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Tofu

  • jamesyfx
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jamesyfx

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(Posting this here as the media I've created is from the remake, although the thing itself originated from the 1998 game)

If you don't know what Tofu is - it's essentially a block of pressed bean curd and soy milk, which is very popular in Japan. So the fact that Capcom made it a video game character is very strange.

Yep, Tofu is a secret character from Resident Evil 2 and the Remake. It has also appeared in Darkside Chronicles as an enemy (but who knew about that?) It's definitely one of the strangest secret characters in any game.

Tofu-original.jpgTofu.jpg
Left: Original / Right: Remake (bet you didn't even need me to make that distinction did ya?!)

In the original Resident Evil 2, it swears in Japanese when it gets hurt (it basically says "What the Hell!" - but in a strong manner). In the Resident Evil 2 Remake it's fully voiced as well. In both games the character is voiced by Katsutoshi Karatsuma, who worked on the original game as a programmer, and indeed programmed Tofu itself.

The character was apparently used in the development of the game to test collision. As it's a rectangular object, it's a reasonably accurate representation of what a collision box would look like in a game, and wouldn't take long to model. In most games from that era (and still to this day), collision detection is done with boxes like this. It's an easy way for the game to recognise when you're close to something.

So the missions themselves are based on The 4th Survivor minigame, where you usually play as HUNK. It's essentially a gauntlet full of enemies and you have to get through it without any other help. But instead of playing as HUNK with guns and other items, you play as Tofu with a knife and some herbs. It's a really difficult challenge.

You can unlock Tofu Survivor in Resident Evil 2 by beating the regular game as Leon or Claire with an A rank, 6 times.

They expanded on the original idea with the remake, offering different 'flavours' of Tofu, with different voices and weapons. my personal favourite is the Flan... as it has a Minigun! It's also clear that Tofu had a promotion between 1998 and 2019 - it's now apparently a member of S.T.A.R.S. !

Here's an extremely poor clip of me losing as Flan.

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I know, I suck. Even with unlimited ammo!


So yeah, that is Tofu. Did you ever manage to unlock it in either of the games?
 
You've kinda beaten me to the punch on this one, but I'll forgive you.. ;)

It was part of the reason I was going to go through all of the games again. to try and unlock all of the extras - especially as I've never done it before. I've briefly played both of the Hunk and Tofu scenarios on the original Resident Evil 2 using gameshark codes, but nothing beats the sense of achievement unlocking them legitimately. Maybe then I'll also have the impetus to attempt finishing those two extra scenarios.
 

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