Twitter review of zombie shooting ‘Dead Rising’

Twitter.com consumes American lives by asking us every day, "What are you doing?" We type answers all day long in 140 characters or less. "I just woke up. ... I just drove to work. ... I am going to lunch." See how Twitter is a leash on our friends?

Twitter has its perks (e-chatting with friends; promoting something you like). In theory, its limitation of words could train Americans the precision of poetry. But in practice, it is teaching us to cram thoughts into small words and stilted English.

To bring this point home, I tried my best to type a compelling review of the new Wii version of "Dead Rising: Chop Till You Drop" as a series of sentences I actually posted on Twitter.

Each of the following paragraphs started with Twitter asking, "What are you doing?" My answers had to be 140 characters or shorter. Ready? Here we go:

Back in 2006, I reviewed the shooter "Dead Rising" for Xbox 360. Now Capcom finally releases it for Wii. Usually, I don't review "ports."

But Wii desperately needs good games. Most Wii games are putrid since Nintendo OKs any dumb thing for Wii. So this fine game earns new ink.

In "Dead Rising," you portray a photojournalist trapped in a mall, rioted by zombies. You kill them and save mallers from getting mauled.

You run through the realistic-looking mall and shoot zombies, and knock them out by swinging mall benches, chain saws and mannequins at them.

The craziest weapon may be the ice auger. Shove it in the torso of a zombie; zombie's body spins on tip of it; blood splatters like blender.

It all looked better on Xbox 360's stronger computer, and the narrative is a bit changed. Biggest difference: Wii "Dead" is more gun-crazy.

You win bullets by killing zombies. But you also can buy bullets at a gun shop for $100 per bullet! Price gouging during a zombie attack?

Yay! Capcom fixed the "save" system. In Xbox "Dead Rising," save spots were rare. Now you can save often and not lose hours of progress.

The bore is all the backtracking. To save people, you travel AC vents, elevators and corridors. You see the same locales too much.

Oh, and red zombie birds and white zombie poodles keep coming out of nowhere to take bites out of you. That is really, super annoying.

But the game is fun because of: odd weapons; the story line is ha-ha campy; and zombies walk slow but lunge at you (perfect zombie action).

This game was created in 2006, the same year a photojournalist won the Pulitzer at the Rocky Mountain News -- which just closed. Poor Rocky.

My game friend John, a photojournalist, says "DR's" main character takes few pictures of zombies: "You're missing a lot of Pulitzer photos."

We will miss many things someday, like prose and photos made by laid-off journalists. But not yet. Newspapers breathe. Twitter's the zombie.

("Dead Rising" by Capcom retails for $40 for Wii -- Plays fun. Looks good for Wii. Moderately challenging. Rated "M" for blood, gore, intense violence, language. Three stars out of four.)

What do you think? Tell me at delfman@ reviewjournal.com.