4 Reasons the Midnight Release of Resident Evil 6 was More Terrifying than an Actual Zombie Apocalypse

This is something I originally pitched for Cracked but didn’t run, so I’m putting it up here. Timely, I know. Also, as I have since come to lean, the game apparently stars Jamie Lannister:

The latest game in the Resident Evil series was recently released, offering us a frightening new chapter in the ongoing saga of survival horror. However, the midnight release of the game was arguably more terrifying than anything you are likely to experience while playing it.

4. Everyone In Attendance Was Clearly Infected With Something

It became clear almost immediately that the foul stench pushing at the four walls of Gamestop like a giant invisible marshmallow made of farts was lined with something more than just expired Axe Body Spray clinging to the folds of a dozen XXL t-shirts. There was actual disease present. Whether or not it was some mutation of the T-Virus is impossible to know, but you could clearly see it pooling wetly in the bloodshot eyes of the living corpses crowding around the flashing lights of the PS Vita display, shedding clouds of Dorito flavoring like crypt dust with each shambling step. Also, if you wanted to get a piece of the free pizza, you would almost certainly be caught in a boss battle against the bald guy with the pewter dragon necklace looming over it like a gargoyle.

3. People Were Desperately Trying to Preserve The Good Old Days

Everyone was crowding around a small, flickering television, playing previous Resident Evil games and forcing cheerful reminiscence about when the series was good. It was like a group of survivors huddled around an old computer that somehow escaped the destructive force of zombie Armageddon and watching videos of the time before the horror. As Resident Evil 2 unfolded weakly before them in the fading light of Gamestop’s display television, each of them knew that this historical document must be protected at all costs if their children and their children’s children were to ever know how great and wonderful the world once was.

2. Society Collapsed Into Madness

As midnight drew closer, the Gamestop staff pulled everyone together to participate in a small raffle, but the authority they once had over the kaleidoscope of despair around them evaporated in an instant. Once people realized they had a chance to claim something for themselves in the midst of their hopeless terror, law and order were torn to pieces and mindlessly devoured like Fergie in Planet Terror. The employees futilely tried to maintain order before abandoning their posts and tossing stickers and oversized display boxes into the churning, gnashing masses to save their own lives. Also, there were like zero females there, so the population is totally doomed.

1. No Hope Left

Once it was finally time to hand out the game, everyone was cast outside of the building and lined up against the wall, soaked in cold moonlight and wrapped in the ghostly creaking whispers of the windswept Panera awning next door. The Gamestop staff, nestled safely behind their security gate and bathed in mocking fluorescent light, handed Resident Evil 6 out one at a time like war rations – a tin of sardines, a flashlight, and a canteen full of rain water and dead spiders for your journey out into the wastes. One by one, the sallow faces dutifully collected their copies before turning their backs on the emotionless electric glow of the store, a pale jewel floating in a sea of blackness, and disappeared into the night to face the darkness alone. And to probably call out of work the next morning.