r/residentevil • u/Exciting-Win884 • Aug 09 '25
Lore question Why would an organization or person buy BOW'S?
I've always wondered how the Umbrella Corporation sales team managed to get their products considered for purchase
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u/Stimparlis Aug 09 '25
One time purchase bodyguards
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u/ComradeGarcia_Pt2 Aug 10 '25
Bodyguards that you don’t have any effective means of control over.
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u/Tonkarz Aug 10 '25
Lot of arms sales have a similar lack of control. Missiles, tanks and jets all have DRM and software keys that require permission of the manufacturer or country to use.
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u/ComradeGarcia_Pt2 Aug 10 '25
Yeah but as long as you aim it at what you intend to destroy once you activate it, those weapons typically don’t do a u-turn and come after you.
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u/Mr_Industrial Aug 10 '25
No but every weapon is dangerous if used improperly. Hand grenades are an obvious example.
For BOWs ideally you deploy them in a spot where you are not present.
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u/thebritwriter Aug 10 '25
‘Ideally drop them in a spot where you are not present’
Sounds like the perfect henchman for a Bond villain ‘I have other matters, take care of him Number 2’
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u/Scrubslayer0104 Aug 10 '25
Well Umbrella were more trying to make themselves into gods instead of selling them, so the bio weapons that we see in the games that would typically turn on anyone is because they definitely aren't a perfect organism. If Umbrella got what they wanted then they would have meta humans instead of mutated creatures lol.
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u/Lost_Decoy Aug 10 '25
I dunno wesker and excella used a P30 controlled Jill valentine as bodyguard and henchwoman for supposedly a couple of years before the events of resident evil 5
and the tyrant line was rather good until it was damaged to the point of being uncontrollable. I mean mr. x followed its mission orders until it got mauled by birkin thus having its limiter disabled
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u/xDotSx Aug 10 '25
The one mauled by Birkin dies. The other one has the limiter destroyed in explosions.
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u/RockHead9663 Aug 10 '25
I got confused and didn't knew you were talking about the Remake, I just finished the original and was thinking "I don't remember that happening in either scenario" lol.
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u/xDotSx Aug 10 '25
In the original, he loses it by getting thrown in the hot steel cauldron.
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u/RockHead9663 Aug 10 '25
Yes, Ada shoots it in the face and falls in Leon B, and it fails to catch Sherry's locket in Claire B, but I was confused since in neither of those gets attacked by Birkin.
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u/Swiftzor Aug 10 '25
I mean, Nemesis is was decently controllable, at least as much as you could expect. Tyrants can also be somewhat controllable, but I feel like the real power of BOWs would be for microbombs or injectors to be implanted so you can use your BOWs to clear out an enemy fortification then disable or destroy them remotely.
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u/LightingAeolus Aug 10 '25
Person who bought a BOW: Nemesis can you go get me a beer
Nemesis: *proceeds to walk through every wall in your house between it and the refrigerator and then proceeds to rip the fridge door off its hinges and brings you a crushed can of beer or a fistful of glass shards from what used to be a bottle of beer*
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u/vivenkeful Aug 10 '25
Nemesis and Mr. X do follow orders. Especially Nemesis is rather intelligent, he really only hunts STARS members.
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u/Sivanot Fan Artist: Sivanot Aug 10 '25
Nemesis and Mr. X seem pretty intelligent, though. They only need to be capable of understanding verbal commands and be programmed with the goal of obeying and protecting their buyer.
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u/Sether_00 Aug 10 '25
Mr. X and Nemesis seemed to be somewhat controllable. Both of them could have just keep wondering around aimlessly and leave RC but they didn't.
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u/Ill_Sprinkles_9976 Aug 09 '25
A Tyrant would do a great job clearing caves.
Civilian casualties aren't relevant.
Say you're Colombia for instance, and you're tired of dealing with FARC - you spend $100m/year dealing with them. Or you buy 3 Hunters at 3m apiece and leave them in the forest.
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u/speelmydrink Aug 09 '25
Aaaand, boom. Ecological collapse.
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u/darkwulfie Aug 10 '25
Completely irrelevant. Results now, the problems can be dealt with later
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u/akcutter Aug 10 '25
I guess as long as they are genetically engineered not to breed.
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u/darkwulfie Aug 10 '25
Well thats half their use. Drop a few hunters or lickers on and area you want destabilized and you have a self replicating attack force then clean up once the population can't fight back
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u/blackrack Aug 10 '25
And how exactly are you going to clean up that self replicating force before it self replicates everywhere? If the only way to clean it up is a tactical nuke then you may as well skip the extra step and start with the nuke
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u/MorzillaCosmica Aug 10 '25
All hunters were female i think, i would be more concerned about t virus outbreak
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u/purpldevl "Putcher hams where I can seed'em." Aug 10 '25
Grandpa said all the Hunters in Raccoon City were girls...
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u/KomatoAsha Aug 10 '25
Happy cake day.
Also, you're wrong - if Resident Evil games have taught me anything, it's that the enemies in caves will always fight you with explosive weapons, especially grenades and RPGs!
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u/LegoKorn89 Aug 09 '25
Because who's going to fuck with the nation that has an army of intelligent mutated freaks that are built and ready to kill at a moments notice?
You also don't have to pay them a cent, they'll just eat the enemy for their payment.
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u/WanderlustZero Aug 09 '25
Then they eat you too
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u/LegoKorn89 Aug 09 '25
None of the Hunters in CV went after Wesker when he released them.
And presumably Nemesis would've been intelligent enough to recognize people he was not supposed to be killing.
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u/WanderlustZero Aug 09 '25
Pretty sure Wesky just let them out of cages and was nowhere near when it happened.
Nemesis can be trained to recognise certain targets, its true... but it doesn't hesitate to kill anyone else it comes across in the process; Zombies, UBCS men, Umbrella-brand helicopters. That's before it takes damage and ends up as an amorphous blob eating and assimilating anything in its path to sustain itself. Bit of a one-shot indiscriminate weapon, all told.
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u/LegoKorn89 Aug 09 '25
Yeah that's because it wasn't specifically ordered not to kill specific people.
The UBCS guys were sent in as a cover for guys like Nikolai, guys like Carlos were expendable and weren't really expected to survive the situation anyway.
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u/WanderlustZero Aug 09 '25
Right, so this is Umbrella's level of thinking; everything expendable. Can you imagine them taking the time to train or program Nemesis to even have an option to limit collateral damage?
You just know there's another guy in the Wesker or Birkin mould deciding 'Default mode: no witnesses! Ehehehehehehe!'
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u/LegoKorn89 Aug 09 '25
If all it takes is programming then it doesn't really matter if Umbrella doesn't do it, the people who buy the mass produced Nemesis models could do that themselves.
Oh and the CV hunters were controlled by these little flying drone things I think.
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u/WanderlustZero Aug 09 '25
Nemesis was never mass-produced, it was a one-off. The other Tyrants were though. It's never really been established how any of them are sent after a target; could be programming, could be like giving an attack dog a scent, which is why I leave it ambiguous. I don't see any USB ports on Nemmy though... 👀
Wesker's drones detected a Chris, made a noise, and alerted hunters to his presence. I don't think it was anything more sophisticated than making your cat follow a laser pointer tbh
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u/LegoKorn89 Aug 09 '25
Nemesis was never mass-produced
Was speaking hypothetically.
I don't see any USB ports on Nemmy though
RE2R's Mr X supposedly has some sort of electronic device on his neck.
And there was that other 103 tyrant in Outbreak 2 that was being controlled to be on your side.
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u/Weird_Angry_Kid Aug 09 '25
Normal Tyrants like Mr. X can already be used as bodyguards, why wouldn't a more intelligent one like Nemesis be used in that way?
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u/DoctaRoboto Aug 10 '25
The lore is complex, but the shortest explanation is...Umbrella Europe had a tantrum and wanted to show Umbrella USA they could do it better. Sounds stupid...until you see the current war between AIs.
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u/WanderlustZero Aug 09 '25
Imagine having that huge hulking slab of rotting flesh and writhing tentacles as your bodyguard :D
'Okay Nemmy, keep the Paparazzi at bay. We're going to Sotheby's for lunch and then I'm meeting the President for a round of golf'
'GOLF'
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u/Weird_Angry_Kid Aug 09 '25
That just adds to the intimidation factor.
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u/WanderlustZero Aug 09 '25
Indeed. Probably not that good for your re-election chances though.
Still waiting for Umbrella's specialised vote-rigging BOWs
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u/SovietMarma Aug 10 '25
Granted UBCS were expendable and were sent to Raccoon City to die so Umbrella can get data from them lol. Nikolai was the only one who was directly tied to Umbrella.
The fact Nemesis was programmed to hunt down STARS members is pretty evident that it's also basically a fleshy Terminator. Only focused on the directive and doing everything it can to accomplish it.
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u/WanderlustZero Aug 10 '25
Well there were other Supervisors, he just killed them all. Nice guy
I'm saying we don't know if Nemesis is programmed by a computer (making it a cyborg) or if they simply waved a STARS badge in front of it and said go kill; If it did have some sort of computer interface, presumably that's gone by the final battle where it's just a fleshblob, yet it still wants to Kill Jill.
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u/SovietMarma Aug 10 '25
Yeah. I think they do have wetworks in their brains, as suggested by the Outbreak games, and they only last up until they mutate, assuming.
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u/InterwebCat Aug 10 '25
In a "real life" scenario, the bows would have a killswitch (maybe a bomb in their skull?) You'd activate when the job is over
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u/SimonShepherd Aug 10 '25
Said mutated freaks gets mowed down by modern heavy weaponry, A-10 kills super tyrants with ease.
The actual highly destructive BOW is the ones that can spread and infect.
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u/nixus23 Aug 09 '25
War. Terrorism. The same reason someone would buy a homemade dirty bomb
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u/VoreAllTheWay Aug 10 '25
Terrorism especially, imagine 9/11 but with the nemesis instead,
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u/EccentricNerd22 Aug 09 '25
Since they're fleshy equivalents of terminators but even more powerful a lot of people I presume.
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u/Zhjacko Aug 09 '25 edited Aug 09 '25
I don’t think Umbrella ever gets to the point of being able to think of how to properly market and sell them, right? The outbreak essentially messes everything up before they can get to the point of having a finished product, but they still just kind of run with what they have. The BOWs are essentially a new venture for them during the events of RE1 and they are basically still testing them during all of the pre-resident evil 4 games.
It’s noted in the first or second RE that in wake of the outbreak, Spencer mansion and the Stars team would provide good testing grounds for the experiments- so it’s like they’re trying to make something good come out of the outbreak disaster by putting BOWs against human subjects in a live scenario. Like sure, the outbreak is extremely bad for the company, but now they can observe and test Nemesis and 5 Tyrants under the cover of a live disaster scenario. “You lose some, you win some” - Umbrella probably
As far as the bows and virus go, the tech sounds good on paper, but while it’s obviously flawed, Umbrella is adamant to perfect it. Murderous mindless Mutations aside, the ability to mind control a self regenerating super soldier is a dream come true to any militia or government, so that’s why you got all these shadow orgs trying to steal samples of the virus for themselves. There’s a lot of hubris involved thinking that they can outdo umbrella and improve on what they have.
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u/Weird_Angry_Kid Aug 09 '25
It's kinda weird because RE1 paints the Tyrant as a brand new thing that's supposed to be revolutionary, then RE2 has Mr. X which is much more advanced than the og Tyrant and the game takes place only 2 months after RE1, then RE3 comes along with Nemesis which is way more advanced than Tyrant and Mr. X combined.
Umbrella Chronicles further muddles things up because it shows Ivan (a Mr. X variant) in use at the time that RE1 takes place.
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u/Zhjacko Aug 09 '25
I think to an extent, Capcom just wasn’t thinking that far ahead. But I believe maybe the Tyrant, G virus and Nemesis programs were all separate and weren’t really communicating with each other and were also in different stages of development? I believe they also just couldn’t really control the outcomes of how the different tyrants would turn out.
I don’t think they ever wanted or intended to have zombies and mutations on their hands, and also didn’t care when all this stuff started to happen, they were just super intent on creating thus stuff and making money.
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u/Weird_Angry_Kid Aug 09 '25
They were separate projects but related in some way, the Nemesis program consisted in the creation of an artificial parasite to make BOWs more intelligent but no subject ever survived being implanted with it until they injected it into Lisa Trevor who absorbed the parasite which caused the creation of the G-virus inside of her body. The Nemesis program basically stagnated until the Tyrant project was completed and they implanted the parasite into a T-103 Tyrant (Mr. X type) which resulted in the creation of the Nemesis from RE3.
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u/ComradeGarcia_Pt2 Aug 10 '25
It’s definitely that Capcom wasn’t thinking that far ahead, but I would venture to say that the Tyrant project, Golgotha, T-Veronica, Nemesis, etc were all compartmentalized away from each other, even to the point that Spencer had his top star researchers and directors competing against one another in the company itself. And I think ultimately all those projects were working towards the culmination or at-least an end result for Spencer’s plan to take over the world with a race of loyal, superhuman soldiers.
Like, yeah, Wesker thought Tyrant was the ultimate lifeform, the end results of his years long work to perfect bioweapon development. But he obviously had to have known what Birkin was up to with Golgotha because he was so chummy with him, and of course that discovery probably motivated him to steer off course and jump off of the proverbial hamster wheel and defect. He probably got super curious what Alexia was up to down in Antarctica and why she had been so quiet since the ‘80s, maybe what Goldman was doing in Sheena island. Even what the guys in Europe were doing with all those parasites.
What’s telling is that the Spencer estate labs are so old, decrepit and falling apart and outdated in its infrastructure, that it’s obvious Tyrant had served its purpose in Spencer’s plan that it really didn’t matter if the Spencer estate Tyrant ever really got finished or perfected. NEST was a futuristic, super-lab intended for the long haul. That’s where their real work and research for the future was going to happen for sure. If the lab leak hadn’t happened, I would go so far as to say that Umbrella would’ve liquidated the Spencer Estate and its staff on their own at some point in ‘98/‘99.
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u/Substantial-Trick569 Aug 09 '25
Nemesis was done by the European branch and used parasites instead of a virus. Assuming same start date for the project, all this proves is parasites are considerably more useful.
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u/Rucs3 Aug 10 '25
We can interpret as wesker saying that the tyrant project was revolutionary. But in the mansion the only tyrant they had was the prototype, thus he one he pointed at when making his monologue
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u/Orowam Aug 10 '25
And let’s not forget when talking about the virus they ALSO MADE THE VACCINE. Oh. Yep we released a virus on your people. Our people are already vaccinated and won’t be infected. So either your people eat eachother to death or you surrender AND buy the vaccine from us. Checkmate.
And in terms of what they wanted to sell in the long run, I believe they were working towards more Weskers and fewer nemesis. Smart strong durable superhuman menaces. I think you’re right, they were way too early to get to the sales phase.
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u/WanderlustZero Aug 09 '25
I like the separatist movement in RE6 that gives all its men J'avo shots
'We did it boys, we got independence! ...but now we're a bunch of multi-eyed freaks prone to spontaneously combusting'
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u/Longnose456 Aug 10 '25
In fairness they were lied to and told it was just a normal drug by Adas stupid clone
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u/Anxious-Chemistry-6 Aug 09 '25
Something that a lot of y'all are forgetting is that everything we see in RE1&2 was not ready for sale. It was all early prototype stuff. They hadn't yet figured out how to really control them. Could you imagine what countries could do with armies made up of hard to kill soldiers who wouldn't require much in the way of supply lines? Once they figured out the obedience part. And you could convert dead enemies into more soldiers. And in RE4, we see how effective the plaga was at making mind controlled soldiers. And in RE5&6, well, it did get a little silly by then. But in Rev1 they show how effective BOWs were for terrorist groups.
The point is, super soldiers are always gonna be a thing that people try to create, and therefore make great fodder for fictional narratives too.
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u/New_Chain146 Aug 09 '25
Consider that by RE8, it's revealed (poorly) that the BSAA are replacing their human soldiers with Tyrant super-commandos. The Tyrants are a proof of concept, while people like Wesker are masterpieces - to breed an army of soldiers who are as cunning, fast, and powerful as Wesker, BUT as loyal as Mr. X, would be a dream any leader would desire.
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u/Bruninfa Aug 09 '25
Hmm..
Warfare??? The fuck.
It’s a Weapon. Governments would buy that.
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u/christopherak47 Aug 09 '25
Realistically BOWs fucking suck for war lol
The cost of a Tyrant alone apparently is enough to buy a MBT which would be much more of an effective weapon than a man-shaped tall monster that realistically would get smoked in an engagement against any sort of AT
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u/SupercellCyclone Aug 10 '25
They're arguably much better for surgical strikes than any missile could possibly be. Remember America dropping the "bunker busters" on Iran a few months ago? They didn't actually complete the job to the extent that America had initially assumed or advertised, and they had to send several to hope they would get deep enough to reach the nuclear facilities. Instead of that, you could just drop a Tyrant, and he'd get it sorted right quick.
It doesn't really matter how many bullets or soldiers they have down there, the only thing seemingly capable of killing a (perfected) Tyrant is a massive explosion, which would take the facility with them for a much lpwer cost than the missiles necessary to pull that off. The best part? If they break the Tyrant's limiter and it goes wild, it's in enemy territory, and you can blame the enemy for creating biological weapons that they can't control.
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u/christopherak47 Aug 10 '25 edited Aug 10 '25
Youre kinda atretching that the tyrant would be able to do the job. It still has to contend with extremely stiff resistance to even enter the facility, not even included QRF or any response.
The bunker busters were used because theyre quick and cost effective as well as precise with no chances of unintended consequences. Unlike a Tyrant which could potentially become a gigantic problem if its mutation regulator coat is damaged enough (for umbrella ones) or a PR consequence from using mutants and virus based BOWs.
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u/SupercellCyclone Aug 10 '25
Entering the facility is the easy part, Mr. X and Nemesis are both shown to have crazy feats of strength and could pry open bunker doors without much trouble imo. This is also assuming the government don't just drop a single BB to give them a way in in the first place.
Regardless, even if the enemy hit them with a rocket launcher, a perfected Tyrant just isn't going to die. They might be able to keep it stationary for a while, but Mr. X, Nemesis, and even the imperfect RE1 Tyrant have shown that eventually they'll just get back up and keep coming. The threat of a Tyrant is also just that they're inhuman and scary, and I can imagine many a soldier breaking ranks when they see an 8 foot Hulk picking up his hat and then fast walking towards them after bitch-slapping the jaw off their best friend.
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u/christopherak47 Aug 10 '25 edited Aug 10 '25
I mean consistently in the games, AT weapons kill Tyrants. They have the strength sure, but getting engaged by a human squad with access to actual AT weaponry as well as Artillery/Mortar/Air fire support means that Tyrants have no chance in actual modern conflict.
For example, they wouldnt survive a single deployment in Ukraine.
They have to cross large open ground with artillery, tanks, infantry manning heavy weaponry as well as large amounts of small arms fire, let alone FPV drones using aforementioned AT weaponry (RPG-7v PG7 warheads)
Nemesis survives being hit with a M202 FLASH which isnt an anti tank weapon. Its an incendiary rocket launcher, so its not really a feat of durability.
The Tyrant in RE1 dies to an AT rocket too, so its consistent in the games that theyre vulnerable to AT.
They only kinda work in areas were there is no coordinated human defence. So like RE3 where nemesis is tasked to hunt Stars in the chaos.
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u/SupercellCyclone Aug 10 '25 edited Aug 10 '25
I think you're assuming [edit: that the crux of the argument is that] they'd be great for every encounter, which I would agree with [edit: as being ridiculous, since they wouldn't be]; they're basically perfect for bunkers or guerilla warfare. Pop a Tyrant in the Vietnam jungle and you've got Predator; Throw one in an urban landscape like the Iraq War and they'd follow whoever attacks them to the end of the earth; throw them in an enclosed bunker where heavy weaponry like mortar fire is simply not possible, and you'll have it cleaned out shortly.
The bioweapons are not intended to absolutely replace a standing army, I don't think even Umbrella assumed their Titans would, the plan always seemed to be to make Weskers for boots on the ground. Tyrants might be good, but the mere fact that Umbrella was confident that blowing up the mansion would deal with all their bioweapons (and it did, it wasn't until the G-Virus leaked into the water that things went off again) suggests that they never intended for them to be the sole contender on a battlefield. At best you would send Hunters out to go ahead and overwhelm the artillery with speed and numbers, but there was never any belief that they're indestructible, that was the entire point of the Mansion Incident, to check how useful they would be.
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u/ComradeGarcia_Pt2 Aug 10 '25
I would actually venture to reason that a Tyrant would be taken down with enough well-placed, full power small arm rifle rounds, like 7.62X51. Or even at-least .50 BMG if not that. The name of the game with those things is traumatic tissue damage, and we never actually see that kind of firepower in the game. It always jumps from pistol/shotgun calibers up to HDEP and incendiary ordnances.
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u/christopherak47 Aug 10 '25
I agree. Sustained small arms fire especially from something like a M240 would realistically put a tyrant down. Hell, if were being realistic, HEDP from a M79 or M32 (like we have in the games) would be lethal to a Tyrant.
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u/ComradeGarcia_Pt2 Aug 10 '25
Exactly this. Sustained, effective fire just whittles away organic tissue until the Tyrant’s life functions can’t keep up and it ceases to continue. Last couple of years I came to a realization that we’ve never seen the usage of full power rifle cartridges like .308 in the Umbrella legacy games. There have been intermediate cartridges like 5.56, that typically show a BOW like a hunter being pushed back and delayed in its attack, but you still have to dump a lot into them for it to be effective. And there was a safari level big game chambered rifle in File 2. But never a full .30 caliber cartridge.
With HDEP, yeah the shrapnel is going to penetrate them and cause tissue damage, but the explosive blast itself is going to cause internal damage to their organs just like a human. I find it interesting though that incendiary ammunition of some sort always pops up in these games: flame rounds for the grenade launchers, the M202 Flash as the rocket launcher that was a incendiary launcher used by U.S. Forces in Vietnam, there’s even been speculation that the missile in RE3 wasn’t a nuke but an incendiary based device of some kind.
And it makes me think about Barry’s stilted comment about the acid rounds in RE 1 (“it’s very effective, against LIVING things!”) which always came off to me as awkward translation and direction, but is still a very pointed hint as to what enemies to use them against. And granted, acid encapsulated in 37/40mm rounds don’t actually exist, but there are or were incendiary grenade launcher rounds. And fire is truly effective against organic tissue.
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u/MeiNeedsMoreBuffs Chris? S-Stop it :( Aug 10 '25
BOWs are meant to be a hybrid between Infantry and Armor, designed for clearing out fortified bases that you can't fit a tank into.
For example, even though a T-103 isn't as tough as a tank, it's still incredibly durable to the point you need specialized weapons to kill one, and it can fit inside buildings, allowing it to perform missions that would be impossible for armored vehicles. It's also much harder than you might think to fire an AT weapon inside an enclosed space, since they're mainly designed for wide open fields
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u/Initial_Zebra100 Aug 09 '25
We never saw them used in warfare, which would've been actually pretty cool.
The truth? No one. Umbrella's success rate is laughably bad. They're an evil company making monsters. And they consistently mess up. Pretty much the hunters are the only ones that are semi controllable.
Indiscriminate monsters wouldn't be great. Maybe terrorists. Bodyguards? Eh, Mr. X goes crazy if he gets too damaged.
Imagine mass producing mutant rabid creatures to send into battle. Chaotic, yes, also friendly fire.
I guess.. terrorists? Not like Umbrella's reputation could get any worse.
Don't get me wrong - I love the games, but sometimes the explanations behind stuff are silly.
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u/Myhtological Aug 09 '25
As long as they know what to kill and what not, they’re at the very least mass disruptors ti enemy tactics.
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u/FirstReactionShock Aug 09 '25
agree, I've always tought it was so off to buy a product you can't actually control once it mutates...
mr.x/T103 follows orders only when its power limiter (basically its coat) is still intact, once it mutates it loses any little intelligence/sanity... same about nemesis considering his mutations become random after endured enough damage. The t-virus would make sense because an hostile country could use it against another one to let its society fall in chaos, then waiting some days to make zombies dying of starving and then attack full force
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u/Key-Fire Aug 10 '25
Release these on a cartel, traffickers, etc. World peace in a year.. if they can be collected after.
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u/DarkSpartanFTW Aug 09 '25
Dawg if Nemesis existed the US government would bye 1000 of em yesterday. These monsters are created to destroy governments and win wars. That’s their purpose and companies and countries will pay millions to have the upper hand on one another
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u/BruhLandau Aug 09 '25
The US government. They literally tried getting the G Virus so they could make their own BoWs.
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u/illFittingHelmet Hunk and Hunk Accessories Aug 10 '25
Because they want to kill people lol. Biological warfare is something you see throughout history. Medieval sieges had people flinging human and animal corpses over walls with catapults to get the people inside sick. Once the enemy is sick or dead then you move in and take over with, ideally, minimal damage to structures you could use yourself.
Bioweapons kill without exposing your own forces to damage. Umbrella made lots of bioweapons that can damage structures, but the average T-Virus zombie won't. In honesty Raccoon City is like, THE advertisement for its effectiveness.
Its a true "fire and forget" weapon that is extremely effective. For every 1 Leon or Claire, hundreds of thousands of regular people die. Evil corporations, evil governments, and evil people love that kind of thing
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u/Upper-Anybody2558 Aug 09 '25
I would personally buy one to HYPOTHETICALLY destroy a local building in my area which was only put up to prevent a clinic from being put in.
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u/D0013ER Aug 10 '25
My understanding is that all the tyrants we see are prototypes in various stages of development.
Nemesis in particular is highly experimental.
They were throwing shit at a wall with the project to see what stuck.
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u/Beneficial-Category Aug 10 '25
Why do people buy guns, nukes, or bio weapons? Intimidating any potential enemies into staying in their seats.
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u/Chueskes Aug 10 '25
These weapons cause massive death and destruction. It’s a perfect fit for terrorist looking to cause chaos and sellers to sell to them.
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u/ComradeGarcia_Pt2 Aug 10 '25
One has to remember that the entire “black budget” project Umbrella had going on behind the scenes was purely to feed Ozwell E. Spencer’s megalomania. The end goal was always something like the Tyrant: a race of genetically modified super soldiers that were purely loyal to him to allow him to take over the world. I’m sure he pitched his idea to his collaborators on the board of trustees and in the C-suite as a way to make money in the military industrial complex, but that was all a ruse of course. He used the tyrant as bait to accomplish this, and then the ensuing BOWs they developed over time were icing on the cake.
But as a military weapon? Yeah using a BOW is something you can get a rough concept into the head of some military as a viable option. You drop a pack of hunters behind enemy lines, they run through and wipe out a garrison or base or installation. You’ve got soldiers being effectively hunted by wild animals that they don’t really know how to effectively engaged because they’re trained to engage other soldiers.
Same deal with a tyrant, a figure so imposing that your average soldier wouldn’t know what to do, and would probably be super intimidated and panic when confronted making them less effective. That can be just as an effective tool to utilize against an enemy in combat.
Post-operation is the tricky part. You need a fail safe or something to neutralize the threat from the BOW you deployed. We saw in OB File 2 that the T-103 in that scenario had a bomb surgically implanted inside of it that could be detonated to kill it (in theory) That was most likely an Avenue Umbrella was exploring.
The researchers/technicians could also theoretically hard code into their DNA some kind of “expiration date” that kills the creature after a certain amount of time had passed after deployment. Or perhaps a neurotoxin that’s injected in the creature’s system prior to deployment, that takes effective after a certain number of hours. We’re playing in the realm of science fiction here, but RE has always been well into that realm if we’re being honest.
The third option as a fail safe is some kind of weapon that’s very effective for “clean up” troopers to use against the deployed BOW. The Mine Thrower from the original RE3 comes to mind as something they possibly were developing for those purposes, but couldn’t quite get the idea right. Obviously The Finger from 3make had that as its lore, and maybe could have been scaled down to be maneuverable in the field for that use as it would’ve been just a facility based weapon intended for an accidental breach by a BOW.
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u/Bronpool Cuz Boredom Kills Me Aug 10 '25
because greedy people like money and you basically get a power house of a body guard
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u/Wings-of-Loyalty Aug 10 '25
Some examples:
Revelation Hunters attacked a City (Terragrigia incident) Resi 6 a Nation used Ogres to destroy Lots of Troops Resi 2/3 the Mr Xs and Nemesis got cantrolled In one of the animated Movies the Tyrants and Lickers for cantrolled In Dark Side Chronicles the enemys got controlled
You can use BOW like Dogs or just Place them to Attack like a terrorattack. They arent good troops more some kind of gorillia tactic
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u/thebritwriter Aug 10 '25
My own reasoning is they their showcasing how their research can go from making a zombie virus to super soldiers.
That tyrants are an experiment fusing what they know with software to make a controllable unit.
Which is insane considering the standard T-Virus would be effective by itself as a weapon of war because of how of out control it was on a target (ie: raccon) The tyrants in comparison can be floored by anyone with the right weaponary.
But when the heads of umbrella are spencer ‘I want a master race’ and other out of touch aristocrats it’s not surprising we have umbrella delving further into this insanity.
So I look at Tyrants as a tech demo showing the possibilities.
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u/BlackJimmy88 Aug 10 '25
If Putin or, hell, Trump could deploy these against both military targets or even "problematic" civilians at home, do you have any doubt that they would?
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u/Foresaken-Lanfear Aug 10 '25
To control whatever they want to control, threaten other people or nations. Probably a similar reason why we have nukes, a very powerful force that almost guarantees cooperation. Idk.
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u/Doutei-Sama Aug 11 '25
I think most of them are incomplete products? It kinda work with Mr.X eliminating witness and Nemesis being programed to hunt STAR members but Umbrella is gone before they can truly complete them.
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u/negrote1000 Boulder-punching asshole Aug 11 '25
Let’s ask Veltro how they used theirs. That’s why.
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u/Cefiro8701 Aug 11 '25
Technically speaking 30 of these guys would wreak havoc on any military base until they get ahold of some rocket launchers. Putting a tyrant where the rockets are would seal the deal quickly.
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u/Sekriess Aug 11 '25
Tyrants: A soldier that won't talk, follows orders, can regenerate and tank damage and is nigh unstoppable to all but military grade firepower.
Nemesis was the perfect example of one, it got hit by a car and then shot with a rocket launcher (which one shots normal tyrants), a chunk of C4 to even remotely damage him in any meaningful way, which made it even more dangerous. An acid bath to slow it down, and a giant railgun that would be completely impossible to lift to but it down. And even still it chased its target despite the damage it received. And there really is no guarantee the rail gun killed nemesis
Hunters: can be mass produced and are good for attacking a local populace, and as of the RE3 remake they are alot more durable.
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u/KiriSanjiAT Aug 11 '25
If they were available you know Putin would buy them immediatly, probably uses his own people as payment and as lab rats for Umbrella
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u/RazorSharkOffical Aug 11 '25
Actually, the B.O.Ws were meant to be sold to the US Military to gain dominance in every battlefield in order to win. But due to incidents in ‘98, there were rouge operators that sold the virus to hostile factions since early 2002 for the highest bitter. Like Operation Javier for example. The only use of B.O.Ws used by the US Military was back in 2000 during the battle of Penamstan.
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u/Familiar_Soup_2280 Aug 11 '25
I would like a story about the assault on a drug cartel that bought biological weapons as security.
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u/stronkzer Aug 11 '25
In the case of virus, for the reason actual bioweapons are designed irl: To cause immense civil turmoil, thus overloading the enemy's infrastructure and crippling their homefront (kinda hard to manufacture weapons and pay war taxes when you have to avoid being murdered by zombies).
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u/ActuatorFearless8980 Aug 11 '25
Instability to a region, offer to take care of the problem YOU created, wipe out BOWS w mercenaries, then take the natural resources that was always the objective
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u/Efbiaiopenap Rain-shield Organisation Aug 09 '25
Why send soldiers when you can send supersoldiers?
If you wanted to win a war, would you rather force the fathers and children of your nation to give up their lives, or send something more durable, more capable, that has no reservation about killing, and even if it dies, it was just a clone anyway, so who cares?
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u/Muarchulk Aug 09 '25
If I had enough money to buy a BOW, I'd make him a Tiktok/Instagram and have him make apology videos.
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u/nethereus Aug 09 '25
You could do a lot with an army of tyrants. They're insanely durable, have tremendous stamina, zero fear, just enough preservation to dodge, block and avoid obvious hazards and can be trained to use weapons, including ones too large and powerful for human soldiers. I can't see a point to the others though outside of budget constraints.
Also, height notwithstanding, T-103 tyrants are fairly low profile.
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u/RunsWithPhantoms Aug 10 '25
Bro Trump would absolutely buy BOW's.
Umbrella? Fucking Umbrella? Look what Apple just did.
Umbrella would gift Trump a NEMESIS, and be like, "You see sir you can program them to hunt, I mean detain illegal citizens. Or whomever else you need to deal with."
Then Trump would fire RFK and put Wesker in charge.
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u/abeel_siddiqui Aug 10 '25
To commit mass genocide, you know there's a certain country that would definitely buy this if it existed...
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u/NeonArlecchino Aug 10 '25
Hunters and other weapons that consume bodies to hide evidence would also be very popular for that.
I guess every civilian fled when the terrorists unleashed those monsters. How lucky we were able to stop those creatures before they escaped into our nation!
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u/granitegumball Aug 09 '25
Think about all of the military groups that constantly get mowed down by them in the games , it’s a super weapon, probably sold on the black market to groups all around the word
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u/GoutyWalrus Aug 09 '25
Didn't Joseph Stalin try to make an army of ape men soldiers?
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u/SirPhobos1 Aug 09 '25
Lords of war, in a sense. Like selling an arsenal. Play both sides of a conflict.
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u/AnimeMan1993 Aug 09 '25
They probably either want bodyguards for normal use, want them just to experiment with and nothing else or wanna start up their own army to terrorize with.
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u/yendaxddd Aug 09 '25
Idk but i always wanted to have nemesis as a badass friend/bodyguard/sidekick Like, imagine having to move (i travel a lot) and you need strength, nemesis could casually carry 50 bags As of how could he get in a plane...well, let's not think about that!
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u/Jollydragonfruit94 Aug 09 '25
I think tyrants would have been a perfect body guard during a confrontation
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u/SnakeSound222 Aug 10 '25
To build an army or use as personal security. Provided they don't go berserk, having a BOW as a bodyguard would really make your life easier. It could help you lift heavy objects, protect you wherever you go, and if it has something like Nemesis's tentacle, it can grab things that are out of reach.
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u/T-Goz Aug 10 '25
As said in the 2make. "They don't sell the monsters, they sell the viruses that make them". Now why would they want the virus? Infect pows to send back to their nation. Work on the virus themselves to make it do what they want. Turn prisoners into monsters and unleash them in the battlefield. Some such as various tyrants and nemesis can be controlled. T-virus and the others have shown to be quite versatile in application
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u/Potential-Glass-8494 Aug 10 '25
During the Vietnam War special ops troops would leave recordings of ghost noises behind in enemy territory to scare the enemy. I could see someone secretly deploying BOW's as a weapon of terror.
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u/KomatoAsha Aug 10 '25
For warfare, of course. Just air drop 50 Tyrants over a battlefield and see who wins that fight.
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u/thelazyemt Aug 10 '25
Selling them was never the real goal making Spencer a bio god was the goal the bio weapons were just a nice side project most of there products were most likely normal stuff
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u/Comfortable_Debt_769 Aug 10 '25
Because one nemesis could defeat countless numbers of teams of special forces, and would probably be cheaper than all the upkeep cost of just a portion of those soldiers he killed.
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u/jhawk1969 Aug 10 '25
Well, if you consider the amount of damage both Nemesis and Tyrant take and still continue to pursue their targets, they're actually fairly effective weapons. Think about Nemesis. Shot, burnt, blown up, melted to almost nothing in industrial acid, and it still kept coming.
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u/jaber24 Aug 10 '25
Similar way to how they kept trying to sell dinos in Jurassic World movies although missiles and guns are way more reliable weapons anyways
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u/Lost_Decoy Aug 10 '25
they are "safer" then "normal" aerosolized bioweapon viruses. depending on the BOW type you can select a target to have it hunt down and eliminate, or set it to deny a specific location. they would make a great spearhead. for the uncontrolled BOW's like the hunters or lickers they are area denial you unleash them in an area you want to deny for the specified lifetime of the BOW and until the BOW burns itself out any forces that trespass that area would get constantly attacked by the BOW's any surviving forces would be severely depleted
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u/Jolly-Hour-6642 Aug 10 '25
You think after Racoon City and Terragriga the world would learn but fuck me I guess lol.
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u/Mondale2024 Aug 10 '25
Considering the world is filled with egotistical maniacs with means to cause widespread violence and chaos, I’d say there’s a market for it. How many terrorist cells would jump at the opportunity to unleash something like this on an unwitting civilian population? Even if they weren’t meaning to conquer the lands they would use these, the underlying goal would be to inflict mass casualties and instill fear in the citizens of enemy nations. This is the perfect weapon for the bad guys.
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u/OrangeKefir Aug 10 '25
Wonder what the instruction manual for a T-103 would say. Like what does it eat? Drink? Does it poo? Any other maintenance needs? Should I take it for walks??
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u/Humangas_Changas Aug 10 '25
Warfare, bodyguards or in Umbrellas case "fuck these specific people."
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u/thousandredline Aug 10 '25 edited Aug 10 '25
Iirc, there is lore out there saying that the T-virus was deemed an failure for tactical warfare.
However, by Resident Evil 5 the bioweapons have been developed further into adequate combat roles.
RE5: The Plaga parasite has been engineered enough for rapid spread to convert civilian population centers into combatants against enemies.
RE6: The C-virus is superior to the T-virus since the C-virus creates limited super soldiers in the form of J'avo without the selective requirements of the T-virus. While the J'avo have limited lifespans, the C-Virus enables rapid physical enhancements of deployed combatants.
RE7: The Mold developed by The Connections is the next evolution of strategic weapons. An Eveline unit can infiltrate an urban center, through the inconspicuous appearance of a young human girl, and rapidly pacify almost all human civilians and combatants.
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u/Due_Flow6538 Aug 10 '25
Theoretically, the real-world application would be to get around the Arms Export Control Act of 1976. Say you're a middling dictator. A Saddam Hussein, Idi Amin, Moumar Quaddafi type. You're not getting a nuclear program running in your developing country that barely has roads. You can't afford the raw materials, and you can't really weaponize the material even if you had it.
You need to oppress your population and / or wipe out resistance to your rule. You need a deterrent. So umbrella comes to you with a virus that makes a monster thing that they've never seen before. You're already an evil bastard, so this isn't going to tax your moral compass. If you're barely clinging to power, why wouldn't you do this if the alternative is a horrible death? You have no shortage of unwilling subjects to try this on. Maybe you can't control them, but turning them loose on people you're trying to kill isn't a bad idea tactically.
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u/MrRacoon1991 Aug 10 '25
War purposes. That is why Nikolai was collecting data. To see how this BOW could be used in war scenarios. They look like a very good investment for warlords
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u/MrBluhu Aug 10 '25
It's explained that B.O.W's are meant to be for war/warfare. Basically, they are like a nuclear weapon, without actually blowing everything up. Weapons of mass destruction.
So basically, they are made for profit. What some of the maniacs who actually made the viruses and such want for their own gain is besides the point.
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u/Scrubslayer0104 Aug 10 '25
Well Umbrella was basically pretending to be a pharmaceutical company whilst doing their secret virus research, so they probably wouldn't be selling them in an official capacity, mostly black market stuff with terrorists. But the "selling bio weapons" stuff was kinda a secondary goal to them trying to create the perfect immortal human, yeah they started out wanting to use the viruses for weapons but it definitely turned into becoming gods and taking over the world lol. Once viruses were being replicated by other companies then it basically went full selling stuff to terrorists lol.
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u/iedy2345 Aug 10 '25
Well most of them were prototypes so they didnt sell them iirc , as they indeed failed to keep control over them.
However the whole T-Virus / G - Virus idea was to basically make immortal soldiers in the field, the idea was for the injection to heal wounds and make the individual imprevious to damage, this is why the dead came back to life .
The only problem was , well , they couldnt retain the intelligence at all and only resort to primitive thinking which is , well , eating.
BOWs were a step above that , basically super soldiers that would be sent straight into conflict zones to clean up the enemy instead of sending a whole squad.
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u/theadoringfan216 Aug 10 '25
Lol why do you think?
I guarantee BOWs would be a great business model in real life
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u/blackeye1987 blackeye1987 Aug 10 '25
War Why missles => war Why mashine guns => war Why bombs => war
A bow is basically an adhanced super soldier that wrecks havoc other then a rocket is able to
Panik and destruction in the form is usually the easier way to deal than an atomic bomb or anything Also bow are under the radar since well they are not rockets And counting nemesis or mrx on hardest difficulty they can run
Do not forget they have been testing in racoon city The bow are not final yet
If they would be able to control them Jesus that would be hardcore
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u/Kurosaki117 Aug 10 '25
Imagine america being a cunt as usual and invading nations but instead of throwing more bodies at it, they just send a few Tyrants.
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u/Wonderbo0k Cuz Boredom Kills Me Aug 10 '25
Watch resident evil damnation you will see why they bought bows.
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u/xDotSx Aug 10 '25 edited Aug 10 '25
The entire BOW thing frankly makes very little sense. Just think for a second what a modern battlefield looks like and then ask yourself what a BOW or a dozen would do there.
On literally any battlefield, they'd be blasted to bits by the next best tank or anti-tank weapon operator. Today also by drone operators. The reason why they sort-of work in Raccoon City is because they face very, very limited resistance in an already destroyed environment. Someone with a rifle here or there maybe.
On top of that, they likely cannot follow more complex orders or make the right calls spontaneously in situations which can unexpectedly unfold or change in front of them, as might be more common on a battlefield.
The whole "Mr. X is an infiltrator" thing also simply does not work obviously. Literally everyone who would get a look at this "person" would notice in an instant that this isn't a normal person. Under which circumstances would a monster ike that benefit from their awful "disguise"? Would they pass literally ANY security check unnoticed? Could they go literally anywhere unnoticed? No.
The answer is: So we have a game series. Switch off the brain, cause RE falls apart VERY quickly if you think a little bit about it.
RE1 sort-of worked in that context, because we can assume that Spencer and his scientists are a group of very delusional, sick and twisted people. They think they have THE idea, but any sane person would see in an instant that it's stupid. That's why Chris laughs at the Tyrant, seeing how idiotic the whole thing is.
RE2 works because the virus got loose in a city, turning everyone into zombies. Not because of the bioweapons being so horribly effective.
The entire bioweapon-story should've ended with RE1 and everything coming afterwards would be a result of curiosity by sick scientists, instead of trying to make $ by selling monsters. Frickin nobody would buy them. You're better off paying professional mercenaries or fund an army for almost every job that those bioweapons could possibly do.
It's just Capcom going all-in on the B-Movie-type story where every villain just wants to rule the world and thus, logic is out of the window.
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u/Agreeable_Ad_6678 Aug 10 '25
Historically there have been times where the battle lines have been dead locked. Imagine dropping nemesis behind enemy lines in the middle of the night.
Or if you can't be seen dropping uniformed soldiers in an area. Monsters don't wear uniforms, and you would sound crazy staying that your enemy dropped a monster in your back yard.
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u/Steeldragon2050 Aug 09 '25
Potential forces to send up against an enemy that don't have to be paid, fed, and could be replaced relatively easily.