Capcom details REX upgrade to make RE Engine AI-ready

Capcom has outlined how it plans to evolve RE Engine for the AI era. Programmer Satoshi Ishida presented the REX project, short for RE neXt Engine, at Capcom Open Conference RE:2026 at Ariake Convention Hall in Tokyo on October 2, 2026. 

Capcom first announced REX in 2023, and the session showed the upgrade arriving in stages rather than as a full replacement. The conference continues in Tokyo on October 3, with an Osaka leg on October 17 and 18.

Why Capcom is upgrading RE Engine

RE Engine debuted with Resident Evil 7 in 2017 and has since been used for more than 27 Capcom titles. Nearly all of Capcom's developers, more than 2,000 people, now use it. Ishida named three pressures: games have grown so large that iteration has slowed, the developer base has become more diverse, and AI is advancing quickly. REX targets performance, tools, development efficiency, and QA. Instead of discarding the engine, Capcom is adding new components over time.

What REX adds

REX is built from components prefixed with RE: RE:Dox converts different data formats into a common structure for faster processing. RE:UI makes the interface of development tools lighter and saves memory by separating appearance from state. RE:Flows is a visual tool for building gameplay that converts automatically into a standard programming language. RE:Runtime handles large numbers of characters more efficiently. RE:Log overhauls logging and communication, collecting logs in a central store that developers can search.

How AI fits into Capcom

Ishida described the end goal as a game engine for the AI generation. To get there, the whole system now follows the rules of a widely used programming language, which should make the code easier for AI to read. Ishida also pointed to a future where AI understands the code, writes programs, and runs tests to catch bugs automatically. Those are goals, not shipped features, and Capcom has not said when they will reach its games. The reported plans center on development tools and testing, and as per GameBiz's account, it does not mention any AI-generated content in finished games.

Open-source plans

Capcom has already released some REX technologies, including RE:Dox and RE:Log, publicly online. The aim is to give AI tools more material to learn from. That does not mean RE Engine itself is becoming a public engine.