RE4 Remake's Cut Intro?! You Played as Ashley?! Gamers Stunned!

Interesting tidbit coming out of the Resident Evil community today: Apparently, Capcom originally planned to kick off the critically acclaimed Resident Evil 4 remake with a completely different introduction – one where *we* got to play as Ashley Graham *before* her infamous abduction. That's right, instead of immediately stepping into Leon S. Kennedy's shoes, players would have experienced the prelude to the nightmare from Ashley's perspective. Intriguing, right?

RE4 Remake's Cut Intro?! You Played as Ashley?! Ga...

For those who’ve somehow avoided it, the final version of the remake, mirroring the original, plunges you right into the thick of things with Leon, hot on the trail of the missing President's daughter. However, it seems Capcom toyed with the idea of a "Chapter 0," a sort of prologue where players would sneak around as Ashley, attempting to evade the clutches of the Ganados before her inevitable capture. It makes you wonder about the narrative choices behind these big decisions.

Reportedly, this scrapped mission would have taken place in a more fleshed-out version of the forest surrounding the village – that same unsettling woodland where Leon begins his search. There was even a tantalizing glimpse of this sequence in an earlier trailer, showing Ashley witnessing a decidedly creepy ritual sacrifice. Talk about setting the tone!

Details suggest that this section would have been a pure stealth affair, completely devoid of combat. Ashley would have been tasked with avoiding a patrolling Ganado, and even catching sight of another one dragging Luis Sera – presumably towards that ominous basement where Leon eventually finds him. The chapter would then have culminated with Ashley's capture, the very event that sets the entire plot of the game in motion. It would have been a very different feel for the game as it currently exists.

Now, Resident Evil 4 Remake is already packed with additions and tweaks compared to the original, so it's understandable why this intro ended up on the cutting room floor. Let’s be honest, Ashley's capture is a foregone conclusion, and she gets plenty of screen time and gameplay later on anyway. Plus, Ashley's character has always been… polarizing, to say the least. While the remake does try to make her a bit more self-sufficient, perhaps Capcom ultimately decided that diving straight into Leon's mission was the best way to go. Whatever the reason, it's fascinating to see what could have been. Makes you wonder what else got left on the design table.

Worth remembering too, that IGN gave the Resident Evil 4 Remake a perfect score, calling it "the series' most relentlessly exciting adventure rebuilt, refined, and realised to the full extent of its enormous potential." So, even without the Ashley intro, it seems they made the right calls overall! Still, a neat little "what if," wouldn't you say?