Customer Reviews

Dead Rising

5 star:		(75)
4 star:		(92)
3 star:		(43)
2 star:		(37)
1 star:		(26)

 

 

Although I prefer FPS (first person shooters) to the 3rd person adventure games, I loved the latest installments of the Lara Croft and the Hitman series games. As of this writing, I have completed Dead Rising in the 72 hour mode and am now replaying the game to try to earn all of the achievements.

Dead Rising is a brand-new genre for the Xbox 360. It's closest cousin is Condemned, a first person horror adventure game but Dead Rising has a number of unique features that set it apart. First off, you can pick up just about anything in the area and use it as a weapon. Potted plants, lawnmowers and even an electric guitar are all at your disposal. There are easily hundreds of potential weapons in this game and part of the fun is discovering new ways to fight off zombies with what you have available at hand.

Adding to the distinct style of Dead Rising is the ability to customize your character. As you make your way through the mall, you can try on new clothing available from the various shops. Cool suits, fashionable glasses and, yes, even women's and children's apparel is fair game to put on. Besides wearing it as you battle the zombies, your character will also appear as you have dressed him during the video cut-scenes, which is a nice extra touch I was delighted to see. Food has also been given special "abilities" in the game. For example, you might find a frozen or raw food somewhere in the mall. If you eat it, you earn one or two points of health. But pop it into an oven before you eat it, and it will completely fill your health meter. Likewise, you can mix certain fluids in a blender can make an extra powerful energy drink!

If you can't tell by everything I've already mentioned, this game is deep. I've only touched the surface to avoid revealing any spoilers, but trust me when I say you can get totally wrapped up in this game. The plot, the game and every little thing (be sure to check out the bookstore!) in the vast mall has been developed with so much detail that you'll find yourself enthralled by it.

However, when undertaking such an ambitious project, there have to be some downfalls. The absolutely worst is the save game methodology. The developers have decided that you must find a restroom or a couch to save. While this seemed cute and clever at first, it quickly became frustrating and enraging (when you couldn't find one right before you got forced into a boss fight). Every player on the planet will find this feature problematic, I guarantee.

One thing that other reviewers haven't mentioned is that some of the level bosses (called "Psychopaths") are redundant or unfairly matched. For example, often you'll be faced with enemies with devastating long-range weapons when all you have is a knife or 2x4 to try and knock out your opponent with. In another boss attack, I literally started at a save point and had to go through two full levels to face a boss who would inevitably defeat me and then I'd have to start all over again. These opponents often have a move that will completely incapacitate you in a single swipe, even when you have full health. This, combined with the fact that you will often have to run halfway across the map (where your last game save was) to repeat the battle, makes the game incredibly annoying. If you could ammo up, then save right before the boss battle, the game would be considerably more enjoyable.

Another item, although mentioned by others in a different light, is the text-based mission objectives. Many reviewers have stated that the text is almost unreadable on smaller, standard definition televisions. However, my biggest complaint in this area is that the text is used at all. This game, by its very nature, is immersive. When you're trapped in a mall and having to fight zillions of zombies, you shouldn't have to stop to read the text of another character. I honestly wish Capcom had spent a little extra time and money to change all of the text interactions to spoken instructions. Not only would this have solved their biggest technical problem with the game, it would have also helped keep the suspense.

Finally, there's a lot of "load-screen-itis" in this game. And by that, I mean that you'll be seeing a lot of the loading screen. Granted, the mall is a huge environment, and the load times are a snappy 5-6 seconds, but it gets annoying when you walk into an elevator and wait, walk down a hallway and wait, turn left and wait... You get the picture.

There is no online component to allow multiplayer (which would be awesome!) but Dead Rising does have downloadable content from Xbox Live. It was available just days after the game released and consists of eight "keys" which unlock several new outfits for the main character, available at no charge. As you'd expect, the game also supports Xbox Achievements, with 50 of them to earn, each worth 20 Gamerscore points. You'll have to spend hundreds (if not thousands!) of hours in this game trying to obtain all of these objectives and I don't consider many of them a "walk in the park."

Honestly, it seems like I'm spending a lot of time picking on the problems of this game, but they will plague you as you try to play through the levels. But when it comes right down to it, this game has all 5 "Es" that make it a powerhouse: Exciting plot, Engaging environments, Enlightening characters, 360 Exclusivity and Encredible customization! (OK, that last one wasn't an "E" but you'll have to forgive me, just like you'll have to forgive certain flaws in this game!) In short, you should definitely pick this game up, but love it for everything it accomplishes while forgiving it for the technical problems that it has. I give it a solid 5 stars for fun, but a 3 star rating for the inherent problems.

Expectations can basically make or break this game. The problem I had w/ it and I think most others do is the fact we wanted to freely roam the mall while killing off as many zombies as we wanted with all the cool weapons avaliable. There would be a story to follow, but not in the annoying way it was implemented.

What CAPCOM delivered is slighly different from what most expected. The game takes place over 3 days, and within those 3 days you have to follow the game's main storyline within set time limits. Let clarify on that... you MUST get to certain story events within a certain time or you will loose out on the main story of the game. Side quests are avaliable, but you must pick and choose a few to do here and there because if you spend too much time on them, you will end up missing the main story. The game is made in such a way to MAKE you replay it two or three times atleast if you want to explore all the side quests and try to find all the cool weapons and things to see.

The issue with saving the game goes right along with the above... the developer didnt want you to be able to have multisaves and say take a different path or what not... they limited you to ONE save per XBOX360 profile. Everytime you save, you overwrite the last save. No other option. You can only save at the bathrooms and the safehouse. There is usually one save spot near each area, but it makes it a pain to save your progress.

Escort missings are a pain aswell as the people you try to save are extremly stupid. They try to fight zombies (and usually loose) and take forever to get where you call them to. You have to call for them over and over to try to direct them to safety.. again not so much fun.

The above reasons make you feel like the game is somewhat "job" like as it forces you to adhere to these requirements it has forcefully. It takes the edge off what could have been a five star game.

Why is the game still great? Well, it's extremly fun to go around killing zombies w/ just about everything you find along the mall stores (hedge clippers, chainsaws, bats, purses, etc..) and the game runs fast and smooth w/ nice looking visuals. Going around killing batches after batches of zombies just doesn't get old! Facial expressions look great and the zombie/weapon/voice sounds are perfect for the game. The voice acting great too IMO... its a shame that the few people you see in the game dont talk, you simply recieve subtitles for them.

I think the demo of the game also lead people to believe the game would be more free roaming that it actually is (fooled me) and that also plays a part in the initial dissapointment many are experiencing. Once you get over the fact that the you tied down by the clock and the subpar save system, you will enjoy the game though! Recommended!

Well, I have been enjoying Dead Rising for a week now and I can't honestly think of a game out there that is more fun than this one. While I do agree with everone else that the small font puts a damper on the mood, I have just learned to move on with it. I can read it but it is tough on the old eyes. I have a standard def 36" WEGA and while it is small, it is legible. I will try it on my parents 61" Hidef this weekend to see any difference. I can only imagine what the graphics look like if they look this great on my standard def TV.

This game is very deep. The save feature is disappointing and you will find that you will learn to constantly bring up the map to check for save points. After you play for a hour or more and die and have to replay through it, you quickly learn. Another thing I don't care for is having to restart the game if you miss a "scoop" and it throws the rest of the game out. You can still play and do the missions, atleast for a while but you can no longer find the truth. This happened to me twice. The first time, I just plain didn't realize that it would happen and did not do the scoop missions in a timely manner. The second time I played through it, I thought I was doing great time and kept checking the watch (another feature you learn to do quite often) and when it said my next mission would begin at 3:00, I noticed that when it turned to 4:00, the missions ended and once again I lost the remainder of the scoop missions. Learn to watch the scoop timelines. They will slowly count down and turn colors to warn you. I guess I just had too much fun whacking zombies and lost track of the in game time.

The depth of this game comes from the many ways in which to dispose of zombies. You can pretty much use ANYTHING in the game to take them out. One spot had me pick up a power auger, which is used to dig post holes. I stuck a zombie and cranked the gas and watched him spin around. Then, I proceeded to walk through the crowd of zombies and take them out. In the process of this, the zombie spinning on my auger started to break apart. This was a great laugh. Again, you can use pretty much everything in the game and while most do eventually tear up, you can always find something else. Another fun part was walking to the other end of the mall through the Leisure Park and seeing a push mower/brushhog and mowing down the crowd of zombies.

I was completely impressed with the graphics of this game. While the zombies do tend to look a lot alike, the environment is just gorgeous. Capcom did a great job to put so many of the zombies onscreen at once. Later through the game, you will encounter bosses that can be difficult to beat. Just be sure to save before you fight a boss, although the first time around it is hard because you don't know when you will fight a boss. You enter a store and then wham, you have a boss fight. As you play through the game, you are encouraged to take pictures and help escort people to the security room, which is basically your home base. You will see that if you can capture pictures that pick up on drama or horror or even erotica, among others, will get you more points and these points along with the points for saving people will get you to level up which will help you increase your life or the amount of things you can carry or unlock special moves.

This is definitely not a game for the younger crowd as it is very gory. I think Capcom has a hit on their hands and hopefully they can work it into a sequel in some way with improvements to the aforementioned bumps but hopefully they will get a patch over Live to help correct the text problems. Most of the time during the normal text there is not much voice over work. During the cutscenes, which are nicely animated, there is no problem as their is good voice over acting, incredible good when compared to the Resident Evil series. You won't go wrong with this game. It is a great game to enjoy so long as you are old enough to understand that things that you can do in the game can't be done in real life. As dumb as that sounds, there are those out there who might want to recreate something they did in the game.

Enjoy this game and know that you will die often and have to repeat things over again but for the majority, it isn't a problem as things aren't often the same way the second time around, except for cutscenes of course. That is another great thing about this game, the repayability is incredibly deep. Forgive the text, the dumb AI and the lousy save functions and enjoy the game for what it got right.

I'm going to get straight to the point. This game rocks, but has a few SEVERE flaws. Really dissapointing becuase this COULD have been the greatest game ever made. Unfortunately, it falls short, yet i still recomend it. I'm sure you are reading a lot of negative press, maybe even a lot of positive too. So if you are trying to decide what to do, my opinion is despite all the problems, this is a must have game if...
You like zombies (games, movies, etc)
you like the resident evil series
you want a fun game that will last you a long time

Really, there is a lot of good, but i will actually cover the bad, i'm sure none of this will be new judging by other reviews but here we go!

The VERY bad....

1) Saves...???? what were they thinking? ONE spot? Come on, it's not a cartridge game for crying out loud! I don't want to start over and over and OVER again because the bosses are insanely hard.

2) THAT STUPID CELL PHONE DOESN"T STOP RINGING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
and it won't either until you answer it, THEIR IS NO HOPE SO JUST GIVE IN AND DO IT OR ELSE IT NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER NEVER stops ringing. I wish you could just kill otis and feed him to the zombies and keep ringing his phone while they eat him, see how he likes it. That is BY FAR the MOST ANNOYING aspect of the game, BY FAR

3) The people you have to rescue are RETARDED! They DO NOT follow commands and it is EXTREMELY frustrating having to continuosly backtrack to rescure them from a swarm of zombies only to have the other person you are trying to rescue die because of it. AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHH!
Why are they so stupid? Take my advice, never try to rescue more than 2 people at once. Forget it, just leave them to be zombie food. It's not worth it!

4) I'm not wearing a telescope on my head, I am not a human magnifying lens, and I don't own a TV as big as a house so WHAT GIVES WITH THE SMALL SUBTITLES? Would it have killed you to spend five extra seconds working on it? This is a 360 not a NES, why not just have the characters voice it out? It's SUPPOSED to be a next generation game isn't it?

5)Aiming with a handgun, or any gun for that matter...UNFORGIVABLE. What happened to the resdient evil auto aim?

Despite these MAJOR flaws, which I guarantee will SEVERLY upset you and bring the overall experience down, I still highly recomend this game. It was my first 360 game and even though it needs work I love it.

I'm sure with capcom this game was a "test run" for a new resident evil, but if you make a sequal PLEASE GET RID OF THAT STUPID PHONE, and be kind enough to fix the flaws. Remember, the consumer who buys this pays YOUR salary, so have a little consideration

Now go out and get this game, don't be scared because of the flaws. You may end up liking it after all, I did. Still makes me mad though. ALMOST PERFECT!

To paraphrase a Marine Corps saying: "Killing zombies is easy and fun". At least, it is when you're playing "Dead Rising", the latest zombie title from Capcom.

But let me clarify the above point a bit. When I say "easy", I'm talking about dealing with individual zombies or small groups of them. As one character tells you in the beginning, "The good news is, zombies are slow and stupid!" The bad news is that what the shuffling undead lack in speed and smarts, they make up for in sheer numbers. Dealing with one zombie is easy, dealing with 20 is a whole other matter.

"Dead Rising" puts you in the shoes of Frank West, a freelance photographer who gets wind of something going down in the secluded Colorado town of Willamette. After bypassing military roadblocks by hiring a helicopter to ferry you in, you touch down at the local mall to investigate.

The early stage of the game is peppered with quite a few cutscenes, but they are surprisingly engaging and set up an intriguing storyline. The character models are alarmingly realistic, right down to those wispy hairs women have on their cheeks, but there are quite a few uncanny valley moments.

As Frank explores the mall, you will discover vast array of zombie-killing implements, each with their own unique effects. In just an hour or so of play last night, I used a lead pipe, a 2x4, a baseball bat, a golf club, a cleaver, a sickle, and a pistol. The sickle was particularly satisfying. After Frank buries it in a zombie's neck, he dislodges it by bracing a foot against its chest and kicking it off, which has the effect of decapitating zombie in a gush of blood. I guess that why they say sickles really satisfy.

But even zombie-hacking would get old after a while, and so it's to Capcom's credit that they've designed a deeper and more engaging game. Frank's real objective is not to mow down endless numbers of zombies, but rather to uncover what the hell has gone so horribly wrong in Willamette. He does this by tracking down survivors and piecing together information from a couple of apparent government agents also trapped in the mall.

Frank also has to document what is happening by taking photos. The game walks you through a tutorial that instructs you on how to compose pictures with horrific, dramatic or erotic compositions. The more of those elements you can squeeze into a photo, the more "player points" you earn and the faster your skills improve.

There are also plenty of side missions, from checking out mysterious developments to rescuing other characters and leading them to safety.

I do, however, have two complaints. One is about the camera. Instead of staying right behind Frank all the time, he can rotate in your field of view so that what he's looking at isn't necessarily what you're looking. Sure, you can reorient the camera behind him with a click of the thumbstick, but it's still annoying, especialy when you're beset by a dozen zombies coming from all sides. It also makes it hard to use aimed weapons like the pistol.

The other complaint is about the save system. Basically, you have one save slot, and you can only save at your "home base" of the security room, or in the mall's bathrooms. Unfortunately, you can find yourself quite a ways away from those places while carrying out a mission, and if you die, you've just lost a good chunk of progress. Also, from some of the reviews, the single save slot can also be problematic because many of the missions are timed, and if you save at the wrong point, you may not have enough time to complete the mission, requiring a total restart.

Nonetheless, I'm looking forward to some good old-fashioned zombie bashing, with a bit o' "X-Files"-style conspiracy thrown in to boot. If you're antsy for some good 360 action during the summer lull, it'd be worth your time to check out "Dead Rising".

Dead Rising does a lot right, and has a lot of unique things going for it. Yet, at the same time, it seems to do so many easy and fundamental things wrong that, at times, they make the game hair-pullingly annoying. While these problems don't kill Dead Rising, they do severely hinder what could have potentially been the game of the year.

The graphics and sound in Dead Rising are both fantastic, even on an old CRT and 2.1 speakers. The characters look amazingly life-like, and the texturing on their clothing/hands etc. is absolutely fantastic. Light and shadows look very nice, and the game -- thankfully -- does not use over the top bloom effects. The sheer number of zombies on screen is a feat in and of itself, and they all look fantastic as well. Killing them makes them erupt in geysers of blood that are also quite nice looking (if that's at all possible). Occasionally, there are some problems with the frame rate -- usually with the baseball bat connecting with a large number of zombies at once -- and some clipping on a few costumes, but the game is pretty much glitch free. Oh, and the Havok physics make for some interesting zombie deaths. Naturally, the physics engine isn't that realistic, but it's still really neat to watch a zombie fly 15 feet after you nail him in the face with your Louisville Slugger.

I won't ruin the story for anyone, but I can say that I throughly enjoyed it. It is serious, yet remains "tongue in cheek," never getting too melodramatic or anything of the sort, meaning it's quite entertaining. The voice acting is excellent across the board, which really adds to the game's story a lot. Some dialogue isn't voice acted, and instead pops up on screen as text, which is awful, since the font size is tiny, making it almost unreadable on non-HDTVs. Bad move by Capcom.

The gameplay is refreshing, which is a surprise, considering that Dead Rising is essentially a beat 'em up. The main reason for this is because of the sheer number of items you can kill zombies with. Nothing says business more than a katana slicing three undead in half. Or shotgunning five zombies in the face, blowing off their heads. The list could go on nearly ad naseum, but needless to say, there's a lot of cool ways to kill zombies. Controls are mostly good, but the aiming system is kind of wonky for guns. It's fine if you aim using the right trigger, but if you don't, Frank seems to just fire in a random direction. I've also seen shotgun and handgun blasts go through zombies that were standing right next to me, which is a frustrating problem when you're trying to clear a path for yourself. These are minor gripes, however, and the number of different ways to kill your enemies ensures that the game remains entertaining throughout.

So far, so good...right? Unfortunately, the design of Dead Rising is severely flawed. Interestingly enough, the problem is not so much the save system, which has been the bane of many a reviewer's existence. Rather, the problem is with the 72 hour mode. Capcom pushes the player from mission to mission, rarely giving them the chance to go and do anything else. For a game touted as having so many possibilities/things to do, it's ridiculous that you can't do even a quarter of them in a playthrough. There simply isn't time to go and save more than 15 (maybe 20, if you're really good or lucky) survivors, or track down and kill all of the psychopaths. Especially towards the end of the game (third day), the game is brutally unforgiving. In a way, this adds to the game's atmosphere, making it more tense and exciting. But all of that excitement dies hard when you fail a mission simply because you don't have enough time to make your way across the mall within the time limit the game bestows upon you. It makes for a frustrating trial and error experience.

The other major problem stems with the surivor escort missions. These make up the bulk of the side missions (probably about 90%, the other 10% or so being "defeat the psychopath (boss)" affairs). The survivor AI is, in a word, broken. They will stop in the middle of a pack of zombies and try to punch them. They won't follow you when you call them with the Y button. Sometimes they won't move at all, and simply just stand still as they are eaten alive. Even if you make it to the zombie free rooftop, you're not homefree. To get into the security room (which is the destination point), you must climb over a ledge. The survivors oftentimes will not climb the ledge, instead choosing to run back and forth in front of it. Now, remember, you're on a strict time limit, so spending a minute or two trying to coax them up is just impossible. And if you leave them on the roof (which has no zombies on it), they'll die. I had to leave two people I had brought from the opposite end of the mall, simply because they couldn't get on the ledge. The AI is completely and utterly busted, with not one iota of intelligence.

The boss fights range from cool to mind-bendingly cheap. Oftentimes, they [virtually] require you to have a firearm, which is not always possible, given the time limit in the game. A lot of boss fights devolve into trying to find a place where the AI cannot hit you, and then cheaply taking pot shots at them with a ranged weapon. It's too bad, since the bosses are pretty interesting characters in themselves -- it's a shame that they aren't more fun to fight. Once you level up enough, the boss fights become a lot easier and less long-winded, which is a big plus.

The game becomes significantly more fun after you hit level 20 or so. At this point, you can kill zombies in one or two hits from most melee weapons, and you have enough health to make it across the map and back without dying. You also have some useful hand to hand moves, which can mow down lots of zombies at once. These are especially helpful, since items break waaaaay too easily. You can only kill 20 or so zombies with a katana (and most any other melee weapon) before it snaps, leaving you with whatever other weapons you have.

Dead Rising features some other novel gameplay elements, most notable of which are the food and photography. You can mix together drinks to form super smoothies of sorts, which give you various abilities, including upping your running speed, temporary invincibilty and more. The photography is more of a gimmick than anything else, but you can take some really cool pictures, and get experience points for them to boot.

If Capcom had made an untimed story mode, with the 72 hour mode an unlockable challenge, Zombie Revenge would easily be one of the best games of the year. Hell, even if they had been more forgiving in the 72 hour mode, allowing players to explore et al., the game would be close to being the game of the year. Unfortunately, Dead Rising stands as a prime example of getting all of the little things wrong. Great graphics, great gameplay, great sound, great story, great level design, great characters...and an absolutely horrible mode that makes the game much more difficult, annoying and exasperating than it needs to be. Overall, while Dead Rising remains fun to play -- a testament to how GOOD much of the game is -- it is nearly undone by how excrutiatingly bad the time limit makes the game.

7.5/10

If you're a fan of horror movies, Dead Rising is probably right up your alley. You play a photojournalists trapped for 3 days in a suburban mall full of zombies.

This game is a mixed blessing. Let's start with all the good aspects. The game is FUN. We've all seen the movies with zombies staggering around, and we've all hung out in malls, feeling bored. Put the two together, and voila! You can walk into any store and grab things to bash the zombies with. Run them over with a lawnmower! Pick up a piece of wood and start swinging! Or, my personal favorite, grab an electric guitar at the music store, whip it around like a fast-moving samurai sword, and hear the TWANG when you make contact!

The food system actually makes sense here. You go into food court shops! If you find the food in its base form, it's mildly healthy. If you take the time to cook it, it's even better for you.

There's an interesting plot to go with it too. I love that the various humans have names and that you actually learn about them, see their interactions and connect with them. You really care (or at least I do!) when you screw up and they get killed. It gives you a lot of incentive to replay the game to try to get everybody out. If you save a husband and his wife, they have a joyful reunion! It really draws you into the game.

So there is definitely a lot going for this game. However, there are a few signs that the game could have used a few more months in testing before it was released. First, we have a large high def TV, so we don't have a problem "seeing things". However, I've heard from many of my site visitors that on smaller TVs it's nearly impossible to read words or to understand the text messages. That's just unfair. They should have made the game easily playable even on non-high-def or smaller TVs.

Plus, why have to read dialogue at all in a horror game? That really interferes with the immersive quality. If you're knee deep in zombie fighting, you don't want to have to puzzle out what a victim is saying to you. They should just yell it out to you in real time so you can keep swinging while you listen.

The real killer here, though, is the loading screen. You take 5 steps. LOADING. You turn around. LOADING. You go up the stairs. LOADING. Good God!! With all the other HUGE map games out on the market that load seamlessly, there is no reason that a mall-based game could not do the same. It might have taken a month of coding time to work that in but it would have been WELL worth it.

Also, the save system is questionable. Only one save? One save at all? What if a friend comes over and wants to play forward for the weekend, but you want to be able to have your save spot for your own play after he leaves? You can't? Having just one save spot, in a world with a massive hard drive of storage, is nonsensical.

Still, you can deal with those issues, and the game really is a lot of fun. Remember though that it is a MATURE game with zombies with exploding heads and a lot of gore. So if you're a mature gamer who enjoys horror, definitely pick this one up!

I came late to the whole Xbox 360 scene and this is one of the titles that finally lured me in. I can't say that it was everything that I hoped for, but it wasn't a complete letdown either. The makings of a great game are there but the problem is that there are so many different facets of game play rolled into one game that it never satisfies fully in one area. On the one hand the game is open-ended and free form, but only if you don't care about the storyline. On the other hand, if you want the sense of accomplishment that you get when you truly complete a game then you will find Dead Rising a frustratingly mixed bag. The reason for this is that while the storyline is actually good and the time system is innovative (to a degree) it is also so hectic and unforgiving that you will find yourself constantly repeated large chunks of the game, at times even starting over from the beginning to get some extra levels under your belt. I think you would be hard pressed to finish this game start to finish without ever quitting and starting the game over from the beginning. Also, I don't think there is enough time in the game to complete every task (investigations, rescues and psychopaths to deal with) and stay on top of the cases (the events that propel the storyline and actually give you the "correct" ending. For me, this meant that I never felt a sense of complete accomplishment. I give the game 4 stars because despite its flaws it really is a very good game, just not perfect.

The GOOD:
- Despite being another zombie title from Capcom this game is much more in line with zombie pop-culture and more fun than the puzzle-driven and serious survival games like Resident Evil.
- The mix of humor and horror in this game is perfect, at times I was laughing out loud only to be grimacing a moment later. The game retains a tongue-in-cheek vibe from start to finish that celebrates zombie pop-culture.
- The game lets you dispatch zombies in any fashion you choose - literally I couldn't even imagine all the ways to kill zombies that exist in this game. Almost everything is a weapon with a surprising amount of versatility.
- The mall is huge and very well detailed. I was very impressed with it and could imagine this being a real mall just down the street.
- The voice acting and some of the cinematic sequences are great, but why can't the voices exist outside of the cut scenes? I'm sick of getting hounded by Otis on the transmitter every few minutes and having to pause to read what he has to say.
- People have complained that the game demands a decent hi-def TV to fully enjoy and I agree that it does. However, I believe in creating a game that is a visual acheivement and meant to be cutting edge and not dulling it down to make it marginal so it could be played on lower-end technology. However, this does limit how many people will be able to enjoy the game. But it does look good.
- Great and diverse sound effects.

Now the BAD:
- Time-based missions are too strict and hectic, and often times vague.
- Difficult to feel a sense of accomplishment the first time through. this is further emphasized by the odd save system and the fact that the game designers expected you to have to restart the game several times from the beginning.
- Controls for aiming are clunky and awkward. The aiming can be improved upon by changing the camera controls under settings though.
- Survivor AI is poor, but they are hardy and can withstand a chewing on.
- Doesn't put as much focus on killing zombies or survival as I'd have hoped for.
- The voice acting is really well done but doesn't exist outside of cut scenes (instead you are hounded by moments when you have to pull up the transmitter, limiting your movement choices and killing your combat abilities, and while trying to keep Frank alive you have to read the on screen text).
- Save system only allows 1 save slot per profile.
- Plenty of save locations, but in the unforgiving chaotic timeline you are under it can take precious time to reach a safe point before and after ever major event and some events do not allow for a convenient save which is incredibly frustrating.
- The constant loading screens get annoying.
- The weapons have varying (and confusing) lifespans and damage output.
- There is a variety of skills you can learn (martial arts style stuff) but they are hard to execute and don't work most of the time.

I don't quite understand people who think this game is lacking. I wonder if they've played it enough. Lets see, you got alot of zombies, of course, you can use just about everything as a weapon (including chainsaws, lawnmowers and of course gigantic teddy bears) along with various types of food and make mixtures of certain items to form some realistic like powerup. You gain points to eventually level up and get more moves, add more life, hold more weapons. become faster. Gigantic Mall inside, large area outside. Several Psychopaths who are smart and aren't slow. Rescue survivors, seems simple, unless they gotta battle there way through 500 zombies along with you. Then you got to protect them and yourself. Find survivors who don't want to be rescued and enter into little mini-games of varying degrees with them to get points. You've got missions to complete helping DHS Homeland Security Agents, if you don't, you can't win the game. You can drive vehicles when ever you can find them. You can take pictures, the better the picture (with more carnage) the more points. Also posters and other random items have stickers attached to them for even more points. Change your clothes and then rewatch the cut scenes in your new clothes (if seeing Frank with a megaman helmet on and kids clothes way too small for him while having a serious conversation with the Pilot doesn't make you laugh, your already dead). Oh yea and you gotta do all this in 72 hours. And don't forget, the lights go out at a certain time so, get ready to fight those zombies in the dark. Good luck. This is a really deep game, much deeper then anyone gives it credit for. I just wonder if naysayers dissing it's lack of depth have actually unlocked it's true potential. Graphically its very good, not the best, but solid next generation. Controls are also good and get better, as you level up. Sound is excellent and really captures the impending doom that anything with zombies should have. Gameplay like my entire review explains is much deeper then people give it credit for. Storyline is good and keeps you wondering like a good zombie game (or movie) should. The only flaw is the save system but thats not enough to stop you from buying this game. Let me also add that during cutscenes there is voice acting and the voice matches up to the lips very well. Its only during gameplay that you get text, rpg style. Something many games do, rpg or not. Its a truly great game and worth the money. Go For It. A++

I was very exciting for 'Dead Rising' after seeing some gameplay videos online. Unfortunately, I have yet to and likely never will complete this once promising title.

First, the good. The graphics, in terms of level and character design, are very good, stylized and effective. The gameplay is great, dropping you in the middle of (literally) hundreds of zombies without a hiccup in framerate, to slice and bash away with any makeshift weapon of choice. It's open ended, ensuring no two playthroughs are the same. It has dozens of characters and missions. It is fun to play, for a while.

Unfortunately, the bad more than outweighs the good, and you may never see much of the story. There are a number of issues that, alone wouldn't be so bad, and might even enhance the experience positively (with one glaring, unforgivable exception), but combined cripple any progress past the first hour or two of the game. The inventory system is very limited; weapons, health, and booster items all use the same set of 6 or so 'slots', severely limiting the overall number of items you can carry. This would be fine, if player and weapon health were better. Unfortunately, most weapons will break or run out of ammo after a dozen or so uses, and player health depletes rapidly, so you'll want to carry a lot of health (in the form of foods) and/or weapons at once. This would be fine, if not for 'Dead Rising's unforgivable save system, requiring the player to use specific save locations that are few and far between. The level design is confusing and repetitive, further complicating the ordeal of locating a save point. Dying could set you back several hours of gameplay. It also features a "replay plus" system, where you can choose to save your character progress, level, skills, etc, but restart the story mode. You might want to do this a few times starting out, so you can make better progress with a stronger character.

Boss fights are truly terrifying, as most greatly outmatch the player, and each hit does at least 1 damage (out of <10 health). Some use ranged weapons or vehicles (or in once case, both), and firearms can be difficult to find, making these battles almost impossible without several tries. But with the broken save system, you may only get one shot.

The objective system is also weak, with several "calls" every few minutes, frequently when fighting hordes of undead. You can either answer, which makes you unable to fight, or ignore the call, in which case you are penalized. Each mission is timed, so you may have to chose which to do (not negative). Each is assigned with a text message, but the text is very small and difficult to read. Luckily, the objective selection system is intuitive, allowing you to choose which to pursue, and showing the time on each.