Working as Intended

I was going to write a normal, stuffy review-thing about Dead Rising 2, but then I figured I could easily sum up the game as, "It's the first game, except the AI is better and the guns don't suck" and it'd be 100% accurate. So, instead, I thought I'd write up some blurbs about a few things I've learnt from playing Dead Rising 2.

Remember, spoilers!


The first, and probably the most important thing to learn from Dead Rising 2 is that while the AI has been significantly improved from the first game, it's still far from intelligent. On my second playthrough of the game I encountered a man and his wife in the Royal Flush Plaza, and since there was another survivor elsewhere in the city I thought I'd let these two tag along. Making sure they could defend themselves, I gave the man a sledgehammer and the woman a shotgun.

Anyway, as we were coming back from the Yucatan Casino with our new survivor friend in tow, the husband was attacked by a zombie in the Food Plaza. He managed to fight it off and we all went on our merry way. But, as we were riding the moving floor between the Plaza and the Slot Ranch Casino (some 5 minutes later) the wife suddenly went, "AHHHHHHHHHH", pulled out her shotgun, spun around and shot her husband in the head.

I'd have been annoyed at losing a survivor if I wasn't laughing so much.

A second example of this would be, again, at the Food Plaza. Much later on, I had to defeat a chef Psychopath and reunite a woman with her boyfriend. However, said boyfriend was hiding on the roof of one of the nearby stores. So, after climbing up there and telling him that following some random arsehole into a swarm of zombies to find a woman who may or may not be alive was a totally swell idea, he agreed to join me. And by 'agreed to join me' I mean he nodded, looked around, then bolted towards the woman's location. Which was awkward, because there was an 8-foot sheer drop and hundreds of zombies between the two.

I didn't even get half-way to the ledge before he had flung himself off it, face-planted the ground and was devoured by a group of zombies. Despite explaining to the woman that her boyfriend was a complete idiot she still refused to join me and, I can only assume, was eventually devoured herself later on.

While there are a few over wacky cases of survivor insanity, the most obvious one is definitely the case of the poor man who thought it'd be a good idea to piss off Snowflake. If you're unaware of who Snowflake is, allow me to show you this picture.




Yes, Snowflake is, in fact, a gigantic adult tiger you can tame (assuming you find the hidden Psychopath battle at the start of the game) and have as a constant companion. It should probably go without saying that she can totally fuck up people's faces. This is why I was rather confused why one of the survivors I was escorting thought it'd be a good idea to anger her. Badly.

While running around DR2 you occasionally come across some more agitated survivors, who you'll literally have to smack some sense into. However, sometimes they still keep this behavior while you escort them back to the Safe House (whether it's intentional or a glitch I have no idea). This one poor man I rescued from the Americana Casino suddenly snapped when I was taking him and his co-worker back to safety, and he pulled out a crowbar and started screaming and hitting Snowflake. While you can smack sense back into a rogue survivor, I don't think fully grown tigers are aware of this.

After a few hits Snowflake spun around and reenacted the above picture on the poor guy's face. I believe it was only when Snowflake had clawed off his face and was devouring his limbs that the man realized that he was a complete fucking idiot. There are just some things in the world that aren't a good idea, zombie apocalypse or no, and I think 'attacking a tiger nearly as big as you are with a rusted, broken crowbar' is several notches above even the stupidest entry on that list.

But now he knows. And knowing is half the funeral cost.

I'll come back to the further antics of Snowflake, the Ultimate Overkill, in a little bit. For now, let's move into the second thing to learn from Dead Rising 2; dress-sense and puns. While a lot (but not all) of the cutscenes in this game are meant to be played seriously, you can easily ruin all of this by wearing either a woman's dress, ill-fitting children's clothes, or a whole variety of other things. I, personally, went for the still-ruining, but more subtle approach, where Chuck was running around in a white fedora hat, no shoes, a bright blue Hawaiian T-Shirt and some sports sunglasses. He was CasualAsFuck!Chuck.

CAF!Chuck, no matter the context of the cutscene, will alway ruin it by looking and now oddly acting as if this whole zombie apocalypse is one really abstract holiday resort. He doesn't seem to give two shits, and lets fly the most wildly inappropriate puns ever.

One good example would be where you have to fight off an obese Psychopath who has been trying to force women to marry him (killing those who don't comply), and has just chainsawed his father in two. After the battle, the man gets attacked by a zombiefied version of one of the brides, who pushes him to the ground and starts eating his face off. Despite the blood, gore, the cut up torso of an elderly man hanging behind him, and a woman crying in the background, all Chuck does is look at the currently-being-devoured man, says "You may now kiss the bride!" and promptly walks away.

The only way this could be made any better is if the game had a CSI: Miami-esque "YEAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!" afterwards. But, alas, it was not to be.

Another case of The Puns comes from when you defeat a Sheriff Psychopath, who has just hung several people because they were 'trespassing' while looking for food and shelter (one of whom Chuck personally saw get killed). While the Sheriff is climbing up to where the corpses are hanging, he says "I'm twice the man you are!" then slips and falls on a working circular saw, cutting himself in half. Again, despite the gore and torsos around him Chuck just looks down at the remains, goes, "I saw what you did there.." and walks off.

I'm entirely convinced that being in a tourist Hawaiian get-up improves the hilarity of this game by a good 20%.

The third lesson to grab from DR2 is --going back to Snowflake-- if you want to ruin the drama of Psychopath battles even more, by all means bring along a fully grown and extremely agitated tiger. One of the best examples of this was during the Slappy battle. After the cutscene Snowflake just gunned for him before I could even start moving, and somehow smacked the poor guy so hard that he glitched through the second-floor railing in the Palisades Mall and fell quite a ways. Snowflake then took off down the nearby escalator and apparently bit his goddamn head off before I made it even half way to the escalator myself, since the ending cutscene promptly started up.

I'm sure if the game had just a bit more detail Snowflake would've come back with a huge grin on her face and Slappy's head dangling from her teeth. She's such a dear! Which, of course, makes it rather weird that she's one of the many gifts you can give to your 9 year old daughter.

Because when I think of suitable gifts for children, I think giant, easily agitated, enraged adult tigers!

So, yes, while Dead Rising 2 is pretty much the first game, except a few minor adjustments, the sheer amount of lunacy and drama-ruining potential is too much for one playthrough. I'll probably be writing more stuff like this for a while yet as I go through even more runs of the game. While certain things, like Snowflake, are borderline broken at times, and the AI does glitch, it all just adds to the hilarity.

And, really, when you want a zombie apocalypse you've gotta have a few laughs.

Even if they're all rather disturbing, given the context.