We’ve been waiting with bated breath for the release of Resident Evil, a new take on one of the most iconic horror video game series of all time. The vast potential of mythology from the series would make it seem like a given that any adaptation would be a guaranteed hit, and as proven multiple times over the years, a Resident Evil movie can make plenty of money, regardless of how good it is.
However, this new Resident Evil comes from Barbarian and Weapons filmmaker Zach Cregger, who has more than proven his skills in the horror world.
In a bold move, Cregger made it clear that his movie, which stars Austin Abrams as a courier who is sent on a job that takes him through Raccoon City, wouldn’t be adapting specific characters or storylines from the games and would instead try to evoke the feeling of playing the games. Understandably, this creative decision elated some while completely alienating others. With the review embargo officially having lifted, it seems as though Cregger’s gamble has paid off.
With more than 70 reviews calculated, Rotten Tomatoes has Resident Evil sitting at 96% positive reactions. Not only is this the best-reviewed adaptation of a horror video game, but this makes it the best-reviewed video game movie based on any genre.
Below, you can see how the movie compares to other horror game adaptations, in chronological order.
Resident Evil (2002) – 36%
No one necessarily remembers the original Resident Evil for its cinematic achievements, so much as we remember how fun it was to see Milla Jovovich kicking tons of zombie butt in a video game movie. At the time, there wasn’t much of a precedent for video game movies getting the big-budget treatment, with 2001’s Lara Croft: Tomb Raider at least somewhat proving it was a worthy endeavor.
While the next four sequels would all have lower critical scores, the ultimate entry in this series, Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, was both the top financial performer with $314.1 million worldwide and the (barely) top critical performer at 38% positive reviews.
Alone in the Dark (2005) – 1%
Unfortunately, the moderate success of some video game movies resulted in a major surge in such adaptations. Enter filmmaker Uwe Boll, who has given us video game movies like House of the Dead, BloodRayne, In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale, Postal, and somehow more. As far as critics are concerned, though, there’s one of his video game movies that manages to be worse than all the others, which is 2005’s Alone in the Dark.
Starring Christian Slater, Tara Reid, and Stephen Dorff, it’s difficult to point out exactly what makes the movie such a failure, as virtually every decision made by anyone involved feels like the wrong decision.
Doom (2005) – 18%
By comparison, Doom feels like a triumph next to Alone in the Dark, despite its brutal Rotten Tomatoes score. Even though it starred Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, Karl Urban, and Richard Brake, Doom is one of many examples of a studio hoping that a recognizable name alone would result in significant profits.
The Doom video game is known for being a seminal first-person shooter that, at the time, delivered some of the most intense violence seen in a video game. In retrospect, those graphics now seem quaint, but it’s safe to say no one was playing the game because of its complex lore; we wanted to make monsters blow up. Still, the Doom movie even failed to offer the necessary grotesque violence required to make for an even superficially entertaining experience.
Silent Hill (2006) – 34%
Much like Resident Evil, the appeal of the Silent Hill games was wandering through an unsettling environment and solving puzzles, occasionally encountering supernatural beings. What made the latter so unsettling, though, is that rather than a seemingly real-world environment, the events of Silent Hill unfolded in the liminal space of the titular town, which was under a constant snowfall, evoking a more nightmarish vibe.
The Silent Hill movie attempted to be a bit more strange and grotesque than what the Resident Evil franchise was doing, and while the Radha Mitchell-starring adaptation has its fans, thanks in large part to its surreal visuals, it still failed to resonate with critics.
Monster Hunter (2020) – 45%
While there were plenty of video game adaptations throughout the 2010s, they were largely either underwhelming sequels in the Resident Evil franchise or big-budget attempts at reinvigorating properties with major stars, like Rampage with Dwayne Johnson or Tomb Raider with Alicia Vikander.
Even though Milla Jovovich said goodbye to Resident Evil in 2017, she and husband Paul W.S. Anderson decided to put their stamp on another video game series with Monster Hunter. The movie wasn’t all that more memorable than their many Resident Evil pictures, though its 45% score is at least somewhat above many entries in that franchise, with this adaptation largely just feeling like a fantasy-leaning spin on what the pair accomplished in the horror space.
Werewolves Within (2021) – 86%
A major tonal shift from a majority of the horror video game movies we had been getting up to this point, Josh Ruben‘s Werewolves Within helped prove that unexpected games could make unexpectedly successful adaptations.
The premise of the game is simple: a group of players must deduce who might secretly be a werewolf. In Ruben’s adaptation, Sam Richardson plays a Ranger who moves to a small town and soon discovers that there is secretly a werewolf living among the community. Even if it leans more into the comedic elements of the concept, it’s still a delight to see the stacked ensemble cast give way to paranoia as they embrace the absurd reality that not only do werewolves exist, but at least one of them is a lycanthrope.
Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City (2021) – 30%
Just four years after the previous franchise’s “Final Chapter,” a new take on Resident Evil emerged in Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City.
Coming from Johannes Roberts, fresh off of movies like 47 Meters Down and The Strangers: Prey at Night, there was plenty of hope that this new take on the concept would lean much more heavily into grounded horror than the CGI spectacles of the former series. While it fared better with critics than some of the many sequels, most reactions claimed that, while the movie was quite faithful to the game, this only cemented the fact that the original concept was best experienced as a game as opposed to being interpreted into an entirely different medium.
Five Nights at Freddy’s (2023) – 33%
If nothing else, the release of Five Nights at Freddy’s at least got fans of the franchise to stop inundating Jason Blum with comments about the movie, which had been in the works for years. The effectiveness of the franchise’s animatronics are undeniably effective, so even if you didn’t play this game, you likely were familiar with its creepy mascots.
Regardless of the merits of the games themselves, it seems the filmmakers also hoped that merely by bringing to life its disturbing characters, it would satiate longtime fans. Instead, we got a movie that was an adaptation that felt like it both appealed too much to younger viewers and too much to older viewers at the same time, as a significant component of the narrative was about a custody battle as opposed to merely throwing a character into a world of animatronics coming to life. The sequel Five Nights at Freddy’s 2 didn’t fare much better, earning only 17% positive reviews.
Until Dawn (2025) – 51%
The Until Dawn video game felt a bit revolutionary when it was released, as it was a horror game that heavily leaned into the unsettling nature of the story itself as opposed to relying on engaging gameplay. In fact, the concept involves a lot of decisions that determine the narrative trajectory of the protagonists instead of utilizing combat mechanics or complex puzzle-solving.
One might think strong source material would equate to a successful horror movie, but the 2025 movie from director David F. Sandberg proved otherwise. Even though Until Dawn successfully captured the variety of terrors depicted in the games, it failed to capture the narrative magic that made the game so entertaining.
Iron Lung (2026) – 59%
As proven by Werewolves Within, you don’t need an overly complex game to make for a compelling movie, with Iron Lung only solidifying that notion.
The game itself features a character trapped in a submarine who uses the vessel’s controls to explore their surroundings in hopes of surviving. Filmmaker Mark Fischbach embraced this minimalist concept for his $3-million film, which similarly unfolds in one contained setting. Even if the reviews don’t highlight the movie being a resounding success, its effectiveness saw it going on to earn more than $50 million at the box office.
