I booted the game again the next morning. It worked fine. And somehow, that felt like the scariest part of all.
I opened regedit anyway.
I was three hours into troubleshooting when my phone buzzed. My friend Mark, who lived two time zones away, had just texted: “Dude. The cathedral part with the helicopter is insane.”
The screen went black. For two full seconds, nothing. Then—a gunshot. The Capcom logo. Leon’s voice: “Sorry, I’m late.”