Amazing fan concept shows off what RE9 would look like with a classic fixed camera—and I think it should make a comeback

The fixed camera perspectives of old have largely been lost in modern times. They were created as smart optimization tools that helped keep only what is important in focus while not rendering anything else but also grew into a recognizable aspect of classic horror games that oftentimes upped the tension and kept the player engaged and centered.

Most of the older Resident Evil games, particularly the first three main titles and then some others, used fixed camera angles. Whenever you crossed preset “thresholds,” the camera angle would switch. Say you were going down a hallway and then made a left to enter another hallway, the camera would switch as you made that turn, focusing just on that specific hallway while your character maintains freedom of movement through the environment.

It’s a nice trick, an old one, that immediately invokes a “classic” vibe and wasn’t just a horror game gimmick either. With Resident Evil Requiem now out and about, first- and third-person perspectives are the only ways to play. Most of the industry uses these two camera styles, and odds are that fixed camera angles won’t ever make a mainstream comeback now that we have the machines to drive detailed environments.

But a player wanted to see how RE9 would have turned out if it still used fixed cameras, and I honestly think the results are amazing.

Specifically, I think Grace’s segments would have been even more terrifying if we didn’t know, or had no way of learning, what was behind each corner. If you play the game in first-person, then some of that fixed camera tension is maintained, since peeking around corners or learning if there are enemies around is rather challenging when you have to actually come around a corner to check it out. In third person, though, you can use the camera itself to get a fairly large view of the environment, and by editing FOV settings, the first-person camera loses a lot of its tension as well.

With these theoretical fixed cameras, your view would be largely limited, and you would actively have to facetank enemies or locations to switch the camera angle and learn if that place is safe to explore. What’s more, while exploring that hallway, you’d lose sight of the place you came from and would have to again force yourself into switching the angle to get some information.

All of this is rather easy to do with modern perspectives, for the reasons I outlined above.

The fixed angles above also make every frame turn into a literal painting. Since they are focusing very specific parts of the level, they also make everything look much better. Every angle serves as a still picture of sorts, allowing different elements to respect mathematical ratios, thus “popping” out much more and becoming more pleasing to the eye.

What’s very interesting to me is how well the levels and the props within them work with these fixed angles, almost as if Capcom had them in mind when making the game. It goes to show how something that goes largely unnoticed can become fundamental to your game’s design just by changing the perspective.

This sort of game design is on its way out, however. Most games use a first- or third-person view, and the last title I played that did have a fixed camera was Signalis. That game is amazing in every sense of the word, and I wrote as much some time ago, and I think it would have significantly lost in terms of vibe and atmosphere if it used standard perspectives instead of its preset angles.

The horror genre is yearning for more innovation and change, but it might also do well to go back to its roots and see what made those old games great in the first place. Perhaps the fixed camera angles have something to do with that, and this RE9 concept surely does make a strong argument for that.

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John Carpenter’s Toxic Commando offers four unique classes from the get-go, once the tutorial has been finished, and you can build them differently based on your needs.

All four classes are unique in terms of their loadouts, abilities, and more. That said, all of them have a skill tree, and you can’t select them all. The skills you choose will determine how the classes will work.

Let’s look at the best skills you can unlock and upgrade for each class to make them perform better.

Best skills to unlock in John Carpenter’s Toxic Commando

The tables below have a list of the best skills that you can unlock for each class.

Best skills for The Strike

The Strike uses explosives to control the crowd and helps to clear huge swarms of enemies. The main focus is to improve how your explosives work so they can do more damage.

Skill	Reason
Combatant	This skill allows you to carry one additional explosive. An additional explosive means more damage and provides you with an extra chance to clear the enemies.
Blast Radius	All upgrade nodes on this sequence improve the blast radius of every explosive you trigger. This enables you to improve the AoE potential of the explosives.
Supernova	While this upgrade takes a lot of time to unlock, it causes your fireballs to explode and spread fire within their radius. The ignited fire does damage over time to the undead caught in the blast.

Best skills for The Medic

The Medic’s primary job is to help heal yourself and your team. The upgrades should be focused entirely on improving your healing potential so that your team can survive for a long time.

Skill	Reason
Wizardry	This skill allows The Medic’s ability to recharge 100% faster when fully upgraded. The faster recover will help you to provide more heals over time, and help your team to survive for longer.
Medkit Efficiency	Once fully upgraded, the Medkit Efficiency allows your Medkits to heal 50% more health. These additional heals will be necessary against harder enemies and bigger waves.
Self Medicate	Things can go wrong at any time, and this skill allows your Healing Aura to revive you when you’re incapacitated. Having such a privilege allows you to survive longer and save your teammates when required.

Best skills for The Operator

As The Operator, you’ll be relying heavily on your drone. The stronger your drone, the better your chances of survival.

Skill	Reason
Sustained Support	This upgrade allows The Operator’s drone to stay in the Battle Mode for 50% longer. This allows the drone to do more damage and kill more enemies. The 50% hike is massive for the latter waves.
Loyal Friend	If you’re playing solo, this skill will work especially well with Sustained Support. It will activate the Drone immediately if a zombie grabs The Operator. This allows you to escape tight situations when you don’t have a possible way to save yourself.
Drone Lethality	This skill significantly improves the drone’s damage output by 10%, which helps it to provide support fire when things get tough. Moreover, this skill upgrade works pretty well with both Loyal Friend and Sustained Support.

Best skills for The Defender

As a tank, your objective is to absorb as much health as possible. Your priority should be to unlock skills that increase your base health and reduce the incoming damage.

Skill	Reason
Repulsor	The Repulsor converts The Defender’s barrier into a death dome. With this upgrade, all enemies will take significant damage when they try to cross the barrier. Roamers will die immediately, and this skill massively improves the damage potential of The Defender.
Energy Armor	Once you get all upgrades on this line, your barrier will provide 25 Temporary Armor when your allies are inside the barrier. This Temporary Armor, when full upgraded, will stack to 100. The additional
Expansion	The Expansion skill increases the barrier’s protective radius by 20%. Both the Repulsor and Energy Armor skills rely on how effective the barrier is. Increasing its radius allows the barrier to target more enemies and provide more barrier to your teammates.

While all classes have their own use-case scenario, this tier list will help you figure out your favorite one.

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