Dead Rising 2 - Get Ready To Win Big

To continue my buildup to Dead Rising 3, I’ve also replayed the game before it in the series, Dead Rising 2. In contrast with the original Dead Rising, I have more of a history with this entry, as it was actually the first one I played. However I didn’t own an Xbox 360 back in 2010, so I ended up playing the game on PS3 instead after receiving the Zombrex Edition as an 18^th birthday present (interestingly enough, this game came out on my 18^th birthday, which is a little more special to me for reasons I will elaborate on later). After I played through it once I wrote a terrible review for it on DeviantArt before playing it again a few times in a row to unlock all of the pieces of the Knight Armor (a reference to Arthur from Ghosts n’ Goblins) and other such things before suddenly moving on to something else. With this last playthrough nearly four years later, I was able to look at it from a new perspective, that of someone playing it in 2014, and was able to conclude that though flawed, Dead Rising 2 is a definite improvement over its predecessor.

Condition Disclaimer: When playing this game again for the review, I started a new game from my Level 50 save game from four years ago with all four of the DLC packs applied. I also did not play the 360-exclusive Case Zero or Case West because I played the PS3 version of Dead Rising 2. It was decided that these conditions wouldn’t affect my overall opinion of the game.

Five years after the Willamette outbreak, former motocross champion Chuck Greene is in Fortune City, Nevada to take part in the game show Terror Is Reality, a rather controversial competition where contestants kill hordes of zombies for money and fame. Chuck is in it to gain the money needed to buy Zombrex (a drug which can stave off complete zombification for 24 hours) for his daughter Katey, who had been bitten by her zombified mother during an outbreak in Las Vegas when she was only four years old. After the show ends, Chuck goes backstage to talk to Katey, during which all of the zombies from the competition are released, killing most in attendance. Chuck grabs his daughter and manages to escape to a safe house, which closes behind them after they enter. Raymond Sullivan, the only surviving security guard, is reluctant to let the two of them take refuge, concerned that Katey will turn at any moment. In response, Chuck holds up a box for a dose of Zombrex and says that he can keep her zombification in check during their stay. Sullivan understands and lets them in, adding that the military will arrive within three days to evacuate everyone. In the security room, Chuck confirms Katey’s suspicions that he doesn’t actually have any Zombrex, holding up the empty box he flashed to Sullivan. Stacey Forsythe, another survivor and leader of the Nevada branch of CURE (Citizens for Undead Rights and Equality), offers to help him find doses of the drug and gives him a map of the area and a two-way radio. After Chuck gives Katey the first dose he can find, he watches the TV with Stacey, only to have a news report by Rebecca Chang claim that he was not only responsible for the Fortune City outbreak, but that he also did it in support of CURE. Determined to prove the report wrong, and receive continued shelter in the safe house, Chuck decides to find Rebecca Chang so he can clear his name and discover the truth behind the release of thousands of zombies. Unfortunately, this action leads to him discovering a rabbit hole which only continues to grow deeper the more he searches.

Chuck Greene (left) with his daughter, Katey (right).

As with the previous game, I thought the story was written pretty well. The overarching mystery of what exactly caused the release of thousands of zombies is kicked off immediately, but doesn’t seem to really go on all cylinders until a few minutes in, when Chuck is framed for the incident. Still, the pacing was pretty decent, although thanks to the spacing of the Cases this time around, there is (depending on your level) a lot of down time between them. When the next part of story does show up though, it does a great job of keeping you motivated to see it through and see what questions will be answered next. There is also a legitimately shocking twist regarding one of the characters near the end of the game, but it doesn’t feel tacked on, as playing through the game again and paying attention to their dialogue and actions actually helps support the validity of the twist. Chuck also feels much different from Frank as a character, but in a good way. Rather than perform actions only as they suit his needs, he actually puts the safety of his daughter above everything else and acts on the need to help not just himself, but those around him. His prime motivation, collecting Zombrex for Katey, may come off as a little clichéd for some, but personally I think Chuck is a good protagonist to follow, although whether or not he’s better than Frank is still a matter of debate.

The supporting cast is also pretty good, with Rebecca Chang and Stacey Forsythe being the stronger and more helpful of them all, though in hindsight I think Rebecca may be a little similar to Frank West; I guess all reporters are opportunists or something. I can give credit though for having the supporting cast as more actively involved in the story, allowing us to get to know them better beyond a cutscene here and there. As for the Psychopaths, I think they’re a little more of a mixed bag this time around. A lot of them are genuinely off-putting and aid the uneasiness of their cutscenes. However, similar to the original, the Psychopaths can also be extremely hammy in their performances and induce laughter rather than terror, partly because some of them are also a bit stereotypical. The one group which encapsulates this feeling is the Militia Men (aka the “Redneck Snipers”), who, in the span of just two minutes, evoke every single negative American stereotype you can possibly think of, resulting in one of the most entertaining introductions I have seen in a long time.

Seriously, I couldn't stop laughing at this scene.

Just as before, 72 Hour Mode is divided into Cases and has six different endings, each labeled A through D as well as two versions of F. Completing this mode with Ending A and fulfilling another condition will unlock Overtime Mode which, upon successful completion, will unlock Ending S. Unlike the original game however, there is no way to independently access Overtime Mode, as it is directly fused onto 72 Hour Mode (which is kind of fudging it since the mode really lasts up to 96 hours in-game) and you must complete both of them in a row. As for my feelings on this Overtime Mode, which also adds another 24 hours to the campaign and wraps things up, it felt a little weaker this time, since it follows the same formula from last time with Chuck collecting items and then engage in a boss fight, except this time the items are more pointless. The boss fight still manages to be pretty memorable and the ending does show signs of good things to come for Chuck and Katey, in contrast with the moment of despair Frank has in the original game’s Overtime Mode, so it’s still worth trying to access. However, I wish it didn’t have to end with a jump scare; that’s kind of cheap.

As a side note related to 72 Hour Mode, I’d like to mention why the game is kind of special to me. The day on which the game’s events starts, September 25, is my dad’s birthday and the day that it ends, September 28, is a birthday that I share with my brother. Plus, as I said before, the game came out on my 18^th birthday and I got it as a gift, which makes it more special to me.

Since Dead Rising 2 takes place in a mall-like casino, much of the gameplay is recycled from the original, mainly the ability to use any item in the casino as a weapon. Just about anything will do in a pinch and you can still hold magazines in your inventory to increase durability of items or add certain special abilities. But the main draw of this game is the fact that you can duct tape items together to form new combo weapons, granting new attack options and opportunities to dispatch the undead. Two of the more well-known ones are the Knife Gloves (Boxing Gloves + Bowie Knife) and the Paddlesaw (Chainsaw + Paddle), but you can also create items like the Beer Hat (Beer + Construction Hat), Handy Chipper (Wheelchair + Lawnmower) or Laser Sword (Gems + Flashlight) among many, many more. I absolutely love the combo weapons, since they are very fun to use and allow you to feel more like a badass for being able to MacGyver multiple items together.

The Knife Gloves are one of the best combo weapons in the entire game.

But while combo weapons are fun, they have their limitations. You can duct tape a lot of items together, but they must have a blue wrench icon above them to be compatible and even then you may have to do some guesswork. It’s a lot of fun trying to discover what goes with what, but if you want the full benefits, you’ll need to find the Combo Cards which show how to create specific weapons, otherwise you’ll get a Scratch Card which has none of the bonuses associated with that particular card. It’s easy to get the cards though, as you just need to rescue and defeat certain people, level up by getting PP or find the posters around the casino which give Chuck the inspiration, and thus the card, for a weapon; it’s like a scavenger hunt in that regard, except that some cards require you to really go out of your way to get them and can be a (worthwhile) hassle. To assemble the weapons, you must also have access to one of the Maintenance Rooms scattered around, though it’s usually about one per area and they are spaced far apart from each other like the bathrooms. Some of these weapons also require two-handed items, so if you need to make a long trek you’ll need to make sure that you not only have everything on you, but also that a zombie attack won’t make you drop that one item you need. Thankfully, the game alleviates this a little by sometimes having some ingredients very close to or inside the Maintenance Room, but if you want a specific combo you’ll still need to look around really hard or memorize where certain item clusters are.

Another major addition to the game is that now you can collect money. This is a natural step considering that you’re in a Las Vegas expy and you’ll definitely need it as you continue playing. One way to collect Zombrex is to buy it at gradually increasing prices from stores set up by looters, so if you don’t want to go through the trouble to collect the nine free doses on the map (two more than you’ll ever need), this is an easy way to do so. But you can buy other things from the looters, including individual items or already assembled versions of combo weapons like the Tesla Ball (Bingo Ball Cage + Battery) or the keys to different vehicles around Fortune City (these are worth spending a playthrough to get). Unfortunately money is also used in annoying ways, like convincing certain survivors to go with you. It was a little jarring to have to deal with money again, as I had nearly forgotten about it, but for the most part I do like this addition to the gameplay.

Zombrex makes the world go 'round.

Apart from that though, Dead Rising 2 actually fixes a lot of the problems that the original game had. Items still break easily, but healing items are more plentiful and allow you to survive longer than before. Vehicles are a little tighter in their handling and can stop much more easily, so it’s less of a hassle to get to where you want, plus survivors can ride inside provided there’s enough room. Photography may be gone, but now it’s possible to move while aiming a firearm, which makes them a much more viable combat option. Stacey will also contact the player in the same way that Otis did, via walkie-talkie, but it’s not often that you actually have to answer and every call actually has a purpose. Additionally, you can re-read what she said by checking your watch and scrolling through the possible side-quests and if the call does require you to stop attacking, you can at least jump around and maneuver away from zombies. But the biggest fix of all is the Survivor AI. Survivors can still be a pain to rescue, but they are far more competent and will actually follow Chuck a lot better; to alleviate all worry though, the Leadership magazine makes them nigh invulnerable and is a must-have. Also, they somewhat fixed the save system by adding two additional slots for a total of three. Some may find this to still be limiting, but it’s a good addition nonetheless.

It’s also good, though painful, to know that Dead Rising 2 does not retain the Infinity Mode from the original game. However, it does have an online mode, Terror Is Reality, in which you and three other people compete for cash prizes in a system where all of the points you earn are converted to an equal amount of money. The games that you can participate in are actually quite fun and an excellent way to make money, since you can cash out to transfer all of the money you earned back to single player and you earn money no matter what your standing is. However, there is one main issue, besides being unable to earn cash unless you’re in a Ranked Match. I didn’t run into it this time, since the community for it seems to have dropped, but I remember when there was a painfully long queue time in the main lobby and sometimes there were people who wouldn’t ever shut up. It’s sad knowing that in the far future this mode will no longer be accessible (as is standard for anything depending on an online connection), but I was able to enjoy it again and I recommend trying it out to get a quick boost in cash.

TIR is very brutal, but also pretty fun.

One final mode that the game has is a Co-op Mode, though it’s online only and you can drop into another person’s game by calling them over the radio. These calls are easily ignored if you want to go solo, as I did, but playing with someone else is a good way of being able to take on certain challenges with fewer problems. I remember playing in this mode once, but not how it went, so I can’t really give a full opinion on it. However, if Co-op is something you really want to do in this game, so be it. I just wish that the call alerts couldn’t appear during cutscenes, as they broke the immersion whenever they came up.

Graphically speaking, Dead Rising 2 is a step up from its predecessor, with more detail in the varied themed environments and the capacity for nearly ten times the amount of zombies to appear onscreen at once, up to 7000 as opposed to 800 from before, enhancing the claustrophobic feeling of having zombies surrounding you from all sides. While cutscenes are more polished than last time, I noticed that they almost all had this odd filter applied and it’s not completely appealing, but you can still see everything very clearly and I have to give them credit for that.

That's a lot of zombies.

Voice acting is also still pretty good, with suitable voices for Chuck and Katey as well as the other supporting characters and antagonists, as well as even more over-the-top narm for fans to enjoy. The soundtrack is also still good, especially the mall music, and the licensed tracks remain good, though there appear to be fewer of them. The one that’s really memorable though, and good in my opinion, is Kill the Sound by Celldweller, which serves as the theme which plays over the first credits sequence (before Overtime Mode starts if you get there).

Dead Rising 2, to put it simply, is a very good improvement to the original Dead Rising. The story is still well-written, with Chuck Greene serving as a great father for his daughter and thus a protagonist you can really get behind. Fortune City is bigger than Willamette and allows for more opportunities to do things like gamble or generally screw around. Combo weapons are extremely fun to use and feel very unique to the world of Dead Rising. Though the game still has its faults, most of the issues from the original game are ironed out nicely and Terror is Reality is a fantastic way to earn quick cash. Fans of the original game will definitely want to seek this out, but for newcomers I can safely say that you can start here, just as long as you know the basics of what happened during the events of Willamette.

Dead Rising - A True Classic

In preparation for the release of the PC/Steam port of Dead Rising 3, and to get in the mood of playing it, I’ve decided to go back and play the previous entries in the Dead Rising series, starting with the original Dead Rising, the subject of this review. I have a light history with this game, having watched one of my friends enthusiastically play it on his Xbox 360. However, I began playing the series from Dead Rising 2 (on PS3) and eventually decided that I would need a copy of the original, so I ended up buying one with the thought that one day I would play it. When I finally got around to it, I finally discovered some time in what the “Perfect Circle Scratch” was on 360 discs and what that means (additionally, I don’t remember if my used copy already came with this scratch), so I ended up having to buy another copy to finish the game; because of this I now have both the original and Platinum Hits versions. Since finally going through Dead Rising on my own, eight years after the original 2006 launch, I ended up liking it more than I thought I would, though there are some issues with it that I ended up agreeing with.

Frank West, a photojournalist who has covered wars, is flying by helicopter towards a big scoop, which involves learning what’s been going on in the town of Willamette, Colorado. Since the town has been sealed off from the outside world by the National Guard, the helicopter serves as a means of getting inside unnoticed. As he is flown over he decides to take some photos, but something doesn’t seem quite right, as it appears that the townspeople are attacking each other, something they wouldn’t normally do. Frank decides to head to the center of town and is dropped off on the helipad of the Willamette Parkview Mall and informs the pilot to pick him up in 72 hours, since he hopes to have his scoop by that time. When he descends the stairs to the entrance plaza, he sees zombies outside the mall, as well as a mysterious old man behind a locked security gate asking cryptic questions. Eventually the zombies manage to break through the barricade and, in the rush to ascend the stairs to the mall security room, only four people survive the attack: Frank, Brad Garrison, Jessie McCarney and Otis Washington, a janitor who welds the door to the room shut. Brad decides to leave via the air duct to continue an investigation, but when Frank asks about it he is told that it doesn’t concern a photojournalist like him. Frank convinces himself that whatever Brad is investigating must relate to what’s going on in Willamette and follows Brad into the mall, where he gradually uncovers a vast conspiracy that he has no choice but to continue uncovering even when his life is continually threatened.

Frank West, photojournalist.

During the course of 72 Hour Mode, where the bulk of the story takes place, the overarching mystery set up at the beginning is written very well. A sufficient amount of questions are introduced within roughly the first few minutes in a way that makes the player just as curious as Frank is about what exactly is going on in Willamette. As the player completes the Cases which make up the main story, more answers are revealed to both Frank and the player, which lead to scenes with a genuine emotional impact through all of the highs and lows, in turn creating more of a connection between Frank and the player, as though the player is also a reporter trying to get the facts straight. That isn’t to say Frank doesn’t have a personality; in fact, it’s very interesting to play as someone who’s willing to help others out, not out of genuine kindness, but out of his opportunistic way of getting more information about his big scoop. In other words, he cares more about his own survival and journalistic opportunity than actually saving people.

The supporting characters, for the most part, are also written nicely. It’s obvious that they have more of a stake in the events than Frank does, but we learn enough about them to get a sense of their personalities and histories with each other, something which also extends to the main antagonists. Additionally, the Psychopaths that Frank can fight are interesting in that they can have unique backgrounds and the way they act gives the player a good idea of the kind of people they are and why they went insane, plus they can elicit a genuine emotion from the player; this is mostly tension or fear, but they are also capable of being sympathetic in their histories. In other words, they feel like people and not just a random person you can fight.

72 Hour mode is divided in Cases that the player can complete to gradually unravel the secrets behind the zombie outbreak. Depending on how well the player succeeds in clearing the cases, or if they just outright ignored it, they will get one of six different endings labeled A through F. If the player gets Ending A, the canonical outcome of 72 Hour Mode, they will unlock Overtime Mode, which adds another 24 hours to the story and wraps up the plot. Overtime Mode is worth going through, since Frank, while still very opportunistic, experiences a truly life-threatening circumstance and places more urgency in his survival. The ending, however, is slightly unsatisfactory since one question was never answered, but otherwise all of the remaining pieces of the game’s backstory fall into place very nicely.

When I played Overtime Mode, this walkthrough was a real lifesaver.

As a sandbox game, Dead Rising has some very interesting elements, the most well-known feature being the ability to pick up absolutely anything in the mall and use it as a weapon against the zombie hordes, ranging from beach umbrellas and soccer balls to lawnmowers and chainsaws. It’s satisfying to experiment with the items to see which ones are the most effective and which are simply meant as a joke; if you have no weapons you can go hand-to-hand or use your own spit. Various food and drink items can also be picked up to replenish Frank’s health, represented by yellow squares, and skill books can be picked up to add skill buffs, such as increasing the durability of specific weapon types or the amount of health you regain from food and drink consumption. Learning how all of these items work in tandem and exploiting that is the best way to survive, although there is a particular combination (Small Chainsaw + Criminal Biography (Book) + Engineering (Book) + Entertainment (Book)) that makes the game way easier than intended by making most boss fights a breeze and allowing you to effortlessly carve your way through all but the largest zombie crowds. At that point, the tension comes from having a low level, being under-equipped or ending up between a rock and a hard place.

Protip: Kill this man at all costs.

Even then, there are a couple of annoyances with the weapons you can use. Firearms are a real hassle, since they require you to stand perfectly in place while you aim, so you can’t exactly take cover or maneuver out of the way of oncoming enemies if you choose to do so. There are a couple points when having a firearm does become essential to victory (one of which involves funneling your enemies into a tight space), but apart from that I almost never used them and kept one around as a last resort tactic. Weapons can also break pretty easily without any skill books, so you have to keep a healthy supply of weapons and appropriate books on hand at all times if you want to make it through each day. I’d also count vehicles as weapons, since you can drive them through zombie crowds, so I’ll mention that they have issues as well. It’s very satisfying to drive through thick groups of zombies and gain an absurd amount of PP (more on that later), but the vehicles in general are a little floaty in the steering and it’s often difficult to slow to a stop and get out/dismount in the exact spot you want, which can force you to wade through more zombies to get to your intended destination. Still, the sheer speed of getting to where you need to go is well worth their use.

Dead Rising also has a very slight RPG touch to it by having Frank capable of leveling up via gaining more Prestige Points (PP). PP can usually be earned by defeating zombies and psychopaths, rescuing survivors or taking photographs. Photographs are pretty easy to take, since it’s pretty much point-and-shoot while also allowing you to zoom in and out (plus you can actually walk at a respectable pace while aiming!). Whenever a shot is taken, PP is awarded based on what’s in the photo, which also determines the shot’s overall genre. This is a rather fun and relatively quick way to gain PP, although you have to worry about replacing the batteries every so often, which takes some of the fun out of it. As Frank levels up in general, either one of his stats increases or he gains a special move that can be activated by certain button combinations. There are ways to exploit the game to gain PP much faster (such as Vehicles + Maintenance Tunnels), but the road to Level 50 is actually not a bad one and there’s an interesting thrill in discovering what’s happened to Frank next thanks to the random nature of the rewards.

You'd better love it down here if you want the Zombie Genocider achievement.

As for the other methods, Psychopaths are essentially boss fights that happen in pre-determined locations at specific times. You can easily walk right into one without knowing that they’re there, but you’re often told about them ahead of time by Otis. Psychopath fights can also be incredibly difficult, though the Convicts in Leisure Park really take the cake for being in a moving vehicle with a mounted machine gun; I ended up just hugging the wall to avoid them whenever I had to go through that area after they spawned onto the map. But the difficulty in Psychopath fights can be worth it in the end thanks to the fruitful rewards you can claim, such as Adam (the clown psychopath) yielding some of the game’s most essential aids; defeating him gives you the Small Chainsaw and a survivor named Greg Simpson who gives you access to the Wonderland Plaza shortcut. This shortcut makes it much easier to rescue survivors, although the survivors themselves are dumber than a sack of rocks. Their pathfinding is abysmal and can be a real hindrance, especially when you give them a melee weapon, since then they’ll just happily run into zombie crowds without a second thought, but giving them a firearm suddenly makes them killing machines, which finally gives those weapons a use as well as making the escort experience bearable.

In general, Dead Rising has a mild arcade feel that actually makes for a very enjoyable experience, though I still have a couple major hang-ups about it. The first is Otis, the janitor, who manages to call you on the transceiver at the worst possible times. The transceiver rings incessantly, so you answer to shut it up, but when you do, you can’t move, attack or interact with items or inventory in any way. If you get hit during this time, the call automatically ends and he’ll call you again a few seconds later; answering this call will result in Otis chewing you out for hanging up on him and restarting his rather long-winded explanation. On top of that, he hardly ever has anything useful to say, sometimes just telling you where you are in the mall. While Otis is annoying though, that’s nowhere near on the level of the game’s 72 hour time limit, or roughly six hours in real time (game time is real time x 12, so one real second is twelve game seconds and five real minutes is one game hour). The idea behind the 72 hours isn’t bad, since it creates the time frame of the story, but the way this is handled results in more of a frantic race from Point A to Point B, rather than a game where you can sort of take your time, and often there is very low margin of error during a Case and deviating from the set path can have disastrous consequences (unless you’re doing this intentionally).

Time is known to pass quickly in this realm.

One final sticking point is the save system. You only have one slot per account, so if you decide to do another game mode while in the middle of another, you’ve lost all progress in the original mode. If you die while playing the game, you only have two options, those being to load your last save (which may have been hours ago) or restart the game from scratch with a new save. Additionally, you can only save at specific points on the map, mainly in bathrooms, which are more often than not spaced what feels like galaxies apart from each other, creating true panic if you’re desperately looking for one. The saving grace of this system though is that when you start up a new game, your stats transfer between attempts, so if you end up getting to Level 50 (which is actually the level cap), then you’ll be Level 50 with maxed out stats and moves in every mode you decide to play.

Dead Rising also has a lot of replay value, since there are achievements or items that can only be obtained by deviating from the main story or performing certain actions. Spending playthroughs doing so to boost your chances of survival can be well worth the effort, since anything you unlocked will be readily accessible and obscenely overpowered. Also, completing Overtime Mode will unlock Infinity Mode, where the goal is simply to survive as long as possible. However, the zombie density is thicker and Frank must worry about his health, which deteriorates at a rate of one block every 100 seconds, as well as random psychopath and survivor encounters. Careful rationing of food and supplies, along with a solid game plan, and possibly being at Level 50, can really go a long way to surviving beyond the first day (I survived for a little less than four game hours).

Good Luck

As far as graphics are concerned, I would say that the game has aged amazingly well. I remember it looking pretty good back in 2006, but even eight years later the game has retained a lot of its luster. The characters look realistic enough that they aren’t off-putting and the amount of detail is incredible on every living or inanimate object. Sure there’s some clipping here and there and close-ups aren’t as good on some characters, but the draw distance is also very good and the zombies are very distinctive even with the somewhat limited selection of character models. In fact, one of the greatest feats of this game is being able to have so many zombies onscreen at once, with one report saying that up to 800 could be rendered at once. This is really incredible and adds to the feeling of being truly surrounded by the undead at every turn.

There's plenty more where they came from.

While I would consider the voice acting to be another plus, even though some lines are so narmy that they’ve become running jokes in the Dead Rising community, I’d also like to give props to the music. The running themes, such as the one at the beginning, are composed well and the mall music is actually done well to the point that I’d like to own the soundtrack just to hear it some more (killing zombies in a mall for so long will do that to you). Some of the licensed tracks are also very memorable, such as Fly Routine by Hostile Groove or Slave by The Evolutionaries.

Overall, Dead Rising is a great game. The main mystery in the story is executed very well and Frank West is a very interesting character to play as, especially during the moments of genuine emotional connection that the player may encounter. Some aspects bog down the experience a bit, including the incredibly strict timing of the story and abysmally idiotic survivors, but there’s plenty on offer to balance it out, such as a solid amount of replay value and valuable rewards to anyone willing to seek them. My experience with the Xbox 360 library is limited, but I would already consider Dead Rising to be one of the best games I’ve ever played on it and I’d gladly return to it again in the future. If you’re looking for a great zombie game, seek out this wonderful gem.

Dead Rising 2: Off The Record

After the success of the original Dead Rising, a sequel developed by Blue Castle Games followed and was met with great critical acclaim. It introduced the world to another protagonist named Chuck Greene, a former motocross champion who had to fend off the zombie horde in Fortune City while protecting his daughter. While I did think he was a likable character, I had never gotten to known Frank West at all due to my lack of an Xbox 360. Thankfully, enough fans missed him to warrant the release of Dead Rising 2: Off The Record. In this game, fans get to see how the events of the game would have played out with Frank at the player's control instead, and I found his version of the story a bit better.

The opening shows us that in the intervening period between Dead Rising 1 and 2, Frank West got to be down on his luck, but he still got by as an active photographer. As he gets sucked into the events of the second game, his story has a lot of the same cues as Chuck, but it has enough variety to make it different and interesting. Players also get to take advantage of his unique skill to take photos for PP, but this time without needing to worry about the battery life or amount of film in his now digital camera. While Chuck Greene was able to make plenty of crazy gadgets with duct tape, Frank West can make everything he could and more, a lot of which I had fun using.

The variety continues throughout the game and doesn't stop coming. There are plenty of new psychopaths to battle, with plenty of surprises and references to the first game that any fan would enjoy. A new expansion to Fortune City can also be explored, known as the Uranus Zone. It's alien themed and contains even more objectives and weapons to use, plus some killer rides and attractions, and didn't feel out of place within the confines of the game.

My favorite addition however is one that I had wished for since the original Dead Rising 2, a Sandbox Mode available from the start. The three save slots return, but now contain saves for both the Story and Sandbox, meaning players can have a file for each without the need to take up unnecessary room or save over their progress in either mode.

In the actual mode itself, players get to explore Fortune City at their own pace, battling optional psychopaths that appear at regular intervals and complete challenges for more cash or PP. Challenges vary from reaching a particular platform in the allotted time to killing as many zombies as possible. They can also be specific to the point of only allowing your camera for gaining PP. There are also some Co-op challenges, which enables a second player to control Chuck Greene, who controls exactly like Frank down to the camera tricks.

The greatest tweak of all is that while Dead Rising is built for multiple playthroughs, it is no longer a requirement to begin the story anew if you find yourself underpowered at any point. Instead, it is now possible to level up via the sandbox and seamlessly transfer your skills back to the Story. I liked how they addressed this, as I found myself having more fun without the need to constantly backtrack through the story like with Chuck.

The online multiplayer mode Terror Is Reality has also been scrapped from this game, but while it was good in theory and enjoyable in practice, it only ended up this way once you got past the various shortcomings it had with getting a single game off the ground, such as a painfully long queue time. Thankfully, the Sandbox mode more than makes up for it.

Off The Record manages to be different enough from its original counterpart to not seem like good DLC instead. There are plenty of new things you can do and it doesn't feel like a clone game at all. Plus it feels like a great bargain at only $40. If you've never played Dead Rising or its sequel, I would tell you to pick this game up now.