Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster is Bringing Back The Original Music

Capcom has made a very gratifying announcement about Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster.

As reported by VG 24/7, Capcom has relicensed the music they used in the original 2006 release of Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster. This means that you will fully recreate moments like fighting the convicts’ boss battle to Lifeseeker’s song Gone Guru.

Now, if you aren’t a huge fan of the franchise, you may take for granted that they are even announcing this. Is it really a big deal? But it really is, not just in terms of what gamers want, but for the people involved in making games, and also in the locus of video game preservation.

See, Capcom already made a remaster of Dead Rising that was released in 2016. While that version of the game essentially has an improved version of the original game’s code, Capcom was not able to license that music. So, some fans may not like the look of Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster, but in some ways this new version will feel more authentic.

That’s because preserving a game can mean more than just keeping the original code or the source code. Going back again to that original 2006 release, that happened at a time when Capcom, like many other Japanese game companies, were struggling to figure out how to make games to cater to the West.

This was the time when Keiji Inafune was still an exec at Capcom, and pushed the company towards this direction for their survival. This experimental time at the company led to new original titles like Dark Void and Lost Planet, as well as Western reboots like DmC Devil May Cry. A lot of those games did not age well, but surprisingly, Dead Rising did.

So retaining this music isn’t about the nuts and bolts of the game’s source code. It’s about recapturing the cultural zeitgeist of the 2000s to cater to that Western audience.

It’s also worth noting the other upcoming releases that can’t afford to make these niceties. Dragami Games, for example, had to make an original soundalike soundtrack for Lollipop Chainsaw RePOP, because the newly independent studio can’t afford to relicense the songs, or for that matter, its extensive DLC.  But maybe that’s something they can add down the line after they see success, the way Capcom did.

Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster is releasing on September 19, 2024, to PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Windows via Steam.