Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop (Wii) Review
It’s hard to say whether or not Capcom really care about the Nintendo Wii. On one hand, they are putting out a relatively large amount of quality titles on the Wii, but on the other, most of them are either side-stories or ports. Zack & Wiki was, to this day, one of the best Wii games that a third party developer has ever put out; Umbrella Chronicles was a very appealing title to the average Resident Evil fan but didn’t provide as much depth as Resident Evil 4, which Capcom also ported to the Wii. With the release of Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop, Capcom have indeed done the unexpected and ported a game that nobody necessarily wanted on the Wii.
That being said, how does Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop hold up against other Wii games, and more importantly, its high definition cousin? Dead Rising focuses on the exploits of Frank West, a photojournalist investigating why Willamette, a small town in Colorado, has been sealed off by the US Military. Desperate for a Pulitzer prize for delivering a chilling expose, Frank is dropped on top of Willamette Mall by a helicopter, informing his pilot to return in 72 hours for evacuation. Naturally, the US military blocked off the town for a reason, and Frank finds that all the citizens of Willamette have been infected by an unknown agent, and are now zombies. Frank, in his attempts to investigate the incident, teams up with several Homeland Security agents as well as a mysterious woman working for an unknown organisation, which has some ties to the event and the antagonist, a Hispanic man named Carlito. Franks (or yours) task in Dead Rising is to expose the truth of the incident and evacuate any still living survivors. What is perhaps the most poorly met aspect of Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop is the graphical capabilities of the Wii and the effect that has on the visuals of the game.
Chop Till You Drop features some pretty mediocre graphics, but this is by far not the worst the Wii has seen. Most character models are surprisingly detailed compared to their high definition cousins, and cutscenes look almost up to par with the 360 version as well and although they were recorded straight from the 360 version, they have definitely undergone ‘downgrading’, although nothing looks majorly ‘bad’. Unfortunately though, the environments are dull and drab. We then come to the most controversial factor – the on-screen enemy count. There’s one thing that’s definite here – Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop has less enemies on screen than in the 360 version, but by no means is it a huge detriment to the game – in fact there are several times in the game where you will be surrounded by zombies. Realistically speaking- does it really matter if we can’t see the zombies in the distance? No, it doesn’t. As long as we’re surrounded by zombies, we shouldn’t really care about what’s happening in the distance but instead, how to get ourselves out of trouble. By no means are the graphics bad, they’re just not amazing. You’ll be swamped and surrounded by zombies quite a bit in Dead Rising. The game is incredibly hard even on normal mode. The general gist of the gameplay is that Frank will receive missions from Otis to rescue specific survivors, and upon completion will be rewarded money (which can be exchanged for weapons). Those missions serve as time fillers though, and occur in between each ‘major’ mission which (most of the time) reveals more of the story and progresses the player closer to the ending.
It is usually in those missions that players will meet Psychopaths- boss characters who have found it hard to cope with the stress of a zombie outbreak and have, well, gone psychotic. Those colourful characters definitely bring a lot of interesting moments into the game, some of which include a clown who wields dual chainsaws, a butcher who once worked in the grocery store and an old man who has taken advantage of people’s uncertainty and started his own cult- a cult whose uniform consists of yellow raincoats and green masks. It goes without saying that these boss battles are some of the most interesting you’ll experience in a video game, and they are a nice ‘twist’ on the regular boss battles and a clever way to integrate them into such a scenario. Frank can, however, defend himself and other survivors through the use of weapons, which are purchased from a gun shop, and melee weapons, which consist of whatever Frank can get his hands on in a shopping mall (and the possibilities are endless!). Frank can shoot with an aim of the Wiimote, with a strong melee attack being assigned to a waggle of the Wiimote, and a light attack being assigned to the A button.
The controls are surprisingly intuitive, and the aiming definitely feels much better than the 360 version, with a system almost 100% similar to Resident Evil 4, the engine of which Dead Rising was developed on. In that regard, players can also level up Frank not only by destroying zombies, but by performing melee moves in a similar manner to RE4. That is, a quick headshot and button press (or waggle) to initiate a kick. The gameplay is surprisingly very different from the original, and is what sets it apart from the 360 version- it’s almost a completely different game (sans story). It’s inevitable that people will compare Chop Till You Drop to what came before it (heck, even I did in this review) but for those wondering why they should pick up Chop Till You Drop even after playing the 360 version, there are quite a few changes from the original. The first and most obvious is that the game is now streamlined into an entirely linear experience, making it significantly different to the original game. The game also now runs on the RE4 engine, meaning Frank cannot jump or take photographs.
It also gives Frank a much greater sense of complacency over firearms rather than melee weapons (with most firearms also appearing in Resident Evil 4 too). The emphasis on gunplay now means that Frank can carry up to four firearms and only one melee weapon at a time. Finally, players will encounter new enemies in the game, some of which brand new (zombie parrots and poodles) and some of which are retooled boss characters who’ve become standard enemies that pack a bit more of a punch. Also, a rather perplexing decision is that Frank now can purchase and sell weapons to Cletus, a deranged gun shop owner, shortly after defeating him. Cletus is on par with the merchant in Resident Evil 4, even coming with his token seedy laugh. Oh, and those who didn’t like the save or timer system in the original can find solace in Chop Till You Drop- all of that has been scrapped in favour of a more Resident Evil-like saving system, where you can save as often and in as many slots as you like. Most players of the original game will be quite pleased to hear that the music featured in Dead Rising is largely left untouched in Chop Till You Drop. Each boss battle has its own signature tune, usually consisting of a metal inspired piece, with some tunes even having some urban hip-hop influences.
There’s a large range of music to go with the gameplay too, something that wasn’t featured in the original version, which really ups the intensity of standard gameplay. Overall, the game really hasn’t changed that much in terms of audio, and that’s not a bad thing either! Dead Rising on the 360 wasn’t an overly long game. Players were looking at around 6 hours to complete the original, and that was in an open sandbox environment. In Chop Till You Drop, there is an extra chapter included in the main game that was optional in the 360 version, lengthening the experience on Wii. All in all, the game will take you around 6-8 hours to complete, and will definitely pose a challenge to those not used to the conventions established in the previous Resident Evil 4 or 5 games, but isn’t an overly long game. However, upon completion of the game, players will unlock Odd Job and Second Amendment mode. The first of these modes comprises missions that are ‘alternative’ with strange objectives, one of which includes killing 50 zombies with a soccer ball in a small, bouncy room. Odd Job mode is definitely entertaining for a while, but might not keep everyone’s attention as it did for me =P. Second Amendment mode is a little more laid back, with the game giving you a zombie picture and then requiring you to find the zombie in a horde and assassinate him from a distance without moving. It’s a rather daunting task at first (and proves that the ‘horde’ of zombies still exists) but players will find some more fun in this mode too.
Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop is a hard game to give a solid rating to. On one hand, it’s an enjoyable experience that is very different to the original game, while on the other it does at times feel incredibly lazily made. The best recommendation I can give is that if you’ve played the original, give it a rent and see how you go, whereas if you’ve never played Dead Rising before, you will probably enjoy the interesting setting and story the game presents, regardless of the method of presentation. That being said, the game is incredibly fun, and despite its technical shortcomings, is one of the better Wii games out there from a third party developer. Definitely a try before you buy.
