Resident Evil 7 Announced for Switch in Cloud Format in Japan, Releases This Week

As announced by Capcom, Resident Evil 7 is coming to the Nintendo Switch in Japan, but it is arriving as no other game on the system has: It is coming to the system via cloud support, as the initial install for Resident Evil 7 on the Switch is a meager 45 megabytes and the rest of the game will be run through the cloud. A stable internet connection will be needed in order to play the game in its entirety due to the reliance on the cloud for the bulk of the game’s data.

15 minutes of the game can be played for free and, from there, a purchase of a “ticket” for 2,000 yen ($17.99 USD) will grant the player full access to Resident Evil 7 and all of its downloadable content for 180 days. It comes to the Nintendo eShop in Japan later this week on May 24.

This is a rather odd way to release a game and if anything, it resembles Playstation’s “PlayStation Now” service—a service where players can buy access into games via the cloud for allotted amounts of time that correlate with money paid for the said game. It is more or less a glorified rental service that lives and dies via the strength of one’s internet connection and the cloud system in play. The feasible answer as to why Resident Evil 7 is coming to the Switch in this format is that the Switch lacks a large amount of storage space, seeing as it relies on micro SD cards for its memory support, and the onus is on the console’s owner to upgrade their storage as they see fit. Capcom may see this as a more cost-efficient way, for players, to release the game.

As of right now, it is exclusive to Japan and there is nothing hinting towards a U.S. release, but one can only hope that a western release will be announced soon enough. Now players can get scared on the bus, in a coffee shop, and anywhere else—granted that Wi-Fi access is accessible.

Check out the trailer for the Japanese release of Resident Evil 7 for the Nintendo Switch below, and find out more here.