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Nintendo media summit - Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop - impressions

by rawmeatcowboy
06 October 2008
GN 1.0 / 2.0

This was my first time going hands-on with Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop. If you follow the site, you know that I’m fairly interested in the title. I wasn’t expecting the same amount of insanity that I got from the 360 version, but I was looking forward to some varied fun via controls and Wii-specific mode. Once I actually got my chance to play, I found the game to be a rather strange experience.

Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop feels like an unfinished game. There are two reasons why that might be. First off, the game isn’t actually finished! Just as all the other titles at the summit, it is a work in progress. The other reason why it might feel unfinished is because…the game modes and gameplay just don’t feel very compelling.

Going from the 360 version of Dead Rising to the Wii version brings a lot of changes. First off, the obvious one that everyone has picked up on. There aren’t nearly as many zombies to mess around with. The mall area feels downright barren. Rather than being thrown into a zombie outbreak, you feel like you’ve just missed one. A few zombies here and there, and lots of empty space to run around. This, of course, can still change inbetween now and release. We hear that Capcom is aiming for 100 zombies on-screen…and in this build, I counted about 10 on screen at once.

The gameplay shown off at the summit was featured on the new mini-game esque modes. For instance, one of the games had you killing as many zombies as you could in 4 minutes. You just ran around, picked up random items, and beat any zombie you could find. Areas were roped/blocked off, which made the game a bit more fun. You were in smaller areas, which gave you a better chance of encountering more zombies. The only thing is, weapons seemed pretty sparse. Benches, umbrellas, guns, swords, shopping carts, cash registers…and that’s all I can remember using. Much less to choose from when compared to the 360 version.

Finally, the controls just didn’t make sense. I don’t understand why I have to wiggle the Wiimote to swing a bat. Shouldn’t I just be able to swipe the Wiimote in one big motion to swing? Hell, you could just hit the A button to attack…and that made more sense. The new RE4-style camera was nice, but the controls just don’t make sense for this game. They make you slow and cumbersome. Subtracting zombies doesn’t make the control scheme work any better.

If I could sum up Chop Till You Drop in one word, that word would be…’disappointing’. Whether you compare this version to the 360 version or not, in it’s current form, Chop Till You Drop failed to impress. At least the graphics were pretty decent!