Frank West returns to Willamette, Colorado to find the truth behind the zombie outbreak, but this time with some extra bells and whistles. Find out if it’s worth another 72 hours in our Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster review!

When the Xbox 360 hit the scene, it was truly the first “next-gen” experience for a lot of gamers, myself included. In its launch day alone, it had games like Call of Duty 2, Condemned, and Need for Speed: Most Wanted. The early years that followed bolstered the platform, and a standout new IP from Capcom was Dead Rising, basically a playable “Dawn of the Dead” that was an instant hit preceding the zombie craze in the late 2010’s. Now, Dead Rising has received a Deluxe Remaster.

He’s covered wars, you know!

There’s no shortage of remakes and remasters as of late, with Capcom releasing Resident Evil 2-4 that got a touch-up for newer systems. Dead Rising looked great for its time, but even with its novel concept, the majority of players would agree that the gameplay had more than a few hitches. Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster seeks to squash its bugs while you squash zombies across Willamette Parkview Mall. Let’s see if it’s worth picking up this revisit of a seemingly-dead franchise in our Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster review!

Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster Review – Story

The story and the majority of the dialogue/content within Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster remain unchanged. But not all of it; there are some omissions to best suit the modern audience, including removing “erotica” tagged photographs being the most noticeable change. With all of the bloody goodness still intact, these minor changes are only truly noticeable if you play each game with a magnifying scope on every line of dialogue, so it’s a non-issue.

A Capcom game through and through, check out all the outfits available as DLC.

The breakneck pacing of the game’s case files means that you can expect Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster to be a six-hour run time on average. There’s a new survivor to save or something else to check out every other in-game hour on the side, but with a strict time limit for the good ending, it’s a toss-up whether these are all worth pursuing in any given playthrough. Since there are extra game modes and modifiers, fans will be playing more than once to check out everything on offer.

Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster Review – Performance/Graphics

By all accounts, the original Dead Rising was notoriously a bugfest. Rendering dozens to hundreds of zombies on-screen at once in 720p was a tall task in 2006. With the job of a remaster solely being an upgrade, I’m pleased to announce the biggest offender from the original release, the movement patterns of NPC survivors, has been completely fixed in Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster. This alone warrants praise as it led to so much ire of players of the original.

Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster boasts great frame rates on capable machines.

In the graphics department, Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster is no slouch. Utilizing only about half the video memory of most modern titles, the RE Engine continues to impress with its performance. Load times are very brief, only a few seconds on a solid state drive, making transitions through the mall swift and painless. While some face models are certainly more appealing than others, the facial expressions and close-ups in cutscenes are exceptionally high-detail.

Psychopaths are no laughing matter – these human bosses are a real threat.

Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster Review – Gameplay

The worst thing about Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster is that the boss fights are still a slog to get through. While the autosave functionality makes things more convenient, you can be saddled with inadequate weaponry/healing items and forced into a state of retrying the same boss over and over again. Ranged weapons don’t make a dent, so you’re stuck using cheeseball methods with no difficulty settings. If they’re on a vehicle, they can tear you down in seconds – good luck in that case.

Projectiles are useless in Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster – don’t bother shooting 30 bullets into a human.

Despite its polish in some areas, others are still a nuisance in Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster. You will regularly encounter a ton of zombies popping in within the more open areas no matter your draw distance settings. I encountered some major bugs, including the game not registering me killing the prisoner psychopaths, as well as the photographer NPC following me around and spewing the same few lines ad nauseum.

I’d rather face a million zombies than these 25 cultists again.

Willamette Parkview Mall is absolutely cumbersome to navigate when you’re learning the ropes. As Dead Rising was always designed to be a game to be replayed due to its brief length and emphasis on completionism, it’s going to take some time commitment to best understand how the mall is laid out. The other aspect to gain efficiency is how to route survivors to the saferoom without becoming zombie chow on the way there, since some areas are blocked off at earlier points in the game.

The mall is a maze for the first few hours, so learn your paths and your stores as quickly as possible.

Controlling Frank in Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster is a big leap from the original, with the ability to move and focus simultaneously being a godsend. All the neat little tricks that Frank learns as he levels up make the zombie-killing more bearable too, as I jump-kicked like crazy and spin-punched to my heart’s content. Those that are here for the zombie combat will revel as this is the best way to experience the game in that respect.

Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster Review – Audio

The psychopath themes in Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster make the troublesome boss fights at least pleasant to the ears. In addition, being able to change the mall’s music based on which character’s costume you have is an amazing touch that I feel adds value to the DLCs for Capcom diehards. Voice acting is still cheesy yet on-brand, as the entire voice cast sees new actors/actresses in respectable performances. Zombies still sound grotesque, and I still die laughing at the sound effects whenever Frank eats something (which is very often).

Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster Review – What Else?

Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster is not verified as compatible on the Steam Deck, but has been reported to being quite playable for its early adopters. It’s also currently sitting at a decent 80% approval rating on Steam, indicating that 8 out of 10 players are having a good enough time with it from the start, which is indicative of a strong PC launch, something that’s become a rarity in modern AAA gaming sphere.

Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster should be listed at a “Playable” rating on Steam Deck in no time.

Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster Review – Conclusion

If there was a game that needed a remaster, Dead Rising was one of them. Plagued by some shoddy design flaws, it’s great to see some bugs get ironed out, but even more frustrating that some still remain after all these years. The chief complaint across critics and fans alike in Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster is its tiresome boss battles, so why is this hitch still present?

Should you buy Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster? I mean shor, yu ken…

Despite its drawbacks, I will say I still had hours of fun in Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster. There’s something to be said about learning how a game functions and overcoming its faults, but if the flaws are insurmountable, it’s a detriment to the entire experience. Fans of the original should do their research before shelling out $50 USD for the remaster.

So, why should you play Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster?

• Much of the core fun of the original remains unmodified, merely polished
• A solid entry point for newcomers with lots of graphics/accessibility options and strong optimization.
• Killing zombies just doesn’t get old!

But why shouldn’t you play Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster?

• Atrocious boss fights nearly ruin it all.
• Still buggy on a fundamental level.
• Autosave is a blessing and a curse, potentially dooming you before tough segments.

A review code was kindly provided by Capcom for the purpose of our Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster Review.  You can check out our other reviews here and if you haven’t already, be sure to join the Qualbert Discord to find out about the latest game and review updates!