Resident Evil: The Board Game Series Buying Guide

In the Steamforged Games library, you will find adaptations of some of the video game world’s biggest franchises sprinkled throughout – from Monster Hunter to Devil May Cry, Sea of Thieves to Gears of War, and their gigantic Elden Ring adaptation that is releasing soon. But for now, let’s look at the company’s Resident Evil series of titles with Resident Evil 1, 2, and 3.

Starting with Resident Evil 2 back in 2019, followed by Resident Evil 3 in 2021, and finally Resident Evil in 2023, each game of the trio plays out similarly, sharing a majority of the same mechanics between one another. In each title, you and up to three friends take turns navigating dark passages, burning streets, and nefarious labs as you play out the stories of each respective game. Each game comes complete with a plethora of incredibly detailed plastic miniatures depicting the gruesome creatures you will be going up against alongside those representing your survivor heroes.

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Each player’s turn consists of three phases – the Action Phase, the Reaction Phase, and lastly the Tension phase. What you can do on your turns is straightforward – you have four actions, and with those actions, you can either move, open or close a door, search an area to grab an item, trade with another player in their square, use an item in their inventory, or attack. Enemies act during the reaction phase, where they move towards or attack the active player, causing the player to roll a die to see if they can avoid the danger. And finally, the Tension Phase has the active player draw from the special Tension deck of cards, which can result in three possible outcomes: Nothing happens, something bad happens, and something really bad happens. By the end of the first full go-around, players should have a pretty solid grasp on how to play the games and can start worrying more about how you will survive and thrive this zombie apocalypse.

Combat is done by rolling dice, and comparing the rolls with your equipped weapons stat and abilities. Depending on the result, you may simply push an enemy into an adjacent square, kill them, or miss altogether, and its surprising how tough even the most basic of zombies can be to take down, if your dice rolls aren’t lucky that day. Shooting will also give enemies in the adjoining rooms (as long as the doors are open) a free movement to the source of the sound. It’s a system that makes you weigh your options and risks when opting for combat, adding to the overall “survival horror” vibe.

Being campaign board games, each one contains a number of scenarios that can be played either as one-off experiences or strung together, telling the story of the original games where things carry over from one session to the next. Levels are built using tiles with tokens denoting locked doors, items to pick up, and other goodies to uncover. At the end of each scenario, players take stock of their inventories, health, and other information that may or may not impact future games. If you and your friends opt to play them as one-off games, each scenario also provides you with a list of gear and info to start you off. It works really well either way.

For players that snag multiple entires of the series, there is some crossover that you can do, too – though some things may take a little fidgeting with to work well. Due to how many mechanics carry over, I have mix-and-matched characters from the other games into ones they don’t normally appear in, such as having Leon trudge through the Spencer Mansion with Chris. Scenario tiles can also be used between games, so long as you don’t mind miss-matched themes on the tiles. Nothing in the rules state this, but if you are so inclined you can without much issue.

Resident Evil: The Board Game

MSRP: $114.99 USDPlayers: 1-4 (best with 2)Play Time: 60-90 minutes (per scenario)Ages: 14+See it at AmazonThe newest and most refined of the trilogy, Resident Evil, takes and improves the best ideas of the previous two games and throws in some interesting new mechanics of its own, culminating in a really fun and tense package. In this entry, players such as Jill Valentine, Chris Redfield, Rebecca Chambers, or Barry Burton explore the mysterious Spencer mansion and surrounding grounds. New this time around, however, you will also have access to special support characters Albert Wesker (definitely the most trustworthy person in the series), Enrico Marini, Richard Aiken, and Brad Vickers, who can be sent off on special missions to gather supplies and provide the team with other benefits at the risk of being taken out themselves.

Brought over from Resident Evil 3, the narrative flow of Resident Evil is flexible ,with players able to tackle the mansion’s rooms in a variety of orders, with rooms being unlocked by different items and solving puzzles. The mansion and subsequent locations are made up this time from special cards, an improvement over the dashboard paper of RE3, with smaller areas being built and expanded as you play, similar to something like Betrayal at the House on the Hill, making setup for scenarios far quicker than the previous games.

If you aren’t looking to play the whole set of games, this is an easy recommendation as the one to get.

The standard zombies are more of a threat this time around (they could be a pain in the previous games as well and were always worrisome when a group was around you) as when you kill one, they don’t leave the gameboard anymore. Instead, their corpses remain until players use a brand new resource, Kerosene, to burn the bodies – else they could return as a more dangerous Red Zombie.

There are a number of other ways that Resident Evil refines and evolves its gameplay from its older board game siblings, but those are only a taste of what you can expect. If you aren’t looking to get into the whole set of games, this is an easy recommendation as the one out of the three to get.

Resident Evil Board Game ExpansionsResident Evil: The Bleak Outpost Expansion

Resident Evil: The Bleak Outpost

MSRP: $69.99See it at AmazonAdding six new scenarios and two new bosses with Neptune and Plant-42, The Bleak Outpost sends players to new locations, including the Guard House and Aqua Ring. For anyone who fell in love with the base Resident Evil game, this is a great addition. Like the base game, these scenarios can be tackled together as a mini-campaign or as standalone one-off sessions.

Resident Evil 2: The Board Game

MSRP: $114.99 USD (Steamforge website price)Player: 1-4 (Best with 2)Play Time: 60-90 minutes (per scenario)Ages: 14+See it at AmazonThis is the game that started it all (in terms of Steamforge’s board games anyway), Resident Evil 2 introduced tabletop players to the zombie-infested hallways of the Racoon City police station and the other unspeakable horrors of the Umbrella Corporation. In this entry, players assume the roles of Leon Kennedy, Claire Redfield, Ada Wong or Robert Kendo as they go up a gainst the likes of Lickers, Zombie Dogs, and Birkin over the course off eight scenarios. These missions take players from the S.T.A.R.S Office in the Police Station all the way through their harrowing escape out of the Umbrella Laboratory.

Resident Evil 2 may be the second chronologically (third if you count Zero, but that hasn’t received a board game adaptation yet), so while you may have an urge to visit this game after completing the first, I would recommend fighting it and actually starting here instead. That’s because this game lacks some of the refinement and nifty features that pop up and are flesh out in the subsequent titles.

The campaign of this game is straightforward where one scenario leads directly into the next without any real ability to deviate or tackle them in different orders – an approach that is only found in Resident Evil 2. Other quality-of-life issues also had yet to be worked out, such such as the tiles that you place and build the scenarios with are overly dark, making details hard to see and some games not including the required parts to fasten the life and ammo dials together. There are work arounds for both, and at the end of the day the details on the tiles don’t matter themselves since what matters is more just the shape of them, but it does take away from the experience a little bit.

Gameplay-wise, though, Resident Evil 2 is still a fun game to play with friends. Some scenarios really require you to plan and strategize or risk getting overwhelmed. It’s a solid game.

Resident Evil 2 Board Game ExpansionsResident Evil 2 The Board Game: B-Files Expansion

Resident Evil 2 The Board Game: B-Files Expansion

MSRP: $54.99USDSee it at AmazonFor those who just can’t get enough Resident Evil 2, The B-files expansion doubles the number of scenarios that you and your friends can play through while also giving you brand new items, enemies, and goal – escape from Mr. X!

Resident Evil 2: The Board Game – Malformations of G B-Files Expansion

MSRP: $32.99See it at AmazonThis small-box expansion is designed to be played alongside the B-Files expansion. Malformations let you test your mettle against Birkin Stage Three before you make your escape.

Resident Evil 2 The Board Game: Survival Horror Expansion

MSRP: $54.99See it at AmazonPerhaps the easiest expansion to recommend, the Survival Horror expansion adds five additional playable characters and two redone, and more advanced, versions of characters from the base game (Annette Birkin, Sherry Birkin, Ben Bertolucci, William Birkin, Brian Irons, Brad Vickers & Marvin Branagh). Plus, you get some new enemies and a brand new gameplay mode. If you are tired of being buddy-buddy, this expansion adds a PVP option to try instead.

Resident Evil 2 The Board Game: – 4th Survivor Expansion

MSRP: $32.99See it at AmazonThis second small-box expansion for Resident Evil 2 adds favorite characters from the video games to the possible roster for players to pick from – the Umbrella unit Hunk and the one-and-only Tofu! If Tofu wasn’t enough of a reason, though, this expansion adds new modes requiring you to fight through hordes of enemies on your way out of the police department building and Extreme Battle mode, a PVP race to stop the big outbreak from happening. The Tofu miniature is reason enough to get this expansion.

Resident Evil 3: The Board Game

MSRP: $114.99 USD (Steamforge’s website)Players: 1-4 (Best with 2)Play Time: 60-90 minutes (per scenario)Ages: 14+See it at AmazonResident Evil 3 continues on where the RE2 left off, both storyline-wise and in terms of developing the game mechanics. While this next entry retains a majority of the gameplay that was first introduced in its predecessor, out was the linear scenario approach in favor of giving players options in how they want to tackle exploring the burned-out ruins of Raccoon City. This time around, players can choose to pick up the holsters of Jill, Carlos, Mikhail or Nikolai, with each character having unique skills to help to survive the hellscape while being hunted by the menacing Nemesis.

Dropping the linear narrative of its predecessor, Resident Evil 3 gives players some options in how they wish to explore Raccoon City, though similar to the video games, some areas are inaccessible until specific key items are discovered in other areas, that will further open up areas of the city. One of the neat things that Resident Evil 3 does is that the game continues to get more dangerous as the city deteriorates around you, with actions you take and whether or not you succeed or fail in your objectives playing a role in how fast it does.

A new mechanic, Danger Tracker, reflects how bad things are going, and the worse it gets, the harder things are for players. The new Narrative deck helps keep the game interesting and unique from one play-through to the next. Having to choose whether or not it’s worth it to double back to try and find more resources or press on with what you have really helps to elevate that survival horror sense that the video games are known for.

Component-wise, the only place that this game stumbles with is the “map” of Raccoon City that you navigate around. While the cards are sturdy and feel nice to hold, and the tiles and tokens are solid and fine to punch out, the dashboard featuring the scenario map is on what feels like a small step up from the standard letter paper you would put in your printer, just with a gloss finish to it. It does its job, but compared to everything else, it certainly is the odd zombie out.

If you are more interested in a more open-ended campaign flow and want to skip over Resident Evil 2, this is a great starting place to get into the board game series with.

Resident Evil 3 Board Game ExpansionsResident Evil 3: The Last Escape Expansion

Resident Evil 3: The Last Escape Expansion

MSRP: $44.99See it at AmazonAdding Barry Burton, Brad Vickers, Tyrell Patrick, Marvin Branagh, Dario Rosso, and Murphy Seeker to the roster of playable characters, along with advanced versions of the base game’s cast, all hands are on deck to deal with the new monsters found in this expansion. Brain Suckers, Giant Spiders, and crows are out for your blood, and new rules, cards, and even a permadeath variant, will test your wits and know-how in this expansion.

Resident Evil 3 The Board Game: City of Ruin Expansion

MSRP: $69.99See it at AmazonCity of Ruin gives players nine new scenarios to play that send them through locations such as the City Hospital, City Park, and Dead Factory, where new enemies and bosses await. Luckily, new weapons and other items will help you along the way, and you will need every tool in your arsenal you can get if you hope to take on the new Stage 3 Nemesis!

That covers the Resident Evil board game series, but we have a lot more similar articles for you to check out as well. Check out the best horror board games, our Final Girl buying guide, and our Nemesis buying guide for more.

If you would like to dive further into the franchise, check out our guide to the Resident Evil games and Resident Evil movies for more.

Scott White is a freelance contributor to IGN, assisting with tabletop games and guide coverage. Follow him on X/Twitter or Bluesky.

Originally posted:

Jan 13, 2025 7:52 pm

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