Dead Rising 2: Off the Record Review

We usually do our best to avoid review clichés, but we've been backed into a corner with this one. If you enjoyed Dead Rising 2, then you'll enjoy Dead Rising 2: Off the Record - but that's because they're identical.

Wrapped up in a budget price tag under the guise of an alternate reality rehash, Off the Record imagines what it might have been like if Frank West had been the main character instead of Chuck Greene. It's not a bad idea, but our hopes for an entirely different chain of events were quickly crushed by the ceaseless waves of overly familiar cutscenes.

While most of the original game remains untouched, Off the Record's attempts to fix its mistakes fall infuriatingly short of the mark. A token warning message doesn't do much to prevent you from accidentally leaving survivors behind when moving into a new area, and the updated checkpointing system will likely prove divisive. If you've always hated the series' cruel toilet-based save system, the ability to restart an area every time you die will undoubtedly be a godsend - but this change sacrifices the series' signature tension in the process.

The new free-play mode also adds a different swirl to the recipe, enabling you to mess around in a sandbox version of Fortune City that isn't tied down by Dead Rising's famously restrictive countdown. Money and experience levels transfer fluidly across both modes, so getting stuck on a tough boss can usually be solved by level-grinding in free-mode. Those of you wondering what happened to Dead Rising 2's original protagonist are in for a surprise, but cool moments such as this are suffocated beneath a duvet of déjà vu.

Bizarrely for a game that seems to be aiming for a fan-service bullseye, Off the Record's technical improvements will likely appeal most to those who've never played the series before. Die-hard Frank-fans are sure to find something to love, but we wouldn't be surprised if the game's lead designer turned out to be a photocopier wearing a wig.