Info about Resident Evil 1.5

Well ... (looks both ways, then grins sheepishly) ... I never got past the Alzaire/Hayes "five era builds" descriptions myself. And Carnivol had to correct me on the use of percentage assessments with RE15 a while back.

The biggest problem with using a "% complete" figure is that it really doesn't give you a good assessment of what's in that build. It also depends on who's doing the assessing. Shinji Mikami himself said that RE15 only reached 65% completion, and that was in that famous Famitsu interview conducted not long after RE15 was scrubbed in favor of RE2. Years later, in a 2004 interview with GameSpot magazine, Hiroyuki Kobayashi claimed that it was 80% complete. Both men were talking about the same "final build," yet both had a different perspective on it. That's why the "era builds" method is better ... and Kegluneq's revision of that is probably the ultimate in terms of truly assessing an RE15 dev build.

The whole "final build" thing is probably a misnomer, anyway. I'm almost willing to bet money that the most sophisticated build of RE15 we fans might ever see is a very late Era 4 build ... unless somebody knows something I don't, or Capcom decides to be kind and revive their copies from their vaults for the public to see. Don't be too upset, though, because a LOT happened during the Era 4 development period. We only have the first iteration of it - the PVB, or raw 40% build, or Build 4.0, or whatever you want to call it. A lot happened to RE15 during the two months that followed ....

"RE15 Beta 1" or "BH2 Beta 1" is a term used by fans to describe the first playable build of RE2 as we know it today. Correct me if I'm wrong, fellow RE fans, but it predates even the RE2/BH2 Trial Edition (but not by much). It's always been a special case where the hunt for RE15 is concerned, because it's believed that there still might be assets from the final build of RE15 mixed in with ts data. It wasn't that long ago that a lot of fans thought that it might have playable versions of RE15's Factory and Lab stages, based on the 1997 TGS footage ... until Mikhail and I pretty much destroyed that theory last year in a discussion on THIA. We conclusively proved that the TGS footage is nothing more than footage from RE2 Beta 1 mixed in with footage from the 40% and "final builds" of RE15 - and who knows what else. If you want to see this yourself, get the best quality print of the 1997 TGS footage and watch the screen borders as it plays. You'll see the black borders change size every time the video source changes. Now that doesn't disprove that there might still be RE15 resources that are part of RE2 Beta 1, but most us now think that if they're there, they're not playable - kinda like those RE15 final build backgrounds Sardeljka extracted from the Japanese BH2 Trial Edition years ago (2005).

The best proof that there MIGHT be RE15 assets in RE2 Beta 1 comes from that copy of BH2 Beta 2 that's been floating around now for years. Take a good look at the Underground Lab's Boiler Room - which is different from RE2 retail (it's darker, for one) - and then look at the rough renders of that same room in Sadeljka's ripped set of RE15 final build backgrounds. They are a perfect match, camera angle for camera angle. The only thing that's changes is that RE15's double doors have been replaced with lifts, and the double door at the far end of the catwalk has been removed - just like it is in RE2 retail. Those camera angles are exactly the same, though - and I for one believe the BH2 Beta 2 backgrounds were probably based on what they intended (but never got around to doing) for the final build of RE15. There's other examples as well, but that's probably the best one.

Speaking of build differences, here's some fun you can have with RE15. Take either version of RE15 that's currently available - the Team's MZD build or the raw 40% build - it doesn't matter which one. Load it up, and head to the RPD Armory. Go inside, and go in just far enough for the camera angle to change - where the lockers are in front of you. Now look through the window to your right into the Firing Range and tell me ... how many shooter's booths are there? There's supposed to be only four .... (grin).

 

I've actually been tempted to put up the full set of CFC tapes and a good few other "subscription" tapes from various magazines/publishers/distributors (since I'm no longer length capped), but the increasingly draconian content handling system on YouTube has kinda made me ignore the upload feature in fear of having the various crap I've archived there taken down.

 

Sure, no problem. Be sure to make notes regarding the differences you find, though. You might just discover things that no one else has before.

Exactly. It seems that the development team kept the assets of the previous iteration of the game when they were re-constructing it. We can even attest to this in the PSM build to some degree. Depending on how finished BH2 Beta 1, there could still be there parts of 2F and B1/B2 of the RPD and complete portions of the Drains. Without knowing the actual progression of this beta it's impossible to assert what is there and what isn't though. But given that the RPD was by far the largest location of BH2 retail, it seems likely that in BH2 Beta 1 they'd still be polishing the RPD and the other locations (namely the Sewers and the Laboratories) would be left unchecked.

That would be great. The CFC tapes always come with various degrees of quality. The ones uploaded by Challenger of Wolves are way too saturated and darkened. The ones uploaded by Retro Reality don't have that much quality although I suspect this is related to the compression methods used by YouTube.. And the ones uploaded by Kim have the bioflames.com watermark.

You could give Daily Motion a shot. From what I understand, they are a lot more pragmatic and less anal when it comes to copyright infringements.

 

Speaking of which Kegluneq: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CIVg82ciyk&list=PLsWfUGdA5L-hZJvSpu2YKD9oFWo7TIaNU&index=1
(excuse the shameless self promotion) take a look at the part where Elza fights zombies in Office A. Go to 0:24,and pay attention to the 2nd zombie that Elza fires at. Very close to him is a table on his right side(the one that has no cardboard boxes). Now,i'm using my upscaled version since it's a little easier to notice that there seems to be a 9mm ammo box there. I've checked the backgrounds just to be sure,and there's definitely an ammo box there.(And at 0:32,there's another ammo box close to the window,which was also present in the final 1.5 trailer,and one of the Hyper PS Remix vids with Leon) They are both hard to see,so i might get some pictures up soon. Another thing(and you don't need an upscaled video to notice this),look at CD video 4. Look at the final part,where Birkin 2 kills the spider man: Pay attention to his feet,and his shadow. Tell me,does the shadow look misplaced? The final build might not be that complete.

 

Bravo. That's an excellent find and one which I don't think has been discovered by a lot of people. I don't even recall anyone discussing that second ammunition box on the bioflames.com forums. If you want to see more item locations, I suggest you check the bioflames.com screenshots. You'll be pleasantly surprised by some things you'll find out. You have a keen eye for this stuff. Make good use of it.

Regarding Birkin's shadow.. Well I'm not going to venture in that territory but suffice to say, some things needed to be polished so it's not surprising that it's a bit off. Those are most likely the issues that get checked by the testing team and probably only on the last stages of development, after everything is pretty much complete.

 

There's another one:in video 4,pay attention to Leon when he faces Birkin 3: as soon as the cutscene ends,you are going to notice that the ADT masks are missing,as Birkin 3 overlaps the background graphics.
EDIT: one of the inventory screenshots of the final build shows a different avatar,it's not Chris,and it seems to be intended for Elza,but the pic doesn't seem to be Elza at all,in fact,it seems to be Jill(unfortunately,it's too bright to properly tell,but keeping in kind Chris was still used as a placeholder for Leon,it's likely they used Jill for Elza) Now that we are on the subject of discovering stuff,that's something i noticed recently when looking at the pictures again.
EDIT 2: I followed your advice Kegluneq,and i'm noticing some weird stuff in the inflames screenshots. One of the things i noticed is clipping issues with Chief Irons. There's two pictures of him,visited by Elza and Leon,respectively. Now,something curious is that in the Elza picture,there's a part that looks like a combination of a bright red and white(which is due to the poor quality of the photos,mind you) on the coach. Now,right next to it,is Irons' left arm,more specifically,the police insignia is there(he is wearing a police uniform after all) Now,compare that to the Leon picture,and you are going to notice that he raised his left arm to his head,and then it becomes terribly apparent: While in the Leon picture,nothing seems to be wrong,in the Elza pic,his arm is layed down,yet,you can see a part of the coach THROUGH his arm. At least,that's what it seems. I'll later post my observations with pictures. One thing i'm noticing a trend with the final build, is clipping issues,which is a little weird,considering that none of the other builds had such clipping issues(maybe for the exception of Marvin in the November 6 build when on the cutscene for ROOM400,the one where Ada leads you to ROOM401,or the security office)

 

I'll have to do that today and check it out. I'm really digging everyone's knowledge on RE1.5, it's certainly enlightening as I'm learning something just about every time someone posts.

 

guys,tell me what do you think of this: I've been analyzing 1.5's development,and it seems as though it was going to be 6 eras,had it been finished and released in May 1997(it's release date). One thing i've noticed is that 1.5's development was quite tumultous,and several idea got multiple changes before being settled on(the sewers come to mind,and so does the RPD). By comparison,RE1's development was more straightforward,despite some rough starts,and 2's development was rushed like hell. (3 again seems mostly straightforward,and doesn't contain,or at least,we don't know yet,some super major changes,excluding,maybe the chain quest).
Era 1 signals the start of development,the game here isn't even in an alpha stage,it has barely started and is likely on a tech demo or pre alpha state,here they begin working on the engine and some assets to test things out.
Then comes Era 2,in this era,they now have a somewhat stable engine,and now truly begin to work on an actual playable product,and not a demonstration. In other words,they are trying to get an idea of how the game would play,feel like,look,sound,etc. I believe that at the end of Era 2,they get a very early Alpha done.
Era 3 is now when they have a clear idea of the game and begin working on making that idea into a video game that everyone can play. I believe the game should have gotten more stuff done by the time Era 3 was done(and probably progressed beyond the status of late alpha),but there were numerous changes very close to the end of this era,like the sewers having a major redesign,numerous rpd rooms having their RDTs(more specifically,their camera angles) and backgrounds changed(though it did happen before,at this point,it didn't need to be necessary as they looked good,and worked fine,but,Kamiya or someone else of importance at Capcom might have hated these rooms,and wanted them to be updated,who knows). At the end of this era,the game is now in a late alpha status(i say this because a beta is technically feature complete,despite some missing sounds or lack of polish of the code,or some other thing,etc,whereas an alpha is not feature complete,to my understanding,please correct me if i'm wrong.)
Era 4 now begins,and now,with a fully clear vision of the game,thanks to the late alpha,the team now begins working on getting the game to reach beta status. The build we have further exemplifies how 1.5's development was so tumultous,as the game is still heavily unfinished(but it is starting to resemble a beta in some aspects,mostly aesthetic,like the backgrounds that are the same as the final,but there are still several unfinished backgrounds at this point) At the end of this era,the game would now be in an early beta status,as videos of later builds(like the final 1.5 trailer one,which is the 4.9 build i believe,but please Kegluneq or any other,correct this if i'm wrong) show that the game has considerably progressed beyond the alpha status of the November 6 build.
Era 5 starts,and i believe the objective here was pretty clear:get the game into a "finalized" state aka,a late beta,that could be used to fix the bugs,polish up stuff,and then burn it to cd,package it and release it to the market. However,as we all know,the game got cancelled early on era 5,and more specifically,the game ends active development at the end of December 1996(24th December,going by RE2 trial dates),the team goes for the holidays,comes back January 1997,and the game gets thrown into development hell when Mikami doesn't like the RE2 they made. No further progress is made,and,well the rest is already known,but you get the picture. Had era 5 been done,it would have ended,i presume,after February 1997,as era 5 had barely begun development in December 1996. The result would have been a late beta that,as stated earlier,could have been bug fixed,polished and released to the market in May 1997.
Era 6,would have ocurred in the beginning of March 1997,and would have ended at either the end of April 1997,or at the beginning of May 1997. The game is now in a late beta status,here they would have bug fixed(fixed the numerous collision issues present in the final build,the missing ADT masks,maybe the Air Jesus bug if it wasn't fixed yet,grenade usage bug,etc) and polished up(added more music,perhaps,made the BGs look better,maybe add an extra mode,or not,who knows) and it would have reached retail status. In an alternate timeline,this RE2 would have been loved by everyone(i presume) and Duke Nukem Forever would have come out in 2002/3.
Wait,what?
Tell me guys,what do you think of this proposed development cycle for 1.5?

 

Actually, the first delay for the game was announced when it was still RE15. That was early 1997, right when Mikami realized that the game as it stood then (Era 5) didn't measure up to his standards. The release date was pushed out to August 1997, probably in the hopes that all it needed were a set of quick fixes. I honestly don't think that they anticipated revising it as heavily as they did, but Sugimura's assessment made it pretty clear that such was needed. So ... yeah ... there's conceivably room for a hypothetical "Era 6," if you want.

One might even say that's the field that Team IGAS is plowing now - in their own way, of course. "Era 6" ... and the nice thing about that is because it never happened in reality, you can interpret what it might have been any way you want. Not a bad line of thought there, young man. Not at all. I'd better shut up, though, and the real fan experts check it out.

 

One thing that i think must be written down as fact for whenever the final build or a build very close it gets released is that the game wasn't THAT finished.(It would help to lower people's expectations a little) Compared to BH2 Beta 2(or the October 30th,1997 build if you go by dates),1.5 is likely to be extremely unfinished in certain aspects,like BGs. Fun fact: the RE2 Trial,at least the BH2 one is dated August 6th,1997. This also proves another thing that I already stated about 2's development: rushed like hell,but relatively straightforward,in comparison to 1.5.
Funny thing that RE3 has barely any beta footage or pictures that reveal huge changes,i bet there were some during it's development(all games have at least some big changes during it's development,and this applies to movies,books,anything,after all,ideas change as time goes along) but Capcom probably took measures(or the dev. team did) so that it didn't end up like the nightmare RE2 was.

 

Well there is the whole RE3 starting off as code veronica story

 

i know that one,but i mean,once the idea was settled upon,and development actually began,there doesn't seem to be as much footage of changes as opposed to RE2/1.5,probably because they didn't want to make the same mistake as 2.

 

Actually, to me the best piece of evidence is this:



ROOM 706 at this point is the last 1.5 background set to be modified, not only this, but it was modified after beta 1. The best estimate date I've found for the E3 1997 build is sometime between the 11th - 18th June 1997, one week prior to the event, E3 taking place on the 19th - 21st of June 1997. Shortly after, background development conveniently resumed on the 23rd June 1997. Early to mid July the game went through a major background overhaul, the majority of existing rooms received updates, including the West Office, the West Corridor, the Basement Corridors, as well as the addition of ROOM 706. This is the point where "beta 1" ended. It seems the door was removed from the West Office, the door was added to the West Corridor, and many other significant existing rooms from the E3 build also received changes or updates. This to me indicates that even after the July redesign and they moved forward towards the Trial Edition, 1.5 Labs were still planned to be a part of the game, something which is further supported by other media of Lab backgrounds still surviving as late as September 1997.



If you think about it however, ROOM 404 makes a better choice for a Stage 7 concept design than ROOM 400, given that the Factory was now planned to be scrapped and that the Factory Elevator no longer had any use. I'd argue that it wasn't until around September/October 1997 that 1.5 Labs were finally pruned from the game for good, and that the reason ROOM 706 was added as a concept design for the Labs on the 16/07/1997 during the July redesign is that because prior to then, a concept design simply wasn't needed when 1.5 Labs were still a consistent part of the game.

I can tell you with some degree of accuracy exactly what is and what isn't there in beta 1. But that's for another time perhaps when I've finished some of the stuff I'm working on.

Do you have a source for this? This is quite possibly the most important piece of information I could have learned right now! This basically puts the cherry on top of my work.

-----

In my opinion beta 1 (era 6) is the final and most advanced build of 1.5. I'll get into more details as to exactly why another time, but I'll just leave it with a few questions for now that hopefully expresses my view on it. How do you define a build of 1.5? The backgrounds? The enemies? The character models? The textures? The story? ... If beta 1 contained the same title screen, the same character select, the same menus, the same blue item pop up, the same door transition, the same weapons, the same animations, much of the same code and many of the same rooms, is that its self still not a build of 1.5? I'd argue that it's more 1.5 than retail regardless of some of the changes Sugimura made to the scenario and art direction at that point, as 1.5 is more than just a story.

 

Now I remembered that when I first saw the first and only image of Roy in Marvin sitting stance years ago, Elza hair was kinda Brunnette, at the time I tought that it could indicate their transition to the final version.

 

geluda,look up the leon vs birkin video of 1.5.
Hear a different door sound? while it's unknown if more doors were added,one thing that we can at least confirm is that door sounds were being added to 1.5,and possibly,door animations and models as well(and i wouldn't be surprised if most of this stuff got recycled over to RE2). i'm saying this because you mentioned the same door transition,and it's clear that they did work on this after the november 6 alpha of 1.5

 

Which video in particular? Can you link me to it?

 

The final 1.5 trailer (from Complete Disc) is what I consider to be era 5.0 build. The era 4.8 and 4.9 builds are what precess this build and the transition into the new stage of development. Of course you can always call these two early 5 build and it would be just as correct. I always prefer to call the last build that got featured the 5.0 to make it easier for others to identify it but mostly because back when discussion surrounding the era builds began, there was no clear distinction between the builds beyond the superficial layers. Thus, there were only 5 builds known and discussed.

Your analysis is somewhat similar to what I've come to conclude in the past. Although I don't agree completely with the idea that the game's development would have ran all the way until May 1997 (Mikami knew the delays and lack of work on the build in the early of the year would have to push back the date further as it was still in 65% development - according to his own words), everything else seems to be more or less in agreement with the footage we have. I also think that up until Era 4 Build they were messing with the design of the game and did not have a vision of it. By then it was becoming evident that they had decided on the layout, stage progression, story events and tangible gameplay features - reaching the beta status of the game.

I think this was Hideki Kamiya's way of brute forcing the development of the game. He made the mistake of tearing 1.5 in pieces and develop it separately. Everything about it was scrambled - backgrounds, scenario events, scripted cutscenes, puzzles, items location, enemy placement, etc. This is a nightmare to design because you have to go back and forth to change things - including the layout of certain areas. Take the B1F - the era 3 build already had the parking garage, service bay, firing range and armory in place. This meant that they a good idea about what each of these locations was used for. But, probably because we're into early stages of Elza's progression, they figured that they needed an additional location - that of the kennel - which was still being designed by era 4 build. Only in era 5 build does this place come to fruition and I'm guessing as a means to extend one of the character's playthrough. Another possibility is that back in era 3 build they didn't thought up of B2F, but needed that when the development took off early 4 build.

Clarify something for me, please. I assume that beta 1 is considered the footage from the E3 1997 trailer, correct?

If that is, I'd say that beta 1 ended somewhere in early June. Consider the following:



To the left: BG from the E3 trailer (beta 1); to the right: BG from the Trial disc (early beta 2?). Date is 12/07/1997



To the left: BG from the E3 trailer (beta 1); to the right: BG from the Trial disc (early beta 2?). Date is 15/07/1997

Both of these precede ROOM 706.

Do you mean the contents of the disc?

I wouldn't classify beta 1 as era 6 build of 1.5. The reason is fairly simple. The decision to scrap the project was done. If I'm not mistaken, this decision came to fruition somewhere in February, after Sugimura offered his feedback on the scenario and Mikami thought it was better to revamp the whole game. This meant that Elza Walker was to be replaced by Claire Redfield; the script was to be completely re-written; some of the stage progression would necessarily change; the old monster designs were going to be discarded in favour of new enemies; the game engine was being modified to become what we played in retail. Every core element of the game was going to be changed and whatever remnants were left were for the inspiration of new ideas.

 

This is a tough question to answer, as there are few if no details at all on the physical nature of a real "beta 1" in the wild, but typically I'd say beta 1 is considered from any point between April, May or June. This fits perfectly for the E3 build and is a likely candidate, but not a definite.

See post below.

Unfortunately no, however I've been working on reconstructing the Trial Edition in various ways that replaces and eliminates all obsolete backgrounds with 1.5 backgrounds, as well as making estimations as to which rooms were present in that era thanks to left overs each time the BSS archive was updated. With this you are capable of getting a clear picture of roughly where the development was at and what rooms/backgrounds were present (in use or not) at that particular time, and when you look at the over all picture you can see just how much had actually changed and/or developed at that time.

Beta 1 had a lot of differences even to the Trial Edition, from cut scenes with enemies and characters, item locations and their uses, to the layout and player progression of the RPD. They continued developing non problematic rooms, for instance the streets and other RPD rooms which don't impact the gameplay progression, until ROOM202 on the 09/07/1997. This room is the West Office, one of the beta rooms which we've known about for a long time and this room has undergone big changes over the course of the development. At this point the doors were changed, Marvin's beta scene was gone, it was left bare for the Trial Edition and wasn't even till later in development when Marvin's scene was replaced as we know it today. This point marked big changes for a lot of the game; for instance, the new basement was added, the West Corridor door was added, the Licker head scene was removed, and other backgrounds were replaced which changed the way items were used such as key cards, or perhaps even the way puzzles functioned.







At least in my opinion these are pretty significant changes and there's no background evidence to support this step forward until early July 1997 as they approached completion of the Trial Edition in August 1997. The beta 1 era had a very distinct look and feel that separates it from the rest of the retail development and a lot of it was lost at this one point during mid July.

For me, you have to look at 1.5 in two different ways. On one hand you have a story and an art direction which Sugimura was responsible for re drafting, but on the other hand you have an engine which imo tells its own story. I wont go into too much detail now, but if what Richard just pointed out was true, that they planned to release in August 1997, then it's likely that in early stages of beta 1 development refining the 1.5 engine was the goal and recycling as much as possible became the means to pushing such a release date. Sure by this point much of the original vision was gone and graphics had improved, but much of the engine its self likely continued to live, perhaps even in a more superior and final state than any build of 1.5 prior to it. This is where you have to ask the question, what is 1.5? A story? or an engine? Perhaps it's a little bit of both, each part being as equally as important as each other, and perhaps as equally relevant in the beta 1 era.

And coincidentally the Trial Edition was finished in August 1997, 06/08/1997 to be exact, and as we can observe much of the game was redesigned in July to the lead up of that particular build, just as the beta 1 era came to an end. If that was the case then August was obviously no longer a viable release goal and more time could be spent redesigning and refining the game to what we know it today.

To me beta 1 has the potential to be and contain:

- The most complete collection of 1.5 backgrounds
- The most complete collection of 1.5 assets
- The most complete and refined version of the 1.5 engine

Regardless of how much was over written or was actually pieced together at the time, I would always consider something like this the final build of 1.5 assuming the engine lived on and much of 1.5's quirks survived by that point. For me, I'd bet money that they did.

 

hey geluda,sorry for the delay,didn't see the post.
here's the vid: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nu_Lx9vRa-Y
that door sound is not present at all on the november 6 build,and this build in particular is later than the 11/6 one. I believe this is footage of the 4.9 build,but I could be mistaken,Kegluneq,if you can verify what I said,that would be awesome.

 

Does anyone knows how the backgrounds on Resident Evil are rendered? Are they static like jpg images or is there any chance for an upscale for a better looking graphics?