One chestnut some claim to be the shortest complete piece of fiction goes like this: "The last man on earth sat in his room. There was a knock on the door."
"Resident Evil 0," which came out in Japan under the name "Bio Hazard 0" months ago but is only now being released in the United States, delivers the same kind of turn-of-the-screw feeling. Just when you think things couldn't get much worse, there's that knock at the door.
The Capcom game, which I'll call Zero, is exclusively available for the Nintendo GameCube. It begins with a moody animation showing the destruction of a commuter train. At one moment the passengers are sitting in a diner car, reading newspapers and holding quiet conversations. A moment later, thousands of organisms that look like bubble-wrapped slugs with fangs crash into the windows like raindrops in a storm.