| 1 | '''As a Headscratchers subpage, all spoilers are unmarked [[Administrivia/SpoilersOff as per policy.]] Administrivia/YouHaveBeenWarned.''' |
| 2 | ---- |
| 3 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 4 | |
| 5 | [[folder: Where the heck did all these Ganados come from?!]] |
| 6 | * Looking at the highest possible kill count in both the main game and Ada's mini campaign, they can wrack up a combined death toll of almost fifteen hundred slaughtered plaga, the majority of which are human or formerly human hosts. The village where most of these "recruits" came from is extremely rudimentary, and looks like it can barely sustain a few dozen families. Yes, the plaga directing their actions don't consider hygiene a huge concern, and probably let the infrastructure deteriorate, but you would think that a community of a least several thousand people wouldn't be that easy to hide away in a forest somewhere [[note]] a community with a population of 1,000 to 20,000 is considered a ''town'', whereas a ''village'' is a human settlement or community that is larger than a hamlet but, smaller than a town[[/note]]. |
| 7 | ** My guess? Most of the ‘kills’, in story, are probably incapacitating shots. It’s shown by the bloodied Don Jose showing up with an axe that the Ganados can survive quite a bit of punishment, though it may take some time. So, it may be multiple Ganados surviving, healing offscreen, then showing up for round 2. Further, the cultists don’t seem to be villagers proper. I suspect they’re part of the original Cult of Los Illuminados brought by Saddler. He could’ve had them squatting in the woods until he had taken over the village and castle, then had them move in relatively recently. By the time Leon’s at the island, it’s all militia, who might’ve been mercs privately hired by Saddler, then given a Plaga egg. |
| 8 | ** I wouldn't go with that interpretation, if we accept GameplayAndStoryIntegration then you may even be able to kill every Ganado with YourHeadAsplode (as difficult as it may be to keep up a kill chain like that). Rather, I'd say that there's more infrastructure off the beaten path than we see and the protaganists' travels didn't need to show us all of it. Also, if we crudely estimate a 1:1:1 split between the three regions for those kills, then only 500 of those are at the village. The castle is pretty vast, and of course a military barracks for the island mercs would be big enough for them. |
| 9 | |
| 10 | [[/folder]] |
| 11 | |
| 12 | [[folder: Let's squander another batch of limited, irreplaceable troops; we've only lost a thousand so far.]] |
| 13 | * Related to the above; Saddler, Salazar, and the Ganados themselves firmly ascribe to the WeHaveReserves mentality, [[DidNotThinkThisThrough even though they have no means of taking on more troops]]. Although they have a Plaga Queen producing an endless supply of parasites, those plaga need hosts to be useful, the local uninfected human population is pretty much shot. They can't expand much further without attracting unwanted attention, and have aspirations of global dominance to consider. The only Plaga controller even remotely concerned about attrition is Chief Mendez, and even he was content to let Leon slay as many Ganados as he could until he proved to be more of a threat than initially suspected. If Saddler is willing to dismiss Mike's slaughter of almost a hundred men as "a bothersome fly", then either there are thousands more Ganados than we see in the game (which relates to the above headscratcher), or he's really out of touch with the concept of "manpower". |
| 14 | ** A trait Saddler and Salazar both share is their arrogance. Notice that, for all their efforts to kill him, neither of them take Leon seriously until he's killed his way right to their feet. It's possible, even ''likely'' that they're operating on the assumption that they can eat the cost of killing Leon and replenishing their resources later. They're looking so far down the road, they're falling into the hole they don't see right in front of them. |
| 15 | ** Also remember that Ashley is the foundation of their plan as they intend to send her back to the president, completely taken over by a Plagas so she can infect the US, starting with their government. Yeah, Saddler and Salazar are arrogant to the point they don't take the danger from Leon all that seriously, but it isn't until JUST before the final boss fight with Saddler do you remove the parasite both from yourself and Ashley, completely derailing their plan. So it's possible that honestly, they didn't care as much and figured they could recoup their losses when Ashley infects the US. |
| 16 | ** Also, if Leon and Ashley's infections had both progressed just a little further, then Saddler would have been able to literally will Leon to stop killing other Ganados. And if they really needed more for urgent manpower at that point, they could pretty easily spread to other regions and abduct more civilians or even military. "Unwanted attention" doesn't matter much when you can also gradually abduct the police and lure anyone who might come to investigate from further afield into more traps for infection. |
| 17 | [[/folder]] |
| 18 | |
| 19 | [[folder: Salazar executing his own puppets.]] |
| 20 | * When Salazar dumps Leon into his trapdoor deathtrap, you can see roughly a dozen Ganados or cultists adorning the various spike in at the bottom. Yet Salazar himself confirmed less than an hour ago that he had "Ab-see-lute control!" while the Ganados were inherently subservient. What could they have done to displease him if they were utterly incapable of disobedience? |
| 21 | ** I always figured he was offing them for kicks. Salazar is a pretty sadistic and twisted individual, so I wouldn't put it past him to kill his own servants because he got some kind of sick thrill out of it. After all, when Leon successfully evades the trap, Salazar complains about not hearing the "satisfying sound of one's impalement". I could honestly imagine him forcing a bunch of Ganados to line up and step onto the trap door one by one, just watching them all obediently shuffle to their dooms and cackling all the while. |
| 22 | ** Ganados retain part of their original host's mentality so a traitor or a spy would still be able to have their own agenda and be caught doing something "sinful". The merchant may or may not be such an example. A traitor or a sinner could be executed after a brief questioning in Salazar's KangarooCourt. |
| 23 | [[/folder]] |
| 24 | |
| 25 | |
| 26 | [[folder: Alright my minions, do... whatever it is you normally do or something.]] |
| 27 | * Not a Headscratcher in the plot hole sense so much as an "I wonder" sort of way, but what exactly do Ganados do when they're not under Master-Plagas-orders to kill everyone in sight? As far as I'm aware, there's nothing that makes them inherently violent, and among other things, potentially getting their hosts killed is probably counterproductive to their survival. And what's it like from the human's perspective? They still maintain their human intelligence (albeit probably at a loss of a couple dozen IQ points) and we've even seen a cutscene with two Ganados having a conversation and joking around (Separate Ways). |
| 28 | ** Judging from some of the earlier parts of the game, the Ganados just carry on with the lives they once had. For the most part, they do a decent job continuing on, but they have trouble nailing sanitary behaviour. |
| 29 | ** Plus, there will be nitty-gritty stuff for the world domination agenda which doesn't exclusively include ultraviolence, like driving supplies of plaga samples, doing paperwork and suchlike. They can do these tasks when they aren't left to their own devices. |
| 30 | [[/folder]] |
| 31 | |
| 32 | [[folder: Hmmm, let Leon take Ashley back and infect America or let him ruin my plans? I'll go with option B!]] |
| 33 | * Why didn't Saddler just let Leon take Ashley back to America and not tell him about the parasite inside them? Wouldn't it have been more surprising to them when she morphs into a mindless Ganado and turns all of America into Ganados? |
| 34 | ** That was the plan. Unfortunately, Saddler is an [[SmugSnake egotistical douche]] who didn't think Leon would figure out ([[IdiotHero in his clumsy, lumbering way]]) how to extract the parasite. He assumed they would both be his puppets in no time. Ironic, really. [[TakeThat He bitched about Hollywood clichés]], yet he succumbed to [[BondVillainStupidity one of the most obvious tropes in the world.]] |
| 35 | ** "''The American prevailing'' is a cliche that only happens in your Hollywood movies and Japanese-imported video games." |
| 36 | ** The worst part is that it would have been FridgeBrilliance instead if Saddler had just not told them about injecting the two of them with the parasite and just sent his Order after them. This way, if they kill Leon and/or recapture Ashley, fine, they continue with their plan where they left off, if Leon succeeds in escaping with Ashley, then Saddler succeeds in his plan anyway (as for the Queen parasite she needs, he could have one of his agents covertly inject her with one later) and it looks like a genuinely successful rescue. However, by telling them about the Las Plagas he put in them, he blows the second part out of the water, since if they did escape, they'd have them removed afterwards, and thus destroying what would otherwise be a pretty cunning XanatosGambit; though Luis or Ada probably would have told them about the fact that they were infected and still ruined it anyway, at least Saddler wouldn't have looked like an idiot that way. |
| 37 | ** That wouldn't have worked for very long; Luis would have just told them they were infected unless the Ganados caught him first (and they didn't). |
| 38 | ** Ashley is infected with a standard-issue Plaga throughout the game, but in order for Saddler's plan to work, he needs to infect her with the special-edition model that Luis steals from him before the game starts. He writes in one of the files that without that special parasite, Ashley's useless to them. He doesn't want to ''kill'' the President; he wants Ashley to be able to infect him with a Plaga of his own. By the time Saddler gets the special parasite back, Leon's got Ashley, and by the time Saddler has both the parasite and Ashley, Leon and Ada show up right in time to free her. |
| 39 | ** It's also entirely possible that Saddler never anticipated Leon and Ashley lasting long enough to remove their Plagas and escape. After telling them about his dastardly scheme, he probably planned to ultimately recapture them (with Leon's continued existence being optional) until they were completely overtaken by their Plagas, after which they would be his puppets just like the Ganados. |
| 40 | ** In addition to many of the already great points mentioned above, which I think do a good job explaining this already, there's also one other thing...wouldn't it be awful suspicious if Saddler just rolled over, gave up, and let Leon take Ashley back? They had already done a LOT of work trying to keep him from getting near her, so stopping so he could escape would have registered as odd since Leon's not that dumb. Not to mention their attempts to stop him was also likely a tactic to delay them in order for the parasites within to hatch and assume control. |
| 41 | [[/folder]] |
| 42 | |
| 43 | [[folder: Saddler's Plan: Capture Ashley + Infect her with Plagas + ???? = World Domination!]] |
| 44 | * How exactly was Saddler's plan supposed to work? If I remember, the Plagas is spread through microbes in the air or injecting into the body; turning Ashley into a Ganado would have not done anything. She would have killed people but not reanimated anybody. |
| 45 | ** The Ganados aren't mindless. The Ganados are under Saddler's direct control. |
| 46 | ** Yes, but still, one person who can't do anything would take over the country? Am I really missing something here? I never collected all the memos by the way. |
| 47 | ** The plan was to inject her with the Plaga, hold her for ransom, then give her back once the ransom was paid. The Plaga probably would have hatched around the same time the ransom was paid, allowing Saddler to control her and plant a Plaga on her, which she would then inject her father with because the man will undoubtedly hug his daughter when he sees her. Once he has control of the President, the rest of the American government will soon follow, then the United States, then the world. Ashley was needed, not because she was some badass fighter, quite the contrary. She was required because she was weak (and thus unable to defend herself from Saddler's Ganados) and because she could get close to those who were actually in power. That was it. As far as Saddler was concerned, that was her sole purpose. The ransom was likely to throw off suspicion (why would terrorists just give the hostage back without a struggle?) as well as for funding when it came to weapons and the like. |
| 48 | [[/folder]] |
| 49 | |
| 50 | [[folder: Pay no heed to the guy selling things to the protagonist!]] |
| 51 | * VideoGame/ResidentEvil4 was my first RE game. Lots of fun. But, um, what's the deal with the Merchant? How does he get there? How does he survive in Ganado-infested Spain? There aren't safer, more efficient uses of his talents? |
| 52 | ** I agree. It's also shown when you play as Ada that she uses him as well. Presumably Saddler and the Plagas would find him and put a stop to him... |
| 53 | ** Take a close look at the merchant, specifically the area around his eyes. There's some sort of infection there, though whether it's the Plagas or something else is impossible to tell. Plus, if you kill him, another one will show up at another store location. In other words, the merchant is ''unimportant''. He's there to provide weapons as a gameplay element. That's all. |
| 54 | ** My cousin and I had a theory that the Merchants were Ganados that Saddler and Co. order to specifically to sell weapons on the black market to fund Los Illuminatos' various terrorist ventures. It explains why there are so many of them (bringing the product to the consumer!) and why they aren't violent (hard to do business that way). Why they are all placed at key strategic points along Leon's investigation we never were able to rationalise. |
| 55 | ** Noticed something interesting on my second playthrough. The Merchant is waiting for you at the bottom of Salazar's pit after he dumps you down there. There's a corpse lying near The Merchant, and he seems to be wearing a robe. Probably just one of the zombies who went off course, but perhaps it's a replacement Merchant? |
| 56 | ** Unlikely, because those corpses look very much like other Los Illuminados cultists, down to the pasty white skin. |
| 57 | ** No one has mentioned his thick Cockney accent? What is this Brit doing in the middle of nowhere, Spain, with an arsenal large enough to fuel a war throughout Europe? Better yet, why don't the Ganados just buy weapons off of the Merchant? |
| 58 | ** Not enough cash, Stranger! |
| 59 | ** Three things: a) Arguably his accent might be Australian? b) Spain is actually one of the most popular destinations for Brits in the form of migrant workers, retired expats and backpackers, even after Brexit. Also, Aussies are well known for visiting the rest of the world, and some of them end up staying. c) How do we know the Ganados ''don't'' buy his wares? We see several of them with crossbows, [=RPGs=] and maybe even J.J. get their miniguns from him. Maybe the ones that prefer melee weapons (or just use their bare hands) just don't have the fine motor skills for projectile weapons. |
| 60 | ** What ''is'' with the Merchant? He's ''definitely'' infected -- he has weird, blotchy, discolored marks around his eyes, oddly luminescent eyes, and his fingers are the same deathly-pale shade you see some of the Ganados take. The real question is, why does he sell you things instead of trying to kill you like all the others? |
| 61 | ** Okay, new question: what is ''with'' the Merchant's hands? At first, I just thought he was wearing brown fingerless gloves, with pale white fingers... but looking closer, it looks like the brown part is ''also'' part of his skin. I think I might've seen some exposed bone, but it's hard to tell for sure. |
| 62 | ** They're just fingerless knit gloves. They only look like part of his skin because the designers simply drew a texture over his hands instead of rendering actual gloves on his hands like they did for Leon. |
| 63 | ** There was a guess or theory somewhere that said that the Merchant is actually a Ganado, which would account for his appearance, and why he doesn't sell you things ''while'' you're being attacked by Plagas-infested something-or-others. As to why he sells you stuff in the first place, check out the [[WMG/ResidentEvil WMG]] on it. Quite simply: he does it for the lulz. |
| 64 | ** It's possible that the Merchants were infected but somehow resisted the mind control of the main plagas. They can't exactly fit in with the rest of the Ganados, they can't leave because of what it's done to their body, and a guy's gotta eat. |
| 65 | ** Or perhaps they managed to get their hands on a slightly lower quality version of the same virus that Wesker used in order to gain immortality. |
| 66 | ** It's stated in one of the files, that if the infectee has a higher drive in life or something like that, then the plaga facilitates that. Like if they wanted to be a researcher more than anything, it would make them take ForScience up to eleven. Presumably the Merchant's drive was to get some more cash, stranger. |
| 67 | ** I think the answer to the "what's the deal with the Merchant?" question is that he's a ''gameplay mechanic,'' and he doesn't exist as far as the canonical story is concerned. Just look at Resident Evil 5. That game had the same Merchant mechanic, but with no actual Merchant. Instead, the guns just spontaneously appear or spontaneously get stronger, and the money then spontaneously disappears. |
| 68 | ** Or it could be that 5 had a Merchant, it just never showed them. Indeed that's surely the idea. Isn't that more plausible than "the gun's characteristics spontaneously manifest and the money deducts accordingly but by no earthly mechanism and no explanation"? There's no reason for the Merchant ''not'' to exist in-universe and canonically. Weirder things have been seen in any given Resident Evil game. |
| 69 | ** I disagree. When you are playing as Ada, Leon clearly has a range of weapons on him. When you first see him in the village, he has a handgun of some sort. When you run into him in the castle, he is using a TMP. Finally, he is using a shotgun against Saddler while you run for the rocket launcher. Or maybe Leon is just that crazy prepared. |
| 70 | ** Considering Leon grabs ammo from the Ganados for guns that they don't even have (and you can't even buy it from the Merchant), the guns in general just run into all kinds of FridgeLogic as far as canon is concerned, Merchant or not (and still, it's not that hard to imagine he dug up a few guns lying around somewhere, like he did for the Broken Butterfly and the Shotgun). The answer to the question of "where else does he get the TMP and that shotgun if there's no Merchant?" is the same as the answer to questions like "where does he get all that ammo?". Answer: "Don't think about it too hard." |
| 71 | ** Maybe the money, ammo, healing items etc which you find on the Ganados were what they were carrying as normal humans before they turned? |
| 72 | ** And bear in mind, there is almost zero acknowledgement of his existence by the characters in the game. Compare Leon meeting, say, Luis vs. when he first meets the Merchant. In the former, there's all this sort of "who the hell are you?" and "what the hell are you doing here?" stuff going on, yet in the latter, the Merchant just pops up and beckons you to follow him, and Leon just walks up to him when the game goes to the menu screen. Not to mention the odd locations you'll find him (e.g. standing around at the bottom of Salazar's pit, standing around outside of Salazar's boss chamber, etc.), the fact that you can kill him but you ''can't'' steal his weapons, the fact that he runs the shooting galleries which ''definitely'' are not canon, and all the other "WTF"-questions he inspires. |
| 73 | ** I like to think he gets his stuff from [[VideoGame/TeamFortress2 Mann Co.]] |
| 74 | ** I believe the explanation is rather simple, and it's found in one of the files you find after Saddler takes control of Ashley. The file clearly says "...the Plaga reflects the conscience of their hosts. If chosen poorly, they could betray me." I think it's simple as that. The vendor was infected with the plaga, but he was probably against Saddler in the first place, so instead of turning into a follower, he decided to sell guns to the enemy. |
| 75 | [[/folder]] |
| 76 | |
| 77 | [[folder: Kill Leon immediately? Too much hassle!]] |
| 78 | * When Mendez confronts you in the Shed Of Death outside the village gates, he grabs you by the throat and starts to choke the life out of you. Then he throws you aside, securely locks the doors, turns around, and reaches for you. If you don't successfully execute the ActionCommand, he grabs you, chokes you for a few moments, and then effortlessly snaps your neck. So why didn't he just do that when he first grabbed you? |
| 79 | ** I'm guessing that was the developers' way of keeping Leon confined to the shed for the boss battle without using the old "the door is jammed" cop out. As for what Mendez was thinking: no idea. |
| 80 | ** Don't get me wrong, I know what the real reason is: if Mendez does the smart thing and snaps your neck at the first opportunity, game's over. No fun. What I don't understand is why they couldn't have cut the "grabs you, throws you, locks the doors, ActionCommand" sequence. Leon steps a few feet into the shed. Mendez appears behind him. Mendez tries to grab him. ActionCommand activated, Leon survives, rolls away. Blows up barrel of gas, bisects Mendez, boss fight starts as before. The player isn't asked to do more or less than he was, and it makes more sense. |
| 81 | ** But that still wouldn't explain the door being unable to open for Leon to escape. |
| 82 | ** I got the impression that Mendez thought it would be harder to kill Leon than it really was, especially considering he'd massacred hundreds of Ganados and two Gigantes. He grabbed Leon, realised Leon might break free somehow and escape like he did with the Gigantes, dropped him, cut off his escape, and then tried to grab him again. |
| 83 | ** That actually makes a bit of sense if you look at the scene really closely. Mendez, while choking Leon for the first time, tilts his head slightly (I think I also might've heard a "hmm..." from him), as if sizing him up and considering whether or not to risk letting him go. He probably figured he could catch him again if he needed to and decided to close the shed just in case Leon somehow manages to escape or if Ada (who shot him before in a similar encounter) decides to save his ass again. |
| 84 | ** That... actually makes a huge amount of sense. The look on his face seems like he's thinking "Huh. Wait a minute. Last time I was in this situation, I got shot by that spy woman and this guy got away. Let's make sure that doesn't happen again.". |
| 85 | ** To add a bit more: the last time Leon was being choked, his eyes turned red, indicating he had a Plaga inside him reacting to the situation. Considering that the Plaga occasionally emerges when the host dies (or is about to), the mentality of the host can be preserved and the quality of its plaga is unknown to us (it was overseen by Saddler himself, after all). Mendez would not want a superpowered Leon-Plaga getting away. |
| 86 | ** Not to mention Mendez at least had the good sense to throw Leon head-first into a 4x4. Leon was lucky that didn't knock him out right there. |
| 87 | [[/folder]] |
| 88 | |
| 89 | [[folder: Let's not tie up the female agent who shot up our chief, guys! I'm sure she won't escape or anyth- doh!]] |
| 90 | * So, according to Separate Ways, after Ada shoots Mendez up in his house and he busts out the window after her, he manages to knock her unconscious. Some hours later, the Ganados haul Ada off to sacrifice her on that stone altar in the cliffs. During the ritual, she wakes back up at the last second and manages to escape. My question is, if the Ganados are smart enough to know to tie up Leon and Luis, why don't they tie up Ada, too? It would have prevented her from escaping (or at least made it a slightly more challenging prospect) and they had plenty of time to do it. I smell a case of VillainBall in action. |
| 91 | ** Personal Opinion: Sexism at work. As Ada is female, the Ganados, in their regressed state and level (or lack) of intelligence, may have viewed her as physically weaker, and as such, restraints were unnecessary. If you noticed, Mendez wasn't WITH them when they started doing the sacrifice, meaning that, if they did restrain her, they untied her. Is it still extremely stupid? Yes, but I'm just trying to explain something that happened because the plot said so. |
| 92 | ** Sexism sure didn't save that lady skewered through the face at the beginning of the game. Also, if she was down for the count until they raised the ax, then she probably didn't seem like much of a problem. |
| 93 | ** Ganados may be smarter than Zombies, but unless you are high ranked among Los Illuminados, your brain functions will be diminished due to the low-class parasite overtaking your nervous system. |
| 94 | ** Well, yes, the Ganados are smart enough to tie up Luis and Leon, but not smart enough to stab their faces with their pitchforks right there. They leave them tied for a while and then ONE guy with an axe shows up to do the job. Plus, she wasn't knocked unconscious the way Leon was, she was sedated. She might have awakened before they expected her to do so, so maybe they sent a guy to fetch a rope to tie her up and she awakened before they had time to do it. As an alternative, perhaps whatever ritual they were planning required the victim to be untied. Considering the crazy things those regressed villagers were up to, it wouldn't be surprising. |
| 95 | ** My guess, Mendez himself tied up Luis and Leon personally, probably to interrogate them at a later time, and then ordered the Ganados to drop them off in the canyon. With Ada, he may have ordered her detained as well, but didn’t realize the Ganados weren’t intelligent enough to know they should bind her. |
| 96 | ** Given the Ganado who attacked Luis and Leon with the axe did so shortly after Leon was injected with the Plaga, he may have been acting under his own free will against that of the conspiracy and its mind control effects on him (possibly it could be a combination of wanting to give Leon a mercy kill to save him from the parasite's FateWorseThanDeath and also to stop the infection from spreading across the world). While the Ganados do attack Leon through out the game separate to this event, presumably the Plaga Controllers (Mendez, Salazar and Saddler) want to give him a fighting chance (maybe they figure the more ordinary Ganados he kills, the stronger he gets), so doing it while he's tied up and merciless is probably against their wishes, otherwise why inject him with the parasite just minutes before? |
| 97 | [[/folder]] |
| 98 | |
| 99 | [[folder: Salazar's no genius?]] |
| 100 | * Why would Salazar morph with the second Verdugo, when A) It would have been [[WhyDontYouJustShootHim easier and quicker]] to just send the nigh-invulnerable Verdugo after him, and B) Salazar would be stuck forever in that chamber as the plant/Gandos/man mashup? |
| 101 | ** But Leon's already killed the first Verdugo. Granted, it wasn't easy, but he did it. Salazar, who doesn't seem to be in the greatest mental state at that point, probably just threw up his hands and said, "If I want something done right...". Sadly, he didn't know I had a rocket launcher. |
| 102 | ** Is there an "official" version of what happened to the first Verdugo? I always assumed that in the "real" telling Leon simply did what I did. Stalled until the elevator arrived and then thanked God the Verdugo was too stupid to go back the way it came and utterly destroy you someplace that didn't have convenient [=LN2=] canisters all over the place. |
| 103 | ** I didn't expect the rocket to kill him... too bad it didn't work so well on anyone else. |
| 104 | ** Also, I'm guessing Salazar and Verdugo #2 can detach from the giant plant thing after killing Leon. |
| 105 | ** Also, we should remember, Salazar is part of the cult. To some degree, at least. If he's a true believer, becoming part of this greater Plagas creature is like ascending to a higher plane. |
| 106 | ** My view is, Salazar didn't know HOW Leon defeated the Verdugo. All he knows is that the first one evidently wasn't as invincible as he had thought. If he had known it was due to a conveniently placed item, he probably would have just sent the second one. |
| 107 | ** HOW Leon did it, is irrelevant. What's more important and threatening to Salazar is still the fact that he did it. Once Leon was still found alive, he presumed that the Verdugo itself was no match for it, and just decided to go through with an alternative plan. |
| 108 | ** There isn't much point questioning the villains of the series, [=RE4=] and Code Veronica in particular. They're about the level of Saturday morning cartoon bad guys. "You're small time, Saddler!" |
| 109 | ** Well, it's actually fun to try and make sense from all the ensuing madness. |
| 110 | ** Maybe that particular Verdugo didn’t have a near-bullet proof carapace? It could have been younger, less developed, or been specialised for different abilities? Or perhaps Salazar wanted to personally crush Leon due to the Leon making Salazar his bitch since he set foot in the castle. |
| 111 | ** Right. And the combination of the Verdugo, Salazar and the plant-thing was presumably more lethal because it had absorbed his Left Hand. Perhaps it used the established-lightning fast reflexes of the creature to power the tentacle's bludgeoning and biting attacks. |
| 112 | [[/folder]] |
| 113 | |
| 114 | [[folder: Las Plagas? What is it?]] |
| 115 | * What ''is'' Las Plagas, anyway? ''Resident Evil 5'' might answer this one, but having just played the earlier games and [=RE4=], it's been bugging me for years. The T-virus and other viruses in the series are, well, [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin viruses]], but they talk about Las Plagas as a "parasite", that has "spores", and they call the tentacled, spidery things Plagas like they're macroscopic animals. So, um, what are they? Some kind of crustacean, or annelid, parasitic worms, a mollusk gone horribly wrong or what? My best [[WildMassGuessing wild mass guess]] is that it's some kind of fungus, since some real-life fungi can infect insects with tentacle-like filaments, control their behaviour, erupt from the host body, and cast long-lived spores. Which sort of answers the question, but it still bugs me that nobody in Resident Evil ever even vaguely says what Las Plagas is. |
| 116 | ** There's a probability that no one in the setting has any idea what Las Plagas is themselves. It could really be anything, and it has already been shown within the setting that there can be sentient and self-aware plants and fungi. |
| 117 | ** I figured they were a sort of parasite. There are numerous creatures that can affect an organism's behaviour, these were just very unusual/advanced. |
| 118 | ** There's a file in the game that ''explicitly compares'' the Plagas to ''Cordyceps'' and other parasites that influence their hosts' behaviour. Written by Luis, no less. So, yeah, it is addressed, and the original troper's guess is correct. |
| 119 | ** There are plagas fossils in the game which imply that the spidery tentacled creatures are the true form of the plagas even in the ancient past. The fungus explanation still makes sense but I'd argue that given how the creatures move and behave it's probably more accurate to say that the plagas exists somewhere between what modern biology would call a fungus and an animal. Of course they also allow normal humans to spontaneously increase their body mass several times over while rearranging into giant monster forms, so whatever they are is obviously functioning on a very high dose of Resident Evil logic that can never be adequately explained. |
| 120 | [[/folder]] |
| 121 | |
| 122 | [[folder: The Case of the Missing Sample]] |
| 123 | * [[WhatHappenedToTheMouse ...What happened to the Plaga sample Ada retrieved?]] (Sorry if this ended up being brought up in VideoGame/ResidentEvil5. Haven't played it.) |
| 124 | ** Wesker used it to make Plagas soldiers loyal to himself in [=RE5=]. |
| 125 | *** Not true. In "Separate Ways," Ada reveals that she was a double agent working for Wesker under another organisation's orders. Under their orders, she gave the Control Plaga to them, and stuck Wesker with an ordinary Plaga like those seen throughout the game. Of course, Wesker outsmarted them, and retrieved Krauser's body and extracted the dead Control Plaga from Krauser's body. He then used Tricell's resources to clone new Control Plagas from it, which he used to control the Majini army. We don't really know what the other organisation (implied to be the Global Pharmaceutical Consortium) did with their live Control Plaga after Ada gave it to them. Since Ada is reappearing in the upcoming [=RE6=], and since their bringing back Sherry Birkin indicates that Capcom might actually be in the mood to resolve old storylines, we might still find out. |
| 126 | *** That sample looks like it got sold to the [[Anime/ResidentEvilDamnation Eastern Slav Republic]], turning a brutal civil war into an even bigger mess. |
| 127 | [[/folder]] |
| 128 | |
| 129 | [[folder: The government must be crazy]] |
| 130 | * SO you're brought to the village at the start of the game by two police officers... both of whom are presumably killed rather quickly after doing so. However, there doesn't seem to be any indication of an investigation regarding the disappearance of two police officers at all during the course of the game. Granted, those two didn't seem to be the greatest examples of law enforcement, but still... |
| 131 | ** The entire game takes place over the course of a single day, and Leon is not exactly in constant contact with the local law enforcement during that time, especially after Saddler's cronies start jamming the radio. |
| 132 | ** Just ''one day?'' Despite the fact that Leon falls unconscious a couple of times? Talk about BadassNormal... |
| 133 | ** It definitely looks like a day. The action begins at daylight, Leon passes out after crossing the lake and wakes up at nighttime, and the game ends in classic Resident Evil style by escaping from an exploding lair into the dawn of the next day. I guess afterward the American government informed the relevant authorities that the two guys they sent to help Leon were dead and that they were sorry. This both explains the lack of an investigation and the fact that Leon receives so little support and backup during the game; the timescale is simply too short. |
| 134 | ** Let's not forget that the town of Pueblo and the surrounding area is a very good distance from any other area where there are likely regular police. Even if the police had been informed of the incident the second after it happened, it would still take hours to dispatch another group of officers to the location, by which time Leon would be long gone. Even if the police could have arrived in a timetable where they could have reasonably interacted with Leon and Ashley, the Ganados in the area would've just killed them upon arrival. |
| 135 | [[/folder]] |
| 136 | |
| 137 | [[folder: The magic note?]] |
| 138 | * Leon passes out after getting past Del Lago. When he awakens, he finds an anonymous note telling him that, among other things, the author couldn't help Leon with his parasites. At this point, Leon has exactly two allies who could have left the note: Luis and Ada. Luis had pills that could suppress Las Plagas, which contradicts the message. Separate Ways shows that Ada was K.O.'d after shooting Mendez and didn't wake up until the cabin battle. So, who left the note? |
| 139 | ** Luis didn't have pills on him at the time, since he already removed his plaga. He went back to the labs to get them. |
| 140 | ** "Leon!" *Smiling Luis shows pills and a plaga sample* "I got it!" |
| 141 | ** Didn't that letter have some rather prominent lipstick on it? I somehow doubt anybody in the village but Ada doing that. Unless Luis swings that way. Seems to me to just be an error in timing. |
| 142 | ** Nope, that's an entirely different note you find in the military base considerably later in the game. |
| 143 | ** Another explanation is that he had the sample and the pills stashed somewhere in case he got killed or captured again. On his way to retrieve them, he finds Leon passed out in the cabin and leaves the note. It would explain why he didn't have them when Leon finds him in the wardrobe. If he did, Saddler's cronies probably wouldn't even have bothered keeping him alive. |
| 144 | [[/folder]] |
| 145 | |
| 146 | [[folder: I'm going to kill the guy we just infected with Plagas and the guy we need alive!]] |
| 147 | * Given that Leon was just injected with Plaga eggs and that Luis was needed alive, why exactly did a Ganado swing an axe at the two of them while they were tied up? |
| 148 | ** He just really had [[{{pun}} an axe to grind, I guess.]] |
| 149 | ** It was the first villager of the game (Mr. "At least he's not a zombie.") coming back to get revenge. He was kind of annoyed about getting shot in the face. |
| 150 | ** As speculated in an earlier folder, perhaps his latent free will made him act against the Hivemind of the overall conspiracy, and thus against their interests. Oh, and the line was "He's not a zombie...". |
| 151 | [[/folder]] |
| 152 | |
| 153 | [[folder: LUIIIIISSSSSSS! If only I could've use some Herbs or a First-Aid Spray... wait a minute...]] |
| 154 | * Why didn't Leon just use some herbs on Luis? Or, for that matter, a First Aid Spray, which is most likely the product that made Umbrella famous for ''being able to heal anything''. |
| 155 | ** Getting about thirty percent of your bodymass -- and most of it consisting of your lungs, heart, and stomach -- torn out is kind of beyond the ability of a first aid spray to fix. |
| 156 | ** Despite the fact that, as said, it cures ''everything''? |
| 157 | ** A troper said that. Not the game. All that line was is purely conjecture. |
| 158 | ** "Completely restores health" doesn't sound like a conjecture to me. But I suppose "health" and "everything" are quite different... |
| 159 | ** Show me an instance across the game where a first aid spray causes someone to spontaneously regrow their heart, lungs, stomach, and liver and replace thirty percent of their bodymass. First aid sprays are impressive healing devices, but they are not that good. |
| 160 | ** The games have never shown that the first aid spray can completely restore health under any circumstances. The most it has shown is that the spray can completely cure people who are currently in "danger" according to their status screen. Notice that they can still walk and fight in this condition, which makes them considerably healthier than poor Luis following his disembowelment. |
| 161 | ** GameplayAndStorySegregation. Herbs and First Aid Sprays instantly restore you to full health as part of normal gameplay, but in real life such a thing is patently impossible. |
| 162 | ** Here's an easy fix: Luis [[PressXToNotDie failed the button prompt]] when Saddler popped up behind him, so his wound was guaranteed to be fatal and he wouldn't be able to use a First Aid Spray on it. Happy? |
| 163 | ** The first aid sprays probably work on a 'surface' level, and don't have the ability to fix organs. So if you're bleeding out from several farm implements and medieval weapons, you're good. Giant penis snake to the chest, which probably made half your internal organs explode? Not gonna help. |
| 164 | *** If the First Aid Chemicals in 7 work similar to the sprays, then the chemical inside closes wounds and can reattach limbs with the advanced type. However, as stated above, replacing a person's heart, stomach and lungs is probably beyond its capabilities. Or, more likely, GameplayAndStorySegregation is in play and Leon never finds any herbs or First Aid Sprays because he never gets hurt, like how the characters in the original never got infected because they were never bit by the zombies in universe. |
| 165 | *** It is not at all similar. Ethan can reattach limbs with the first aid sprays in ''7'' because [[spoiler: his Mold infection gives him regenerative ability]]. The first aid in that game probably just put his already potent healing factor into overdrive. If first-aid kits can heal that good in the lore, Krauser would have easily recovered from his injury and not fall to Wesker. |
| 166 | ** The herbs can heal organs, but they can’t replace them. Also Luis died almost immediately. And once his heart stopped, the herbs cannot do anything to help him. |
| 167 | [[/folder]] |
| 168 | |
| 169 | [[folder: Private Matters]] |
| 170 | * Early on in the game, you can surprise a Ganado in the bathroom. In the main game it's a man, but in Separate Ways it's a woman. What makes this a headscratcher? The only facility is a urinal. |
| 171 | ** [[FridgeHorror ...Oy]]. Seriously, though, uh, maybe she was just looking for something in there? |
| 172 | ** You know, if we're going down that route, it's not actually that difficult for a woman to pee into a urinal even without any complex techniques or apparatus. It's extremely unlikely the Ganados use toilets anymore, considering how they leave rotten food and corpses just scattered around -- it would be a bit of a hypocritical situation there. |
| 173 | ** Why would a bathroom equipped with only a urinal have toilet paper in it? Where did the Ganados poop anyway? |
| 174 | ** I always loved that part because it shows exactly what the Ganados feel. He stood there and was confused as if saying “umm I’m supposed to do something here?” He remembered enough of humanity that he recognized the need to piss. But the parasite took away the function and enough of his memory so that he was just in a confused haze. |
| 175 | [[/folder]] |
| 176 | |
| 177 | [[folder: "Loo-es" or "Lewis"?]] |
| 178 | * Luis tells Leon his name by pronouncing it with a Spanish accent, "Loo-ees," but Leon always pronounces it "Lewis." This is probably a mistake by the voice actor, but Leon might simply be more comfortable pronouncing Luis' name with an American accent. Luis doesn't seem to mind. |
| 179 | ** I know enough people with "oddly" pronounced names. It gets bothersome correcting everybody and in a life or death situation I don't care if you call me Radney (my name) or Rodney (a more common name) and my little brother Jamil generally just shrugs when someone calls him Jamal. With monsters and the like running around as long as I know you're talking to me I'm not going to correct you until we get off the island. |
| 180 | [[/folder]] |
| 181 | |
| 182 | [[folder: The Americans send a helicopter to make my plans easier? Not on MY watch!]] |
| 183 | * If Saddler's plan involved sending Ashley back to the US infected so he could manipulate the President through her, why didn't he just let her and Leon go on the first helicopter Hunnigan sent rather than have it shot down? If it's because they already knew about the parasites, they were intent on going back anyway and the only surgical procedure to remove them is on the island, and besides which the only reason they knew about the parasites at all was because Saddler blabbed it in true Bond-villain style. |
| 184 | ** Saddler explains that bit; he wanted to make some money first before getting on with taking over the world by bargaining for Ashley's release. It's also possible he thought that just letting Leon go would be too suspicious. |
| 185 | ** Not to mention that he ordered Mendez to capture both Luis and Leon alive (the letter in Mendez's house states this). Great move, letting Leon get chummy with one of the two people who could tell him about the Plaga. Also, if Leon and Ashley had managed to escape the village instead of getting trapped in the castle, Luis wouldn't have had the chance to give Leon the Plaga-suppressant drug, and he would have fallen prey to it in a few hours. |
| 186 | *** Which would be a good thing, right? The plagas clearly have something of a hive mind going on. The President's Daughter and the Hero of the Hour under your control when you're trying to overthrow the US government (or infect them with plagas) is a brilliant strategic move. Maybe he wanted to make it look difficult, but he really did botch his own plan to get Ashley in place all on his own. |
| 187 | ** Remember, Saddler's plan was to infect Ashley with a Queen Plaga, the one Luis had stolen. Ashley hadn't been implanted with that plaga yet, only with a normal one, so it'd be counterproductive to let them take her away. |
| 188 | [[/folder]] |
| 189 | |
| 190 | [[folder: Ada's going in STYLE!!!!]] |
| 191 | * Why does Ada go about her mission in a flimsy evening dress? It can't be to use her feminine wiles to persuade Luis to help her; he's already agreed to work with her, so the tactical gear she wears in "Assignment Ada" (in which she is still hot) would make more sense. |
| 192 | ** ...when is military gear hot? |
| 193 | *** When it's form-fitted and being worn by Ada Wong. You played the game and ''saw'' it, right? |
| 194 | *** It's hot, but not as much as a red cheongsam under ideal conditions. |
| 195 | ** Probably the same reason as to why her pistol holster has to contain a phone slot that spins: [[RuleOfCool it looks pretty damn awesome.]] |
| 196 | ** Ada's only there to get close to Leon. The red cheongsam is what she was wearing when last they met. It probably helped cement his attraction for her. And Ada, clever and ruthless girl that she is, is wearing it again (or one just like it) to gain Leon's attention once again. It wouldn't surprise me if she wore similar clothing to get close to John in ''[=RE1=]''. Ada's so hot in that dress that after one look Ashley decided she'd better get some overtime with Leon [=ASAP=]. |
| 197 | ** She... was not wearing that the last time he saw her. She wears something very close to it in Mercenaries, but it's even further away from looking like a cheongsam than the strapless number she has on in the main game. |
| 198 | ** Given the fact that the dress doesn't seem to inconvenience her at all (she's still able to pull off incredible aerobatics moves with little to no effort), it could be that she just likes the way it looks. |
| 199 | [[/folder]] |
| 200 | |
| 201 | [[folder: Ada can survive anything]] |
| 202 | * At the end, Ada jumps off the cliff and immediately rises into view in a helicopter. [[FridgeLogic Wouldn't she have been Cuisinarted by the rotor?]] |
| 203 | ** She's just that badass. |
| 204 | ** She has a grappling hook. She fell down past the chopper and latched onto the landing strut. |
| 205 | ** There is a certain technique for cliff diving. Adds knows how to do it. And just wanted to show off for Leon. |
| 206 | [[/folder]] |
| 207 | |
| 208 | [[folder: Men, I need Ashley ALIVE, so QUIT TRYING TO KILL HER! Seriously. Especially you Salazar.]] |
| 209 | * It's constantly emphasized that Saddler needs Ashley alive for his plan. So why are there a bunch of times when the bad guys try to kill her (e.g. Salazar's spiked ceiling, the drilling machine, the soldiers in the bulldozer sequence...)? |
| 210 | ** The Ganados are ''psychotic''. |
| 211 | ** But they're established to be under Saddler's direct control. It's more logical to deduce, based on the evidence given, that Salazar and Saddler are both ''[[StupidEvil unbelievably stupid]]''. We're talking guys who want to delay reaching their goal for the sake of squeezing the American Government for ransom money, when they could have had the '''entire U.S. Treasury''' to play around with if they'd just stuck to the damn plan. |
| 212 | ** Because the bad guys know that Leon was able to survive most inhumane situations, like the bit with Mendez, so they're more testing him to see if he could be a possible second-in-command in case Krauser fails. |
| 213 | ** They also had a contingency plan in which Saddler's militia would invade the United States and bring chaos and destruction. |
| 214 | ** A few hundred guys with maces, crossbows and the odd minigun, carrying a parasite that requires forced introduction into a resisting host, invading a huge country with a lavishly-funded military (including reserves), federal and state police forces, and a well-armed civilian population? ''[[DidntThinkThisThrough Buena suerta, idiotas.]]'' See above: for all his smug self-satisfaction, Saddler is dumber than a bag of hammers. |
| 215 | ** Despite what Salazar says, it seems neither he nor Saddler have "absolute control" over the Ganados unless they're in their immediate presence. I'm guessing some Ganados just got so violent they forgot they were supposed not to harm Ashley. As for why Salazar himself does it, he's insane. |
| 216 | ** Nor Mendez. But the person who says the US would definitely win against a Ganado invasion? Don't be so sure. The main plan was to take over the government by easily-achieved infection from Ashley to President Graham. From there they could spread the parasite across Congress and then across the populace e.g. by disguising it as a vaccine. If COVID-19 has taught us that a certain percentage of the US population is obtuse to the prospect of getting innoculated to ''new'' diseases, then they can just say it's the flu shot, for measles or any generally-accepted vaccination. Or perhaps disguise it as a common medication. Any stragglers could either be killed or physically overwhelmed to infect them that way. If they had to fall back to the plan of using soldiers to invade, then they could still run it as a guerrilla campaign, gradually infecting more and more people. If they could place soldiers disguised as Latino US service members (I don't know, give them dark aviators to disguise their creepy eyes), they could infect the military while they slept in their barracks bunks. There's all kinds of ways they could achieve this aim without resorting to armed confrontation and risking the possibility of "I'm gonna shoot this pseudo-zombie before he can get me sick", and if America is vulnerable to a ''regular'' ZombieApocalypse, well then improved hordes with ''some'' level of intelligence should also pose a significant threat. |
| 217 | *** The militia invading is Plan B in case infecting the government ''didn't'' work. So, just a few thousand foul-smelling, ill-tempered, strong but perfectly killable guys with rotten grey skin, guns, syringes, no centralized base of operations in the U.S., and no easy way to start sticking them into 300 million necks. If these guys couldn't fool Leon into thinking they were normal humans for longer than 20 seconds, they probably couldn't fool many more people than that (and you just ''try'' [[SchmuckBait sneaking into a military barracks]] and let us know how that works out). There's a good reason the PuppeteerParasite zombies in the series only ever turn up in rural areas and smaller population centers (the city in ''Damnation'' is mostly deserted due to being an active warzone). The T-Virus is a bloodborne pathogen and a simple sneeze is enough to spread a COVID virus, but a ZombieApocalypse that requires forced injection to spread would too easy to squash before it could grow to such a large scale. |
| 218 | [[/folder]] |
| 219 | |
| 220 | [[folder: Pay no attention to the non-human person selling weapons!]] |
| 221 | * The Merchant. He's '''very''' obviously not human. Nobody ever comments on this, and it's never explained why there's this blatantly-non-human person wandering around selling you weapons. |
| 222 | ** If you look carefully at his eyes, they're glowing like the other Plagas-infected Ganado, and his skin's also very pale. It's possible he has the parasite, but his strong willpower fought it off so he could help you. |
| 223 | ** And if you mean "nobody in-universe comments on this", really only Leon and Ashely (well, and Ada in her campaign) come across the Merchant. Leon is too professional to attack, or even to question, someone who is willing to provide him with arms, Ada is the same, and Ashley likewise accepts Leon's trust in this neutral (but friendly) third party. |
| 224 | [[/folder]] |
| 225 | |
| 226 | [[folder: Magic Rope?]] |
| 227 | * One thing that has always bugged me was when Leon had just killed the creature in the lake. The rope had been originally tied to the boat and yet the rope somehow ends up wrapped around his foot just in time for the cutscene. If the rope was always loose, it should have pulled him out of the boat long before he can kill the creature, so what gives? |
| 228 | ** More to the point, how exactly is it that a tiny boat and one man's leg are able to support the weight of this sinking creature? I may not have majored in physics, but I know that bouyancy is all to do with the mass/weight of an object being less than the volume of water it's displacing -- I would say that Del Lago's weight pulling down for even half a second would have either powdered his leg like dry leaves or pulled that boat down quicker than Leon could say "glbllblblbllblglbllb". |
| 229 | ** Del Lago was in the process of dying, but not fully dead. That was the whole point regarding the quick-time event where he slashes the rope off of his leg or else he dies and drowns with the dead whale. |
| 230 | [[/folder]] |
| 231 | |
| 232 | [[folder: Screw the Plans, I Need Money!]] |
| 233 | * The only ones that could have warned Leon about the effect of the Plaga in his body were Luis and Ada, both of whom were already busy enough recovering the Queen Plaga sample. What if Saddler had simply waited until Luis exposed himself to try and steal it to dispose of him (which actually happened) and let an infected Leon escort an infected Ashley back to USA? When Leon got to Ashley, he still knew little enough to dismiss his symptoms as stress and bad dreams, and things like the Plagas and El Gigante as T-Virus mutated wildlife, and Luis was still far from retrieving the Plaga-suppressing drug. If he had just let them go, they would have been thousands of miles away from the only people who knew how to stop the Plaga. And Saddler blew up his whole plan just to get some ransom money. |
| 234 | ** Saddler DID wait for Luis to exploit himself and did kill him; granted, it took longer than expected. Saddler also told Leon and Ashley at the church that they were both injected with the plagas as well, so going back home would've been completely stupid and suicidal from the hero's perspective. The money thing is when Saddler admitted to needing it at his territory for some odd reason. |
| 235 | ** Even before that, Leon probably knows enough from his training on bioweapons to know this is something different. He's seen viral weapons and never did they manifest a parasite, whereas these new ones clearly do. And he knows these aren't zombies, partly due to their intelligence, ability to communicate and wield weapons, so he knows better than to dismiss them as new T-virus mutations. He can also link the parasites to the wolf-monsters and El Gigante, being as they ''also'' show parasites after being sufficiently damaged. |
| 236 | [[/folder]] |
| 237 | |
| 238 | [[folder: Snake-In-A-Box]] |
| 239 | * Occasionally, when you bust open a box, there will be a venomous snake inside. These boxes were previously nailed shut, which means that somewhere, somehow, there is a Ganado ''boxing snakes'', presumably just to screw with Leon. |
| 240 | ** Assume that Saddler has at least ''some'' knowledge about [[KleptomaniacHero Kleptomaniac Heroes]] and the {{Evil Overlord List}} and ordered some of the boxes to be filled with snakes on the off chance that they might actually kill Leon. Of course, this only leads to further [[WhyDontYouJustShootHim Fridge Logic]] when you realize that he has bushels of grenades at his disposal and an overly elaborate and exotic death is completely unnecessary. |
| 241 | *** Then again, his mooks aren't the sharpest tools in the box. [[HoistByHisOwnPetard They often blow themselves up when using dynamite.]] |
| 242 | *** There are sometimes eggs inside these crates. The boxes might have holes; the snake crawls in, eats the egg, and then takes a nap inside or finds it comfy or whatever. |
| 243 | *** And you do always get an egg when you kill a snake. So that means you're eating an egg that managed to go unbroken and undigested inside a snake's belly. Wow, that's... kinda nasty. |
| 244 | *** In fact, [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egg-eating_snake snakes do swallow eggs whole]]. Why they can't squash them within their stomachs in-game eludes me. On the other hand, these may be the snake's eggs... |
| 245 | *** The eggs are chicken eggs, like the ones you can find around the farm. They have the same name, the same model and the same briefcase sprite. |
| 246 | [[/folder]] |
| 247 | |
| 248 | [[folder: Can't see a thing with my eyes sewn shut!]] |
| 249 | * Why exactly do the Garradors, who are obviously supposed to be trying to kill you, have their [[EyeScream eyes sewn shut]]? |
| 250 | ** The more obvious answer is that Saddler is fucked up and thought it would look creepy. |
| 251 | ** It's pretty likely their eyes don't work to begin with. Now, why they bother to sew their eyes is another question... but I can't help but think of [[EyeScream something gross]]... |
| 252 | ** They appear to still work. When you throw a flash grenade, they charge towards you. Their eyes most likely still work, and enough light from the flash passes through their eyelids for them to see Leon. |
| 253 | ** Presumably to amplify hearing. If one of your senses fails, the others become better to somehow make up for it. Garradors could then be used in total darkness with no loss of effectiveness. The reason they are chained up is because they lacked the necessary stealth aspect, by being completely crazy. Probably because someone gouged out their eyeballs. |
| 254 | ** That would make sense, except that in that case, why don't they ever deploy a Garrador in complete darkness? It's kind of a shame, because imagine that double-Garrador fight if they'd also snuffed all the torches; you have your belt light, so it'd still be doable, but it would have been a lot scarier. Also, the Ganados don't seem any less effective in the dark. I'd be willing to bet their glowing red eyes let them see. |
| 255 | ** Because that would've been an extremely frustrating and utterly miserable section in the game. I imagine it was in play-testing and gamers thought: "Gee, being in pitch darkness with powerful enemies and a sole weakness that we can't see because it's too damn dark sure is a pain in the ass! You guys might want to change that.". |
| 256 | ** I have always thought that their eyes are too sensitive to light and seeing it renders them berserk and unruly, thus dangerous for Los Illuminados themselves. The eye sewing is a safety measure, as headgear can fall and start an undesired rampage. Perhaps gouging the eyes out proved more difficult due to their superhuman resistance. |
| 257 | ** There's a pretty simple explanation, actually - Garradors are AxCrazy. They didn't have their eyes sewn shut because they were too sensitive to light or some fucked up desire by Saddler, but because they were so psychotic they killed ''everything'' they came across. |
| 258 | ** It could also be that the relatively advanced Plaga used on them (it causes them to grow very tall and be capable of sprinting and wild flailing of their claws with no apparent drop in stamina) had a side effect of compromising their vision for some reason, and again with only partial sight this means the Los Illuminados are vulnerable to them. So, they sew their eyelids shut during the initial stages of the mutation for safety reasons, and train the Los Illuminados which sometimes accompany them to not make certain loud triggering sounds (but culty Spanish phrases, even yelled out, are fine apparently) lest they fall victim to a beserking. |
| 259 | [[/folder]] |
| 260 | |
| 261 | [[folder: A Stock Question]] |
| 262 | * Why the hell does the stock for the Mauser C96 (or [[{{AKA47}} Red 9]]) take up space in inventory? You already have the gun, the holster shouldn't take additional space, right? [[http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fichier:Mauser_C96_M1916_Red_9_5.JPG Here]] is the gun holstered. [[http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fichier:Mauser_C96_M1916_Red_9_7.JPG Here]] is the gun with the stock mounted on. The Holster and the stock are one and the same. |
| 263 | ** If you pay attention, Leon never uses the stock as a holster. Both are in his hammerspace attache case. Why he doesn't do it anyway, to save space in the case, is the question. |
| 264 | *** That, and if Leon had to mount the stock/holster every time he takes out the gun, he might get eaten by a horrible monstrosity. It is just more convenient that way. |
| 265 | *** Another obvious problem is that the Red 9 takes up eight inventory squares, while the stock takes up three. The stock is big enough to act as a holster for the Red 9. So it should actually take up more spaces than the Red 9. |
| 266 | *** Read that last statement: Because it would take up more spaces than the Red 9. Another one of those thrilling attentions to detail that were omitted for the sake of having a fun game. |
| 267 | ** One might think of the attache case as an abstraction of "Leon/Ada is just simply carrying lots of weapons and ammunition {{Hammerspace (and maps, and files, and treasure, and keys...)}} on their person". Thus, clearly the stock will add additional mass (and volume) to where ever they hold the stock (likely simply attached to the gun itself). In just the same way as the other stocks and scopes with their respective firearms. |
| 268 | [[/folder]] |
| 269 | |
| 270 | [[folder: Congrats, Salazar! Leon's dead, now what?]] |
| 271 | * Wait, what exactly was Salazar planning to do ''after'' he killed Leon? |
| 272 | ** TakeOverTheWorld, of course. |
| 273 | ** To elaborate, spread Las Plagas throughout the US, either via Ashley (and Leon) once ransomed, or if they escaped or died via his "Plan B" militia forces. Bringing up the question why they bothered to try and kill Luis and Leon when they could have just left them chained up and Plaga infected until they were totally controlled... |
| 274 | ** Think about it. Almost all villagers take several pistol shots to go down. The Don Josè you find at the beginning of the game only takes a couple, and he doesn't fade when "killed". The Ganado that tries to kill Leon and Luis is a bloodied Don Josè. You do the math. |
| 275 | ** If the first Ganado is the one that shows up later, how come the other Ganados in that area don't fade away either? |
| 276 | ** ... because he wasn't killed, just wounded. That's the entire point. |
| 277 | ** You guys do know that OP is talking about the midget and not the cultleader? Salazar merged with the Queen Plaga and also with his remaining bodyguard. OP was wondering what Salazar would do in the event that he successfully killed Leon. He'd be stuck there as a giant plant, probably being bored out of his mind for the rest of his existence because he can't go anywhere. But since he is ten different shades of crazy, I highly doubt that Salazar would've even thought about that and if he did, I don't think he would've cared at all. He was so desperate about killing Leon that he was pretty much willing to do anything within his power to do so. |
| 278 | ** Why do we assume he'd be stuck forever? There might have been a way for him to detach. |
| 279 | [[/folder]] |
| 280 | |
| 281 | [[folder: Seeing S.T.A.R.S.?]] |
| 282 | * A bit meta, but how can the S.T.A.R.S. prosecute you for pirating this game if Raccoon City is nothing more than ash and particulate left behind after the nuclear explosion? |
| 283 | ** RuleOfFunny. |
| 284 | ** I think a more applicable question would be why the heck would they send an anti-terrorism/SWAT stand-in team for such a simple matter as software piracy. In any case, the answer lies in the novelisation. Though non-canon, the Resident Evil novels claim S.T.A.R.S. exist in several cities, not just Raccoon. |
| 285 | ** Alternatively, even if the Raccoon City team was the only one, there are still several surviving members of it (Jill, Chris, Barry and Rebecca) and perhaps they have standing orders against piracy even after the team is nominally disbanded. |
| 286 | [[/folder]] |
| 287 | |
| 288 | [[folder: Rites, Wrongs, and Reasons]] |
| 289 | * At the start of the Tower in Ch. 4-4, Salazar states, "''The sacred rite that's about to begin will endow the girl with magnificent power.''" Upon meeting him again at the top of the tower Salazar says, "''Ahhhh, you just missed her. The ritual is over.''" The only thing different about Ashley on the Island is that the first cutscene will show her in the popstar costume, if she's wearing it in game (at least, in the [=PS2=] version of the game). The ability for her to control other Ganados makes the most sense, and could have been awesome in combat. Too bad they ignore this wonderful opportunity. What was the "magnificent power, then?" |
| 290 | ** The ability would have broken the game. Granted, this game isn't hard to break enough anyway. |
| 291 | ** There's a big chance Salazar was just bluffing in order to make Leon think the situation was hopeless. Or, perhaps, it was a religious ritual of some kind, which means the "magnificent power" is meant to be spiritual. Another option could be that the ritual is necessary for Ashley to be able to survive the infection of the Queen Plaga. |
| 292 | ** Could also be an additional step to mutate the parasite and have her able to subvert the presidency through infection. |
| 293 | [[/folder]] |
| 294 | |
| 295 | [[folder: Wesker, Krauser's dead... again.]] |
| 296 | * In the closing cutscene for ''Assignment Ada'', Ada tells Wesker that Krauser's dead. He didn't die in my game, just threw a flash grenade and vanished, just like he did with Leon. No death scene. So why did Ada report Krauser dead to Wesker? |
| 297 | ** Playing Separate Ways reveals that Ada finished Krauser off herself after he ran from Leon. |
| 298 | ** But when Ada met Krauser in Separate Ways, she stated that she'd ''already'' reported him dead. So when Ada was on the 'copter and told Wesker that Krauser was dead, Wesker should have replied she'd already told him that. Or something. Seems a bit of a mess. |
| 299 | ** Assignment Ada is not actually a canon part of the story, it's simply an alternate scenario minigame. It isn't supposed to connect with Separate Ways or anything else. |
| 300 | ** You imply that Wesker would even bat an eye at someone returning from the dead. |
| 301 | [[/folder]] |
| 302 | |
| 303 | [[folder: Reproduction?]] |
| 304 | * How does the Queen Plaga reproduce? It's the source for the eggs that Los Illuminados inject into their victims and it can even spawn adults. Does that thing secretly have two genders [[FridgeHorror or does she get it on with any of the dominant strain-carriers?]] |
| 305 | ** I am a biology student and this is my two cents- it probably reproduces asexually, quite a few parasites have two genders. They produce eggs and self-fertilise, so the Ganados could still collect eggs for infecting others with. |
| 306 | [[/folder]] |
| 307 | |
| 308 | [[folder: Dissolution Dilemma]] |
| 309 | * Why do none of the Ganado in the very first area of the game dissolve into nothingness like the others later on? I understand that they wanted you to investigate the guy from the beginning, but it doesn't make sense for the others in that same area (up to when you first meet [[{{ChainsawGood}} Dr. Salvador]]) to stay there. Speaking of that first area... |
| 310 | ** It's to disguise the fact that the first Ganado comes back. If he is the only one whose body doesn't vanish it's a big clue that he's not dead. |
| 311 | ** He's not the only one though, the other Ganados in that first extended area don't dissolve, as the OP said. If I had to guess for an in-universe reason, perhaps the parasite can cause it's hosts to initially pretend to just be psychotics. But, given they then mobbed Leon to try and overwhelm him, the hosts demonstrated in various ways that they weren't wholly human (discoloured flesh, ability to take several bullets without going down, eyes glowing red as the day wears on, eventually leading to their heads popping and being replaced with the parasites), so the HiveMind collectively decided there was no point in a masquerade any more and removed the limit on dissolving to muck. Of course, the software reason is that consoles of the time ([=GameCube=], [=PS2=]) would be unable to show such a large number of bodies stacking up and remaining in RAM, so after that point they dissolved to make it easier on the hardware. |
| 312 | [[/folder]] |
| 313 | |
| 314 | [[folder: The Case of the Missing Campers]] |
| 315 | * ...in the first playthrough of the game, you find a group of Ganado camping on a cliffside, then they see Leon coming and run off to warn the others. Why don't they reappear in a NewGamePlus? |
| 316 | ** Because in the first playthrough your pistol does not have the range to damage them and you can't possibly get close enough to hit them before they run off. In NewGamePlus you can easily have many different weapons that can hit them from that distance, hence why they aren't there. |
| 317 | ** It would have been interesting (sadly, the doorway to that path is blocked off) to go and explore up there as Ada in Separate Ways, with her hookshot tool. |
| 318 | [[/folder]] |
| 319 | |
| 320 | [[folder: Legitimate Search?]] |
| 321 | * Was Leon being sent to actually save Ashley or was he being banished on a SnipeHunt? IF the former we are to believe that the President's Daughter only necessitated one US Agent, two locals who obviously didn't care very much and support that was too far away to do much to help even in the best of situations. Every prior and latter RE game either sent in teams or if they didn't it was because they were already in the shit when it hit the fan. Here however we're to believe the President chose to send just one guy? If it's the latter which seems supported not only by his equipment and lack of help but also by the kind of bored way he describes being send to the ass-end of no where to look for the President's Daughter. |
| 322 | ** It was legitimate. If you read one of the files the US Government knows that Ashley's kidnapping was an inside job. They only send Leon because he was the only man who they knew 100% was loyal to them. Everyone else who would handle this sort of job is currently being investigated in case they were the traitor since none of them know Krauser is involved. |
| 323 | ** The President didn't actually KNOW Ashley was there. The opening cutscene clearly states that a girl that fits her description was seen there. Leon was there only to ask a few questions. Of course, when the shit hits the fan, as the previous troper answers, there wasn't many people the president could count on to send and not betray them. And when Leon finds out it was Krauser who did the kidnapping, his communications had been compromised, so he couldn't call back home. |
| 324 | ** [[OneRiotOneRanger Well there's only one death cult. Why do we need more than one agent?]] |
| 325 | ** The wiki says that there were a succession of agencies with solo agents specifically tasked for missions like this, whereas more globally-threatening events (like those depicted in ''5'' and ''6'') would necessitate larger teams. |
| 326 | [[/folder]] |
| 327 | |
| 328 | [[folder: With the President under my control, I will control the U.S.! ...Somehow!]] |
| 329 | * How was Saddler expecting to control the U.S. Government through the president? We have checks and balances to prevent any one branch of the government from becoming too powerful, and he would have only been useful for eight years at the most (assuming that the president just started his first term.) It's not like the president is the ''"High Lord of All America."'' |
| 330 | ** The checks and balances would do nothing; all of those check and balances are reliant on the people in the other branches in government. The President just so happens to be the one person who would be expected to have contact with each and everyone one of those people. The President goes to pay a visit to the Supreme Court justices for whatever reason, then behind closed doors he infects all nine of them with Plagas. He decides to have a closed-door meeting with the majority and minority leaders in Congress, four more Plaga-controlled lackeys, who in turn infect the rest of their parties. The next joint chiefs meeting? Boom, all the heads of the military are now under Saddler's control and start infecting people beneath them. Controlling the President isn't the end goal, he's the bridge that gives Saddler the keys to the kingdom. |
| 331 | ** Also the President has access almost at will to a majority of other world leaders. The President may not be the High Lord but he does have substantial power all on his own and unless he was asking for truly insane crap there is no particular reason to believe his party and in theory Congress wouldn't fall in line. |
| 332 | ** It doesn't even need that (although it may "help"). The POTUS could disguise his abetting of Saddler's goals in all kinds of apparently benign ways. By increasing aid to countries in need of it, and increasing trade with more prosperous nations, he gets positive publicity from a majority of the electorate while secretly lacing the shipments of goods with plaga samples. All the while, working to spread the infection domestically through "vaccination" programs and "fighting the scourge of opiates with a huge distribution of ''naxalone''". |
| 333 | [[/folder]] |
| 334 | |
| 335 | [[folder: The Ganados fate]] |
| 336 | * Well what happened to them at the end of the game? Leon could not have killed all of them and the explosion happened on another island. |
| 337 | ** Ganados don't seem to be particularly big on independent thought. With all the higher ups dead they probably just went back to being villagers and priests respectively until Leon told the nearest local government to carpet bomb the place. Alternatively perhaps enough of them escaped just as given that crows can carry the T/G Virus something must have escaped Raccoon City. That would explain why BOWs are such common place by RE5 and RE6 that there is a dedicated international military unit that seem to do nothing but battle against outbreaks. Either that or it somehow slipped Leon and Ashley's minds and they were left to live out their Ganado lives in peace. |
| 338 | ** The Mercenaries happens, that’s what. |
| 339 | ** Wesker may have captured some of them to study the parasite in preparation for his use of Manjini as his private military force. |
| 340 | [[/folder]] |
| 341 | |
| 342 | [[folder: How is Salazar even alive?]] |
| 343 | * The booklet of Biohazard 4: Incubate mentions that all of the village's children died before the events of the game. If that's true, why is Salazar still around? When you briefly play as Ashley, you'll enter a room that has a portrait of a pre-infected Salazar hanging on the wall. He couldn't have been older than 12 when that was painted. Maybe the children of the village were younger than he was (most of the children in the drawings appear to be between 3 and 10 years old), but I find it hard to believe that there were no kids his age at the time. What makes Salazar so special? Shouldn't there be more pale-skinned elfpeople running around in the area? |
| 344 | ** Because he isn't a child. He's just short. |
| 345 | ** If it is dwarfism at work, they could've made that more clear. I think his shortness was the result of being infected at a young age. The plaga stunted his growth. Salazar claims that he is twenty years old. So he either lied about his age or he was about 12 years old when he was infected. |
| 346 | ** I was also under the impression that he was already an adult when he was infected with Las Plagas, and that the [[BuffySpeak Ganadofication]] of the area was fairly recent, having happened only a few months ago at most. |
| 347 | ** That actually makes more sense. The theory would also clash with Luis' presence and involvement. During the events of the game, Luis is 28. Let's say he got on the project two years prior. If I apply my theory (Salazar being 12 years old at the time of infection) here, the dude would've been 20. I know that in the RE universe child geniuses are well established (Alexia Ashford, William Birkin), but Luis being one would be pushing it. |
| 348 | ** Wait, why does Luis need to have been there at the time Salazar was originally infected? |
| 349 | ** Helping this case is that there's a portrait of Salazar in one room depicting him with the same short stature, but he otherwise looks perfectly healthy (it's in the chamber where Ashley uses the crest on that dais). |
| 350 | [[/folder]] |
| 351 | |
| 352 | [[folder: Puppet of the parasite... why does Leon call Salazar this?]] |
| 353 | * So in the cutscene where Salazar says he is 20 years old, Leon says "I guess you're another puppet of the parasite" - why does he conclude that? Couldn't he just be a dwarf? |
| 354 | ** Leon's not reacting to Salazar's height, he's reacting to how advanced in age Salazar looks. Dude looks like he's got a mild case of progeria (rapid aging syndrome) no doubt brought on by the Plagas in his body. If I put Salazar in front of you and didn't tell you anything about him, you'd probably guess he was in his late 40's at BEST. |
| 355 | [[/folder]] |
| 356 | |
| 357 | [[folder: Two Holsters, One Pistol]] |
| 358 | * Leon starts the game with just a pistol, which we can see from the cutscene where he finds Ada at the boat dock he keeps in the holster on his thigh. However, when he loses his jacket, we see that he has a shoulder rig with a pistol holster plus a carrier for two magazines. Why have two holsters but just one pistol? |
| 359 | ** Probably because he ''does'' get plenty of use from the mag pouches and knife sheath that are on it, but prefers a leg drop holster for quicker access to his pistol. |
| 360 | ** It's also possible to carry two pistols in the case (not that that has too much tactical value, most gamers just go for their pistol of choice in this game and you can't DualWield them, plus it would eat up space for other types of firearms but then each handgun does fulfill slightly different specialisations) so it could be an allusion to that. |
| 361 | [[/folder]] |
| 362 | |
| 363 | [[folder: The original Los Illuminados location]] |
| 364 | * For the original Los Illuminados from the past, what were they doing on the island? Las Plagas were from the cave under what would become the castle, but the island has ancient ruins that show the inhabitants knew about Las Plagas. So did they move Las Plagas from the cave to island? Why do that much work? |
| 365 | ** Recall Salazar’s diary. Apparently, his ancestors, the previous Castellans of the castle, realized the Plagas were seriously messed up and dangerous. They persecuted the Los Illuminados cult and sealed the caves, to try and make the parasites extinct. It could be that the original cult were forced to flee to the island and use it as their base until Saddler worked over Salazar to his cause. |
| 366 | [[/folder]] |
| 367 | |
| 368 | [[folder: I think it's very nice of Wesker to give that dead woman another chance]] |
| 369 | * Maybe this is a case of AllThereInTheManual, but it definitely seems weird that Leon's reaction to seeing Ada again is "So the rumors about you working for Wesker are true" and not "How the hell are you suddenly not dead?!" I can believe that Claire and Chris told either the US government or Leon directly that Wesker is alive after the events of ''[[VideoGame/ResidentEvilCodeVeronica Code Veronica]]'' off-screen, but unless I'm missing something, there was no indication to the audience, let alone Leon, that Ada was still alive. |
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