Awful Archives: Dead Rising 4

Dead Rising is my all time favorite game series, and at launch this game came off as attempting to make the game appealing to people who don’t like the series in the first place by ditching or modifying everything about the series. No time limit, psychopaths are replaced with maniacs (which doubled as trying to be less offensive in the eyes of many fans), survivors are just infinitely generated events with a handful of exceptions, weapons were nearly indestructible, and the map was only really populated with Ubisoft-style collectibles that where no where as interesting as Dead Rising 3’s, among other things. The fact that the DLC mode Frank Rising served as the overtime mode with a $10 price tag and the only mode with a time limit only made things look worse

Then came the final update a year later. It definitely fixed more than a few issues (maniacs were given more distinct encounters and movesets, unique side quests with unique survivors were added, weapons were rebalanced, etc) and even added a free arcade version of the story mode, but for most it was too little too late.

Then interviews with former Capcom Vancouver employees made it apparent how bad the development was. Between the fact the dominos where being set up since Off the Record’s development, how little time and resources they had, to the removal of the time limit being the devs feeling the game couldn’t justify it, Dead Rising 4 went from an example of how to kill a franchise to a group of devs trying to make the most of a bad situation. And as such, I’ve adjusted my approach in this article. In order:

• Presentation: More so my thoughts on the aesthetics, and my theory on the graphics being so inconsistent.
• Story: going over each overall problem I have with the story, and if there was any way to improve it if the game had the time to edit and refine the story.
• Gameplay: Going over the core gameplay. What works, what doesn’t, and if anything should be brought back in future entries.
• Multiplayer: Covering the multiplayer post-final update.
• DLC: Finally, talking about the content added post launch.

So buckle up. I’ve been playing this game on and off for five years now; this is going to be a long one.

Presentation

When it comes to graphics, there are three things that stick out to me. The first is the particle effects, which are really well handled and even on the most simplistic version of the Xbone it doesn’t suffer framerate drops (although I hear the PC and PS4 versions aren’t well optimized). The second is that the game reuses weapon icons from DR3, which gets a bit distracting with weapons like the handgun or the assault rifle which have distinct designs from the previous game.

The character models are what I (and others) find to be the most distracting element of the game’s raw graphics – namely in how some look up to par with a 2016 release and others look worse than the original 2006 game. However, with the knowledge of the game’s rushed development, I think they were smart with where they placed their resources. Characters who appear in cutscenes got the high quality models while those who are only seen in gameplay are given less effort. This is seen best with the two bloggers: Darcy gets a higher quality model than the four multiplayer characters, while Paula (who only appears during gameplay) has a model barely better than any generic survivor and lacks any pre-rendered model. When looked at from this angle, it makes sense why the animation quality can be so good while the models are occasionally so horrible.

The other talking point about the game’s visuals is with the Christmas theme, and what I was the most concerned about. Thankfully, the game isn’t as in-your-face with it as I feared. In the mall or across town, it mostly amounts to wreaths and nut crackers for the stores and Christmas trees in homes with some presents everywhere. There’s also a few combo weapons with a Christmas twist to them, and some gingerbread cookies and yule logs as healing items every now and then. Unless you actually go into a blind rage in relation to the holidays, the Christmas angle is nowhere overbearing. That said, the fact all of Willamette is covered in snow might become a problem for some players – more on that later.

Then there’s the Christmas music that plays in a few mall stores, in the pause menu, and in the vehicle radios. And to be honest, I don’t get why so many people hate it.I don’t find it any more or less fitting than the earlier games having the mall music play as the player makes their way across the map. That said, I greatly prefer the instrumental music used in the pause menu to the acceptable but noticeably weaker lyrical covers of classic Christmas songs on the radio. Thankfully, pressing up on the D-pad will change the station, and pressing it a second time turns off the radio (how does nobody seem to know this?)

I’m also glad that the Christmas music is here because the original soundtrack is easily the weakest one in the series. Aside from Tom’s banger of a theme, most of the music is way too atmospheric for its own good. The final update even removed some of the really awful maniac music in favor of recycling previous boss themes for them (although the pirate boss got an original theme. It’s okay). Overall though, you’ll really notice that Celldweller wasn’t brought back for the OST.

The voice acting thankfully fairs much better than the music. Ty Olssen is very different from T.J. Rotolo, but it’s not hard to get used to. The dude certainly didn’t sleep through his performance either, which is true for all the voice actors as a whole. Character’s voices always match the expressions they’re supposed to have, a few dub deliveries from time to time aside. I may not like most of these characters, their dialogue or the events they describe, but it’s clear they tried their best with the material they’re given.

But you know what they say about trying to polish a turd.

Story

Right. The plot involves Frank going back to Willamette long after it’s been rebuilt with his student Vick Chu. After the two have a falling out and attempt to flee, Frank becomes a wanted man thanks to Vick leaving him behind and getting spotted. He’s brought back in a few months later (and 6 weeks into an outbreak) by ZDC director Brad Park. He soon discovers a military conspiracy, a survivor faction of questionable ethics, and that Dr. Barnaby was still working on something zombie-related well after returning from Santa Cabeza.

What went wrong? More like “what didn’t?”

Tone

Dead Rising 4’s tonal problems are the most consistently complained about in any given review of this game, and for good reason. Even assuming the plot itself is good for the sake of argument, this game’s sense of humor would work against it every step of the way.

The first way is through sheer surplus of jokes. I’ve already gone over how this in the Archives for Origami King and ZomBeer, so I’ll keep it brief: the sheer number of jokes combined with how weak a lot of them (especially early on) are results in even the good jokes becoming weaker by sheer fatigue of comedy on top of ruining a lot of emotional moments. This was likely a result of the rushed development, though; using comedy to fill out a bare bones plot is a surprisingly common tactic for productions facing crunch due to things going off the rails and having to start from scratch (see the movie Foodfight as an example), so it’s safe to assuming a lot of this would have not been the case if time wasn’t a factor.

The same can be said of the second problem: the jokes themselves. Most jokes in the Dead Rising series are a result of the extreme characterization or situations the characters fall in rather than characters making jokes directly. DR1 has the store manager stay alive long enough to say there’s a clean up (his corpse) at register 6. DR2 has a Magician peacefully killed by his assistant only for him to violently stab him repeatedly afterwards because he’s always wanted to. DR3 has Kenny belittled by the survivor he took captive because literally no one takes him seriously. DR4 has Brad accidently show Frank gay porn on his phone because it’s funny.

These two problems are symptoms of a bigger one. In DR3, the boss Zhi decapitates himself in sheer rage and despair. In order to avoid things getting too dark, the camera shows that he has a really goofy face as his head rolls on the ground. I used to think this was out of fear of being taken too seriously, but given that DR3 was a massive jump up in gore levels from previous games, then it’d make sense to have a more lighthearted death to ease players into it. After Zhi, the deaths only get more gruesome with fewer laughs. DR4 showed me what that would actually look like.

Dead Rising isn’t strictly a comedy or a drama. Instead, the series gives the players a chance to see it either way. If you want to see it as a comedy, the situations are very far out there, the dialogue is blunt and there’s a lot of silly outfits you can wear the moment you leave the safe house. If you want to take the games seriously, the characters treat the situations as life or death and don’t make jokes about how wacky and unrealistic it is (Hollywood, take note), the stories don’t take shortcuts, and the games have surprisingly damning commentary. Dead Rising 4 is the first time the player has to see it primarily as a comedy with serious moments, and hopefully it’ll be the last time.

Bloat, Don’t Tell

Dead Rising 4 has five plots to cover in only 6 case files. There’s Frank and Vick, the monster known as Calder, Tom and Kylie falling out, Obsurists involvement with zombies, and Barnaby’s research. This is ignoring the character arc of Frank, Vick’s antics off screen, and the mysteries of Calder. Everything struggles for room to breathe, meaning most storylines have to follow a three-prong rule that doesn’t take long to get annoying:

• Interaction 1: The player is introduced to the concept and//or characters.
• Interaction 2: The characters talk about how the situation has changed (bonus points if this is the first time this information is brought up)
• Interaction 3: The conflict reaches its climax and is then resolved.

Not helping matters is that nothing actually happens for half the story. 90% of the story missions in case files 0, 1, 2, and 3 are just Frank going to a location, learning he’s too late to get what he needs, learning about the next location that might have what he’s looking for, and then that cycle repeating until he finds what something that helps, but often with a complication that starts the cycle anew. This also means that the player doesn’t directly engage with most of the plot. Imagine if in DR3, instead of being there for the raid on the safehouse with the illegals and Gary, the player arrives after the fact and is told by Red what happened and where to go next. Not nearly as impactful. Now apply that to half the story. Not much of a story at that point.

So, before even talking about the plot itself, the tone is tone deaf, the stories are fighting each other for screen time, and not a lot actually happens in the story to begin with. Great.

Frank West: Unwanted

This one is a short one, but the game establishes the idea of Frank West being a wanted man at the start of the game thanks to Vick leaving him behind, but once Frank is in Willamette, they don’t do anything with it. Compare this to Dead Rising 2 where Chuck being framed for the outbreak results in a lot of conflicts (making 5 survivor rescues more complicated than they needed to be, and being the result of two Psychopath battles). They bothered to establish in the final cutscene of Case 0 that Frank has had to go under the name Hank East (nice little nod to Saints Row) because he’s a wanted man, yet Frank is only ever referenced as the guy from the first outbreak. Combine that with how Brad finds Frank regardless in the very next scene, and I wonder why they bothered.

Also, Brad is the best character in the game but doesn’t get enough dialogue to justify getting his own section. I do wish I could play as him instead of Frank, though.

Frank Isn’t Frank

In Dead Rising 1, Frank West is introduced as a hard-edged war-time journalist. He enters Willamette on a tip that something big is happening, and a freelance reporter doesn’t pay the bills by waiting for the news to tell them the stories to cover. While the involvement of DHS has him realize this is the biggest story he’s ever worked on, it doesn’t take long for Frank to start acting to both save those around him (like when brad gets shot) to simply acting in what he thinks the right thing to do is (like carry an injured Isabela back to the safe house not long after she tried to kill him). This gets ahead in Carlito’s last conversation; despite violently yelling at him that his tragic backstory doesn’t justify what he’s done, he assures Carlito that the story of Santa Cabeza will be told. In short, Frank is shown to be more than just looking for the next big scope, even if that’s objectively what he was after.

In Dead Rising 4, Frank’s characterization is greatly, and annoying, exaggerated. Not only is Frank in it for the money, but shows little interest in what’s happening to the survivors of Willamette once the outbreak starts properly. This is at its worst when Frank leaves a character tied to a chair to go investigate what Obscurists are up to. He literally refuses to help a bunch of injured survivors who just gave him what he needed because lmao, got stuff to do. It’s literally not until Case file 5 that Frank actively tries to save someone, and it’s portrayed as character development. 

And sadly it is, because Frank isn’t Frank. Frank is a greddy dick, and only a greedy dick. This one-note behavior, far more than any jokes, makes Frank a nearly unbearable character, makes every character interaction painfully predictable and makes the fact you can’t skip in-game dialogue actually painful. All this trait is used for is for Frank to learn to stop being an awful person, but all that amounts to is Frank saving Hammond and being slightly less angry with Vick.. So Frank’s character is backpedaled and simplified for a character arc that was out performed with How The Grinch Stole Christmas. The fact he’s not the worst character should say a lot about Vick. Speaking of which…

Vick vs Frank

Okay, for this section, let’s pretend Frank is a different character with the same first name as Frank West, just for the sake of argument. So Vick and Frank have their falling out in Case 0 when they discover Obscurist (although they don’t know the name yet) are using human clones for zombie research. They both have legitimate grievances with each other; Vick is disgusted by Frank’s apathy to the situation while Frank is not putting up with Vick’s reckless behavior because she can’t control her emotions. It’s a good setup for a conflict. But there are two major problems.

The first is the three-prong story structure. While Frank and Vick interact for the entirety of Cases 0 and 6, the only conversation they have face to face in between is a single cutscene in Case 3, and it is just them arguing about what already happened and basically ensuring they don’t work together. So basically, only the first and final scenes accomplish anything. Because of this, it’s actually through Kylie and Tom that Frank learns to care more deeply about those affected by the outbreak; despite Frank regretting getting into a fight with her back in Case 3 towards the end of the game, Vick is actually pretty irrelevant to Frank’s character arc despite being the moral measuring stick.

That’s the second problem: the game really wants to hold Vick up as being the morally superior one despite being no better if not worse than Frank. Vick sells out a group of survivors to Obscurists (a group she believes to be behind the outbreak) and takes their word that they won’t shoot them (she knows it ended in gunfire and then assumes Tom’s men must have shot first). She also ties an Obsurist scientist trying to escape up to a chair and holds her at gunpoint to try and get answers from her while Obscurists guards shoot anything that gets too close to the house. Oh, and she destroys a harddrive of Evidence and steals Frank’s camera because she refuses to let Frank sell the story to the highest bidder despite hearing him say this story is going straight to the New York Times.

Yet despite all of that, Vick is never called out on any of this while Frank is called out on everything he does. Even when it looks like Vick is about to be called out, it’s turned around on Frank every single time. That’s why I say this game sees Vick as morally superior – because it’s pretty straightforward with everyone else (more on them later). Apparently this is actually the better version of her as in an earlier draft of the script she was “too unlikable” as a character. Either that was a lie to make it sound like the story had more editing, or she ate kittens alive while stabbing starving orphans, because Vick’s the most unlikeable character in this franchise.

In terms of “fixing” Vick, my two solutions are to either make her the main character or remove her outright. With the former, cut the nightmare prologue out and have her start out investigating the military base in Case 0. Frank could even be kept in for this part, but after Case 0, have Brad track Vick down since Frank is off the radar as a wanted man. The story could then focus on Vick’s guilt over that night, showing that empathy is not the same as acting on emotions. Alternatively, cut Vick out by cutting out Case 0 and instead having the nightmare prologue extended. Frank can be woken up in the classroom he’s in at the end of Case 0 right as Brad enters. The only challenge in terms of adapting the story would be Vick selling out Kylie.

Paula and Darcey

These are two bloggers that survived the outbreak. I left them out of the plot synopsis because they really don’t contribute anything beyond pointing Frank in the right direction for the first half of Case 2.

No, really. Darcey appears at the end of Case 1 to introduce Frank to Paula, and gets kidnapped by Obscurists to send Frank to West Ridge. The thing is, even if Vick was written out of the plot, Frank would head to West Ridge because Paula informs Frank about the Obscurist setting a trap for the monster there. Speaking of Paula, her role in the story is to tell Frank about the sniper in Old Tow for the second Obscurist outpost. That’s it in terms of the main plot. She has three other conversations, but those two are the only ones that actually advance the plot.

Paula also informs Frank about the optional boss fights (Maniacs) via the radio, and she also has a set of collectibles called “The Undead Gospel”. (Part of me can’t help but think she’s meant to be a parody of religious people, possibly of zealots. Not sure on that, though). These two actually have some interesting tidbits to them: Paula’s Radio voice is just supposed to be a character while the actual Paula is very level headed, and her Podcast is suppose to have lead survivors into attack Obscurists thanks to her propaganda, which is why soldiers will yell about defending themselves in combat. However, 80% of Paul’s dialogue is over the radio, and the game never makes use of the propaganda angle with Paula in the story itself.

Both of these two could easily be written out of the game with the characters already in the game. Darcey in his entirety could be replaced with Connor, who has a similar personality, is introduced much earlier in the same case file, and has several appearances afterwards. Having him get kidnapped could also resolve the need for Kylie and Obscurists to clash if Vick isn’t in the plot to boot. Paula in Case 2 when she appears in person can be replaced with Jessa, a mechanic working for Tom who is in the same part of town for the same reason. Simply have her tell Frank about the Outposts and have her meet Frank and the Junkyard. Paula on the radio, informing Frank of the bosses can (and should) be done by Brad.

The undead gospel has two avenues. The easier of the two is using the four characters of the Co-op mode (Jessa, Connor, Jordan, and Issac) to host a podcast in their spare time (giving them more lines). The harder of the two is Luke and Dawn. These are two characters who have a side story in the collectibles that show how far Tom has fallen as a leader, and having their story play out with audio would be preferable (and less cringe) as well as connect better to the main plot while offering the propaganda to turn survivors against the Obscurists.

Personally though, I think the game has too many collectibles and doesn’t need the podcasts or Vick’s cloud updates. So much like Paula herself, her podcast could be dropped without losing too much if ya ask me.

Obscurists

On paper, the group of Obsurists have an interesting story. Introduced as a military group, the player comes to learn that the survivors assumed the worst in them thanks to Tom (and Paula), attacked out of that assumption, and now the soldiers after weeks of harassment are forced to fight back and cannot trust anyone out of uniform. And when their leader is dying while trying to complete their mission, she orders them to instead start evacuating. Sounds like a pretty tragic group of antagonists.

That being said, the fact they’re mercenaries really doesn’t matter. They look like a military army, act like a military army, have the same ranks, conduct themselves in the same manner, work for the US Government, and react to most situations as a military would. The game keeps using the phrase “para-military” to describe them because you’d probably forget otherwise.

Fontana and James, the two leaders, also undermine them. James is a non-character who just wants to shoot every survivor who snoops around with them, and he dies in Case 2 anyway. Fontana has the opposite problem. The game wants her to be someone to fear as the collectibles paint her out to have tortured two terrorist to death before the events of the game, but also want her to be light hearted and caring, so she doesn’t let James shoot Darcey (damn it) and makes light-hearted banter with Frank before their confrontation. The game says she looks after the men in her unit, but never references Frank murdering 30 to 100 of their soldiers (James included). Apparently the survivors keep attacking first, but she never gets dialogue to even address it. Fontana is supposed to be the face of Obscurists, but she’s used for nothing more than a plot twist that they aren’t the bad guys, and as such that’s about all most will remember from Obscurists.

Shame, too. Fontana actually doesn’t need much screen time in my opinion. Just keeping her in the shadows for the confrontation only to reveal she’s just doing her job isn’t a bad idea. I actually like the idea that Tom’s the real villain of the outbreak itself; just remove the MCU side of Fontana’s character and it’d work a lot better. Maybe have a few more named characters beyond Sargent Harris the player can save too, and you’d have a much better version of the same group.

Tom The Mad King

Tom and Kylie’s conflict is the one part of the story I wouldn’t say has anything that needs fixing, just fleshing out. It follows the three-prong beats to a fault. We meet tom and Kylie to learn they’re dynamics in Case 2. Case 4 has it revealed that Tom blamed and punished Kylie for what happened instead of Vick or Obscurists. Case 5 is the Coup against Tom failing and him planning to kill Kylie before Frank intervenes. This works as a story, just needs more to it. Things such as giving Tom and Kylie an extra story mission or two, the aforementioned idea of tying the podcast back to the survivor militia, adding more side quests related to them, or just letting Tom call Frank up from time to time on the radio would help.

The only actual issue I have is the game revealing the looters in the gas masks are actually working for Tom. The game literally says in the notebook they’re gone crazy from the stress of the outbreak, using anything they can find as weapons (from vacuum cleaners to assault rifles) while believing the gas mask will keep them from getting infected. Make of that as you will, but the choice to say “no, they’re actually Tom’s secret army” is really stupid. Something as simple as Tom working with them instead would work better if this plot point has to be there, and to be fair they may have been the intent.

But yeah, I think this part of the plot actually works otherwise.

Dr. Barnaby

Okay, let’s get this out of the way. They do NOT retcon what Barnaby was doing in Santa Cabeza. It’s in a blink-and-you-miss-it line of dialogue, but he explicitly references the failed attempt to mass produce cattle. He’s instead trying to make something out of the existence of zombies, and believes that they could be the key to human immortality. It’s stupid, but it’s a different kind of stupid. To be frank, it should be criticized for the kind of stupid it is instead of being criticized for the kind of stupid it isn’t. But make no mistake, it’s not just kind of stupid. It’s immensely stupid. The idea that Barnaby was working on human immortality up to literally the night he was called up to the mall is so pathetically desperate that I’m surprised Disney didn’t write it.

This goes from immensely stupid to unbelievibily stupid with how easy it is to fix: Dr. Blackburne. She’s an Obscurists scientist so irrelevant to the story I didn’t bother including her in the Obscurists section. Her only role in the story is to tell Frank where to find Barnaby’s secret lab. Now imagine if it was actually her lab, and she simply was using Barnaby as a red herring (down to having the automated voice in the lab address visitors as such) so Frank wouldn’t piece together that it was her trying to create immortal humans. It’s much less bitter of a pill to swallow to simply have the plot say “The old man wrote down the idea but refused to bring it up with the government because he wanted nothing more to do with zombies after Santa Cabeza”, instead that he was actively working on it from day one. Plus, it could make Frank being too late (yet again) when he gets to the lab double as a trap: she knew Obscurist already secured her research, and expected Frank to die either trying to get in or getting locked in with a horde of zombies.

Calder

The game’s plot is so broken by the time Calder actually becomes a factor that I’m not too sure what to say here. The big thing that hurts him as a character is that the fact he talks is not a character trait but a plot twist. So the game has him behave as an instinct-driven monster only to reveal he actually has plans and a goal. So he is just a plot point for the first 5 case files, and has to get all the information out there in Case 6. Luckily for him, his story is very simple: He was an Obscurist soldier who accidentally started the outbreak and got infected, but by falling into a testing chamber was able to halt the infection process; although not fast enough to keep himself entirely human. He now plans to stop Obscurists from allowing humanity to achieve immortality.

Okay, so i think Dr. Blackburne should have personally experimented on Calder to make him a half-zombie. It could be that, once his own unit turned on him at a single command, he developed a hatred for the group and wanted every major figure dead while having no mercy for the underlings. This blind rampage could be what released the wasps from the lab back into the town. You can also drop the whole “Calder leads the zombies” as not even I think that’s something Dead Rising as a series should have and instead just have him be after Obscurists and the intel of the experiment. This can then play into him, revealing to Frank he can still talk much sooner and is trying to accomplish this goal before his body and mind rot to that of a normal zombie. This could then be the set up for their final confrontation: Frank needs the evidence to expose what happened, but Calder wants to make sure he’s the last monster of his kind. Once Case 6 is underway, there’s no longer any compromise to be had between these two and they have to fight it out.

Sorry this section just devolved into me playing fan-fic writer, but there’s not much to say about Calder because he’s very important but a very late-game story beat. He has maybe 10 minutes of actual screen time.

Urg, what a mess of a plot. But I said it is the worst part, so how does the gameplay itself hold up?

Gameplay

Dead Rising 4’s gameplay is basically a simplified version of Dead Rising 3, with some improvements and a whole lot of downgrades.

Core Gameplay

The first of those is the controls for when Frank is on the ground at a standstill. Once you get him moving, everything’s fine, but at a stand still trying to change directions will result in him walking forward in that direction. While this does mean that you can accidentally fall off a ledge by changing directions, this is actually quite rare. The bigger issue is that you’ll walk away from the item you’re trying to grab or accidently get a little too close to a zombie walking right towards you. Plus, while Frank controls well when moving properly, he’ll often get stuck on things in tighter areas or in small doorways, forcing the player to stop and readjust themselves. Neither is the worst thing ever, but a constant annoyance from start to finish.

There’s also the addition of stealth mode and its effects on the controls. Stealth mode is mapped to L3, which is traditionally the dodge roll move in Dead Rising from the second game on. So for long time players, expect to accidently slow Frank down to a third of his running speed when you meant to quickly dodge something. And since zombies can tackle frank in this game, standing still when you intend to dodge will result in a lot of otherwise avoidable damage. Meanwhile, the dodge roll is now mapped to RB, which is the sprint button; tap to dodge, hold to sprint. So you’re also going to accidently dodge roll and waste stamina when you mean to run. All of this for a mechanic you’ll never use in the game properly because you’ll never be lacking in terms of weapons.

That is because of the multiple inventory system. Frank starts out with 14 inventory slots spread across 4 categories (4 slots for melee, ranged, and throwing, and 2 for healing). At max, Frank has 8 slots for each weapon and 6 healing items. Given that Frank can, by the end of case 2, very easily have all 8 ranged and throwing slots along with 6 melee slots and 5 healing slots, there’s just never a point where the player runs the risk of running out of weapons.

Also, all food items heal the same amount and are used the moment the player presses down on the D-pad (holding down is how you drop weapons, so expect to accidently heal from time to time when playing). This means that the player can instantly refill a large chunk of their heal bar at any given moment, making most encounters non-threatening unless it’s a boss that stunlocks you for several attacks. And since almost every human enemy drops food and food itself is plentiful, there’s very little threat of Frank actually dying in combat.

The other reason that stealth is worthless and Frank can feel near immortal is that the combo weapons are back and more broken than ever. It’s a combination of how easy weapons are to build (you just need one item and then any item in a certain category) and how deadly some of these weapons are. Even after the final update buffed base weapons while nerfing combo weapons, some are still way too useful:

• Blast From The past: A sledgehammer with explosives. Instantly kills common zombies, is given early game, and is reasonably durable.
• Ice Sword: Despite all the nerfs this weapon received, it’s still OP. It can be made with liquid nitrogen (which is stupidly common) and any bladed weapon. Has long range, freezes zombies, has a long combo, and does pretty good damage.
• Raining Nail: A hand cannon made from a flare gun and anything mechanical. Each nail counts as a separate attack, meaning it has several chances to land a critical hit with each shot. Combine that with solid damage and a good ammo pool even after all the nerfs, and not much can stand up to one of these.
• Holy Terror: A rapture gun made from a computer case and any gun. Causes zombies to instantly evaporate and deals heavy damage to tougher enemies.
• Ion Cannon: A portable railgun made from a battery and any gun. Pint, Shoot, Delete. Better for human enemies.
• Laser Splicer: A unique laser gun made from a Microscope and any gun. It takes a bit of effort to use effectively; each shot is fairly weak but lasers connect between shots for a pretty generous range, and with practice literally everything can be killed in seconds with a single Splicer.
• Elemental Grenades: Exactly what the title says. It’s not that convenient to make, but saving survivors rewards the player with a random combo weapon, and they REALLY like dropping these. So you’ll always have a full inventory of grenades.

There have been some quality of life improvements, however. Collecting outfits is no longer as painful as it was in DR3 (thanks to the safe house shops selling clothes or even giving you missing pieces for free if you found part of a set), and the outfits themselves have the best variety in the series. Progress in PP trials carry over this time, compared to progress resetting each time in DR3. The minimap will mark human enemies and evolved zombies that are alert to your presence, aggroed, and/or in Frank’s eyesights. But the king of them all is that all weapons now use the background of the item slot to double as a durability meter; this is very useful for when players carry duplicates of weapons and need to know the one they just used half the durability on vs the one they only swung three times with. If anything returns from DR4, make it that.

Finally, driving is back as a major form of transportation like in DR3. Combo vehicles also return, but I never bother with them. Not because the vehicles control poorly (quite the opposite) or because the vehicles lack variety (it actually blows DR3 out of the water in this regard), but just because sprinting is just fine. Frank in this game is the fastest any character has ever been without Quick Step (fitting, given mixed drinks didn’t return) and his stamina doesn’t take too long to refill, so vehicles are only a major help in terms of moving across an entire district of the town. Combine that with how the best means of gaining PP is to run into each room/building to add them to your map for 500PP, and there’s really no benefit to driving unless you have a trip across town. And you can’t even use Exosuits, the game’s newest addition to the series, as trying to get in a car will instantly remove the suit. Shame, too; I like driving in a Mexican food truck.

Exo Suit

Oh right, the Exo Suits. These technological suits of armor give Frank the ability to casually push hordes to the side while having the power to launch cars like they’re made of plastic. There’s also a series of large weapons that require an exo suit to use, allowing for unparalleled devastation. If that’s not enough, there are items that can be jerry rigged into power ups to make the exo suit an outright tank, from using an arcade cabinet for electrical shockwaves to attaching military grenade holsters and a mounted gun on your shoulders. In short, the exo suit makes you the weapon.

I’ve softened up on this addition over the years. What was once the “jump the shark” moment for the series is now something I’m just fairly indifferent to that I personally wouldn’t bring back to the series moving forward. Even from a story angle I’m no longer bothered by it. Sure, 2006 me wouldn’t believe you for a second if you said in 2016 that this series would have robotic suits… but I don’t think 2006 me would believe anything from the past 5 years.

That got a little too somber, so I’d like to say I actually do have fun with the exo suit. While I’m very much a stick in the mud with this series (saving survivors is more fun than killing zombies – bite me), I do still have fun grabbing a big weapon, holding the attack button, and watching the corpse drop while the kill counter rises; the exo suits do a great job of hitting that particular part of Dead Rising’s appeal.

Where the exo suit starts to lose me is when I try to use it as an actual extension of the player’s ability. The suit has a 2-minute time limit for its use before the batteries die, so the player can only ever use it for anything in the immediate area. Power-ups can restore some battery if it’s below half its charge, but otherwise the only way to gain more is to replace the suit. If the game wants you to have an exo suit for a section, it’ll place a wireless charging station to give you infinite battery. On the other hand, these infinite suits tend to be removed the moment you enter a story section they don’t want you to have one (like with the showdown with Tom). Combine that with the fact the story loves to have the player stop and investigate or talk with survivors, and it’s very hard to ever take an exosuit anyplace it’d actually be useful. 

The weapons the suit can use are generally dull too. The flamethrower is the only firearm good for zombies as the minigun and the railgun both are too specialized for human enemies to be much use against a large horde, and your fists outclass any exosuit melee weapon that isn’t just a better version of your fists. Also every single throwing weapon may as well be a giant saw blade in terms of function. Suit upgrades offer more unique combat styles, but most of them are so far out of the way of an exo suit you’ll use up a good chunk of the battery trying to get to one, and you’re locked into the power up until you over use it to the point of it break (I’ve never once had this happen) or the battery dies.

Overall, I find them to be harmless and ultimately pointless. A fun little distraction at best, a real wasted opportunity at worst. The game itself even treats them as a side-show, since there’s only three perks in the level up system that involve them, none of which increase the duration of the suit.

Levelling Up

Speaking of levelling up, this game has a slightly different way of earning it. Combo weapons no longer earn extra PP from zombie kills, and instead the PP values come from the enemy type regardless of how they’re killed so long as it’s not with a vehicle. Each collectible also earns 500PP, and since each location on the map counts as a collectible, running in and out of stores like an indecisive Christmas shopper can get you to level 25 before the end of Case 1. No joke, I think you can reach level 40 from locations alone. To compensate for this, the level cap is raised to 100 and now every perk only gives one benefit with some getting separated into 2 weaker ones.

I don’t like how levelling up works in this game. At all. The upgrade skill tree requires the player to both get all previous perks AND to reach a required level. Just a reminder: Dead Rising 3 only required the player to get the previous skill in the tree, with the only level gate being the final and often overpowered perk in a tree requiring a maxed-out player. In this game, the next perk will always require an additional 10 to 15 levels to become available, which can be doubly annoying if the previous perk has “levels” to make it more potent (and raising how many points you’re spending on upgrades you don’t care about). Granted, this game gives out PP like it’s candy so it won’t be too long a wait, but it also means there’s nothing to really save up to; players who want to use their level ups wisely are left with the only option of stockpiling their attribute points from each level up and then going on a spending spree every 5 to 10 levels.

The perks themselves aren’t that good either. There’s your bog standard stuff like more health, more stamina, more inventory, etc. But there’s some really crap ones too. Stealth is such a non-mechanic that I don’t know why anyone would bother upgrading it, and the exo suit can’t be used long enough for any of its three whole perks to make a difference. The ability to regenerate health is too weak to ever be practical since it needs 2 upgrades to it’s speed and 4 upgrades to its max value to heal the player to half health over time. But that only works outside of combat, at which point you’ll heal up because this game gives the player healing items like they’re PP.

And then there’s the critical hits, which take up a lot of the brawling and shooting categories. This takes the place of attack upgrades in previous games, and it’s a poor replacement. Landing critical hits allows the player to deal secondary effects to the target, but these effects are often too weak to make a difference on anything larger than a zombie, and zombies are too weak to really need those secondary critical effects to die. But then there’s the rng factor: since these random crits are unreliable even with maxed-out odds, you won’t be using weapons unless that weapon is good without the random crit, which defeats the purpose of having them in the first place. If players didn’t have to upgrade random crits to get the durability and ammo perks for each weapon category, I doubt anyone would get them at all.

And yes, you read that correctly: weapons are in several categories now in terms of upgrades. When I said perks were divided up into weaker ones, I was being polite. They’re actually made damn near useless because you need to get each upgrade 3 times to be applied to the whole arsenal. Take melee upgrade: you need to upgrade close quarter weapons, blunt weapons, and bladed weapons all separately from each other, instead of just upgrading your melee stat once like in DR3. This basically triples the actual price of any given upgrade that revolves around weapons, because the same applies to guns (handguns, shotguns, and rifles). All the while, some categories don’t get upgrades and there can never get better. Want more ammo for Flare Guns? Too bad, there’s no ammo upgrade for launchers. Want crossbows to have aim down the sights? Only handguns and rifles can get that perk. Want the minigun for the exo suit to have manageable recoil? Well it’s not considered a handgun, shotgun or rifle to you’re S.O.L.

Overall, a level 100 Frank isn’t much better than a level 1 Frank. You’ll use all the same tactics, you’ll just be able to do so longer and/or more recklessly than before. And frankly, that’s lame.

Map

The town of Willamette is fully explorable, although not at first. The player starts out locked in the mall for Case 1, but by Case 3 the whole town is free to explore, save a handful of buildings locked behind story progression. The mall is easily the highlight of the map, with it being divided into 5 sections: an Amazonian food court, a pirate stage show, a Japanese shopping center, a motor speedway and finally a send-up to the real-life Medieval Times Dinner And Tournament. The town itself consists of Old Town (what remains of the old Willamette), West Ridge (housing and farming district) and North Peak (industrial and commerce district).

New Willamette has some improvements from DR3’s setting of Los Perdios. The map now has the mall serve as a centerpiece for the map, with each safe house and the game’s sewer systems having a shortcut back to the mall. Verticality is now more easily accessible without vehicles thanks to the second floor to most mall districts and an increased use of fire escape in the town. Finally, the map isn’t littered with dead ends and roadblocks to force you out of your car while driving, opting to instead just put some busses tipped over for the player to drive around or climb over.

That said, the map is held back by it’s constant asset recycling. This has always been present in the series, but never this bad. Nearly EVERY building is repeated at least 2 or 3 times in the mall and in the town, sometimes in the same district, and often with the same textures. This is likely a result of the rushed development, or at least I hope it was. While it’s annoying in the mall, it makes the town very dull when combined with everything being dusted in snow; the farmlands are the only place that stick out because of a sheer lack of buildings.

Beyond that, the map itself is serviceable but unremarkable.

Enemies

While the combat itself is too straightforward to get it’s own section, the foes populating Willamette have earned a few comments.

Somehow, this game has the weakest yet most annoying common zombies in the series. They aren’t quite as resilient as they were back in DR3 (thanks to the final update, cutting them in half can actually kill them now),  and most combo weapons can two-shot any member of the horde. Yet at the same time, since this game is trying to justify it’s stealth mechanics, zombies are even more sensitive to sound than ever before. And not only are there still no skill moves to help you evade the horde like in the first two games, but now you can’t even dodge roll or sprint pass zombies or Frank will bounce right off of them and back into the horde. So when you have to start fighting your way out of the horde, the noise you generate from even melee weapons (yes, zombies can react to the sound effects from combo or even base melee weapons) will draw in nearby zombies. So unless there’s a clear opening in the direction you’re heading in (which is almost never), be ready to fight off a good 30 to 50 zombies when surrounded. And when you try to save the randomly generated survivors, this can be the difference between life and death for them.

The new enemy is the Fresh Zombie – a human who was infected and turned so quickly they haven’t had a chance to properly start decaying. This allows them to run at full speed and tackle humans. This translates into gameplay as zombies that can outrun the player while sprinting, and a single zombie stumbling in front of you (because they hear you running) will be enough to slow you down and let them catch up. And once they tackle you, you’re losing at least 100 health because the QTE at its fastest takes a few seconds to throw them off.  And after their introduction in Case 1, they’re everywhere (but ESPECIALLY common in North Peak), so they also don’t take long to get repetitive. The Holy Terror is considered OP just because you can shoot a fresh Zombie once and they’re gone.

Ironically, the Evolved Zombie is considerably easier to beat, if not the least threatening enemy in the game despite giving the most PP on defeat (250). While it’s annoying how their dodge attack and ability to cling to any wall basically lets them teleport, they spend more time planning to attack than actually attacking. Their preference to make distance and then pounce both makes them easier to dodge than fresh zombies, but also makes the pushback attack (which reset your combo counter and their PP bonus for combat) far less common. Just pull out a Raining Nails and put a few loads into them.

Then there’s the human enemies. Obscurists are basically the spec ops from DR3 combat-wise, with the only addition being some melee weapons. Looters, on the other hand, can be wielding any base weapon in the mall, from vacuum cleaners to shotguns. As such, human enemies don’t focus on being “melee or gun” archetypes the series has used before. In its place, enemy factions fight each other as well as the player. This technically isn’t new to the series, but this is the first time it was brought to the forefront. And honestly, it’s cool. It’s more so a shame there’s no way for the player to initiate these fights manually (like mixing perfume with chemicals to make a gas bomb zombies chase, or being able alert factions to the presence of enemy factions).

There’s also the Maniacs, but they will be talked about at a later date. All that matters in terms of this review is that their followers never appearing outside of their single encounter does not play into the strengths of human enemies in this particular game, and they’re just damage sponges with slightly more unique attack patterns.

Photography

Not sure if this is a hot take, but I’ve never cared for the photography mode in any Dead Rising. I get why it exists with Frank, and it was a cool flex on the 360 being able to capture and save a photo of gameplay and then score it on a consistent basis, all in real time. But it’s just never been appealing to me beyond occasionally capturing a memorable moment or earning enough PP to finish off a level up.

And that perfectly explains why I don’t bother taking pictures in DR4 – nothing interesting ever happens, and you get no PP from Photos. The first one has been overly explained at this point; so let’s make it clear the game says that Photos earn PP, but I have never once seen the matter be moved from pictures even in mass. While in DR1 and Off the Record pictures could earn over 1,000 PP if the player got a really good shot, the points earned from pictures only determines rank. I’ve never once seen any PP values on screen, and given the game has a tiny pop up for earning 2PP from destroying something or killing an enemy in a car, I doubt it’s just being subtle all the sudden. I’ve only ever gotten PP from completing Photography trials or certain collectibles that need photographing.

There’s no longer an erotica category (strange, but whatever), but the game does add an additional 3 categories: destruction (things blowing up), conspiracy (Obscurists) and CAPCOM Tribute (crossover material). New to this game are sub categories based on the two most prominent elements of the picture (for example, conspiracy + destruction = warfare).There’s also unlockable filters the player can apply once they clear certain trails. These are nice additions that I’d actually care about if I ever used the camera when i wasn’t forced to.

Yes, the game forces you to use your camera. Quite frequently at that. The game has investigations where Frank needs photos to piece together what happened (these pics aren’t saved and don’t count against the player’s maximum count), a night vision filter and a detective mode filter (not the actual name, but a spade’s a spade). Investigations kill the pacing and get increasingly annoying on repeat runs. They just become a case of “stop moving, get the camera, scan the thing, listen to Frank talk, repeat until you’re allowed to move on”. It’ll also be on repeat playthroughs that you’ll realise most of the investigations would be cutscenes in previous games. And then there’s how the game removes your ability to pick up or observe items in dark areas unless you have the filter out, even if you have a flashlight equipped. And the detective mode just adds extra steps to what would normally be picking up a key and unlocking a door, since every panic room also needs a key regardless of finding its location.

Unless it was to nab a photograph-based collectable like zombie graffiti, I didn’t really use the camera in DR4.

Collectibles

Not counting the 6 side quests added in the final update (which I’m not going over; they’re welcome additions that don’t add enough to justify putting a section for them) or the 7 maniacs (again, going over them another time), the major optional content in Dead Rising 4 are collectibles. They earn 500 PP each, with a collection bonus for getting all in a set (for example, all 4 cell phones that detail a bank robbery). The only collectibles that offer gameplay rewards are Blueprints for extra combo weapons/vehicles and training manuals that fill out otherwise unobtainable parts of the skill tree (none are needed to get a later skill, thankfully). The rest are just flavor text and the occasional side story; I don’t care for most of these narratives and especially the ones just meant to be jokes. Even then, I am glad these are here; their hiding locations can get surprisingly devious for a map as simple as this one.

There, that’s everything. Am I missing something?

Multiplayer

Oh right.

The multiplayer is inspired by the infinite mode from the original Dead Rising. There are four episodes that get progressively more difficult with two days each. The players must complete tasks each day before 9:00 pm, with the second day having an optional boss fight. These missions can range from clearing out a store to removing bombs people hide around to securing vehicles; overall a solid variety. Once all missions are complete, the game just challenges the team to kill zombies as much as possible until 9:00 pm. Items don’t respawn, so fresh zombies with bags of supplies (Loot Zombies) and rewards for clearing missions are crucial to be on top of the horde, freshies, Evo zombies, and human enemies. (all of whom are much more durable than the main game). Weapons break faster to boot.

Honestly, the multiplayer can be really fun with friends or even randoms if you get lucky (much to my surprise, people still play this game online 5 years later). The mode is only in the mall, but the final update increased the PP from all enemies that aren’t horde zombies to 100 PP or higher, so levelling up isn’t as painful as it used to be (since you’re starting from level 1 again). The game does a good job at encouraging both cooperation and competition: players receive PP bonuses for out-performing their teammates in certain categories while offering PP multipliers for however many teammates survive the night (at least one player needs to make it to the designated safe zone by midnight for the team to move on).

The biggest downside to this mode is the grinding on top of how you still need to finish the main mode. It’s not that it’s locked until you get the game’s ending, but blueprints and cash are shared between story and multiplayer. As such (and especially with how brutally hard this mode is), you’ll want to have as many blueprints and as much cash as possible. When starting at a low level, weapon durability is as bad as Breath of the Wild’s great plateau, so getting to level 65 as fast as possible is a must. So most players will grind episodes 2 and 3 until then to get enough durability, ammo, and inventory to handle the final episode.

I would greatly prefer it if each character has their own level tree, though. Lower the level cap to 50, and give two attribute points on level ups instead of 1. Finally, give each character a skill tree unique to them. Let’s use Connor (who is meant to be the medic) as the example: he could have a skill tree that lets him regenerate hp on hit, a lot of hp on kill, and heals teammates twice as effectively with healing weapons (a type of weapon exclusive to this mode).

Another type of weapon for this mode are golden combo weapons. With the blueprint, you can combine a combo weapon with a gold bar. The resulting golden weapon is functionally the same, but with massive buffs to counter the increased difficulty of multiplayer and to be on par with the single player version. These blueprints do actually carry into the story mode, though. One new game +, gold bars spawn in Willamette and the player can then create ridiculously powerful and durable weapons. It’s a nice little bonus.

Prior to the DLC and final update, Multiplayer was the best part, and to some the only good part of this game.

Minigolf

Minigolf is the first paid DLC mode added to the game. It has some solid customization, and some funny lines from Frank and Bob (who is literally just a zombie tied to a chair).

Positives over. This is a golf game without different types of grass or any grass at all. It’s just “the green” (which is made of metal), sand pits, and out of bounds. As such, you’ll have the ball roll of the course several times unless you get trapped in the sand pit. But on top of that, your default clubs are so crap that you can not make par on some later holes. Yeah, you need to use the zenny on the course to buy better clubs to increase your stats. But this isn’t like Mario Golf star clubs. Imagine if in Mario golf, you had to unlock 5 tiers of star characters for your favorite character. This also means you can’t buy any cosmetics if you want to be not awful.

I hate this mode. Moving on.

Frank Rising

The final update removed the glow from his eyes.

Now for the DLC that matters. Frank rising sees Frank West revived as a zombie and become a member of the horde. After eating some looters to satisfy his hunger, he gets shot by Kylie who has yet to escape. He has enough humanity in him to hesitate for a split second on lunging at her, but is flash-banged by Dr. Blackburne. She reveals he’s the very kind of zombie Barnaby wanted to create, but Frank insists on being cured. The rest of the game is Frank getting what Blackburne needs, she betrays him in an effort to learn about how he came to be, and is ultimately cured of his zombie infection.

If this sounds stupid, it is. But given that I treat the main game’s plot like I treat Boruto and The Last Jedi (pretending it never happened), I’m beyond the point of caring about the story by the time Frank Rising rolls around. And to be honest, I think the writing is generally better. Not in terms of storytelling, but the character banter’s not only not cringe-inducing this time but actually got a few laughs out of me. Thanks to the consolidation of the cast down to Frank and Blackburne (and Vick being nowhere in sight), the exchanges were just sharper across the board.

The gameplay is also overall better, thanks to the final update, though. Being a zombie doesn’t stop the horde from targeting Frank after the intro thanks to Blackburne’s treatments, but the final update gave Zombie Frank melee defenses from the get-go so only gun-toting enemies and survivors with combo weapons pose a big threat on it’s own.

Another thing buffed was Frank’s feast move. Unlike the core game, food items don’t heal Frank and he instead must eat others to survive. The game had it so that zombies gave far less health than human enemies, and health bar enemies couldn’t be eaten at all. This is all still true, but now the values are far more forgiving and it simply determines how high the hit combo meter must be to get a lot of health back (a level 4 feast on a zombie recovers about 500 health, while on a human it nearly maxes Frank out regardless of his health bar).

Frank also gains a pouce, a vomit attack and a scream. The former can be used to safely move a short distance and disarm an opponent, and the spit can be either rapid-fired like a shotgun or charged up from a long-distance attack. The last one is simply how Frank stuns enemies, zombies included. Frank’s dash (replacing the dodge roll) also gets priority over zombies. And to seal the deal, the upgrades for these moves are actually really useful (acquired through collectibles and side quests:

• Increasing maximum HP
• Increasing max stamina
• Increasing damage of Frank’s melee attacks
• Moves recharge faster
• Yowl can deal damage
• Pounce gains a shockwave attack
• Vomit attack draws zombies in on that target
• Dash attack doubles as a melee attack for zombies
• Feast can be used more than once before resetting

That said… I don’t recommend trying to get everything in one run. The time limit is a mere 2 hours, and dying does not restore any lost time. I’d recommend gathering the collectibles the first run and then focus the second one on trials and story. Sadly, only collectibles are carried between runs. You’ll have to redo trials every single time, even in a new game plus. I get why in the sense that the mode is barely a half hour otherwise, but when you finally max out Frank, there’s only 3 enemy encounters left. So having the option to restart with all trails saved, only collectibles saved, or starting fresh would have been greatly welcomed. Because of that, Frank Rising is a fun change of pace for the series, but not something I can go back to as often as I may want to.

CAPCOM Heroes

CAPCOM Heroes is a free mode released with the final update. It basically applies the structure and approach of Frank Rising to the main campaign and the whole map. As such, I’m only going over the changes. Frank by default dresses like his classic self. There are no weapons nor outfits in this one. Instead, Frank attacks like he does in the Capcom VS series. Frank also has a revolver and a queen jar for his rechargeable ranged attacks, and his skill move lets him blind enemies with his camera. As he goes through the game, Frank unlocks Capcom characters to turn into, all of whom offer different dodge rolls, melee attacks, ranged options and skill moves. These characters are unlocked through story progression, collecting stars, and purchasing in safe houses.

Because character abilities are determined by trials, that gives the game 33 side quests (2 per character across 17 characters, minus Frank who only gets one), so there’s plenty to actually do. However, simply put, this mode gets dull after a while. I could go over how some missions are poorly designed (Viewtiful Joe’s second mission is nearly luck based), how the costumes are given in a questionable order (X is unlocked first but you max out Dante, who is way more powerful by default, way sooner), how the shadow costume share both hideous and poor design choices, how the healing system is just straight up worthless, or how unlocking costumes is mishandled. I could, but none of that matters. Regardless of any of this, you’re going through the same events, levelling up the same way, collecting collectibles for the same general reason, dealing with the same enemies in ultimately the same way. When it first came out and many players were playing the game for the first time since Frank Rising, it was a fun novelty with some design problems. As part of the big package? It’s hard not to feel like it was pure fluff and a questionable use of resources when the core game still needed more work. Like the maniacs, I’ll go over this mode more at a later date, but it was not exactly a bang to end on.

Final Thoughts

Sorry for the length of this one, but it’s not often I archive something I have this much to say about. But for my overall favorite franchise, Dead Rising 4 was a whimper instead of a bang to end the series on. Not the kind of final game a series wants. So, why do I come back to this game every year? Well, because Dead Rising at its worst is still more interesting than most AAA games to me. Compared to most of what EA, Activision-Blizzard, Ubisoft, and Take-Two put out, Dead Rising 4 is still more unique of a game, still more stable (somehow), and has more of an identity. Sure, that identity makes me want to punt Dead Rising 4 in the nose half the time, but that’s better than making me think “I could just play something else.”

I also didn’t have to pay for any of this; the game was a Christmas gift back in 2016, and through a string of events I got the Season pass for free thanks to Microsoft; maybe I enjoy this game because I have no buyer’s remorse.