Dead Rising 2 followed the “bigger, better, more” sequel
formula and built on almost everything that made the original Dead Rising such
a hit with mostly success. It gave you
a huge new area to play in and greatly expanded the gameplay, but stumbled a
bit when it came to its version of the psychopath fights that made the original
so memorable. It was, and still is, a
solid all around sequel, but not quite up to the standard of the original. See our full impressions of the Dead Rising
2 remaster on Xbox One right here.Game Details
- Publisher: Capcom
- Developer: Blue Castle Games, Mercenary Technology
- ESRB Rating: “M” for Mature
- Genre: Third-Person-Action
- Pros: Weapon combo system; fun gameplay; great presentation; Katie
- Cons: Awful boss fights; not as interesting as DR1
- MSRP: $20
Dead Rising 2 released on Xbox 360 and, in a first for the
series, on PS3 on September 24, 2010.
At the time it was widely regarded, including by me in my review for
About.com, as a step above the original thanks to new gameplay systems and a
richer overall world. I also enjoyed
the new casino / mall setting and the story featuring Chuck Greene and his
adorable little daughter Katie (who is still great and one of the best kids in
a videogame) was solid.
Looking back on it six-years later, however, I don’t feel
quite as fondly toward it largely because the psychopath aspect – regular folks
who went crazy because of the zombie outbreak – weren’t nearly as interesting
in Dead Rising 2 as they were in Dead Rising 1. A larger problem is that the psychopaths were just plain not fun
to fight in Dead Rising 2 as these boss fights are very poorly balanced for the
gameplay. The bosses can move faster
and attack in ways that the gameplay seemingly can’t keep up with, which makes
them incredibly tiring and not fun to play against. Honestly, the boss fights just plain aren’t fair here and really
make the game no fun to play.
It is a shame, too, because outside of the boss fights Dead
Rising 2 is fantastic. The game takes
place in a casino / mall hybrid so there are tons of crazy items to find and
use as weapons as you fight against the zombie hordes. It also introduced the combo weapons that
have since become a staple of the series, and these combo weapons – like combining
gems with a flashlight to make a laser sword or attaching chainsaws to a kayak
paddle to make a super paddle of chainsaw destruction – are incredibly
imaginative and a ton of fun to use.
There is little question that from a purely zombie slaying
perspective, Dead Rising 2 was an improvement over Dead Rising 1. It gives you more toys to play with and
significantly more zombies onscreen at once, and sets you loose and lets you
have fun. The problem comes from the
fact that story and overall game progression is gated behind the aforementioned
awful boss fights, which sap the fun out of the experience disappointingly
quickly.
Unlike Dead Rising 1, DR 2 had multiple save slots from the
start so they didn’t need to be added for the remaster. As such, the remastered version of Dead
Rising 2 doesn’t really have anything new or different over the original Xbox
360 release. It obviously features some
visual enhancements – most notably in the large outdoor areas where you can see
hundreds upon hundreds of zombies all onscreen at once – at a solid 60FPS. It is also worth noting that the Xbox Live
co-op feature is present and accounted for and works just like it did last
gen. Unfortunately, the XBLA side
mission games for Dead Rising 2, Case Zero and Case West, are not included in
this package.See our reviews of the Dead Rising 1 and Dead Rising 2: Off the Record remasters!
While the remaster of Dead Rising 1 for current-gen makes
some somewhat big additions (mostly save slots), this new release of Dead
Rising 2 on Xbox One doesn’t make any significant changes or improvements. It is just a smoother playing, cleaner
looking of the same experience as the original release. I personally don’t think it is as good as
the first Dead Rising, nor is it better than its alternate universe “same game,
but with Frank West instead” brother Dead Rising 2: Off the Record (see my
review of that game for why), but it is the “real” Dead Rising 2 as far as the
story goes so it is worth a look for that reason alone. It isn’t a bad game, and the
remaster is solid all around, but I’d skip it in favor of the other two Dead
Rising remaster releases instead of vanilla Dead Rising 2.
Disclosure: A review code was provided by the publisher.
