Four years ago, Dead Rising launched on the Xbox 360, which not only successfully simulated the zombie apocalypse in a video game, but was also an absolute blast to play despite its staggering difficulty. Flash forward to present day where Capcom has successfully taken many of the weaknesses present in the first game and addressed them while cramming even more zombies into the newly released Dead Rising 2. Set 5 years after the events of the first game, Chuck Greene takes center stage as an ex-motocross champ who is a contestant in the horror-reality show “Terror is Reality.” Chuck young daughter, Katie lives the life of an infected, yet unturned human who must receive a daily dose of Zombrex to keep from changing into a zombie-tyke. Everything goes to hell during a round of Terror is Reality, forcing Chuck and Katie find safety somewhere in Fortune City. The two end up in a safe house, which is the hub for the remainder of the game, allowing Chuck to go in and out to perform odd jobs or find survivors of the new zombie infestation, of which Chuck has been framed for. This is mostly a zombie apocalypse plot with a few twists and turns along the way, some more surprising and intelligent than others, but the overall narrative is well thought out for what it is. There are plenty of side stories to be told between all of the various Survivors you rescue, and the outrageous Psychopaths (bosses) you encounter. One of the toughest components of the game is the time mechanic. Chuck has 72 hours to clear his name, give Katie doses of Zombrex on each of the 3 days, and find as many survivors as possible. The in game hours fly by and each mission is time-specific. As you go deeper into the game, it becomes progressively more challenging to complete all the various side missions and make it to each main mission on time.
Near the end, most players will have to miss out on a few side missions to ensure that the best possible ending is achieved. It’s a challenging formula some may not take kindly to, but for those who dug the first game, the time-mechanic is largely unchanged. So what makes Dead Rising 2 such a blast to play? You kill, maim, burn, and obliterate thousands of zombies with hundreds of different weapons as you travel through the infested streets of Fortune City. For each kill, you’ll gain PP which in essence is the equivalent of experience points. Gain enough PP and you’ll level up, which will often award you with an upgraded stat, new attack, or another combo card. Not unlike the first, there are loads of comical and devastating weapons to find along the way ranging from random appliances and toys all the way to swords and guns. The joy of taking out the zombie hordes is changing up your weapons, which happens often as each has a limited number of uses. The real star of the game’s deep weapon system is the all-new combo weapons mechanic. There are workbenches located all throughout the game in which you can combine two items to make a devastating weapon. Just to name a few combo weapons, there’s flaming boxing gloves, footballs strapped with grenades, an oar with chainsaws on each end, and the ever ridiculous hat-with-machete-blades-spinning-on-top. Each increasingly ridiculous in its nature, but all equally find to discover. When you begin the game, you have virtually no idea of all the available combos, so as you progress, you’re bound to find different combos or you’ll receive the occasional “combo card” that will tell you the ingredients for a new combo.
Combo cards can be gained a number of ways such as leveling up, saving key survivors, or just looking at an in-game poster. With the game’s time constraint, it’s pretty tough to locate all the cards in a single play through, but luckily the game was designed with a high level of replayability in mind. While the gameplay in the game is a blast, there is a fairly big issue with the game. Dead Rising 2’s difficulty will be a turn off to many. It’s not a bad thing for those of us looking for a challenge, but the unfair bosses, time element and lack of a perfected save system will shut many out from enjoying the game. There have been updates to the save system since the first, with more save spots located throughout the city and an opportunity to save after major events, but when you run into a random Psychopath and get stomped on, you may have to still load a save from an hour ago. Luckily there are also multiple save slots which are great to avoid putting yourself in a situation where a missions is impossible to complete due to lack of time. While on the topic of the bosses, while they are all unique and well varied, they will hand your ass to your at least once in every encounter, especially if you unexpectedly find yourself in a boss fight. I can assure fans that each and every Psychopath is a unique in design and you’re guaranteed to have plenty of favorites. There are a few multiplayer options present including co-op and competitive modes. Co-op is basically what you would imagine, allowing you to play through the campaign with another player, but the games technical hiccups are increased in doing so. Another downside to the co-op is the fact that the other player is also playing as Chuck.
It’s not exactly the most realistic tale told, but I felt like it wasn’t a good way to play the game your first time through as it detracted from the plot. Competitive multiplayer is a set of minigames in the tune of Terror is Reality. You can play these various minigames in an effort to earn cash, of which Chuck can use in the main game. The minigames are fairly quirky, but they aren’t exactly something people will be revisiting in a few months from now. Dead Rising 2 is rough around the edges in the technical department. Load times are often and typically last around 5-10 seconds. The framerate will occasionally chug when you use some of the more destructive weapons on a mass of zombies. That being said, there are a mass of improvements over the first. Especially regarding the survivor AI that was extremely poor in the first game. While the survivors aren’t exactly intelligent by any means this time around, they are at least capable of following you and pushing other zombies out of the way while you work your way back to the safe house. I was able to save most of the survivors without losing any to the crowds unlike the first game, where trying to rescue anyone was an absolute nightmare. Dead Rising 2 is a downright blast to play which is conveniently accompanied by a coherent plot and tons of great weapons. The new combo weapons are awesome and typically ridiculous along with the crazy-hard Psychopaths. Blue Castle Games was also kind enough to put some form of brain into the survivors this time around, making survivor gathering a much more enjoyable experience. My biggest complaint with the game is that it is pretty rough in terms of polish. Framerates suffer due to the large number of zombies crowding the streets and co-op play magnifies these issues. All in all, I think it’s the game fans were hoping for and it is a much more accessible game than the first. If one thing’s for sure, creatively wiping out hordes of zombies doesn’t grow tiresome.
