Dead Rising

Besides Nazis and Aliens, Zombies are perhaps the most commonly used fodder in video games today. The living dead have made their menacing presence felt through a lot… and I mean a lot of action titles, and what they lack in speed (and I.Q), they generally make up for in huge numbers. Unfortunately due to graphical limitations none of the previous generation games could convey that feeling of dread that would wash over you if you were facing thousands of these undead buggers. Now, thanks to the power of the Xbox 360, Capcom has been able to deliver a game that’s capable of emoting the above mentioned dread, but unfortunately it’s marred by a whole load of problems that stop it from becoming one of the best Zombie games ever.

In Dead Rising, you’ll step into the boots of Frank West, a highly enthusiastic journalist who lets his enthusiasm get the best of him at times. In one of the above mentioned moments, he finds himself chasing the scoop of a lifetime in a small American town called Willamette. Now this town is probably like any other peaceful, idyllic town except for a small, tiny problem; it’s infested with zombies and the only place where Frank can get any sort of answer is the town’s not so bustling gigantic mall. Zombie genocide and some window shopping ensue…

For some weird reason, developer Capcom has added in stupid time constraints into the game so you’ll have only 72 hours (roughly translated into 6 hours) to unravel this mystery before your chopper AKA your ticket out of Willamette, comes back. Once you’re finished playing the game, you’ll unlock different modes that will allow you exploration at a more leisurely pace, but by the time you actually do that, you’ll be so bored of slaughtering the undead, you’ll probably get back to Gears of War (I can’t help it, I love that game). To make matters worse, the game doesn’t offer any sort of multiplayer action (co-op would have been nice); the only thing you can probably do is boast of your achievements on Xbox Live.
Even though the game offers you a certain amount of freedom, to unravel the mystery surrounding the infestation and progress along the story line, you’ll have to complete a series of cases to find out what exactly transpired in this town. In case you get bored of the story missions (which in all honesty, you probably will), you could indulge in some of the (many) side quests the game has to offer and by successfully completing them you’ll be rewarded with Prestige Points. Prestige Points (PP) are experience points of sorts that can help you level up your character-like increase his life bar or speed, as well as endow him with newer moves like zombie evisceration (ripping out its intestines), zombie head ripping, zombie ride (crowd surfing over a group of zombies) and so on. Prestige Points can also be earned by clicking photographs (you are a photographer in the game after all) and the juicier photos you click (like those denoting brutal violence or erotic situations like a female zombie chomping on the crotch of an innocent survivor), the more Prestige you earn.