Dead Rising Deluxe Remastered: Series S suffers, with PS5 and Series X faring better

Today we return to the zombie-infested shopping mall of Capcom’s Dead Rising via the Deluxe Remaster – a brand new take on the 2006 original, built on RE Engine. The visual upheaval is as dramatic as you’d expect, but the original framework of the game is faithfully intact – right down to every mission objective, the layout of each segment of the mall and even the framing of its cutscenes. Still, in looking at PS5, Series X and Series S, almost every facet of the original’s visuals has been rebuilt from scratch – including character models, textures, lighting, vegetation – and there’s an optional modern controller scheme for moving and shooting simultaneously.

It’s an expansive remaser then, but how does it stack up to the 2006 original as played on Xbox 360 hardware? And perhaps more importantly for players new to the game, what does the transition to the modern RE engine mean in terms of performance on each of the three target platforms?

To set the scene, it’s worth looking back at the Xbox 360 original. Despite being very much a game of its era in terms of its character and environment rendering, that first game still managed to impress thanks to its hundreds-strong zombie hordes and physics-based interactions, all rendered at or near 30fps for much of play and dropping the 20s with screen tearing at worst.

Two console generations on, the Deluxe Remaster keeps the original Willamette Parkview Mall, even down to its segmented design and fade-to-black loading screens. Cutscenes sync up impeccably and uses the same body motion capture data as the 2006 original. However, facial animations have seen a much-needed update and there’s been a huge boost to each character in terms of geometric detail. Where RE engine makes a particularly big impact is in its material rendering, with skin and fabrics in particular showing huge improvements and reacting more realistically with light. Of course, the nostalgically-inclined might prefer the original 360 designs – which arguably fit better with Dead Rising’s satirical tone. In terms of the detail level though, it’s hugely satisfying to see such an upgrade presented using the same capture data so many years later.

Looking at the environments, it’s a similar story. Adverts, billboards and mall signs receive new textures on PS5 and Series X, and while texture maps are a tad simplistic at times, they still represent a big leap forward. Outdoor areas are filled out with actual grass tufts as well, while the dynamic shadow system of the original is maintained. Water features now sport screen space reflections too, rather than the simple and non-interactive cube maps applied in the original. For a modern console release it’s hardly pushing the envelope, but it’s still a satisfying visual upgrade.

In optimising for current-gen machines, the bottom line is that PS5 and Series X run with a native 4K resolution target and aim for 60fps. That’s a 9x upgrade over the original 360 game at double the frame-rate, without even considering the swathe of other visual upgrades. There’s little to split PS5 and Series X visually, but the Series S version is a little more interesting – and unfortunately not in a way that’ll delight owners of Microsoft’s smaller console.

The obvious news first: Series S runs at a less impressive native 1080p, with a matching 1080p HUD. What’s more surprising is that settings are also dropped compared to the two premium consoles, starting with texture quality. Every sign, surface and item of clothing runs with lower-grade assets on Series S, which can be quite a glaring downgrade given the frequent cutscenes close-ups. Items like mesh fences are almost unrecognisably altered, and it’s a huge dissapointment.

Anisotropic filtering (AF) is also lowered, producing a blurry appearance to textures at oblique angles. Shadow quality is dropped too, and so shadow outlines across the mall are heavily dithered and noisy. Finally, outdoors grass drops significantly in quality too, with the paper-like blocks looking nothing like the foliage on Series X and PS5.

For a game targeting PS5, Series X and Series S it’s also surprising to see that none of the three consoles can lock perfectly to 60fps. The first playable encounter with zombies sets the tone on Series X, where at the back of the mall we go down to the 45fps line as long as all enemies stay visible on-screen. The game doesn’t appear to rely on dynamic resolution scaling, so there’s no flexibility for Series X to adjust here. Moments like this are uncommon, but it might be an early sign of how gameplay will dip at the extremes in later missions as well. Curiously, testing PS5 in the exact same spot shows a clear performance lead on Sony’s machine, going down to the low 50s at worst.

There are rare moments on PS5 and Series X that dip beyond this, such as the outdoors park area at the mall’s centre that drops into the high 50s or close-up alpha effects in the helicopter intro sequence that trigger big drops on each console. Otherwise it’s the extreme zombie count that is most likely to topple frame-rates on each, with PS5 holding a clear performance lead overall.

Looking at the situation on Series S, for all the drawbacks in visual settings – the 1080p resolution and lower-grade textures, shadows and foliage detail – the console does at least hold 60fps for the most part. Series S even runs some segments, like the problematic helicopter flyover, at a tighter 60fps than Series X. Where Series S does struggle is during those massive zombie encounters, with the early sequence in the mid-40s on Series S alongside the Series X. VRR displays improve the perceptual result on both Xbox machines for these moments, but for those without VRR it’s an unfortunate turnout.

Overall, the Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster is a surprisingly faithful revival of an 18 year old game – at least in its world design – and the modern controls come highly recommended too. The main criticism here is the huge drop in visual quality on Series S next to the other consoles, and the fact performance is occasionally prone to lurching sub-60fps drops on all three. The RE Engine powered upgrades, especially in character model detail, are satisfying to spot in comparison – but ultimately this is a game that we’d expect to see locked to the performance target. Despite the action unfolding in interiors, it suggests that the push to a 4K resolution on PS5 and Series X is a stretch too far, and DRS is needed to ensure reliable performance. This is still easily the most palatable way to enjoy Dead Rising today, but beware the rough edges.