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Don't you just love and hate the undead at the same time? They're supposed to be dead, but they've been brought back to life by a supernatural force. With minimal cerebral activity, they're slow and dumb. With their bodies in a permanent state of decay, they are not a pleasant sight. The smell of rotten flesh precedes them, as well as the hollow, lifeless sounds that emanate from their throats. They're coming for you, carrier of a fresh set of brains, to temporarily appease their never-ending hunger. And there are absolutely loads of them. We call them zombies, and this summer Capcom brings them to your Xbox 360 by means of Dead Rising. flan_man makes a stand inside of the shopping mall, and brings you the preview. 
| Dead Rising | | Capcom | | Capcom | | ESRB: M; PEGI: 18+ | | August 8, 2006 | | 1 | | No |
Short introduction With Capcom behind the development rudder of Dead Rising, you might expect a survival horror game close to the likes of Resident Evil. While both Resident Evil and Dead Rising both feature zombies, the latter will take a whole other approach, and incorporate plenty of humorous bits into the gameplay. Zombie devotees who have watched Braindead, or more recently Shaun of the Dead, know that the mix of zombies and humor is tricky, but in the right hands it can work to great effect.
If you're somewhat of a self-respecting horror fan, George A. Romero's classic zombie fest Dawn of the Dead should be well known to you. A group of survivors from an ever-growing zombie epidemic decide to find refuge in a secluded shopping mall. Unfortunately, the mall attracts a lot of zombies, and when a motor gang busts through the barricade, their safe haven is lost. When you see Peter and Roger, the two SWAT team members, running in between the hordes of zombies for the first time, cold chills creep over your spine. Yes, those zombies are slow, but there are so many of them, it's like a flesh-eating ocean to paddle through on a rubber boat!
With this classic survival horror formula in mind, Capcom gives us a whole new shopping mall to mess around in, filled to the brim with hungry legions of the undead. This time you're not just watching the action though; you're dropped right into the middle of it! Can you keep your cool and make it out of there alive?
The story goes Your name is Frank West, and you are a photojournalist. You just found out that something weird is going on in the town of Willamette, Colorado, and with a strong desire to win a Pulitzer Prize, that town is just where you're headed. The army (in a true zombie plot form) did set up several checkpoints and roadblocks, but you can easily bypass those with your handy helicopter.
It doesn't take long for you to figure out that zombies have overrun the entire town. With your overzealous freelance photojournalist qualities taking the lead, the helicopter pilot drops you off by the Willamette Parkview Mall, and gives you 72 hours to get your story. Before you know it, you'll become trapped in the shopping mall, where you must use whatever you can find to protect yourself, and other survivors, from the seemingly never-ending stream of zombies, all while attempting to photograph the carnage in order to win that Pulitzer Prize. There's tons of them After having shoved some zombies out of your way as you start exploring the shopping mall, a sadistic smile will cover your face as you pick up a battle-axe. You run back to the zombies that you first tried to avoid at all cost, and start hacking into them, with satisfying blood showers and plenty of severed limbs as a result.
This is just the start of things, because soon zombies come in masses, and this is where Dead Rising will try to set itself apart from other zombie games. Such is the power of the Xbox 360, that up to 800 zombies can appear on screen at once, every single one of them fully rendered and animated. They all group together, and the Xbox 360 doesn't lose a single frame while displaying this onslaught. It doesn't get more frantic than this.
More than just blind carnage
Of course you could just play Dead Rising with the single goal of splattering as much zombie tissue all over the mall as possible. The game provides you with just about everything you can think of. Baseball bats, hockey sticks, tennis rackets, shower heads, light sabers, plasma screens, shotguns, chainsaws, plastic cacti, and many more items that can be used and abused by you to bust up zombies foolish enough to get close to you.
In total there will be over 250 items at your disposal in order to satisfy your taste for hemoglobin. Alternatively, try killing 1,000 zombies with your bare hands to gain the Karate Champ achievement. It's all up to you.
Killing zombies isn't the only thing Dead Rising offers. Remember Frank’s quest for the Pulitzer Prize? He will need some convincing photographic evidence of his adventure, and this is where his, and your, photojournalistic skills come into play. From the very start of the game you are equipped with a camera, which is mapped to your left trigger button. Take photos of zombies and survivors, and you'll earn prestige points. The more sensational and dramatic moments that you are able to capture in your photos, the more prestige points you'll earn. These points are in fact valuable for you to level up and gain new abilities in the game. New abilities can range from a longer life bar, to an additional inventory slot, or a new combat skill. You'll have to start thinking as a true journalist, as a great photo opportunity could always be waiting around the corner.
Another way to earn prestige points is to complete side missions, which are referred to as “scoops” in the game. These will often involve escorting or rescuing the other survivors that are stuck inside of the mall. The choice here is completely yours, as you are by no means obliged to help them out. It is perfectly acceptable (though probably not to the victim) to just stand there, waiting for their demise, and a great photo opportunity at that. You can even decide to blast them to bits alongside with the zombies, but then you might miss out on crucial pieces of information they carry, information that will bring you closer to discovering the truth behind the zombie incident.
The ultimate goal
Dead Rising is designed to be totally open-ended. You can investigate whatever you want, kill whoever you want, and finish the game by completing whatever objectives you see fit. Making it out of the mall isn't that hard if you lay low, but without any shocking evidence you're not going to become that star reporter.
There will be roughly 100 characters to find and interact with, and the mall itself is quite large too, sporting around 120 shops. Not all of the mall's areas will be accessible in the beginning. Depending on your actions during the game, and your aptitude at completing the scoops, you will be able to gain access to these areas, and get a hold of better weapons, as well as clues that will bring you closer to Dead Rising's real ending. Conclusion There is something about zombies that always keeps us begging for more, and Dead Rising looks set to deliver a massive ration of zombie onslaught festivities. Getting to the point where the helicopter comes to pick you up will only take 2 to 3 hours in real time, but there seems to be an enormous amount of replay value and insane fun hidden in Dead Rising, guaranteeing plenty of fresh starts. For starters there is a real plethora of weapons to face the zombies with, and some of these weapons are totally outlandish (plastic cacti anyone?). Apart from that you'll also have to gain a greater awareness of your surroundings in order to interact with the other survivors inside of the mall, and finish the right set of scoops within the imposed time frames. And then there also are your photographic skills, the desire for the Pulitzer, and trying to maximize your prestige points.
The combination of relentless action, sadistic humor, excessive gore and strong visual presentation looks set to make Dead Rising a must buy for the Xbox 360 this summer. As if that weren't enough, Capcom also mentioned there will be un-lockable gameplay modes. These might very well let you hang out in the Willamette Parkview Mall for good.
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