Dead Rising 3: Operation Broken Eagle Review
Rather than following on directly from the main storyline of Dead Rising 3, the new series of downloadable episodes are looking to expand upon the existing story and enrich the game world. Being titled The Untold Stories of Los Perdidos, each of the four new episodes will focus on a different character, but interestingly, they will be characters lifted directly from the original experience. Those who have completed the story of Nick Ramos will recognise each of the four new protagonists, and can now find out more about their individual backgrounds.
The over-arching idea is that each of the four tales will be presented to us by an unknown person, who has been watching events unfold in Los Perdidos via the network of ZDC security cameras that are spread throughout the city. For Operation Broken Eagle, this character gives us a brief introduction to Adam Kane – Special Operations – as he and his unit prepare to drop into the city, tasked with locating the President and eliminating all opposing forces. Your Chopper is hit and the squad split up, parachuting into the destroyed city. This all occurs before we join Nick for his adventure, so it provides an interesting alternative viewpoint. Sadly though, there are only about three cut-scenes here, and the story lacks any real meat.
A big contributing factor here is that the DLC is incredibly short. There are only three or four story-driven missions to play through, which coupled with a new set of collectibles means you will only get a couple of hours of gameplay from this episode. There isn’t really adequate time to develop any characters or build much excitement, which is a shame as Kane is clearly an interesting character – conflicted between fulfilling his duty and doing what is morally right. On top of that, he is essentially just a re-skin of Nick Ramos, with no new skills to consider.
Also new are a selection of five weapons, which are made up of an automatic shotgun; Kane’s signature twin Bowie knives; a liquid nitrogen grenade launcher; a new combo weapon, and a new armoured Spec Ops vehicle. These are all pretty fun to use, with the CQC-style twin knives you start with being the most memorable. What these new weapons also do, however, is skew gameplay toward ranged fighting – but this actually suits the character. As a result you will find yourself resorting to gunplay, rather than relying on the melee-heavy combat from the main story.
New side-quests come in the form of hacking ZDC broadcast towers, “cleansing” illegal hideouts (killing everyone inside), and locating your lost squadmates – be they alive or Zombified. These are all typical of Dead Rising, and whilst collecting the dog tags of your dead compatriots is somewhat interesting, none of these are particularly involving or time-consuming, so therefore don’t add a great deal to the package – all they do is slightly mask the woefully short length. But be warned, if you complete the story missions before all of the side quests are finished you won’t get a chance to go back and mop them up – the DLC simply comes to an end.
VERDICT: As an overall idea, the premise of playing as bit-part characters from the main campaign, and discovering more of their back-story is a clever hook. The way in which the DLC manages to integrate itself into the canon is successful, and makes you excited about who else we might get to play as. Unfortunately there is just too little content and not enough character or story development to recommend Operation Broken Eagle wholeheartedly. As part of the Season Pass, it provides a nice excuse to jump back into Los Perdidos for a few more hours, but I do hope that the forthcoming episodes delve a little deeper into the lives of their protagonists, providing a little more to get your teeth into.
AVERAGE. The epitome of a 50/50 game, this title will be unspectacular but inoffensive, charmless but amiable. We aren’t condemning a game by scoring it a 5, but we certainly aren’t championing it, either.
Review code provided by publisher.
Robin Parker
If I'm not playing on a good Adventure Game - still longing for the long-past Golden Age of the genre, when Lucasarts and Sierra ruled supreme - you might find me searching for a local arcade, in the hopes that it still houses titles such as Sunset Riders or WindJammers.
