Is Mariah Carey in Resident Evil 3?

An eagled-eyed Resi fan and Lamb managed to discover something during a playthrough video of Resident Evil 3, and it’s none other than what appears to be Mariah Carey.

Tell me that’s not @MariahCarey having a cameo in Resident Evil helpppp pic.twitter.com/rgyDgTBHVx

— Andrew (@AndySmith48) January 7, 2022

Resident Evil 3: Nemesis is high on my list of Resident Evil games. I played the shit out of it, and know the plot well. I would also consider myself somewhat of a lamb, so I couldn’t help but see the parallels between Jill’s dire situation and that of Mariah’s at a point in time.

Jill (Mariah Carey) is in the thick of a zombie outbreak by herself, and at some point she’s going to need a friend, and find one in Carlos (Luis Miguel), as she's chased down by Umbrella B.O.W Nemesis (Tommy Mottola) whilst she attempts to flee Raccoon City (Columbia records).

It tracks. A lamb had to have worked on Resident Evil 3: Nemesis.

For real though. Game designers are known to throw small seemingly insignificant references to things they are fans of in their games. Hideo Kojima did it most famously with his Metal Gear Solid series; which was a melting pot of things he was a fan of. But sometimes level designers and asset creators will throw in personal Easter eggs in games too, and it seems somebody on the Resident Evil 3: Nemesis team was a Mariah Carey fan. It’s not a stretch, given that Mariah Carey was big in Japan during the 90s, having sold out the Tokyo Dome, a concert which is still regarded as a defining moment in her career amongst the lambily. But throwing a cover for a Mariah single into a game was risky. Maybe because of how low the resolution of the backgrounds were, the person figured that nobody would be able to ever notice that the poster was of Mariah Carey. After all, which games company and developer in the 90s was thinking ‘Well, maybe in 15 years time this game will be re-released and upscaled in HD’. But of course, that’s what’s happened, and as a result, somebody noticed.

This is not the first time that the Resident Evil series has snuck in references to pop stars. Claire Redfield's jacket in Resident Evil 2 features the words ‘Made in Heaven’, with her jacket in Resident Evil: Code Veronica outfit featuring the words ‘Let Me Live’, which are both the titles of Queen songs from their final album with Freddie Mercury, Made in Heaven.

It'd be great if whoever was on the Resident Evil 3 team could confirm that they are part of the lambily and di indeed sneak Mariah Carey into the game. I imagine the implications of confirming this would be pretty huge though, and Mariah’s lawyers would have a case to demand money for using her likeness and / or an image of her in their game. So if you are the lamb at Capcom and you want to slide into my DM’s, I’mma keep the Mariah confirmation on the low.

💿 Mariah album reviews: Caution | Me. I Am Mariah... | Merry Christmas II You | Memoirs of an Imperfect Angel | E=MC² | Charmbracelet | Glitter | Rainbow | Merry Christmas
🦋 Mariah playlists: A Gospel Moment | Featuring...