Richard's Fate

[Helegad]

In RE1, when Richard is bitten by Yawn and Jill gets the serum, I was just wondering: was there really any point of Jill trying to save him? He was inevitably infected by the T-Virus, and I wonder why Capcom didn't reanimate him just like they did Forest in the Director's Cut... Has anybody else ever wondered about this?

[Gradon]

Jill/Chris got biy by the snake, they needed just the venom, so Joseph only needed the venom, havn't played the game for a while, but I think that he dies nevertheless/gets eaten by Snake, so basically, he dies, but if he didnt jump at the snake/stayed until Jill came by, he'd be fine.

[TheSelfishGene]

Spoiler:

show spoiler

Richard always dies
In the original providing the serum is futile
In the remake, if you give the serum, he saves Jill from Yawn
In the remake, if you give the serum, he saves Chris from Neptune

If you give him serum in the remake, you can take his assault shotgun once he dies

So, at least in the remake, that's why he didn't become a zombie

[Helegad]

Hmmm... okay, just wondering is all!

[Alzaire]

I got the impression that really, in the original, Richard died from the actual wounds of the snake bite more-so than the poison. But it really doesn't matter. What I find is a bit more interesting of a question, is what actually killed Forest. Evidence shows (talking original here) he was wounded pretty badly before he entered the balcony where the crows probably finished him off. But what got him before then? No sign of blood or anything until the little hallway leading to the balcony. Perhaps a zombie bit him up badly and he managed to kill it and it's body disappeared after he changed rooms into the balcony, hence why we don't see it! (the body disappearing bit is just a slight tip of the hat to the fact bodies disappear when you exit/enter rooms after killing em)

As to why he doesn't become a zombie in the original, there's plenty of possibilities. I doubt there's any real canonical explanation, but I imagine either a) the snake had an odd strain of the T-virus due to it's non-human infection mutated form and/or it's own poison perhaps interfered with the normal effects of the virus in a human, and hence Richard doesn't revive. or b) his body disappears much later on if you come back, I believe, so maybe he did reanimate and just roams the mansion and you never see him. To be honest, I'd have to suspect there were still plenty of enemies roaming around even if you "killed them all" in the playthrough of the game. Afterall, there were quite a few zombies and zombie dogs roaming the area outside the mansion prior (hence the murders). Not to mention I find it hard to believe members of the Bravo team managed to get around where they did without killing a few, especially since Enrico, Wesker, Barry/Rebecca, Richard, Forest, and Kenneth had been moving around a while before we got there. Unless you want to believe Bravo team had only minutes before entered the mansion before Alpha, and they split up with Kenneth going to the dining room and into the hallway of his death immediately and Forest also going straight to the balcony. So it's an interesting thought to realize there were still quite a few people running around the area, and while I'm sure they didn't have a ton of ammo, considering ammo is lying around in decent quantities (more as a gameplay necessity though), I'd find it unbelievable that they weren't fighting and killing quite a few enemies before their eventual deaths.

[Scream]

I got the impression that really, in the original, Richard died from the actual wounds of the snake bite more-so than the poison.

Yeah, a fair assumption considering his appearance. I always thought it was a waste of time retrieving the serum, especially the second time!

[Helegad]

The question I originally asked was: "why didn't he reanimate?"

Don't forget that.

Of course, Richard would have died of the massive trauma before the T-Virus took any effect, but we didn't see him turn into a zombie like Forest in DC.

@Scream: Retrieving the serum for him is optional really, don't forget.

[Gradon]

Well, I honestly think the Yawn carries just poison. He likes to feed and violate his victims.

[Alzaire]

The question I originally asked was: "why didn't he reanimate?"

Don't forget that.

Of course, Richard would have died of the massive trauma before the T-Virus took any effect, but we didn't see him turn into a zombie like Forest in DC.

@Scream: Retrieving the serum for him is optional really, don't forget.

I somewhat gave my answer to that in the second paragraph. There could be a few possibilities, although I really doubt there's a true concrete answer. Yawn's poison could be strong enough that it has some kind of effect on the T-virus. The virus managed to mutate the snake, but perhaps the poison interferes with the T-virus's effects when transfered to a human in a large quantity, and hence, someone bitten and killed by Yawn won't reanimate at all or severely slow down the revival to a timeframe where Richard would have reanimated, but we'd never see it.

There's also that possibility he does reanimate and we just never see it. As I said in my second paragraph above, consider the fact that there are more zombies and mutated animals around the mansion and moving around inside it that we'll never see or know about even if we "kill everything" during a playthrough. Not to mention the side-characters and Enricho are running around, probably killing a few monsters as well. I can't remember exactly, and I might be wrong, but if you return to the area where Richard died later on in the game (possibly after you return from the guardhouse), his corpse isn't there anymore, which could entertain the possibility he's up and roaming a bit and by the same coincidence we rarely run into the side-characters and Enricho, we just never run into his zombie form.

Also to add on to the paragraph above, there's no real set time for someone to revive. It could be minutes or hours, varying. Perhaps he would have reanimated at some point, but because we aren't really supposed to have a need to go back into the attic area, he just isn't programmed to do it on screen. We don't know for certain, i.e., how long Forest had been dead before we find him and he revives. Could have been an hour or more.

I really wish sometimes that we had a better timeline and idea of how Bravo team went down. RE Zero seems to indicate the probability that the team entered the mansion at different times and not together, which could lead to various possibilities, but just going by the original RE1, it's hard to say. Forest seems to have been dead for a decent amount of time before we get there, but Kenneth had been alive until right when we entered the main hall. Richard was also likely running around for some time and had probably encountered the snake only moments before we entered the area.

I love BH1 original.

[Helegad]

Doesn't the time it takes for a person to reanimate officially depend on their strength and health?

Also, I never noticed Richard was gone. I'll have to check next time.

Alzaire, I've never given that much thought to any game Are you particuarly bored?

[Project Omega]

Well, first look at the fact that the larger snake would obviously have larger venom glands and the normal injection of venom would increase with size. Vipers have hemotoxic venom which brings about coagulation of the blood and clotting of the pulmonary arteries. Since the huge dose of venom is circulating his body. The venom is destroying his blood cells and clogging up his arteries with the debris of dead blood cells littering the arteries. The constant contact with the vascular wall damages the wall and causes more clotting factors to try and repair the damage. Soon no blood can flow smoothly and any blood that does pump is not oxygenated well enough so hypoxia sets in. Either way, you die slow and painful without treatment. The serum helps, but it takes a while for it to work with Richard since so much venom is circulating his body.

He doesn't become a zombie because the T-Virus is slowed down tremendously by the coagulated blood.

[Nomad9026]

Or the developer just messed up as usual Anyway Omega's explanation sounds the most logic. It appearse that fans can always find a way to explane any developers mistake, and it does not sounds like mistake anymore.

[Helegad]

Yeah, I like your thinking Omega

(P.S: There someone goes again with the one-star topic rating. WTF? I've countered it with an Excellent rating.)

[BLSR1]

But it can be said that you dont know if he became a zombie while you were in the labs.

[Project Omega]

Well, if he did, then it'd be either in the belly of either Yawn or Neptune. That'd be funny if he ripped his way out of their dead carcasses. Although with the hyper-active digestive enzymes and acids eating him from the outside and the venom eating him from the inside, if he turned, then he'd be a pretty weakend zombie with little to know muscle strength since his muscles could not efficiently ridthemselves of metabolic waste products and with various vascular membranes clogged with congealed blood and dead cells, many of his extremities would rott off in moments given the epidermal necrotic nature of the infection.

In the scenario where he's not eaten. Then it's safe to assume that perhaps he does turn into a zombie later on, but I don't recall seeing a zombie skin for Richard when the ReMake discs were ripped and the files were converted.