How to unlock Cat Ears in the Resident Evil 4 remake

The ultimate reward

The Resident Evil 4 remake brings back some of the wackier elements of the original, including the iconic costumes. While Leon can still don his classic don/gangster garb and Ashley can slip into a full suit of armor: there’s even sillier stuff on offer, like the Cat Ears. Here’s how to unlock them in the remake.

First, unlock Professional Mode

The Cat Ears cosmetic is gated behind Professional Mode: a new difficulty setting you’ll unlock after completing the game for the first time. Professional Mode has several individual tasks associated with it, namely a lack of auto-saving and a tighter parry window. We have a full breakdown of Professional Mode here.

You’ll need to go a bit further than just clearing Professional Mode to get the Cat Ears, however.

You’ll need to clear Professional Mode with an S+ ranking to get the Cat Ears

Getting the Cat Ears to unlock is contingent on finishing the game with an “S+” ranking on Professional Mode, which is one of the biggest meta-hurdles the game has to offer.

A Professional Mode S+ rating requires the following:

• A brand new game/fresh file without carry-over NG+ items
• A completion time of less than five hours and 30 minutes (5:30 using in-game vernacular)
• A save count (read: using the typewriter) of less than 15

We recommend clearing the game at least twice (or studying the layouts of each level, knowing which sections are required and which aren’t) before taking on this gargantuan task. While you can fudge an S+ without a handle on parries (outside of several fights like Krauser), you will need to know the optimal path to avoid going over time.

This can essentially be considered the prime challenge reward for the Resident Evil 4 remake: the ultimate goal to work toward.