Resident Evil 3 on the Mac review: Time to meet your Nemesis

Macworld

At a glanceExpert's Rating

Pros

Enjoyable survival-horror action

Modest system requirements

Free demo available

Cons

Definitely not suitable for children

Zombie-slaying can get a bit monotonous at times

Our Verdict
It might not be the best game in the series, but the zombie-slaying action is still good fun, and a new enemy called Nemesis adds a bit of variety.

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You’ve got to hand it to Capcom, as the company is certainly putting real effort into releasing Mac versions of its games – or at least the Resident Evil series anyway. Resident Evil: Village was the first of the series to be released for the Mac, back in 2022, although that was actually the eighth game in the long-running series. Since then Capcom has followed up with Resident Evil 4 and 7 and 2, in that order. Fortunately, the order doesn’t matter too much as most of the Resident Evil games have their own individual stories – which is just as well, as the latest game in the series to arrive on the Mac is Resident Evil 3, which was originally launched on PC in 2020 (although it’s actually a remake of the original game from 1999).

This time around, you play as Jill Valentine, a special agent sent to Racoon City in the American Mid-West to investigate the outbreak of the ‘zombie virus’ that first emerged in Resident Evil 2. Jill and her fellow agents suspect Umbrella, a typically evil big pharmaceutical corporation that has developed a biological weapon called the T-Virus that seems to be behind the outbreak. In most Resident Evil games, this is the point where you start gunning down wave after wave of not-very-smart zombies, but Resident Evil 3 has a new trick up its sleeve in the form of Nemesis, a kind of intelligent super-zombie developed as a secret weapon by Umbrella.

See all the games we have enjoyed playing on the Mac in our round up of the Best Mac Games.

Nemesis turns the tables and shakes up the traditional Resident Evil formula by turning Jill from the hunter into the hunted. Instead of blasting your way through hordes of zombies you now find yourself on the back foot for a change, as Nemesis is always on your trail, hunting you down as you attempt to escape Racoon City. It actually makes a welcome change to find that you’re on the defensive occasionally, often just running and trying to stay alive rather than casually blasting zombies out of your way.

It’s a shame that the reliance on cut-scenes sometimes breaks the flow of the game, but Resident Evil 3 could still be a good starting point for Mac gamers who are new to the series, as the combat isn’t quite as relentless as it is in some of the other games. Capcom does recommend using a game controller, but I grew up playing games with a mouse and keyboard and didn’t have much trouble playing the game that way.




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It’s a good option for owners of older Macs too, as the age of the game means that it doesn’t require a top-of-the-range Mac to handle its 3D graphics. The Mac App Store says that the game will run on any Mac with an M1 processor or later, and macOS 13.0 or later – but not on Intel Macs unfortunately.

We tested the game on a MacBook Pro with an M2 Pro chip and it run smoothly at all times, even with hordes of zombies lurching across the screen (although it’s a shame that there’s no frame-rate counter built into the game to precisely measure performance). The game also provides a number of graphics presets that allow you to prioritize performance or graphics quality, depending on the speed of your Mac. We were also pleased to find that you can download a demo version of the game to see how it runs on your Mac before paying for the full version.




Screenshot
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The bad news – as is so often the case with Mac games – is that the Mac version of the game is currently only available on the Mac App Store, so if you’ve already bought the game on Steam or another online store then you’ll still have to buy the Mac version separately. There’s some consolation, though, as the Mac version also runs on the iPhone 15 or later, and iPads that have an A17 or M-series processor, so buying the Mac version will allow you to play it on your mobile devices as well.

Should You Buy Resident Evil 3

The zombie-shooting formula can quickly become a little over-familiar if you’ve played other Resident Evil games in the past. However, Resident Evil 3 shakes things up a little by using Nemesis to put you on the back foot for a change, and the game’s modest system requirements – and a free demo – make it a good, affordable choice for anyone that’s new to the series. Now if we could just have a word with Capcom about the Monster Hunter and Dragon’s Dogma games….