It’s not all zombie bashing though, so don’t for one minute think that this is repetitive. You’ve still got a story to solve with the remainder of the survivors. You meet up with Brad and Jessie, and later on an old man who is the key to this mystery. Frank needs to assist them but maintain his distance at the same time as Brad and Jessie are Department of Homeland Security agents. You’ll get key case files from time to time which you must solve in order to progress towards the next case. Each case file unravels a portion of the storyline. Fail these case files, and you’ll miss out on the true ending at the end of your 72hrs when your chopper picks you up. The good thing is that you can choose to replay the game from scratch again but with your current characters level, so it becomes much easier to play a second time round.
Aside from this, you’ll be notified of ‘Scoops’, which are essentially side quests. There are many survivors scattered around the mall by the Caretaker Otis. This irritating imbecile has to be the most annoying thing to grace a computer game in a long time – He is in essence, a replica of that god forsaken Paperclip Assistant that is found in earlier versions of Microsoft Office. While you’re out dispatching hordes of zombies and risking life and limb, he’ll suddenly ring you up and inform you of the whereabouts of some survivors. Choose to ignore this, and he’ll repeatedly ring you back until you’re on the verge of wanting to murder someone yourself. He almost always chooses the worst time to ring you up. Weather this was done on purpose by Capcom as a humorous joke I have no idea. As a result, Otis is one of Dead Rising’s most hated characters and sadly can’t be killed, not in the normal game campaign anyway.
Otis is still a key character and while most players will choose to ignore him, don’t! As stated, he points you out to the whereabouts of survivors who require rescuing, and the rewards are major PP. These people have to be escorted back to the security office which is your group’s central hideout.
The survivor NPC AI can be both annoying and surprising at times. Upon rescuing them, they’ll either get stuck behind objects or wander straight into a group of zombies as you escort them back to the security room. Some survivors are injured so you can carry them on your back which saves a lot of trouble, although in this state you cannot weild a weapon. On the other hand, if you give them a weapon or a firearm they’ll turn into Rambo dispatching wave after wave of zombies while occasionally saving you if you should get into trouble. If you have the chance, try and get rescue five survivors and give them all firearms - the shotgun works well and order them to move to a specific spot and watch them fire away clearing out the zombies.
At the end of the day, it is up to you which survivors you choose to rescue, most of the time they’ll prove a hindrance unless Frank is at a high level. In my opinion however they’re essential because of the PP that is awarded will help you level up a lot faster through the game expanding your inventory allowing you to hold more items.
Case Files, Survivors, Psycho’s – You can choose what to focus on during your initial 72hrs in the mall. One thing is clear, you cannot do everything in this game within a single session, as this game was designed to be replayed multiple times. I’ve gone through the game 14 times and have still yet to find it repetitive. If you choose to focus on the main Case Files then you’ll end up having to forego rescuing some survivors as well as fighting psycho’s. You just don’t have the time for everything.
The Save System
One gripe many gamers new to Dead Rising tend to complain about is the Save system. You’re only allowed a single save slot during your 72hrs. Although, this extends to two if you have a memory card on your system.
Saving a game is initiated by visiting locker rooms or toilets around the mall. A single save slot may not seem much, but it is needed. A lot of new players fail to understand that Dead Rising was never meant to be finished in a single go like most games. It’s various missions have been intertwined together so that they will clash, and you can’t do them all at once. Once you finish the game and appreciate what you’ve been through, you’ll then realise why this system exists. Too many gamers have been spoilt by ‘quick save’ features in today’s games and Capcom have given us a feature to make us prioritise what we do in the game.
Dead Rising works brilliantly with this system, and it was a superb addition by Capcom. Just imagine how boring things would be if you did everything in a single session like most power gamers do. Where’s the fun in that? You’d be finished with the game inside 48hrs and then what?