Dead Rising Review

Since Google bought blogger.com it took me eons to get logged in, the fucking thing kept saying "try again later".

Anyway I'm here again and thought I'd write up a little review of Dead Rising which I just finished the "true ending" storyline last night. I think I have enough experience with the game to write up some comments on what I liked and didn't like with the game.

The game itself is quite good. I generally have a real dislike for Japanese games for several reasons:

1. unidentifyable characters, meaning characters that I don't consider heroic at all. If I'm playing a game I want the characters to be dynamic and at the very least interesting and/or the other game characters interesting and exhibiting characteristics that I can believe. I dislike the androgynous characters that are a mainstay of Japanese games
2. horrible, REALLY horrible voice acting

Needless to say I sort of went into Dead Rising with a lot of dread, I liked the premise of the game but didn't really have that high expectations of it. Thankfully for the most part I was mistaken.
Frank West, the main character is interesting and cool, the other game characters are believable and match the storyline. Some of the voice acting is a bit strange, there are uncomfortable pauses in the dialog that seem odd but they're not really bad enough to take you out of the game and you really only notice them if someone points them out to you.
The story is a bit cheesy but not bad considering the content. The story has been covered well and there didn't seem to be too many places where you ended up wondering "why did XXX happen? Why do I need to do YYY?".

My likes with Dead Rising:
everything is a weapon

• there is nothing more satisfying than picking up next to anything in a mall and using it as a weapon... from frying pans, hockey sticks, shower heads, iron bars, hunting knives, guns, chars, etc.. they all feel right, have appropriate sounds for them and are a lot of fun. I was surprised that this never really got old
  

difficulty seems perfect

• some of the 'boss' fights can get annoying but never did I get really frustrated or pissed off and I managed to get the "true ending" without hitting max level or using some unexpected game AI or behavior to trick the game
  

lots of variety

• some people complain about the rescue missions but I found all of them fun and challenging, driving vehicles, searching for items, rescuing people, progressing the story line all made the entire game experience fun
  

vehicles

• how can running over tons of zombies with a Harley not be fun?
  

physics are fun

• some games overuse physics but the game uses them so that they make sense and add to the believability of the game. The physics make the weapons look and feel a lot better, even if some of the weapons sometimes feel weak.
  

Dislikes:
save system tries to make the game more difficult than it needs to be

• The game is difficult enough, the single save slot system seems to be in place to artificially make the game more complicated or longer than it needs to be. the save system only limits experimentation by the game which is a mistake in my opinion. I still managed to get far enough in the game without being hamstrung by the save system but I can see how people could screw themsevles up and have to start again. I don't think this is fun or improves the game in any way.
  

some bosses seem buggy or intentionally more difficult than necessary

• I didn't have too many problems with the NPC AI though the regularly did get stuck on the geometry or took odd paths to get to my location, I really liked the ability to give the NPCS weapons to protect themselves so maybe that's why I didn't run into as much problems. Boss AI sometimes seemed off and they would get stuck on geometry or exhibit the same pathing problems as the NPC AI
  

the game screams co-op multiplayer yet none exists

• If they would have even just put in a "sandbox" mode with co-op play over live to go through the story mode I really think it would have pushed this game even higher. I understand the mechanical problems of multiplayer in a sandbox game but man it would be a lot of fun to bash zombies with a friend.

I've really only just finished the storyline of the game. I still want to go replay the whole thing to get the maximum level, get some of the achievements, save a lot more mall residents, etc. I'm really happy with Dead Rising and would definately recommend it if you're looking for a fun single player game or a title to show off to your zombie loving friends. I think Dead Rising bodes well for Lost Planet from the same publisher (Capcom) and designer (Keiji Inafune).