The History of Resident Evil Village's Thomas The Tank Engine Mod
To say Resident Evil Village's Lady Dimitrescu is popular in the wider gaming community is a huge understatement. Using Dimitrescu in this way has apparently paid off for Capcom, as Resident Evil Village currently boasts some incredible sales figures. However, whenever an imposing video game antagonist appears, a mod follows quickly behind to morph them into something ridiculous.
Despite a relatively recent release, Resident Evil Village is already a popular game on leading mod websites, boasting over 63 thousand downloads on Nexus Mods in just 4 days of release. The scope of these mods vary wildly, ranging from accessibility edits to adding fan favorite characters like Albert Wesker and Ada Wong into the game. For context, on the same mod website, Resident Evil 7 only has 21 thousand total mod downloads after 4 years.
By far and away the most iconic addition through mods, however, is a time honored tradition in modding. Players can finally face off against the fearsome "Countess Theodara": a horrific melding of Lady Dimitrescu with Thomas The Tank Engine. This is not Thomas' triple-A game debut, as modders have been adding the "really useful" locomotive to high profile games since 2013.
There is something that surpasses even the weirdest uncanny valley moments about mapping a grinning anthropomorphic train onto the face of the usually regal Dimitrescu. While some gaming experiences are more subtle with horror, like the Lovecraftian influence in The Elder Scrolls, the non-Euclidean nightmare of a rictus-grin Thomas on a huge vampire lady body is immediately unnerving. Uploaded by Nexus Mods user Crazy Potato, the mod even allows players to customize the color of the Dimitrescu's really useful helmet. The train is available in a shade that blends into Dimitrescu's usual colors or sticks with the traditional deep blue. Either one is equally upsetting.
Interestingly, this is not Thomas' first appearance in the Resident Evil game, nor is it the only weird mod for Resident Evil Village. One particularly haunting example is a mod that turns Ethan's baby into Chris Redfield. Mods for both 2019's Resident Evil 2 and 2020's Resident Evil 3 remakes feature Thomas the Tank Engine replacing iconic antagonists. Interestingly, the Resident Evil Village mod is the only one to keep the villain's character model mostly intact, which could be partly due to the massively positive reception of Dimitrescu's design. Some users actually report that in the Resident Evil 3 mod, Nemesis' head still sometimes remains on Thomas' body, which is a different but equally terrifying creature as "Countess Theodora."
Thomas' illustrious video game cameo career really began gaining traction nearly a decade ago. The "Really Useful Dragons" mod for Skyrim launched on Nexus Mods and the Steam Workshop in December 2013. Mod author TrainWiz's creation swaps all dragon models and roars with Thomas and Friends (alongside some truly chilling train whistles). The mod sits at over 69,900 downloads on Nexus, an impressive number for a train meme mod. Really Useful Dragons' initial popularity stemmed from a breakout YouTube video featuring Thomas' destructive wrath, one that accrued over 2.5 million views. The video features Skyrim's iconic execution scene with a rather unusual interruption.
The mod radically shifts the tone of The Elder Scrolls 5. Rather than battling imposing forces of nature bent to an evil will, the draconic fights of Skyrim now feels more like a general strike in Sodor than anything else. Thomas' reception in Skyrim was undeniably positive among certain fans. Many Elder Scrolls modders, however, felt that the project made light of modding as a creation tool. It is not hard to see why. When mods like The Forgotten City exist, which win national writer's guild awards and become standalone games with governmental funding, silly mods like Really Useful Dragons could seem somewhat trivial.
Despite these concerns of silliness, Thomas the Tank Engine appeared in many more games after Skyrim. He became a sword in Monster Hunter World, a vehicle in Cyberpunk 2077, a boss in Minecraft Dungeons, and a Multi-Troop Transport in Star Wars: Battlefront 2. Less than two weeks after its PC release, Kingdom Hearts 3 was also visited by the jolly blue train, as a mod replaced the tram in Twilight Town with Thomas. This incarnation was particularly haunting, with glowing eyes that seem to follow players around as they move. Skyrim is not the only game to see huge reptilians turned into cartoon trains: the iconic snake in Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice also received the train treatment.
Crazy Potato's mod has enraptured certain Resident Evil fans, but if the history of Thomas the Tank Engine mods are remembered the train's corporate owners may not be as enthusiastic. Kevin Brock (AKA TrainWiz), the original creator of the Skyrim mod, was hounded by Mattel's lawyers due to his use of the copyrighted carriage. Nonetheless, the history of these types of mods is quite long.
Resident Evil Village is available now for PC, PS4, PS5, Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Reviewed by Unknown
on
May 17, 2021
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