If you had to think of a word to describe Resident Evil 3: Nemesis, "adorable" probably wouldn't be at the top of that list. The game is swarming with gruesome biological terrors, including the formidable Nemesis T-Type that hunts the remaining S.T.A.R.S member Jill Valentine through the heart of a devastated Raccoon City. In other words, it's not exactly the most wholesome of setups.
Nevertheless, "adorable" is precisely the term we'd use to describe Resident Evil 3: Chibi Edition, a new fan hack that transforms Popeye for the NES into a cute arcade platformer based on the survival horror game (thanks @CDRomance_Spike). The hack is the work of Crying Onion and ProtoPixel, who uploaded the results to romhacking.net on April 22nd. It apparently started out as a joke between the pair, before developing into their first proper collaboration.
Just like Popeye, the hack focuses on navigating a set of platforms while collecting items dropped into the level — replaced here with Umbrella symbols. While you try to collect enough of these items to advance to the next stage, Nemesis will pursue you up and down ladders and stairs, with Jill being able to eat Green Herbs to fight back or press switches to drop barrels on his head.
Here's a list of the features from the romhacking.net page:
- Redesigned title screen inspired by Capcom’s well-known franchise.
- Two versions of the hack have been made, with the franchise title localized to the Western and Japanese markets.
- New text font (Calderon Majuscule Roman, created by James Calderon and available from RHDN).
- New sprites of Jill Valentine, Leon S. Kennedy, Carlos Oliveira and of course, the deadly Nemesis.
- Stages have been redrawn to make them feel more in tune with the RE/BH universe.
- A bunch of references and some easter eggs have been added for the enjoyment of fans of this saga.
Want to try it out for yourself? The patch is available to download from romhacking.net. It is compatible with the Japanese ROM of Popeye for the NES. You can see some more images of the hack below: