A World on Fire - A Zombie Blog

For people who own an XBox, this week was a pretty good one since we saw the release of Dead Rising 2: Case Zero. This small game acts as a prelude before Dead Rising 2, giving us a little backstory to our main character while doing its best to wet our appetite for good old fashioned zombie killing. The story follows Chuck, a man who looks eerily like President Bush, who does his best to save his little girl from a zombie infection. Evidently, a shot of the rare drug Zombex keeps the infection at bay for twelve hours after which, another shot is required. Needless to say, our hero stops at a deserted gas station whereupon his truck is stolen along with his stockpile of the serum. With only twelve hours to save his daughter in a town packed full of zombies, hilarity ensues.

Fellow zombie website Hot Zombie Action did a nice write up of the game, covering all the bases for the five dollar download. I won’t spoil the surprise of their conclusion, but I will say that they had quite a few positive things to say about it. Here’s what they had to say about the most hyped feature of the game – the weapon combo system:

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For those of you sitting back in your lawn chairs right now, sucking down tasty margaritas between epic sessions of Dead Rising: Case Zero (more on that later) while some of us are slaving away under a hot September sun, you’ll be happy to hear that Capcom is raising the stakes of their upcoming release, Dead Rising 2. First we had a collector’s edition that included a pen shot of Zombrex. Now we have a high stakes edition.

I can hear the furrowing of a thousand brows just beyond my window. Why would anyone want to drop ninety bucks on what amounts to be a higher priced video game? Well, for some, it may be a little overkill. But for the poker loving zombie killer, this looks to be right up your ally. Here’s what is included:
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These days if you can find an electronic gizmo that can bleep and flash, chances are, there are at least a couple of zombie games written for it. This isn’t a bad thing. After all … zombie games can be wonderfully fun. I got a good solid years worth of Left 4 Dead 1 alone. Yet, as a gamer, I’ve been finding the genre to be growing a little … er, moldy. It’s a lot of running and gunning, without much time put in the thinking department.

Well, it seems like the folks over at Double Bear have been listening to my thoughts and writing some of them down, because it was just announced on Destructoid’s blog that a zombie role playing game is set to be released sometime in the future. There’s a lot of info at their site. Here’s some of the juicer bits:

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For those of you chomping at the bit for plenty of “chainsaw on paddle in zombie action”, the fine folks over at Ars Technica managed to play a little through the current build and they love it. While they enjoy the deadly seriousness of a zombie outbreak, they simply adore the ingrained absurdity of crafting your own zombie killing weapons while wearing a bikini.

Having seen some stills of the protagonist, cruising the streets in a wheelchair armed with miniguns, I gotta say, I’m laughing a little myself.

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Sarah over at Brandsocial wanted me to spread the word about a new online zombie game that just might have you scratching your head as much as I’m scratching mine. It’s a game utilizing Google Maps Street View mode where you traverse the pre-apocalpytic streets of Britain and fight off hordes of zombies or pissed off Nordstrom customers. I can’t tell which.

Your weapon is a strange red Virgin (as in the corporation) phone that shoots out stickers. Shoot a zombie in the head, and they will glow in delight, before floating off into the heavens. Yes, you are wielding an orgasm gun which on reflection, seems like a waste of ammo when used against a zombie horde :)

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For video game lovers such as myself, August most definitely lives up to its reputation of being filled with dogged themed days. With developers priming their releases for the holiday season, most of them skip over the heatwave month in fear of their product being forgotten in a stampede of spartan soldiers and plastic guitar wielding rhythm gamers.

I remember in the summer of 2006, we faced a similar August except one game was released that won the hearts and minds of many a zombie lover — Dead Rising. It was a fun game for sure, taking on the zombie horde in nothing but your underwear, but the game had some serious issues that turned a fun game into a teeth grating exercise of patience. Does the name Otis ring a bell?

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For those of you just can’t get enough of aiming crosshairs over a Nazi zombie’s forehead, you’ll be happy to know that Nazi zombies are making a return in the upcoming version of Call of Duty. As of yet, there is scant information about this new play mode, only that it will include four maps and that if you get bitten in the game, someone from Activiion will be dispatched to your house to kill you, and then steal your wallet.

The key thing to note about this feature is that it is only available for people who buy the “hardened edition” of the game which retails for a cool eighty bucks. Otherwise, you’re out of luck until they offer the content as a paid add-on through XBox live. Would you pay an additional twenty bucks for a mode that only includes four maps? Have no fear — the edition also comes with a collectible medal which begs the questions — who in the hell collects this stuff?

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Thanks to Jamie for sending me these news items. It’s been awhile since I played Left 4 Dead 2 on the old XBox. I still enjoy the occasional zombie massacre, but somehow the mutations feature never really gripped. For those who haven’t played the game, the mutations feature basically adds a twist to the gameplay. One mutation had players constantly bleeding while another equipped players with just chainsaws. The latter sounds much cooler than execution. It was like playing the game with a circular saw running in your television.

This update sounds pretty cool. Titled Four Swordsmen of the Apocalypse, this mutation equips people with just swords. The sword is probably my favorite weapon in the game, so I’m thinking that I will like this mutation although no promises.

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The other night I was playing a late night game of Fallout 3 when my friend, Jeff popped online and asked me if I had been playing Red Dead Redemption. I shook my head, noting that Grand Theft Auto 4 left a bad taste in my mouth and when I heard the game described as “Grand Theft Auto” on a horse, I had no interest whatsoever. To which he responded, “… but it’s gonna have zombies in it.”

I’m such a sucker. Take a game that I don’t like and throw zombies in it, and I’ll be singing it’s praises. I found myself very interested in this game. Needless to say, I didn’t rush down to the store to pick myself up a copy, but rather I did a little online research to see what I could find. Here’s the skinny:

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Bad news from the zombie video game department. Dead Rising 2 has been delayed until the fall. There was no specific reason given, but I’m guessing it probably could use a little polish. God knows … sandbox games need a whole lot of loving from the Quality Assurance team as they must test every inconceivable action being performed by the player. I’m guessing if the development team had its way, they’d probably push it back another year, but money being money probably dictated the short one month delay.

That said, I hope the sequel addresses some of the game mechanics of the first one. I thought the first game was really cool and I put quite a bit of time into it, but the game left a bad taste in my mouth. I hated the never-ending phone calls from Otis. Sure, it made for a good way to get missions, but it was so irritating to have to answer the phone every five minutes while being assaulted by hundreds of zombies.

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Back in the day, I used to love skateboarding games. When Tony Hawk hit the market, I was immediately hooked, spending many a Sunday evening in a virtual half pipe, pulling off some amazing tricks. As the years progressed, Tony and I went our separate ways and these days, the only virtual skateboarding I do is over the shoulder of some gamer at Walmart while waiting in line.

It looks like I missed out on EA’s take on skating. I remember reading about it but not being too impressed. It felt like a cold blooded knocking, focusing purely on skate mechanics while doing it’s best to avoid the inherent zanieness of the Tony Hawk series. Stumbling into this article today, I realize I was wrong.

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For those of you who own Left 4 Dead 2 on the PC, a special treat has come your way by way of an enthusiastic mapper who loves both zombies and Disneyland. I’ve seen some pretty clever maps for Left 4 Dead, but this one is pure gold. The mapper has managed to recreate Disneyland’s Indiana Jones: Temple of the Forbidden Eye attraction and I gotta say, having spent many a day at Disneyland (I used to work for Disney’s internet group some time ago) the mapper managed to get the attraction just right.

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In Valve’s original Left 4 Dead, hardcore biker Francis turns out to be quite a charmer in the fact that there is nothing he really likes. Walk into a train yard, and he mentions that he hates trains. Stroll into the hospital, and he lets everyone know his distaste for them. One has to wonder if there is anything that Francis does likes. Truth be told, some people have discovered that our pessimist biker enjoys both lasagna and the army. If you want to find out more, check out this link (it spawns a new window).

So I imagine if you told Francis that there is a new campaign for the original Left 4 Dead, he’d probably tell you that he would hate it which makes for a great title, “I Hate Mountains”. This campaign is a player created campaign but the big difference between this one and the countless others out there is the quality. From the article:

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With the release of Saving Private Ryan, the video game marketplace was saturated with World War II games that swarmed with trigger happy Nazis and their plans for world domination. As the years passed, World War II faded from popular consciousness but the Nazi’s persisted in the form of zombies. And my oh my, do people love to kill the Nazi zombies.

Nazi zombies exploded onto the scene with the release of Call of Duty’s World at War. Some time later, the Nazi minigame appeared on the iPhone with great fanfare. The game took to the top of the charts and remained king for a short time, allowing gamers to kill Nazi zombies on the go. This in itself is not big news. I’m sure many of you have played the game, killed a whole bunch of zombies, and moved on with your lives. But wait … here’s where things get good …

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Many thanks to zombie chow Ben for sending me this interview with zombie icon, George Romero. When I first saw the headline of this article, I thought this was going to be Romero baiting clip with Left 4 Dead being the catalyst. But George takes it all in strides. He shrugs off the fast zombies, saying it’s not his zombies. He acknowledges most zombie films these days aren’t even zombie films but rage infected people.

For the recent resurgence of zombies, George gives all the credit to video games and as much as he respects the genre, he will never stick his toe in video game development. As he says, “I’m just too darn slow”.

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