All I can say is Wow. From the great voice acting to the crazy amount of customization to the improved gameplay, case zero is a knockout. I don't even know where to begin.

 But I'll start with the biggest new addition to the Dead Rising formula: combo weapons. There are at least 10 "combo" weapons, made by combining two (or maybe more) "ingredients" (such as nails, propane tanks, baseball bats, and rakes) and creating something truly beautiful. In a gory, bloody symphony of dismemberment these weapons murder the undead. My personal favorite? The electric rake. Made by combining a car battery and a leaf rake, it essentially is a supercharged cattleprod that is capable of taking out many zombies at a time. I laugh every time their electrically charged bodies go flying dozens of feet and taking down their brainless friends with them.

There's also the improved gameplay. Moving with Chuck feels a lot smoother than with Frank, and guns play out a lot like other third person shooters, without any cover mechanics. You can climb all over Still Creek, and jumping around the rooftops hasn't felt this good since assassins creed 2.The zombie AI, as strange as this sounds, has been improved. They now come at you in droves, and each battle seems like a fight for your life unlike the easy DR1 zombies.

But all of these new features are based around a tight, compelling (though short) story: You and your daughter katey need to get out of Still Creek before the military arrives and quarantines all of the infected, even those that are kept at bay with zombrex. Unfortunately, this includes katey. One problem though: Chuck's truck got jacked, so now he needs to fix a broken motorbike with spare parts around Still Creek. Oh yeah, he also has to avoid the zombies.

Your quest leads you to rescue some survivors and fight one crazy mechanic, as well as some other surprises on the way. And it was only on my third playthrough ( I failed the first two) that I discovered my only flaw with the game: After you beat it, there's nothing else. What would have bumped this up to a 10 is if I unlocked an "unlimited" mode after beating the game, because the time constraints during case zero are unforgiving, often forcing you to abandon survivors and sometimes outright failing as I did. So if you want to just mess around, you're not given much leeway.

In the end though, at just $5, you really can't go wrong. If you even had the SLIGHTEST INKLING of checking out DR2, buy this now. Or if you honestly don't care, download the free trial. You've got nothing to lose, and a great game to gain.