[Wii] Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop

[Infernal Monkey]

System: Wii
Developer: TOSE
Publisher: Capcom
Genre: Action
Players: 1

Originally released for the Xbox 360 in 2006, Dead Rising was an extremely impressive title that put the system's raw power to good use. The game featured a staggering amount of zombies on-screen to create a completely overwhelming experience. Now, while Capcom's no stranger to forcing square pegs through round holes (see the Commodore 64 port of Street Fighter 2) the mere thought of trying to make Dead Rising work on the Wii was absurd. Slapped with a clever, but rather misleading 'Chop Till You Drop' subtitle, the gameplay has taken some gigantic hits along the way, but does it still work? Well, no, not really.

The game begins with Frank West – a freelance photojournalist – hiring a junker helicopter to investigate the quiet little town of Willametter, Colorado. Earlier that morning National Guard troops had blocked off all the roads with no reason given, so it was either this or digging an elaborate tunnel underground with a spoon to get there. Amusingly, the first major element cut from the game is Frank's ability to take photos. He'll still carry his large, bulky camera with him at all times, but now it's just to impress the ladies. Seeing as the game's cutscenes are recorded from the 360's real-time graphics, this actually removes a pretty large part of the introduction sequence where Frank slowly discovered the zombie outbreak by taking photos of the town from above.

Dropped off at the Parkview shopping centre to buy some back to school supplies and hopefully find out exactly what's going on, the helicopter pilot promises to pick Frank up in three days. It isn't long before you meet up with a bunch of survivors desperately trying to form a barricade at the entrance, which obviously fails (there wouldn't be much of a game, otherwise). Now thousands upon thousands of zombies begin piling in. Actually no, make that hundreds. Maybe.

While no (sane) individual ever expected Chop Till You Drop to match the zombie count of the original, it still comes across as an almost embarrassingly sad effort. At most you'll see about 10 zombies on-screen at any one time. As you run around the place, more zombies will literally appear out of nowhere. It's entirely unconvincing; especially when you start picking them off from a distance, only to see more instantly take their place like magic. While they were slow and stupid in the original, the constant threat of being swarmed by a large group was what made things so intense. Here, you can often just navigate the shopping centre without a care in the world.

That's not to say there isn't any threat at all. The occasional zombie will attempt to attack Frank - some may even give chase, before flopping to the floor and giving up. In an effort to up the challenge, Capcom have added a larger variety of undead fiends, including birds, dogs and giant security guards. The dogs can be difficult to kill, as they tend to stick close to Frank's leg (to bite, not hump); a blind spot for most weapons. The birds will even start dropping grenades after a while, which is pretty hilarious.

Running off the Resident Evil 4: Wii Edition engine, the game now adopts the same over-the-shoulder shooting controls – a vast improvement over the original game. Hold the B button to take out your gun and aim away with the Wii Remote. Feels great, works great. But the real fun comes from the assortment of melee weapons laying around. A lot have been removed, but there's still a decent selection. Chainsaws, baseball bats, brooms, lawn mowers... store mannequins. Oddly, you need to press the Z and A buttons together to pick something up (or even talk to people). Why not... just use say, the C button? Aside from sniper segments, it has no use. Primary attacks are carried out with the A button, but each weapon can deliver a more powerful blow by swinging the Wii Remote. Though the clumsy motion detection makes this rather useless.

While time marched forward no matter what you were doing in the original game (you could spend the three days riding a bike around the park if you really wanted) progression is now entirelly linear, forcing players to complete missions. Not necessarily a bad move, but with the majority of them consisting of tedious escort missions, boredom can quickly set in. Essentially, you go see Otis – the janitor with super powers – in the security room and he'll give you a list of people around the shopping centre that need saving. Simply follow the arrow, talk to them for a bit and they'll follow you back to the security room.

Again, the awkward lack of zombies to deal with makes these 'missions' unbelievably easy. The other humans rarely ever get attacked. The only difficultly comes from the AI being thick as pig crap, requiring Frank to constantly scream "THIS WAY", "FOLLOW ME" in their face. Seriously, if you don't remind them to follow you once in a while they'll completely forget and just stand on the spot, furiously scratching their crotches as zombies very slowly approach.

After a certain amount of idiots have been saved, a cutscene following the wacky storyline will pop up, usually followed by a boss fight. Boss characters consist of humans that have gone insane, such as a chainsaw-juggling clown that gathers up dead children and straps them to the rollercoaster for eternal happiness. Just send $1 to Happy Dude, 742 Evergreen Terrace. They're enjoyable – and much needed – breaks in the gameplay.

99 red balloons that won't be floating in the summer sky.

The shopping centre itself has been messed with, reducing the open sandbox feel. A number of paths are now blocked off by barriers, and with Frank unable to even jump anymore, players will often find themselves being shuffled down a single route in an open area. Sections such as the cinema can't even be accessed until you reach a mission that requires you to go there. It's still a very large zombie killing playground, but these changes are a tad frustrating.

The environment itself is a pretty solid recreation of the 360 game, but it's clear Capcom just didn't care about the graphics. The textures range from decent to downright horrendous, and the whole look comes across much blurrier than it should be. It's almost as if some new vaseline filter has been implemented. To top things off, the PAL version doesn't support 60 Hz and has gigantic black borders. The fact that this sort of sloppy PAL treatment still exists in 2009 is mind blowing, especially from a big name publisher like Capcom.

While the Dead Rising experience has lost a lot in the process, Chop Till You Drop is still very much playable. It's just been hacked down into a very average and largely forgettable game. The severe lack of polish doesn't help, either. First time shoppers would be advised to give it a rent. If you've played through the original, don't even bother.

Score: 5.5/10 - "Try/Rent"
What's next, Capcom? A port of Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles from the Wii to the Wii? That'd be fantastic.

Review by Lance McGill (Infernal Monkey)

[TSPhoenix]

Considering how many games are out there, why bother playing something thats merely passable unless there is some aspect of it that is brilliant or appeals to you immensely.

[Kiru]

What's next, Capcom? A port of Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles from the Wii to the Wii? That'd be fantastic.

Infernal, you are god!

[Adam]

Another crap Wii Port... whoa, that's unusual.

[Raziel]

I was almost tempted to buy this game while I was out today. Glad I didn't then.

[Gookanheimer]

Originally Posted by Kiru

Infernal, you are god!

Seconded. It got my lols.

Wonder how much it'll end up selling.

[KoKoO_Psy]

Wait, what, TOSE made this, no way, they really get a lot of work.
Anyone notice how much zombie/mutants are on wii att the momement.

[BoonMcNougat]

Originally Posted by KoKoO_Psy

Wait, what, TOSE made this, no way, they really get a lot of work.
Anyone notice how much zombie/mutants are on wii att the momement.

I noticed there weren't enough.

[KoKoO_Psy]

Originally Posted by BoonMcNougat

I noticed there weren't enough.

Not what i mean, We have this, house of the dead, and Madworld, onechanbara, thats alot of zombie/mutant games at once.

[nnytard]

i still want to get this game when i can get it really cheap or whatever