Dead Rising 2 is rated M for … zombies. Parents, if you let your kids watch zombie movies, there’s nothing here that will surprise them. Some parents may not like the focus on gore for gore’s sake and killing for killing’s sake (but these are zombies). The game does have a fascination with zombie brutality and this game will challenge your kid to kill in more and more interesting way by combining items (propane tank + nails = IED). That creativity is a double edged blade if there ever was one.

As I was playing Dead Rising 2 I found myself muttering “oh yeah” every so often as a memory slipped into place. I’d quite forgotten how annoying Dead Rising 1 could be and I can’t believe they didn’t even try to address those problems. The most glaring flaw is, of course, the save system. I don’t object to difficulty and I don’t require frequent save points… but when the core mechanic of your game is already flawed because of repetition, making the player repeat vast sections of the game just because they got hung up on a table or something. That not fun.

The game itself is all right. I features casinos, the strip and a mall in a Vegas stand-in called Fortune City. Tons and tons of zombies mill about, blood and gore are everywhere but something is missing. The game is in no way shape or form “scary.” Sure, zombie death is everywhere and always possible but the mass of zombies become hazards, not monsters. The zombies are the lava you couldn’t touch when you were a kid, or cacti that must be run through or chopped down. A big part of the game is running through crowds of zombies and taking damage every so often or wading through, carving your own path, which is challenging because they can sneak up behind at any moment.

The combat is cool, but only fun for a short while. The gore is exhausting. Zombies get ripped apart in every way possible and one of the charms of the game is the workshop – where you can combine ingredients to hurt the zombies in fun and gory ways.

Some people will love this – to me it’s akin to fighting the cops deliberately in Grand Theft Auto. The novelty fades fast and while there’s a decent story here (it hits on most of the zombie cliches, of course) the length and random difficulty (seriously, even skilled players get hung up on things and eaten) and absurd save points hurt the game. Add in that most of these missions are run and fetch or timed and you get the gist of this.

They’ve added a Reality sports show to the multiplayer and some of those games are fun. The money you make there even carries over to the main game.

In short the game is good for what it tries to be. And what it tries to be isn not a horror story. My problem is that it just isn’t scary.

Tags: Game Reviews