In 2013, filmmaker Richard Raaphorst released the found footage horror movie Frankenstein's Army, which featured a number of unique monster designs that combined humanoids with machines and other mechanical parts. Fast forward to 2021, and Raaphorst has now accused Resident Evil franchise developer Capcom of stealing his monster designs for the recently released Resident Evil Village game, providing some compelling comparison photos to argue his case.
In a recent post on LinkedIn, Raaphorst showed photos comparing Resident Evil Village's Sturm monster to a creature from his Frankenstein's Army movie. Sturm, for those who have yet to play through Resident Evil Village, looks like a humanoid with a huge propeller engine for the top half of its body. While it hasn't been proven that Capcom directly stole the idea for Sturm from Frankenstein's Army, the two designs are eerily similar.
However, the similarities between Resident Evil Village's monster designs and Frankenstein's Army go much deeper than that, as pointed out by Twitter user CloneKorp. CloneKorp provided some additional comparison photos, showing that three other monsters from Resident Evil Village look a lot like the monsters from Frankeinstein's Army. All of these monsters come from one of the later sections in Resident Evil Village, specifically the Factory area where players have to contend with Heisenberg, one of Mother Miranda's four Lords.
Capcom has yet to respond to these accusations at the time of this writing, though Raaphorst was interviewed by Eurogamer. Raaphorst said that the encounter with the Sturm monster in Resident Evil Village is the same as when the similar creature is encountered in the Frankenstein's Army movie. He went as far as to say that the boss fight "looks like an animatic" for the Frankenstein's Army movie.
In the Eurogamer interview, Raaphort said that he would like to receive a credit in Resident Evil Village and is exploring his options. However, it's been pointed out that the rights to the Frankenstein's Army movie is not owned by Raaphort. On the contrary, the movie is actually owned by MPI Media Group, and so it seems that particular entity would need to be the one to get something done about the situation.
Whether or not Capcom intentionally lifted the Resident Evil Village monster designs from Frankenstein's Army is up for debate. While having four monsters from Frankenstein's Army look similar to Resident Evil Village monsters seems like it has to be more than just a coincidence, it's still possible that this was not intentional. Fans will have to wait until Capcom releases a statement on the matter to learn more.
Resident Evil Village is out now for PC, PS4, PS5, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.