'Resident Evil 7' VR release date, spoilers news: Capcom explains January launch; prequel footage revealed at Comic-Con

Capcom has offered an explanation for the January release date for its upcoming triple-A title "Resident Evil 7."

When the video game developer announced at Sony's press conference during this year's Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) that "Resident Evil 7: Biohazard" will be out in January 2017, many fans were surprised. After all, most titles that are of the same caliber as "Resident Evil" are either released in the spring or in the fall.

"Resident Evil 7: Biohazard" is the next installment in the popular "Resident Evil" franchise. The upcoming survival horror video game is the 11th entry in the "Resident Evil" franchise and is the first to be played from a first-person perspective, marking a turning point in the series that has been moving steadily away from the survival horror genre into the world of third-person shooter gaming.

In an interview with MCV UK, Antoine Molant, Capcom's EMEA marketing director, said that many of the games that Capcom released in January have done well, which is why they decided to drop "Resident Evil 7" in the same period.

Molant also said that the game will not be ready before the holiday season and that spring 2017 will see a huge wave of new games, making January the sensible time to release "Resident Evil 7."

"Historically, we have released quite a lot of games in January and it has gone well," he said. "To be honest, there's a development reason — it's not going to be ready before Christmas, and we don't want a game that's unfinished. Just look at April and May this year, even spring is getting congested. Q1 is going to be mental next year — you saw that from the announcements at E3."

Meanwhile, on-screen footage of "Kitchen," the tech demo that paved the way for "Resident Evil 7," was unveiled at last week's Comic-Con in San Diego. This marked the first time that footage of the game was captured in its entirety.

Upload VR notes that "Kitchen" had some striking similarities to the "Resident Evil 7" demo that was shown at E3 2016. The website also suggests that the reason "Kitchen" — and not "Resident Evil 7" — was featured at Comic-Con could be because Capcom is still working on the nausea-inducing aspects of the game that fans experienced during E3.

"Resident Evil 7: Biohazard" will be released Jan. 24, 2017.