Dead Rising 4 – Frank Rising DLC Review – Unacceptable Cash Grab

Dead Rising 4 – Frank Rising DLC Review

Please note: the Frank Rising DLC is a direct continuation of the Dead Rising 4 story-line. If you have not beaten Dead Rising 4 – go do that first. Don’t even bother reading this review as it contains spoilers from Dead Rising 4. If you’re interested in how we felt about Dead Rising 4, be sure to check out our review. Now, beyond this sentence lies Dead Rising 4 spoilers… you have been warned.

Dead Rising 4 ends with the game’s protagonist, Frank West, narrowly missing his escape and dropping into a horde of blood thirsty zombies ready to tear him apart. Frank West, the hero of Dead Rising, was seemingly dead. And that’s where this new DLC story, Frank Rising, begins. After being mauled by the undead, Frank comes back to life as a zombie himself. Shortly thereafter, Frank encounters some of his Dead Rising 4 allies. Due to some special circumstances, Frank hasn’t gone “full zombie”, and is able to communicate with his allies. Now he must work with them to return to his human form and escape Willamette for good. But he’ll have to work fast because, in 90 minutes, the army intends to level the town with bombs.

In Frank Rising, Frank West has three new abilities: howl (which stuns enemies), pounce (which leaps onto a targeted enemy), and vomit (which sprays enemies with caustic vomit). No longer will he have access to any melee weapons, combos, guns or EXO suits – he’ll have to rely on his bare fists and these three new abilities to survive (oh, and dress up time is done too, no costumes here!). To regain health, Frank will have to feed off other zombies or humans – no more food or medkits. You’ll be given directions throughout the short campaign, heading from one checkpoint to another collecting mission critical items that’ll help restore your humanity and escape the city. The entire DLC environment is identical to the primary campaign – no new areas have been provided. There are special “trials” that allow you to enhance your abilities and there are plenty of collectibles to find as well. However, the 90-minute timer is constantly ticking down. In fact, if you die, you’ll head back to the nearest checkpoint, with however much health you had when you got to that checkpoint – but the time remaining doesn’t replenish! That timer just keeps ticking away. While I was able to complete the DLC on my first try – it was damn close (like a few minutes to spare!). Completing the DLC allows you to replay it over again with all your health and collectibles – however, you’ll have to regain most of your enhanced abilities again.

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“The entire DLC environment is identical to the primary campaign – no new areas have been provided.”

Here’s the problem with Frank Rising – it’s a rip-off. First, the content is a direct continuation of the main game which has direct implications on potential sequels. Without playing Frank Rising, you’ll never know the real conclusion of Dead Rising 4 – and that’s just not acceptable. This content should have been included as a bonus for completing the main game. If the developers hadn’t quite completed it, then it could have been released at a later date for free as an added bonus. Second, the amount of content is minimal at best. Sure, you get to play a Dead Rising game as a semi-zombie – but a playthrough will take you no more than an hour and a half. Sure, some gamers might be motivated to play through a second time to find collectibles or finish on a harder setting – but they’re still getting the same, minimal amount of content. You look at a game like Red Dead Redemption that essentially offered the exact same kind of DLC (Undead Redemption) – and yet it had hours of new content and story, for the exact same price that you’re paying for Frank Rising.

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“Without playing Frank Rising, you’ll never know the real conclusion of Dead Rising 4 – and that’s just not acceptable”

Frank Rising provides a much-needed conclusion to Dead Rising 4, but it’s also a completely unacceptable cash grab. While some of the new abilities in Frank Rising were fun to toy around with, there really isn’t enough here to warrant a purchase, aside from knowing what happens to Frank West and some of the other characters. It’s a damn shame developers exploit their game’s fans like this – because you know those die hard Dead Rising fans are going to jump for it anyway (they probably already bought the Season Pass in advance). If you absolutely need more Dead Rising 4 content or need to know what happened to Frank West, then you have no choice but to pick this up. But if you’re a casual fan, at least wait until it’s offered at a discounted price before purchasing. And Capcom, you need to be better than this.

***A season pass was provided by the publisher***