving your game takes time. You’ll want to make safety saves right before risky parts of the game like boss fights and tough enemy areas, but try to cut those down as much as possible.
Make Multiple Save Files for Tricky Parts
This might sound a little contradictory to what we just said, but while you’re still learning the game, you’ll want to make multiple save files right before the tougher parts.
After all, unforeseen circumstances and unpredictable enemy patterns are what cause you to lose time, and by making save files right before those bits, you can go back and practice them over and over again until you develop a reliable strategy for getting past them quickly.
Like most other games, perfecting a Resident Evil 3 speedrun is about practicing. You’ll save yourself a lot of time and trouble by going back to specific save files to practice an area, instead of starting new runs and getting stuck on the same parts again.
Practice the Final Boss Fights
This is especially crucial for Inferno runs, as the two final boss fights of Resident Evil 3 are particularly brutal on this difficulty setting. The fight with Nemesis in the arena isn’t too bad as long as you can manage the zombies in between each phase, but it’s the very last fight that has given runners the most trouble in the beginning.
The final fight requires you to push in energy cells to charge up the railgun so you can kill Nemesis with it. However, while pushing in the cells, you’ll also need to dodge his tentacle whips. This is way harder than it looks or sounds as the tentacle whips aren’t telegraphed very clearly, and getting hit just once will stun Jill, allowing Nemesis to follow up with more tentacle whips to kill her before she can even get back up.
We recommend unlocking the S.T.A.R.S. manual from the bonus items shop and putting it your inventory while practicing this fight. The manual makes it easier for you to pull off a perfect dodge, and it’s a great item to have while learning Nemesis’ timing for the tentacle whips. Once you’re dodging those attacks reliably, get rid of the manual and continue practicing until you can do without it.
Watch Other Streamers
The Resident Evil 3 speedrunning community is pretty massive, and you’ll find no shortage of help if you’re ever stuck with something. There are tons of streamers speedrunning Resident Evil 3 daily on Twitch, and it’s always a good idea to check out their runs and take notes for your own reference and practice. Even challenge runs of the game can be helpful as well.
Distortion2, Maxylobes, and bawkbasoup have all ran past Resident Evil games at GDQ and ESA, and are pretty good starting points if you want to check out a bunch of different runners and their respective PBs (personal bests) for the game.
CarcinogenSDA doesn’t do speedruns of the game, but he does do challenge runs on Hardcore and Inferno with no damage taken and no bonus items. These runs are probably better for the earlier stages of your practice, and they’ll help you get more familiar with the game and learn how to dodge bosses and enemies effectively.
And those are our tips for speedrunning Resident Evil 3. Be sure to check our guide wiki for more information on the game.
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