![]() To really appreciate DR3's technical achievement, consider the other common ways crowds appear in modern video games-what I call the Madden Stadium Crowd. It’s a bit cheesy on the developer's part, sure, but the effect really can't be understated, whether those hordes hide in a controlled, indoor cage or fill out disheveled city streets. Sadly, Capcom added a completely unnecessary scene of implied sexual assault in DR3's early going, which comes across as a troubling, disgusting moment in an otherwise funny, self-aware romp.įrom the moment you run right into a crowd of hundreds of zombies in that opening, though, Capcom seems to be saying, look, we can handle a lot of zombies on screen at once. Nick is never annoying as the unsteady protagonist, while a brooding, gothy sidekick, a perverted policewoman, and a mob boss' errand boy stand out among the game's giant cast. The plot that unfolds from that jarring introduction is surprisingly clever and amusing, loaded with memorable tweaks on horror-movie archetypes, just-cheesy-enough B-movie dialogue, and startlingly solid vocal performances. From there, Ramos finds his small crew of fellow survivors and goes on an open-world journey, completing "story" and optional missions in kind, to find a way out of the city of Ingleton before shady members of the government blow the city up. You're just a panicky young man in post-apocalyptic pseudo-California who decides to look for supplies in a place with 200 or so zombies hanging out in a giant cage. The game opens in the middle of what seems like an already-unfolding story, showing protagonist Nick Ramos running toward a zombie quarantine zone with no context or explanation. In spite of that, DR3 succeeds with a careful balance of polish, restraint, and wild zombie slashing. The result isn't a revolutionary zombie game, let alone a game-changer in the wider, open-world genre, and it definitely reeks of launch-day development rush. With that in mind, Capcom Vancouver went out on a (severed) limb to make a key design decision: Put as many zombies on the screen as possible, whatever the visual cost. That focus is kind of a necessity, considering this is maybe the 4,000th zombie video game ever made. That’s because here is the rare, next-gen launch game that tries to apply its new powers to the play, not the appearance. It shambles and lurches in the graphics department, almost resembling an Xbox 360 title at times. ![]() ![]() Xbox One may glisten with sexy-looking launch fare like Forza Motorsport 5 and Ryse, but visually, Dead Rising 3 is the system's day-one sore and severed thumb. Bigger worlds, user-generated content, more frantic action, crazier online battles-that's when new systems really start to look attractive. For the most part, these terms all boil down to describing the amount and detail of stuff rendered on your TV set-in short, how shiny things will look.Īfter the new-console smell wears off, though, and the graphics become expected, fans usually focus on how new tech has transformed the way games play. Then it was polygon counts, texture maps, fill rates, anti-aliasing, particle effects, teraflops, the “emotion engine,” and on it goes. Once upon a time it was "blast processing," sprite counts, and “Mode 7” graphics. Every time a new wave of video game systems comes along, so do the high-tech buzzwords and techspeak.
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