Review

Developed by:Blue Castle Games Published by:Capcom Genre(s):
  • Survival Horror
  • Beat 'em Up
  • Platform:
  • Microsoft
  • PC
  • Sony
  • Cost:$59.99 ESRB Rating:MATURE Players:1 (2-4 Online) Release date:September 28, 2010 Reviewed on:PC
    8.2

    Dead Rising 2

    Dead Rising 2 has all the main ingredients of a classic campy horror movie. You got the interesting yet unrealistic plot, random crazies running around, survivors held up in a makeshift fort, and even some social commentary. All of the staples for a decent film and an awesome video game are here. Blue Castle takes them all these ingredients, sprinkled in some brains, and throws them in an oven. Whether or not they were well cooked before being served is another story.

    Dead Rising 2 picks up 5 years after the original zombie outbreak from the first installment of the game. Our new protagonist, Chuck Greene, has been working hard to get doses of Zombrex (a drug used to postpone zombie transformation for a 24 hours) for his daughter Katie. Katie was bit by her zombified mother and has being taking Zombrex ever since. Being that the drug is very expensive, Chuck has to raise money to buy it by competing in a dangerous game show called Terror is Reality. The show has its contestants compete for money by killing zombies in different physical events, something like The Gladiator meets WWE. On the night of the latest event, TIR XVII: Payback, in Fortune City (Las Vegas),there is an explosion that releases the caged zombies located under TIR’s arena. Chuck is forced to flee with Katie as the entire place is swarmed with the undead. Narrowly escaping the madness, Chuck makes it to a shelter and is able to breathe a sigh of relief. That was until he realized he only had one dose of Zombrex left for Katie. Not only that, a news report showed a man dressed in Chucks motocross uniform, arming the bomb that lead to the release of the caged zombies. The military is on their way to clean up the mess and apprehend Chuck in within three days time. Things don’t look so good.

    Dead Rising 2’s (DR2) plot is perfect. It won’t win any awards and it’s not meant to. It is a device used to showcase the human condition. Will the survivors work together to secure a future, or will they be selfish and fight amongst themselves? When faced with such catastrophe, will their true colors arise and if so, what are they? These are the questions that are the most interesting. That’s why I have a major issue with how the story pans out. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not a bad. It just feels like there are too many missed opportunities. Take the Psychopaths (boss encounters within the Dead Rising games). Instead of building stories around these characters that explains how they became the way they are, they are made crazy just because of the zombies. So much so, that it’s hard to believe they weren’t nuts to begin with. There was similar characters in the first game (a chainsaw wielding clown) but DR2 feels a little overdone.

    The reason I talked about the story and characters in such detail is because Dead Rising is all about the story. Yes, you can kill zombies with any and everything in sight, but the whole game revolves around the main story’s timed cases, or missions, that need to be solved to proceed. Miss an important case and its game over. Throwing in so many random bosses hurts the story which in turn, hurts the gameplay. The difficuty of bosses introduced early in the game and the fact that the missions seldom warn you of a boss encounter, make them feel more like a chore. The same can be said about the time restraint as a whole. Even though a lot of the cases are fun and it’s a blast rescuing people from becoming Z food, you are always reminded of the clock. The time limitation can put a strain on gaming when all you want to do is grab an item and run back to the safe house when all of a sudden you inadvertently start a cut scene that leads to a boss fight. Now you have to try to kill this lunatic before your clock winds down on the next case. Frustrating!

    To be fair, this didn’t happen too often, especially as you begin to figure out what cases are boss fights and which aren’t. Although there are annoyances stemming from how Dead Rising 2’s mechanics work, it is a big improvement over the original game. For instance, the first game gave gamers the ability to use everyday items as weapons against the horde. DR2 went a step further by allowing gamers to create stronger weapons by combining items found around Fortune City. The weapons range from realistic; a bottle of vodka and news paper make a Molotov cocktail, to the absurd; a car battery and a rake making an electric rake of death. Being that the combined weapons are better at busting skulls than the normal ones, it also makes since that they would give you more PP points used to upgrade your character. This makes finding new combinations a fun and worthwhile distraction for gamers. Another improvement would be the enhanced AI. It is so much easier to lead the survivors back to the safe house this time around. I never really felt like I was babysitting whenever I had to rescue someone. Not only that, they didn’t run off and fight random zombies on their own, but did a rather good job of keeping up with me and defending themselves when needed.

    Unlike it’s predecessor, Dead Rising 2 features a multi-save option as well as Co-op play. This is great as now gamers aren’t forced to resave in the same slot over and over. This caused issues if you accidentally saved and didn’t have enough time to finish a required case, forcing you to start the game all over. The multiplayer aspect is pure awesomeness just waiting to happen. You can image the mayhem that two people can create; a buddy and I discovered zombie bowing, requiring frozen zombies and a large round object! While this is all great, there is one glaring issue when it comes to Co-op. After you’ve joined a friend’s game and want to go back to your own, you can’t. You have to start over. Even though you keep your leveled character and money earned while playing, the story itself is reset. Let me paint a picture for you. Let’s say you’re at the final case in the game and you decided to join your friend and help them out before finishing up you own game. If you’ve loaded that character to your friends game, when trying to go back to your saved game later on you won’t be able to. You’ll have to start anew. Mind you that there is no warning before joining a friends game, the only thing you’re told is that your story can’t progress while playing in Co op in a friends game. That’s a fail in my book.

    Being able to play in the Terror is Reality game show is also a mixed bag. The different events that you compete in not only offer some variety in what is mostly a straight forward game; they are also are fun to play. On top of that, any money earned in this mode can be transferred to your main character in the campaign. Each show you compete in is divided up into short mini games where you compete for points with three other players. While the first 3 events are random, the last one is always Slicecycles. This is where you ride a motorcycle that has chainsaws tide to the handlebars and try to cut down as many of the undead as possible. As fun as the games are, I have an issue with the point system. Players earn points for each mini game based on how they place; 1st place gets the most, than 2nd , and so on. The person with the most points before playing Slicecycles gets a head start while the other players have to wait for a timer to count down, in the order of each person’s ranking at the time. Really, it didn’t matter how many points you got before getting to the last event as it’s still anyone’s game. After being in first for majority of the events, I came in last over all because I came in last on Slicecycles. The person that was last the whole time came in 2nd. You shouldn’t be able to pass everyone by such a huge margin when you were in last place the entire time. It feels like working to keep the lead in the mini games is pointless by the time you get to the last event.

    When it comes to killing zombies, Dead Rising 2 shines bright. Being able to pick up everyday objects and use them to fend off the undead never gets old. The improvements over the first game make Dead Rising 2 a must buy for fans of the series. There are more zombies on screen at any given time, more weapons to use, more psychos (for better and for worse), and multiplayer options. With every thing going well for DR2, there are things that gnaw away at its gameplay. With that being said, I still very much enjoyed my time whacking zombies with Chuck and look forward to DR3!

    Gameplay:

    7

    There are a lot of things holding DR2’s gameplay back. Even so, it’s still an enjoyable experience.

    Graphics:

    10

    The PC version looks better than its console brethren due to the fact you can scale it according to your hardware specs!

    Sound:

    8

    Everything from skulls splattering to Chuck’s voice work sounds great.

    What's New:

    8

    There is a lot new here. However, not everything works the way it should.

    Replay Value:

    8

    Being able to replay the game and keep your saved character’s stats is always a plus. The multiplayer components help here as well.

    Final Score:

    8.2

    © United Front Gaming. All rights reserved. Site design by: 801red