Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster (Capcom, multi-format)
TWO years after Dead Rising’s original 2006 release, the producer of George A Romero’s Dawn of the Dead sued Capcom, claiming its shopping mall-set horror ripped off the duke of dismemberment’s classic. The case, however, fell apart like a zombie in a wind tunnel.
Whereas Romero’s 1978 zombies-at-the-mall benchmark had something to say about the state of the world (take that, capitalism), Dead Rising was simply mindless action that shared its setting. But what mindless action!
A scrungey antidote to Capcom’s own Resident Evil , the Xbox exclusive played out like Mall of Duty - and this full-fat remaster brings back the blood, guts and chuckles aplenty to today’s consoles.
Let’s face it - most shopping centres in Northern Ireland are hellscapes littered with sunken-eyed ghouls, but you can’t roam them carving folk up with weapons. Dead Rising ups the ante as zombies are crashing the mall and photojournalist Frank West has 72 hours to take out the brain-famished blighters with a variety of makeshift weapons before catching his rescue chopper.
Being America, you aren’t restricted to bashing undead heads in with a big Toblerone. The Willamette Parkview Mall is littered with guns, swords and chainsaws, while everything from hockey pucks to lawnmowers can be used to mow down thousands of coffin-dodgers.
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Favouring sandbox-style shenanigans over the precision engineered horror of Capcom’s other big zombie franchise, its marauding monsters aren’t so much dangerous as plentiful, with hundreds onscreen at once, while racking up kills and snapping Polaroid moments of horror earns points to increase Frank’s skills.
Arguably ahead of its time, Dead Rising was a proto-roguelike, with death bringing the option to either continue or begin the three-day cycle with Frank’s upgrades intact.
The Deluxe Remaster rolls back the years, reanimating a classic with the modern bells and whistles we demand. Combat has been overhauled for a more fluid experience, with item durability bars, the ability to move while aiming and auto-focus for Frank’s camera, while lashings of ridiculous bonus costumes let players cos-play as Capcom legends from Mega Man to Resident Evil’s Licker, complete with Gene Simmons-proportioned tongue.
But it’s not just technology that’s moved on in the last 18 years, and Dead Rising mercifully no longer rewards Frank for taking snaps of cleavage or underwear. Yes, that was a thing.
While Dead Rising may lack Romero’s satirical bite, the splashy splatter and high-octane corpse-torturing carry it through. It’s time for horror fans to tool up and get the big shop in...
