It’s like 2006 all over again and Frank West is once again back to doing what he does best: snapping pictures of the living dead. Miss out on the 2016 PS4 or PC rereleases or just want to play again with some modern touch-ups? Perhaps it’s time to get the camera gear ready and revisit an Xbox 360 classic in Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster.
2006 is Back from the Dead
Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster stars freelance photographer and part-time crossover brawler Frank West. Fresh off of apparently covering wars, Frank gets a hot tip that something is going on in the unassuming town of Willamette, and upon arriving in a helicopter spots that the military has the town on lockdown. Landing at the one notable location in the town (the Mall), Frank meets some characters who try to convince him that the town is flooded with people acting like members of the undead. Naturally Frank is skeptical of this, at least until the zombies are practically chowing down on him.
This is a Capcom zombie game, the same company that gave us the Resident Evil series. As such, it’s not much of a surprise that a lot is going on behind the scenes. Being the investigative journalist that he is, it’s up to you as Frank West to get the scoop and find out exactly why a riot of brain-dead people has descended upon the mall. And unlike Dead Rising 4, this game isn’t set around Black Friday.
Putting the Store in Story
If, like myself, this isn’t your first Willamette rodeo, you’ll be wondering if anything is different in this new version of Dead Rising 1. Aside from a few changes to the dialogue and some character redesigns to be less potentially offensive, the story remains the same, so taper your expectations accordingly.
The story provides a fun mystery and the cast helps carry it along. Frank is enjoyably tongue-in-cheek in his iconic debut, and the Psychopaths (bosses) that litter the mall manage to tiptoe just about every cliche you can think of. While I would have loved a few additional scenes, I can appreciate that, as the title implies, this is a remaster and not a remake in the vein of Resident Evil 4’s 2023 remake.
Time to Play the Game
Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster is a third-person action-adventure game set in a shopping mall filled with zombies. It evokes classic zombie movies like Dawn of the Dead so much that there was once a copyright case over it. If you’ve ever seen either of the films this will scratch that itch perfectly.
You are given 72 (in-universe) hours to uncover the secret of the outbreak of Willamette. All you have are your wits, your smart mouth, your camera for taking pictures of anything and everything, and a shopping mall full of items ranging from magazines to katanas and guns to kick the undead’s ass back to hell.
During the game you constantly have the in-game timer looming over you. You have 72 hours but that’s only in-game time, the game roughly works out that 24 in-game hours equals 2 real world hours. This means that you’ll spend a lot of time trying to figure out the quickest routes around the mall, weighing up if you should save one of the game’s many survivors, take on the optional psychopaths or side quests, or make your way through the main story cases. The timer offers a risk vs. reward system that is greatly rewarding when you plan your time well and manage to level up using the optional content enough to continue to the main case with ease.
This system also ties to the game’s many optional endings, as well as how much of the map you see, which survivors spawn, and other hidden events. Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster really leans into being a multiple-playthrough type of game, and fortunately you can carry over your gained stats between playthroughs should you want to. This can make those opening hours a breeze and allow you to bask in the chaos should you decide to forego the main story in favor of focusing on saving survivors.
PP is on the Next Level
Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster uses a leveling-up system that rewards you for killing zombies, escorting survivors to safety, defeating psychopaths, completing main or side missions, finding special stickers and taking pictures of them, or just about any action that isn’t as basic as movement. As you gather the requisite prestige points (PP) needed to level up, you gain levels that give you more health, extra moves, more inventory space and even make Frank move faster. PP is as fun to gather as it is to say, and as you go around the mall discovering items, stores and many secrets you’ll just naturally get stronger from playing the game and exploring around. It’s a great system that rewards natural curiosity, a common theme within this game.
Combat is a pretty basic affair, at least at first. You start with some standard moves like punches, but as you level up you gain more moves like zombie riding (where you jump across their heads), or even a lariat which lets you spin around hitting zombies reminiscent of moves from some of Capcom’s other titles. Weapons can be found all over and have quite a wide range of variety. It’s always fun finding a new weapon and figuring out how best to use it, and it’s cool that guns aren’t always the answer, as at times it’s best to bring the pain down on the undead with a mini chainsaw.
You can find magazines around the mall that offer buffs to your character. Some help you gain PP using certain weapons or even increase the durability of weapons, while others are for very specific contexts (including one for teaching Frank basic Japanese to communicate with a pair of survivors in a particular sidequest). You’ll be swinging and shooting a lot so it’s always good to keep durability-improving magazines in mind. There are also food items around that fill your health up, as well as blenders in certain locations that allow you to create smoothies that can also offer you buffs such as extra speed or a brief window of invincibility. Experimentation is the name of the game.
One Giant Escort Mission
Escorting survivors to the safe house is an arduous affair; many tend to get hung up on the zombies, some require Frank to carry them, and they often just aren’t the quickest group of people to move around. This is another risk vs reward system as survivors can be quite a time-consuming to get back to the safe house but outside of PP stickers and the Psychopath fights they are the best way to build PP ultimately making the game a little easier. You can get them to follow you or place them at a certain location. Some have a better affinity with weapons and you can thankfully heal them so it’s not all bad. Still, if you happen to not be careful and do something like getting caught in the main yard while the ever-dangerous escaped convicts are riding around, your survivors can fall victim quite quickly.
Using everything at your disposal, your goal is to survive the 72-Hour Mode and achieve one of the game’s endings (which depend on story progress and actions taken). Should you get the “true” ending, you’ll unlock the infamous Infinity Mode, which allows you to explore the Mall without a time limit. The game gradually steps up in difficulty, and this mode is considered more of an optional challenge to see how long you can survive. Fortunately in Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster you can save in Infinity Mode, allowing you to take breaks (unlike in the original where you had to just keep your console on the whole time and risk overheating/RRoDing your Xbox 360 if that was your platform of choice).
What’s Old is New
The game has had quite a few additional tweaks and quality-of-life improvements. There is now a set of stairs leading to the vent to the safe room, which expedites part of the trek back. Survivors will point stuff out to you as you walk around the mall such as PP Stickers or locations where you might find items. There is a new control scheme allowing you to move and aim with guns, and the dodge roll is far more effective than it was before. These changes make fighting psychopaths a lot easier, though for those wanting the classic experience you can still use the original control scheme. Exploration and combat all have a share of additional minor features and tweaks as well.
Finally, they have added many more costumes for Frank in Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster along with a costume case (similar to Dead Rising 4) allowing you to switch to any of your costumes, unlike the original where you had to the store with the specific costume you wanted to change into. While there are quite a few to unlock through in-game challenges, there are also a bunch of DLC ones that not only change Frank’s appearance but can also change the Mall music. Fancy running around like Lan Hikari from Mega Man Battle Network while that series’s ACDC Town music plays? Go ahead! Dead Rising is just as much of a toy box as it is a zombie survival game, and it’s fantastic to see this game back once again in arguably the best shape it’s ever been in.
Frank’s Failed Botox
Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster has had quite a facelift to make this title from 2006 stand up graphically with today’s titles. Arguably it does look better than Dead Rising 4, but I feel some of the art direction has been lost with this facelift.
The original Dead Rising has an almost cartoony look to it at times, which gave it a rather unique charm that carried on into Dead Rising 2 (though sadly not 3 or 4). This remaster opts for a more realistic look that saturates the color to a point and makes the character models, especially Frank, look pretty bad. He’s gone from a roguish-looking reporter to someone with a bulbous face, and he looks out of place.
The game’s performance is great and the lighting effects look fantastic, though some scenes are lacking, like one at the start where you see a gas station destroyed. Sadly, the explosion effect looks cheap compared to the original. For the most part though, it does a great job of modernizing the game while only slightly taking away from the style that resonated with gamers in the original.
In terms of voice acting, all the voice actors have been replaced in the Remaster. In this version we have Jas Patrick as Frank who honestly does a damn fine job of replicating the reporter we all know and love without sounding like a cheap knock-off of the original performance by T.J. Rotolo. Brad, on the other hand, doesn’t benefit from a new voice actor. I can’t say I was a fan of the performance, finding the voice grating.
All the survivors have voice acting now and it helps to add a little character to them. The more questionable accents have gone along with some other changes like the removal of the “erotica” category of photos. For newcomers this won’t affect your time with the game, these changes are only going to hit the people who’ve played the original version.
Verdict
For me, Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster plays exactly how I remember Dead Rising, but without the annoyances that the original had. Almost all of the changes have been made for the better, and it’s an absolute joy to play from start to finish, infinity and beyond. I can see some old school gamers being annoyed at the changes in the game but I feel what they changed would have been very problematic in today’s climate.
I highly suggest any fans of Dead Rising or even just zombie pop-culture in general pick this up. Even if you just fancy a fun sandbox that rewards experimentation and exploration with an enjoyable and sometimes tongue-in-cheek story with a unique sense of humor, you need to run down to your nearest store, fight off a zombie horde, down a smoothie and grab this game as soon as possible. Your 72 hours start now!
DEAD RISING DELUXE REMASTER IS HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
Enjoy Action titles? Why not check out Earth Defense Force 6?
Many thanks go to Capcom for a PlayStation 5 review code for this title.
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