This really should have been just an utterly insignificant piece of news.
But the timing couldn't have been more perfect — it happened to surface right when Resident Evil was starting to gain traction online.
Maybe the average person wouldn't think much of it, but most internet users — especially in the U.S. — absolutely live for chaos.
And this was especially true in America, where the reaction was even more intense.
The day the article was published, it quickly caught the attention of the right kind of people — and was wildly exaggerated, with some shouting: "The end of the world is here! The real Resident Evil has begun!"
At first, it all stayed relatively under control. Most of the people saying these things online were just memeing — they were Resident Evil players joking around, mixing their love for the game with a bit of real-world imagination.
But not everyone got the joke.
And those who didn't know about Resident Evil were still the overwhelming majority.
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Maybe it's part of American culture, but U.S. citizens have always had a particular fascination with apocalyptic scenarios and the Book of Revelation.
There are countless films and shows with similar plotlines. The story of Noah's Ark is practically common knowledge.
There's even a joke that some Americans believe the Earth is flat, yet still wholeheartedly accept the Ark story as fact.
But jokes aside — some people actually believed this Resident Evil situation was real.
These people belonged to a group often called the "doomsday preppers."
Even in normal times, they loved building personal bunkers, hoarding supplies, and obsessively tracking global news, always worried the world could end at any moment.
So when they saw that local news article, paired with dozens of exaggerated posts by fans online, they took it seriously.
Of course, they didn't believe it right away. At first, they dug into the source — trying to understand where this so-called "biohazard" idea came from.
Then they learned that Resident Evil was a horror game.
For a moment, they breathed a sigh of relief.
"Oh, it's just a game. That scared the crap out of me."
But that also made them curious — and they started digging deeper into the game online.
And that's when things got worse.
By now, Resident Evil had a strong core community. Fans regularly posted on the official forums, sharing their gameplay experiences. Some even compiled summaries of the game's backstory and lore, all written in a tone that mimicked internal government reports — like memos being submitted to higher-ups.
When the doomsday preppers read these, they discovered that the game featured a company called Umbrella, which was secretly developing a virus that drove people insane.
That virus — the source of the "biohazard" — was capable of spreading through transmission, gradually stripping its victims of rationality and turning even loved ones into monstrous threats.
To the untrained eye, the fan-written summaries looked shockingly believable. If someone didn't know it was from a game, they might actually think Umbrella was a real corporation doing unethical things behind the scenes.
But… the setting was just too airtight.
The preppers had initially assumed Resident Evil was your typical ghost-and-demon story.
They hadn't expected something so grounded in modern science fiction.
That very modernity made it all feel disturbingly plausible.
And they panicked.
What if there really was a company like Umbrella out there?
Sure, it was "just a game," but what if the game was actually a warning from someone on the inside? A cry for help disguised as entertainment?
A secret message from a developer trying to alert the public to real-world horrors?
It couldn't be ruled out!
These doomsday preppers were also big believers in conspiracy theories, and they were convinced that human nature would collapse during an apocalypse.
So they began scouring the internet, searching for real-world companies that resembled Umbrella.
And the more they looked, the more they felt like some of the big pharmaceutical giants seemed suspiciously similar...
Now this wasn't just game talk anymore — this was breaking news. Something serious!
"The end is near! The end is near!"
The panic started to spread.
The preppers immediately began stockpiling supplies, preparing for doomsday.
At the same time, they started warning others in their own way — sharing what they believed to be the "truth" on social media, thinking they were doing their civic duty… just like the game's protagonist.
And the original cause of it all? The "zombie" in that blurry news photo?
It turned out the guy had simply overdosed on drugs and gone into a frenzy, biting at strangers. The journalist had just wanted to raise awareness about the rising drug problem.
But now?
What started as a few Resident Evil fans joking around online quickly spiraled out of control — amplified by the doomsday preppers who took things seriously and spread misinformation to people who didn't know any better.
Good news rarely travels, but bad news spreads like wildfire.
This twisted game of telephone grew worse by the hour.
It began to feel like Resident Evil had become real. The state where the original article came from suddenly became the target of national paranoia.
Locals had no idea what was happening — and before they could react, the entire state was being labeled as "zombie-infested."
And it didn't stop there.
Within a very short time, tens of thousands of netizens were signing petitions, demanding answers from the government:
"What is the government doing? Why haven't you released this information? Are you covering it up?"
"Or are you already prepared with your own escape plans, and just planning to let the rest of us suffer?"
The government, for its part, was completely baffled.
Where on Earth had this so-called biohazard outbreak even come from?