Dead Rising 3 Reviews
It's far from perfect, but there's no doubt that Dead Rising 3 stands as one of the most fun gaming experiences in the next generation so far.
With zombies, more is better. Dead Rising 3 delivers the undead and great tools to kill them with by the truckload.
The spine of the game is still mashing your way through zombie hordes with elaborate weaponry, and fortunately this remains enjoyable from beginning to end, but having stripped back some of the humour and made the game less colourful and more gritty, it's a shame that the developers weren't able to infuse it with something else to top up its character. It's not as though Capcom Vancouver didn't understand people's love of the originals: when you're not smashing through zombies, you collect golden statues of Frank West, while the local museum has exhibitions dedicated to West and Chuck Greene, his successor in Dead Rising 2.
Dead Rising 3 has made its brand of zombie-slaying as much fun as possible, but it needs to fix a lot more than that before it becomes the king of the undead.
The absurd sense of humor and massive crowds of zombies are an irresistible combination. A variety of nagging bugs and glitches distract from the overall joy
Dead Rising 3 has a lot of fun encouraging you to use its impressive array of barmy, brutal weaponry in an undead city.
Dead Rising 3 is a promising, ultimately clumsy next-gen debut
The third outing of Capcom's other, more ridiculous zombie franchise ably walks the line between approachability and the series' trademark off-the-wall quirk.
Easily enjoyable enough to recommend, though its ambitious scale and satisfying zombie slashing are undercut by frustrating design and clueless writing.
Perhaps the biggest issue with Dead Rising 3 is that there's not much to it. Those who want to simply roam and cause wanton destruction will find their needs tremendously appeased, but anyone hoping to see a game truly trying something new will want to look elsewhere.
I do think it suffers from significant tonal misjudgements, but it does a very good job of keeping me busy, keeping me pushing pennies into the slot, and keeping me fed with micro-anecdotes that, though they might dissipate immediately, are instantly replaced by new ones.
Dead Rising 3 proves to be one of the better launch games of this new hardware generation. The single-player is a bit too easy, and the map is far too large to lack a fast travel system. Capcom Vancouver's decision to make the shiniest zombie cliché over truly innovating on this worn out pop-culture trope was also disappointing. Most players will spend the majority of their time cutting through zombie hordes with electrified sledgehammers, however, and the mechanics of the crafting system and combat are solid enough to settle into an engrossing routine of making something and then stabbing a zombie with it.
Overall, Dead Rising 3 is a lot of fun, with a 13-16 hour campaign enhanced by replayability due to the sheer amount of ways you can approach your time in Los Perdidos. From the very outset there are different play-styles offered up, including co-op if you fancy it: Capcom Vancouver want this to be your experience, and while it does stutter from time to time, this is a game well worth playing, so long as you can stomach the B-movie acting and gore.
A better version of an already good game, Dead Rising 3 on PC is as close to the game's reveal trailer as we'll get.
The game's scope, over-the-top weapons and surprisingly enjoyable story all trump the tedious mission slogs and sluggish controls. The idea of charging headfirst into a slow marching horde of 300 zombies with a flaming sword is still ridiculous and satisfying.
All told, even though this is one of the better next-gen exclusives, it's still not a system seller. It's not that kind of game that's simply so good you need to go buy a system to play it. The fact is that right now on both Xbox One and PS4, we have yet to see a true system seller. Dead Rising 3 is lots of fun, but we won't be talking about it in a year. That being said, if you're getting an Xbox One already, this is a title that's definitely worth playing. Open-world mayhem, fun crafting…it's great escapism. That's all it is.
Dead Rising 3 is an impressive improvement on the series, especially for those who hated the time pressure in the first two episodes. Nightmare mode, however, is a huge tribute to the original gameplay. Multiplayer is a lot of fun. Only the graphics are not "next-gen ready".
Review in Italian | Read full review
The best Dead Rising so far and purveyor of some of the most entertainingly absurd weapons in all gaming – just don't expect any depth or longevity.
Dead Rising 3 scores points for its huge zombie hordes and iterative improvements, but it's clear this is a series that could stand to evolve into something more.
It may be another game with zombies in it, but few games get as crazy as Dead Rising 3.