Crimson Peak, Guillermo del Torro's unforgettable thriller about an intellectual heiress who falls in the trap of a downfallen degenerate aristocrat and her charming brother, seems to share many essential plot elements with the epic Resident Evil: Code Veronica. Del Torro does not cite the game among his influences and inspirations for the creation of the film, but still the similarities are way too many and way too obvious to pass unnoticed.

The plot in Crimson Peak is centered around Edith, a girl who lives with her father, a wealthy businessman, in 1887's New York. Edith is an aspiring writer and likes to write scare stories, haunted by certain childhood experiences during which the ghost of her dead mother would visit her and warn her about a mysterious Crimson Peak, in what seemed to be a verge between dream and reality. One day she meets Thomas Sharpe, a young baronet from England who claims that he is an inventor and is looking for investors to support his work. Thomas is always accompanied by his sister Lucille, older by two years, who seems rather cold and crypic in her behaviour. Soon after Edith's father denies to invest on Thomas's invention, he discovers some interesting info about the Englishman and his sister and, seeing that Edith is falling in love with the young man, he orders the siblings to leave as soon as possible by offering them a generous check. On that day, however, Edith's father is brutally murdered by a mysterious stranger and Edith, emotionally crushed, finds support in Thomas's presence. It is not long before the two get married and Edith follows her husband in England, in their mansion which is located on an isolated mountainous area called Crimson Peak.

Edith finds out that the mansion is in a really bad state, derelict and with no means to keep it going. Meanwhile, her marriage with Thomas is never consumated, as Thomas claims that he wants to respect her mourning for her father's death. Edith starts discovering several frightening things about the house, like ghosts roaming its corridors at night and a creepy basement with several locked cauldrons. One day when the couple are in town on business, they get snowed in and they spend the night in a host house where they finally make love. When they return home the other day and Lucille learns about this detail, she gets infuriated and nearly attacks Edith. At some point, Edith realizes that she is being slowly poisoned by Lucille, who secretly adds poison in the tea which she offers her every day. She finds out that Lucille and Thomas are lovers, maintaning an incestuous relationship ever since they were in their early teens. However this is only half the truth. In reality, it was the psychopathic Lucille who first dragged her innocent brother into this, not hesitating to kill her austere mother when the old lady found out what was going on. Later, she urged Thomas into seducing and marrying wealthy girls from whom they took all their money and later killed in due time. However in Edith's case things didn't work out that well, because Thomas fell in love with her and because her childhood friend Alan came looking for her. Lucille, who was also the one who killed Edith's father, murders her brother out of jealousy but Edith manages to defeat her, avenging both her own torture and her husband's death.

Althrough Crimson Peak's plot is not related to the storyline of Code Veronica, there are several interesting details that bring the game to mind as you are watching the film.

The evil siblings

Admittedly not exactly the same case, but quite similar from certain aspects. Lucille and Thomas in Crimson Peak had devised a cunning and twisted plan which they had been following for several years, so as to keep their incestuous relationship going. In fact the plan was Lucille's, who had developed an unhealthy obsession with her brother and was emotionally and physically attached to him.

Pretty much like Lucille, Alfred Ashford in Code Veronica was sentimentally attached to his genious sister Alexia, and went as fas to dress up and act like her after her death.

An imposing but derelict mansion

Allerdale Hall, the family home of the Sharpe siblings, once was a glorious and imposing mansion but now, with no means to preserve it, it has become a cold and unfriendly place with snow falling from its ceiling holes.

The private mansion of the Ashfords, well-hidden at the back of the main house, is also in a decadent state. Its garden is in ruins, with fountains that have frozen and there is no water in them, and the house itself is adandoned and hostile.

A snowy scenery

Edith arrives in Allerdale Hall in winter, and soon the whole place is covered with snow. The white scenery adds to the unsettling atmosphere that this hostile place creates, while at the same time acting as a symbol foreshadowing death and all that is buried and lost.

Nearly half the plot of Code Veronica takes place in Antarctica, where the snow and cold naturally dominate. The stillness of the frozen environment accentuates the feeling of fear and isolation that is following the lead characters throughout the whole story.

The attic

The Allerdale Hall has an attic that Thomas has turned into his personal sanctuary: it is the place where he makes his inventions and creates his dolls.

The Ashford mansion also has an attic; it is hidden above one of the bedrooms and it is a private study where Alfred keeps his collection of books and stuffed butterflies.

The moths

There are black moths in abundance in Allerdale Hall. Moths are fluttering around the house because of the humidity and moss that grows in there, but they are also used as a symbol for the evil Lucille.

When Claire and Steve find themselves in the secret Umbrella facility in Antarctica, one of the most dangerous enemies that they encounter are huge, poisonous moths which like to grab onto their victims' back and bite them relentlessly.

The imagery of voracious ants

Early on in Crimson Peak, after Edith befriends Thomas and Lucille, the three go for a walk in the park together. There Lucille and Edith have a conversation which, for Lucille's part, is full of cryptic messages and allegories, and it is about the dying butterflies that are devoured by ants. We even get a close-up of the described scene.

As Claire wanders in the Ashford main house, at some point she needs to operate a film reel machine to open a secret passage. The scene that plays shows young Alfred and Alexia ripping off the wings of a dragonfly, then placing it in a bowl full of ants that attack the helpless insect and devour it.

In both cases, the imagery is particularly strong, as it carries major symbolisms that relate to the characters involved.


The red jewel

When Thomas proposes to Edith, he offers her a ring with a red stone, which was his mother's. Later on, as Lucille is in the process of eliminating Edith, she can be seen wearing the ring herself.

Alexia in Code Veronica has a trademark jewel, which is a choker with a red stone attached to it. This stone is actually the key to solving one of the many puzzles in the mansion.

A lullaby

Lucille likes to play the piano and her favourite piece is a melancholic lullaby which she used to sing to Thomas when they were little.

An equally wistful lullaby is the theme that plays from Alfred and Alexia's music boxes, as well as from a mechanical piano in the main house. In Game of Oblivion of The Darkside Chronicles, which is a retelling of the Code Veronica story, Claire and Steve also see and hear Alfred singing the lullaby while impersonating Alexia.

An intimidating portrait

In the Allerdale Hall, the huge portrait of the late matriarch of the house, the mother of Lucille and Thomas, is hanging on a central wall. The angry and judging gaze in Lady Sharpe's eyes makes her look like she could come to life any moment.

Alexia's portrait is in the same way imposing itself in the main house of the Ashfords. In the painting, Alexia looks extremely tall and can be seen wearing her favourite purple dress.

The family story in pictures

One of the first things that Edith notices when she arrives at the Allerdale Hall is a mural depicting two young children playing. She is distracted before being able to realize what it is, but in fact the children are young Thomas and young Lucille.

In the office of the main house of the Ashfords, there is an antique music box which has to be operated so that the secret passage leading to the hidden manor will be revealed. In Game of Oblivion, this part is a bit more complex, with Alfred challenging Claire and Steve to solve a riddle that says "the boy and the girl, destined to be one, will reveal the path". This riddle is connected to the music box which features a mini game where Claire and Steve have to shoot several obstacles, allowing a boy and a girl to meet each other. Of course the boy and the girl depict Alfred and Alexia.

Additionally, again in Game of Oblivion, Alfred can be seen holding a snow globe featuring a snowy scenery with two blonde children, who also symbolize himself and his sister.

Dolls and their symbolism

Thomas Sharpe has a hobby: he creates dolls and he is actually quite talented. Dolls in his case symbolize his lost childhood; he keeps creating them in a subconscious attempt to go back to the innocence of those years, that he was not allowed to have.

Alfred's mansion is full of dolls; some are in a good state and some look creepy as hell. For Alfred, dolls symbolize his attachment to the past and his emotional state which is still that of an immature child that refuses to grow up, although he is in his late 20ties.

Haunted corridors

The family home of the Sharpes is the residence of the souls of all the victims of Lucille and Thomas. Edith, who has the ability to see ghosts, bumps onto them several times while wandering in the mansion's corridors at night.

The whole Ashford residence is inhabited by zombies and monsters, which are lurking around every corner and, unlike the tormented ghosts in the Allerdale Hall who in reality want to alert and warn Edith, these ones here are extremely hostile and bloodthirsty.

Ghosts of the past

Among the ghosts that Edith sees in the mansion's corridors, the most terrifying one is that of Lady Sharpe, the mother of the siblings, whom Lucille murdered with an axe when she found out about the incestuous relationship of her children. Lady Sharpe keeps wandering around the house, as her soul is unable to find rest.

Alfred had trapped his father, Alexander, and started testing on him a virus that was created by Alexia. As a result, Alexander eventually mutated and became the horrifying Nosferatu, who was kept locked in the basement of the Antarctica facility until the day when he managed to break free. This happened while Claire and Steve were still there, struggling to find a way out, and he went on to attack them.

A cruel murder

When Lucille finds out that Thomas is in love with Edith and that he is trying to help her escape, her jealousy and sick passion overwhelm her and she kills him.

In Game of Oblivion, Alfred wakes Alexia up from her slumber of 15 years, and she comes back as a vicious monster who attacks her brother and crushes him with her lethal tentacles.

It is notable that in the original story of Code Veronica this does not happen; instead, the awakened Alexia holds the body of her dying brother in her arms while planning her revenge.

There Is No (Christmas Season) Rest For The Weary (and The Wicked)

Some time ago I realized that a few of the most memorable adventures in the Resident Evil series take place during the Christmas season. I don't know if this is random or if it was a conscious choice from part of the scenario writers for some reason, but in any event it is a very interesting detail that deserves some exploring.

The events in Code Veronica happen three months after the Raccoon City incident which, as we know from both Resident Evil 2 and Nemesis, occured on the 28th of September 1998. This puts Claire Redfield in Rockford Island on around the 27th or 28th of December of the same year, that is in the heart of the Christmas holidays. The time of year doesn't seem to play a part in the story as it develops in the original Code Veronica game. In The Darkside Chronicles: Game of Oblivion, however, which is a retelling of the Code Veronica story, there is one reference in the opening scene of the scenario: we see Alfred holding a snow globe with a scenery showing two little children playing in the snow.

The two children in the snow globe depict little Alfred and Alexia

This scene, albeit brief, is particularly strong as it demonstrates Alfred's growing insanity, partly due to the seclusion he's been subject to on the isolated island. It is Christmas season, yet nothing around him is festive, and the only happy scene he sees is the one in the snow globe, which represents his obsession with the past and his denial to see things as they are. Deep inside, he never grew up and he prefers to view both himself and Alexia as little kids, going back to a time where they were supposedly careless and happy.

The snow globe is the last thing that he holds in his hand before he dies, in a version of the story that strays off the original scenario of Code Veronica.

Alfred holds the snow ball in his hand while Alexia is killing him

In the Game of Oblivion version, Alexia, after waking up from her long slumber, mutates thanks to the Veronica virus and, before going after Claire and Steve, she attacks her brother, who is already heavily wounded after falling off a long drop during the fight with Claire and Steve, and kills him. As he dies, the snow globe drops from his hand and shatters on the floor.

The broken snow globe symbolizes not only Alfred's death but also the shattering of his delusions

For Claire and Steve, this is no Christmas season either, as they find themselves on the eery grounds of the prison, where soon they are surrounded by zombies.

The cold air and, later on, the snow are the only elements that hint at the time of year

Neither of them has a mind for anything festive; Claire is desperately searching for her brother, and Steve was imprisoned together with his father who, as we find out later, turns into a zombie and Steve is forced to kill him to save Claire. Christmas is the last thing they could possibly think of, as their main concern is to survive. However the fact that all this happens during the Christmas days, intensifies the tragic essence of the story: Claire and Steve are two innocent young people who, at this time of year, should have been in a nice place, having a good time with friends and family, yet they are trapped in a nightmare. Same goes for Chris, who comes to Claire's rescue and finally reunites with her in Antarctica, in the Umbrella facility there.

The cold setting of the North is the opposite side of the Christmas season. We usually identify Christmas with snow, but this identification has only positive connotations. Antarctica in Code Veronica is an unfriendly and deserted snowy place where danger and death lurk around every corner.

The Antarctica facility is not exactly the snowy place you'd choose for a Christmas vacation

Fourteen years later, and specifically on the 24th of December 2012, Chris Redfield had the most traumatic experience of his army life. In Resident Evil 6, while in China with memoy lapses, he has a flashback and recalls the tragic events of his mission in Edonia. The (imaginary) eastern European city is covered in snow as Chris arrives there with his team; there are no civilians anywhere, and although it is Christmas eve, not even a hint of festive element can be seen in the streets or behind the house windows of the war torn Edonia.

Christmas time here would have been idyllic in other conditions

Later on, as they enter the City Hall, the whole place is full of dead people trapped in coccoons. The only other living human being they encounter is Carla Radames, who apparently had been hiding in the building all this time. If Chris and his soldiers have to forget about the Christmas season because the duty calls them, Carla obviously doesn't even care for it.

There is nothing festive about the lights and candles in the City Hall

The disastrous end of the mission leaves Chris devastated, making this yet one more Christmas season in his life that will be unforgettable for all the wrong reasons: Carla reveals her true intents and attacks his soldiers with a lethal ball that throws infected needles on them, instantly killing them and turning them into monsters.

Carla's perception of Christmas ornaments is rather extravagant

On the same evening, somewhere in the snow-covered mountains of Edonia, Jake and Sherry struggle to make their way to a shelter, while running away from bloodthirsty mutated soldiers. The scenery around them looks naturally christmassy in the cold night with all the imposing cypresses, but in fact it is not friendly at all, and the snow can easily become a lethal trap for the two heroes.

The cypresses remind Jake and Sherry that it's Christmas eve

After a long chase that involves snowmobiles and an avalanche, Jake and Sherry end up in a cave which could have been a wonderful setting for a romantic Christmas day. What awaits for them in there, however, is anything but. Ustanak, Jake's relentless stalker, is guarding the place and although he gets defeated at some point, he eventually comes back to life, leading them directly to Carla's hands.

Jake is the perfect gift for power-hungry Carla

This happens on the 25th of December, but neither Carla nor Jake or Sherry have the time or mood to realize it's actually Christmas day. Maybe Carla did a little bit at that point, since her biggest desire was to capture Jake and use his antibody, and she actually managed it, achieving a rather illusive and very temporary victory.

Resident Evil: Code Veronica as a Bildungsroman

Although Claire Redfield made her first appearance in Resident Evil 2 and was already popular, it was not until Resident Evil: Code Veronica that her character gained more substance and depth, setting the ground for further development of her personality. This was also aided by the progress on the technical and graphical field, which favoured the realistic design of movements and expressions, as well as the creation of the necessary atmosphere thanks to the better environments and visual effects. 

 

These were the ideal conditions for Claire to live one of the most fascinating and unforgettable adventures in gaming history. Code Veronica takes place shortly after the events of Resident Evil 2. Claire had been to Raccoon City looking for her brother Chris, and as soon as she arrived there she found the whole area inhabited by zombies. While struggling to make it out of the nightmare alive, she met Leon Kennedy, who was a rookie then, and later little Sherry Birkin. By the end of the game, Claire left Leon and Sherry and continued her quest for Chris.

Putting several puzzle pieces together, she arrived in Paris and infiltrated the local Umbrella headquarters. Her presence is noticed soon, and she gets arrested and sent in a solitary prison, on the Rockfort Island, somewhere in the Northern Atlantic. Upon waking up in her cell, she realizes that nearly all the humans on the island (prisoners and guards) have become zombies. This is quite familiar to her, however she soon finds out that she hasn't seen anything yet.

Code Veronica has more common elements with the very first Resident Evil, but goes one step further, adding in its cast enemies with deranged psyche who are unable to explain or rationalize their obsessions. If Albert Wesker in the first Resident Evil was a conceited power-hungry man with a twisted Messiah syndrome and William Birkin in Resident Evil 2 was a deluded scientist who became the victim of his own research, Alfred Ashford in Code Veronica is a half-crazy obsessive officer who lives with the ghost of his beloved dead sister and goes to such extremes as to impersonate her from time to time. So Claire has to face a rather complicated enemy, who may not be famous for his intelligence but has such an unstable and perplexed character that he can become dangerous before you can blink an eye.

Throughout her development in the game, Claire carries the characteristics of a Bildungsroman heroine. A Bildungsroman, aka a 'coming-of-age story', is a a literary genre that focuses on the psychological and moral growth of the protagonist from youth to adulthood in which character change is extremely important. Its basic characteristics are the following:

• A search for meaning for the young hero
• An inciting incident puts the young hero into the journey
• The journey won't be an easy one
• There is an epiphany that changes everything
• The young hero finds his/her place into society.

Claire, who is 19 years old at the time of the Code Veronica events, has a warm and loving relationship with her brother, and the two are very close. She is proud of him and he has taught her several combat moves and how to use weapons. However her essential role in life starts as soon as she is urged to go looking for him after he disappears. Chris's disappearance is the inciting incident that marks the beginning of Claire's journey.

It is notable that said journey is both literal and metaphorical. It is literal because she is actually travelling to France but it is mainly metaphorical as she is transported to a different world, where fear and horror dominate, a world where she will have to battle all sorts of obstacles and face insane enemies in order to make it through.

Claire's coming-of-age journey is far from being easy. Alfred Ashford, who is the prison supervisor on the island, sees her as an enemy from the start and is determined to make her suffer and eventually kill her. Luckily for Claire, however, he is quite timid and cowardish, which keeps him hidden in the shadows and he resorts to setting traps in his attempts to discourage her. The several zombies that emerge from all sides are his unintentional allies. However Claire is not alone in this nightmarish journey. Early on in the game, she meets Steve Burnside, a young boy who was a prisoner as well, but for some reason wasn't affected by the biohazard attack and is still human. Steve becomes her ally and friend and it's not long before he falls in love with her (the Redfields are irresistible); and although the main concern of them both is to escape, later Steve's feelings will be responsible for their adventure taking a rather fatal turn later on.

After passing through Alfred's painful trials, they manage to get on a plane and leave the island. However the plane crashes and they find themselves in another Umbrella facility somewhere in Antarctica. There, among frozen rooms, poisonous moths and zombies coming to life, they struggle to find a way to escape once again. Eventually they come up with a plan, which involves operating a crane carrying a mining drill which will break open a wall of ice, creating an exit. While at it, Steve is distracted gazing at Claire, the mining drill gets momentarily out of control and crashes on a pipe, breaking it in half and releasing toxic gas in the room. As a result of this complication, Claire and Steve's escape gets postponed for a short time, during which however not only Alfred is able to catch up with them and they are forced to fight with him face to face, but moreover Alexia awakens from her slumber and attacks them, trapping them in the facility.

Meanwhile Chris arrives at Rockfort Island looking for Claire and finds the prison grounds almost completely destroyed. Chris has his fair share of the Bildungsroman hero in his part, although his story is not a coming-of-age one. Chris is already an experienced officer and is totally conscious and aware of the situations he is called to face. But as far as he is concerned, he witnesses a revelation when he discovers that Wesker, his former captain in S.T.A.R.S., is the evil mastermind behind the destruction of the Rockfort Island and the events that followed as inevitable consequences.

Eventually he flies to Antarctica where he finds Claire trapped in a coccoon inside a construction which looks like a replica of the Spencer Mansion. Chris frees Claire like a proper knight would do, and the two siblings finally reunite. Still, their problems are not over; now they have to face Alexia and they also need to locate Steve.

Claire goes searching for him and when she finds him, it's the last thing she wanted to witness. Alexia has injected Steve with the Veronica virus and now he is infected, which causes him to mutate and attack Claire against his will. This is the epiphany in Claire's story: her former friend becomes an enemy who wants to kill her, but because his love for her is very strong, he manages to control himself and refuses to do it at just the last minute. This causes Alexia's rage, and she hits him lethally. Steve manages to express his feelings to Claire just before he dies.

Considering Claire's later life choices, we can safely say that the events in Rockfort Island and Antarctica formed her personality, boosted up her perception and awareness and were significantly responsible for her decision to enroll in Terra Save, the organization that offered help and support to victims of bioterrorism. Thus Claire found both a meaning and her place in society, completing her role as a Bildungsroman heroine.

But it's not only in the major points that Claire's story has the features of a Bildungsoman. Several of Claire's in-game decisions and actions may affect the way things turn out both for her and her co-protagonists.

At the start of the story, while she is in her cell, her guard Rodrigo is seriously wounded and is losing blood. This is a minor plot point which the player can either ignore or take into account. While looking for clues in Alfred's Training Facility, Claire finds a bottle of hemostatic. It's up to her (and the player) to decide whether or not she is willing to take a detour at that point and go back to Rodrigo to give him the hemostatic. If she does go back, Rodrigo will use the hemostatic and he will be cured, and to show her his gratitude, he will give her his lockpick - an item which is not necessary for the completion of the game, but which opens several briefcases and lockers that contain very useful items. Claire then will give him her lighter, as a thank-you gift. When Chris arrives on the island, he will meet Rodrigo, but soon after the poor guy will be attacked by the Gulp Worm, Alfred's mutated pet. There is no cure for Rodrigo this time, but before he dies he will give Chris the lighter that Claire had offered him. With the lighter in his inventory, Chris will gain access to a couple of very rewarding spots.

If however Claire decides to not go back to Rodrigo with the hemostatic, the man will die, she will never get the lockpick and thus Chris won't be able to receive the lighter, automatically losing his chance to fill his inventory with extra guns and ammo.

Another example of the bildungsromanesque character of secondary events is the boss fight with Nosferatru in Antarctica. Nosferatu, who is in fact the mutated father of Alfred and Alexia, is not a tough boss, but he is very toxic (literally) and if Claire doesn't kill him quickly, he may be able to poison her. His poison is not like the standard one from the spiders and moths, so, unlike that one, it can't be cured with a blue/green herb mix. If Nosferatu succeeds in poisoning Claire, when Chris arrives in Antarctica and frees his sister from the cocoon trap, she won't be able to go on and the game won't progress unless he goes back to the Armory room and finds the Serum that is needed for her to be cured.

Most Bildungsroman stories have a happy ending; even if there is loss and death connected to it. Reaching the conclusion, the young hero/heroine has learned a life lesson and has become mature enough and ready to follow his/her own path. Code Veronica has a generally good finale, with Chris and Claire flying away from Antarctica towards freedom. Both of them, however, have a thorn in their side. Chris, after his confrontation wih Wesker minutes before, knows that his former chief will be his sworn enemy from now on and that he won't give up until he manages to realise his evil plans. And as for Claire, she won't be able to forget Steve so easily; the life lesson she learned was a tough one and affected her completely, leaving several marks on her, both physical and emotional.

The Notion of Duality in Resident Evil: Code Veronica

From the protagonists to puzzle elements, almost everything in Resident Evil: Code Veronica seems to work in pairs. This duality is very prominent in the game, and it stands out in a great variety of forms.

The story itself revolves around two pairs of siblings: Chris and Claire Redfield versus Alfred and Alexia Ashford. Chris and Claire represent all the good and healthy elements: deep and touching love between brother and sister, solid family bonds, pure and gentle characters, good and brave heart; while Alfred and Alexia are all the opposite: unhealthy obsessions, corrupted - practically non-existent - family, insane and  degenerate characters, dark and evil heart.

Chris and Claire are "made in Heaven", while Alfred and Alexia are made in Hell

The game is split in two parts, where the good characters meet the bad characters crosswise: in the first part, the leading character is Claire, while Alfred is the villain who chases her and places obstacles in her every step. In the second part, the protagonist is Chris and the role of the villain passes over to Alexia.

Claire constantly hides from Alfred's attacks, while Chris has to fight twice against Alexia's most grotesque mutations

Alfred himself seems to suffer from a form of split personality disorder; being obsessed with Alexia, whom he considers dead, sometimes he likes to slip in her clothes and pretend to be her. In this case, the duality is expressed within the same element  - more specific, within the same character.
 

Alfred as himslef (left) and showing off his "Alexia" persona (right)

When Chris arrives in Antarctica, he finally finds Claire at the back of the main hall in the mansion there, where she had passed out, trapped inside a coccoon, and he is the one to rescue her and sort of bring her back to life. A bit earlier, Alexia had woken up from her slumber, after fifteen years of hibernation, as a result of Alfred's actions.

Chris frees Claire from the coccoon, while a dying Alfred tries to reach Alexia as she's waking up

When it comes to puzzles and puzzle elements, there are several instances of duality present in the game.

Quite early in the story, as Claire tries to make her way out of the zombie-infested prison grounds at the Rockfort Island, she comes across a huge door that needs a special item to open. This special item is later found in the Security Room near the prison barracks; it is a metallic Hawk Emblem. She can't just carry it along and bring it to the door, however: the room where she finds it is highly secured and prevents her from leaving while holding anything metallic on her. She has to use a 3D printer and make an alloy duplicate of it, using a special material that can pass undetected from security scanners.

The Special Alloy Emblem (right) is the perfect "master key" that tricks the security scanners

After going through that gate, she gains access to the Ashford mansion, which is in fact the headquarters from where Alfred used to command the prison before the biohazard attack that turned all of its inhabitants into zombies.

The mansion is a luxurious but rather eery house that looks like it's stuck to past decades, full of locked rooms and creepy secrets - not to mention its residents, that are not exactly human.

One of the first things that Claire has to do there is to find a steering wheel which is well hidden inside the secret compartment of a small military museum at the back of the house. In that same secret place, there is a pair of golden Lugers in a panel on the wall. Claire needs those guns as they have to be placed on an identical panel somewhere else, to open a secret passage.

The panel on the door indicates where to look for the items that will open the secret entrance

However, removing the Lugers from their original place results in her getting locked in the secret department while deadly toxic gas fills the room. At that point in the game, there seems to be no way to get the guns and leave the room alive.

Minutes later, though, as Claire is about to exit the mansion, she hears screams of agony coming from that room, so she runs back there. Steve, the young man she met a bit earlier in the prison yard, obviously got in that room after she left, took the Lugers from the wall panel and got trapped in the deadly secret department. Claire manages to open the locked door by solving a puzzle on a panel outside, but Steve, who runs out with the Lugers in his hands, refuses to hand them over to her; he got extremely impressed by them and wants to keep them for himself.

Later on, Claire finds a pair of Sub-Machine guns in another area. Her agile mind quickly sets up a plan, and next time she sees Steve, she offers them to him, in exchange for the golden Lugers. Since the Lugers have no bullets while the Sub-Machine guns do, Steve happily accepts the switch.

The Sub-Machine guns (left) are exchanged with the golden Lugers that open a secret passage

While still in the mansion, Claire has to solve a series of puzzles so as to find two items that are necessary for the progress of the game and her being able to get out of there. In the locked Gallery, she finds the Queen Ant object in a vase - it's a red jewel shaped like an ant - while in the similarly locked Poker room she finds the King Ant object - a blue jewel shaped like an ant - in a slot machine.

The two Ant objects represent Alfred and Alexia Ashford

In the second part of the game, where Chris takes over the action and gets to Antarctica while looking for Claire, he has to find a blue jewel and a red jewel to solve a similar puzzle.

The jewels that Chris finds in Antarctica are in fact the eyes of a tiger statue

Once Claire manages to get through that locked door that opens with placing the Lugers on its panel, she enters a small study that conceals another hidden path behind an antique music box. This path leads to the secluded residence of the Ashfords, a palace of sorts that is even creepier than the main mansion, with bats flying around, zombies and monsters strolling around its corridors and rooms, creepy dolls hanging from the ceiling and what not.

The upper floor of the palace hosts two bedrooms (obviously the rooms of Alfred and Alexia). The rooms are almost identical in their setting and architecture, with just a few decorative details making a difference.

The bedrooms of Alfred an Alexia are twins, just like their owners

Equally, Chris in Antarctica gets to explore another mansion, which seems to be a replica of the Ashford villa, that hosts, among other rooms, two identical bedrooms.

The Antarcica bedrooms are twins and are also twins of the twin bedrooms in Rockfort Island

The two rooms in Rockfort Island are parts of a puzzle that Claire has to solve so as to first find an important item and, eventually, open yet one more secret room. She has to use the two music boxes that are located in the two bedrooms and make them work, one at a time, by placing the correct Ant object in the receptacle on each one's lid - although there are certain things that she has to do in between.

The ant jewels fit perfectly on the lids of the music boxes

While in Antarctica, Chris has to solve a similar puzzle, this time placing each one of the jewels, that he found previously, on the correct music box, so as to make each one work.

By placing the blue and red jewels on the respective music box, the lids open

Once you finalize the music box puzzles in Rockfort Island (with Claire) and in Antarctica (with Chris), a secret ladder is revealed above the beds in each room.

The Ashfords seem to have a thing for hidden entrances and passages, especially above beds

When Claire climbs up her ladder to the hidden attic, she finds a Silver Dragonfly jewel sitting on a chair. Chris, in the attic that he discovers in his story, finds a Dragonfly object in a pot.

Both the Silver Dragonfly (left) and the Dragonfly object (right) are more than just jewels

Claire has to detatch the wings of the Silver Dragonfly, while the remaining part of the jewel (its body) is revealed to be a key which opens yet one more secret attic above the one she is in. Chris, on the other hand, has to attach four wing objects on his Dragonfly to create the Golden Dragonfly, which is the key that opens a crucial exit.

Placed in the concealed keyhole, the Dragonfly object reveals the hidden room for Claire (left), while the Golden Dragonfly opens an exit for Chis (right)

To access the second secret attic, Claire has to climb a ladder which is located in the centerpiece of a carousel. In Antarctica, Chris comes across another carousel, just outside the Ashford mansion replica, where he promptly finds two of the missing wings for the Dragonfly object.

The Rockford carousel leads to the secret attic, while the Antarctica one holds two important items

In the Diorama Room of the Rockfort Island's Training Facility, there is a picture on the wall, which shows that same room as it should look after all its puzzles are solved. It is as if the actual room (more precisely, a version of it) is mirrored in the framed picture on the wall.

The picture on the wall is like a revealing mirror of the actual room

On one of the walls of the room is a painting depicting a man, while the wall opposite it holds an emblem. However there is a rectangular shadow on that same wall, implying that something else has to be placed there, and more specifically another painting of the same dimensions as the other one. Claire finds this missing painting somewhere else in the Facility, and it is one that shows a skeleton which has the same pose as the man in the first painting and also wears a similar hat.

The skeleton version of the painting seems to be a reminder of the futility of human existence

Each one of the paintings seems to be a mirror of the other, each showing a side that the other is hiding. Only when they are placed facing each other, the next part of the puzzle unlocks, revealing a hidden compartment of the room which hosts a model of the Training Facility.

When you hang the skeleton painting on its place (right), the room becomes more like its mirror picture on the wall

In one of the yards of the Training Facility, there is a huge tank which, in Chris's part, when moved slightly out of place, reveals a hidden trapdoor that leads to the basement. A bit later, Chris finds a tank object on a lone balcony, above a storage room.

The actual tank and the tank object are used in similar ways

Chris then has to take the tank to the save room with the Training Facility model and place it in its receptacle there. Doing so, reveals a hidden panel on the wall opposite, behind the framed picture that depicts the actual room. After placing the correct set of objects on that panel, the model of the Training Facility is drawn back, revealing a secret trapdoor, just below the spot where Chris placed the tank object previously, more or less a place similar to the one where the trapdoor outside was revealed, under the actual tank.

The trapdoor below the model is at the same place as the trapdoor outside

Claire and Chris as a pair, but also each one of them through their stories, have a third axis that somehow affects their actions and, to a certain extent, their lives. For Claire it is Steve Burnside, the boy she escaped with from Rockfort Island, while for Chris it is Albert Wesker, his ex-captain and eternal enemy. Steve is on the good side, but jumps to the evil realm at the end, albeit against his own will; Wesker is always on the bad side, and always totally aware and conscious of it.

Claire brings the best out of Steve even when he is irreversibly mutated, while Chris brings the worst out of Wesker even in the good days

Via Chris and Claire, Steve and Wesker's paths sort of cross: after Alexia killed mutated Steve, Wesker took his body so as to examine the Veronica virus it carried. Although there is no other obvious relation between the two characters, their individual connections with Claire and Chris and the way their decisions influenced the progress of the story for the Redfields, kind of set them on a similar level.

Moreso, since both showed a most evil side at the end; although only Steve mutated physically, he was the one who managed to maintain his humanity deep inside, while Wesker, who never changed on the outside, was the one who was truly the 'monster' all along.