Resident Evil 3 Remake - Inferno - No Damage/No Shop Items Playthrough

This is my Inferno playthrough of Resident Evil 3 Remake, without taking damage and without using any shop items. It is the most challenging mode of the game, this time in its raw edition, as I am not making use of any perks that would make the gameplay slightly easier. Specifically, I am using the default inventory for Jill and Carlos, and I pick the other items as they normally appear in the game.

Inferno is several scales higher than Nightmare; not only are the enemies much tougher, but also the amount of bullets that you can pick up or craft is minimal. There are no automated checkpoints to aid you and several typewriters are absent, which means that you are required to go through whole areas without being able to manually save at all. My first Inferno run was with a few shop items included, but even then it was tough as Hell. After beating Nightmare without perks, however, I thought I'd also give raw Inferno a try.

In practice, it is not as bad as it may seem or sound, given of course that you should have already practiced enough with playing the game in Nightmare. I wouldn't say that Hardcore helps; the game is much different in Nightmare and Inferno, so if you want to beat Inferno, practicing with Nightmare seems to be the best choice. Even so, Inferno is a lot more difficult, and more so since you find less items scattered around, therefore you are called to think well and decide how (and if) to waste those valuable bullets. 

In Inferno, the game gives you one extra pouch and the Magnum as soon as the main game begins, at the Subway ticket office. Still, you have to use this very strong weapon wisely, as the amount of ammo that you can craft is extremely limited. In this run, I used the High Grade gunpowder to make ammo for the Magnum strictly, and the standard gunpowder to craft handgun bullets, as the ammo that you find for the Shotgun is more or less enough to last you during the demanding sequences.

This playthrough is not a playlist, as the game is relatively short and cutting it down breaks the action. The full video can be found at the end of this article, as always. Disclaimer: the following report reflects my own experience and the strategies that I found to work well according to my own play style.

Uptown: the intro of the game is rather easy and straightforward and the only thing that you really need to worry about is dodging the extra zombie that is standing by the gate beyond Jack's Bar (also appears in Nightmare), and then the elevator zombie at the parking garage. If they do not take you by surprise, you can easily evade them both; even simple dodges can work as long as you time them right.

Downtown: there is no typewriter in the Donut Shop, which makes things quite tight, and going back to the station to save is out of the question, as the back alley that leads there is still crawling with zombies, so everything before putting the fire out has to be done flawlessly, in one go. You have to keep in mind that in Inferno the 'no damage' rule is a prerequisite in order to make it safe, as the grand majority of attacks will either one-hit kill you or put you in Danger state, so losing no health is a must anyway when you play in this difficulty. After obtaining the Bolt Cutters and the Lockpick, I backtracked to get all those locked items from the shops, offices and alleys. The back alley near the station was by then zombie-free, by the way.

Power Substation: I usually kill most of the Drain Deimos, but Inferno is not a mode where you waste ammo, so I just ran along the paths killing only those that were truly a threat and dodging / running past all the others. It was much easier this way, but I was also a bit lucky this time.

Downtown again: when Nemesis smashes the wall outside the Substation and starts chasing you, is where the real fun begins. There are two extra zombies blocking your way just around the corner, and one more banging the door of the garage. Thankfully there is a typewriter there, to which I also return to save after setting the route in the Subway office. It means a bit of backtracking, but I don't mind that if I can save my ass.

Sewers: this section is not so difficult as it is annoying, what with the Gamma Hunters being so creepy and disgusting, and the bonus NE-α zombies that sometimes look like they have been killed but they may still be alive. During my initial playthroughs of the game, I could never for the life of me dodge the Gammas, but Inferno made me learn to do it as it was a matter of life or death (literally).

Demolition site: the first boss fight with Nemesis looks like a pain, but can be completed fairly quickly and safely as long as you don't let the boss flood the rooftop with flames and you keep it away from Jill. I kept my grenades especially for this fight, as Nemesis in this form can evade any other shot and cause you to both miss your target and waste a valuable bullet. I never bother stunning Nemesis with grenades during the Downtown section, because in Inferno (as well as in Nightmare) it will never go down with just one. This of course has a cost, as I miss the upgrades for the handgun and the extra ammo that the bonus cases provide, but those items are not that essential for the rest of the game.

Rocket Launcher Nemesis and Rolling Head sequence: this brief section I both hate and love. I hate the first part where you have to run like mad while evading the rockets that Nemesis fires at you, what with NE-α zombies getting in the way, but I love the rolling head sequence, which is probably my most favorite instance of the game (you can read my respective article here). The worst thing about this sequence is that you may get past both the rockets and the head only to get killed by the Nemesis while running to the back alley gate. Or, even worse, get past this whole part and return to the subway, then while playing with Carlos, get killed by the zombified Brad in the RPD courtyard.

RPD: a rather tedious sequence, mainly because you have to kill all the zombies in the West wing, and in Inferno their heads are made of cement. Not to mention that Carlos's default handgun is a useless peashooter. Even so, it is a relatively easy part, which however can end up pretty badly after you place the explosives. I always throw a flash grenade to stun the zombies beyond the exploded wall, but sometimes a palehead may get me as I burst out of the locker room door to the STARS corridor. Since there is no typewriter in the Dark Room, getting killed at that final point means having to repeat the whole section from the Main Hall.

Clock Tower Battle: one of the major fights of the game, which is quite frustrating because there are that many weapons you have to use in order to get done with it quickly. Jill needs half a century to reload that accursed Grenade Launcher, but thank God for the switch-weapon trick that is a life saver. Apart from that, and assuming you don't end up dessert, this fight is marginally entertaining, with the Nemesis performing parkour all around the Plaza for your viewing pleasure (not).

Hospital (Carlos): unlike in the lower difficulties, in Inferno there is only one typewriter in the hospital, and that's in the makeshift sickroom where Jill is, which translates in doing everything in one go, or backtracking every now and then to save there. I did the second, because you never know with those frigging Hunters. That said, I killed most of the zombies to keep the place clean for Jill, but didn't bother with the Hunters. Jill has a great advantage over Carlos: her dodge is much faster, more efficient and easier to perform, so I knew I could trust her with making it safe past those monsters. When I got to the ambush part, I had so little ammo to begin with, that I thought I wouldn't make it, but fortunately I did it almost first try.

Hospital (Jill): with almost everything cleaned up thanks to Carlos, I only had to worry about the Hunters with Jill. The first Hunter that you come across in the hall outside the Operating Room can be easily outsmarted with a simple trick: run in the hall to trigger it, then go back out the way you came, and it will go stand in front of the doors on the left. Then run (don't walk! You want the Hunter to hear you!) quickly to the small area beyond the glass doors on the right where the locker is, and the Hunter will run and stand in front of the Operating Room doors with its back to you. It will remain there as long as you walk in this area from that point and on, and will be no threat at all. As for the Hunters in the cassette room, I found it better to lure one of them outside, as this way it would be easier to dodge them separately if necessary, because I desperately needed that explosive powder.

Hospital underground: there is no typewriter in the office of the storage, but this doesn't cause any problems because the fuses sequence is so quick and so easy that it's no big deal replaying it if you mess up. There is almost nothing that can seriously trouble you, as long as you are careful and plan your moves anyway.

NEST Labs: here, however, the omission of the typewriter is a big deal, because of the Hunters that appear at the end of the section. The labs up to that point are quite easy to complete, but the Hunters are so fast and vicious, that you may end up heavily wounded or even dead before you know it. 

Acid Nemesis: I normally rely on grenade rounds for this battle, but this time I had very few of them, so I followed a different strategy which turned out to be a lot safer and much quicker. The Shotgun seems to deal a dramatic amount of damage on the Nemesis, especially when the boss is in flames, reducing the times it will escape to do its parkour routine around the room, therefore minimizing the number of the zombies you have to fight as a bonus. In this run, I managed to sync perfectly with Carlos, and he did his trick with the acid, considerably weakening the Nemesis before I finally defeated it for the time being.

Final Boss: the most dreaded part of the game, and one of the worst boss fights ever. The level of difficulty seems to shoot up in that battle, which becomes one of the biggest challenges in Inferno. The only way to evade the Nemesis is to perform Perfect Dodges flawlessly, but this in fact is the easy part. What makes this battle so difficult is that the Nemesis (obviously in a state of extreme hysteria) shows off a series of cheap attacks that can cost Jill's life because they make her unable to move. Additionally, it has one specific potentially lethal attack that consists of performing several vertical slams in a row, that you have to dodge perfectly, during which sequence it may stop briefly at either the 4th, 5th, 6th or 7th slam and you never know which is going to be every time, usually resulting in a badly timed dodge and subsequent instant death. The Inferno version of this battle comes straight out of the deepest depths of Hell, but it gives you such a great sense of accomplishment when you succeed in completing it.

As an overall impression, I find Inferno very challenging and exciting, but also hellish, like its name says, with the amount of difficulty in certain sequences getting a bit unnecessarily frustrating and tedious. Still, the way the game is setup in this mode, along with the lack of checkpoints and the limited saving places, instantly creates a feeling of old-school gaming, which fits perfectly with the vintage mood and cultish character of the remake.