The thing is, Capcom is in a bad situation now. Yes, they see the mainstream demand for Resident Evil to be changed. They see people saying, "change the control", " less backtracking", "more shooting" and other various things. However, if they do any of this, they are changing the forumla that made the series so popular from the start. Yes, they can change these things. If they do though, they risk upsetting a large fanbase (I know I would be upset) and reviewers tearing it apart for not being like classic Resident Evil, because Resident Evil still gathers excellent reviews from most places.
Resident Evil 3 for the most part, did go the more action way. There was still quite abit of backtracking but it did have more action. It also had random puzzles, random items and random enemies. Was Resident Evil 3 any good? Depends on which group of players you are in. The \'hardcore\' RE fans, like me, detested the game. Then there was others who was amazed and loved it.
Maybe, Capcom can make two series of Resident Evil? A constantly serious / backtracking/ classic RE and then one more action based. Sort of like they did with Street Fighter and Marvel Vs Capcom.
By the way - Devil May Cry was originally going to be Resident Evil 4 and then it took on a life of its own and they changed some stuff and it became Devil May Cry. So, it is very possible Capcom is looking towards a more action based Resident Evil installment.