"Perfect arcade conversion, but still not enough replay value."

One of the least replay values game are gun games. First you start from first level and go through levels after levels until you reached to the final boss. Then you beat the final boss, watch the ending, and The End. After that, there’s barely any point to play the game again unless you are really bored or have much time to waste. But Sega’s The House of The Dead really changed the way of gun games for the Saturn version. Blowing away zombies with hit point damage. Still, it was a gun game, it had an end somewhere. After that, we screamed for more zombie blasting and Sega has delivered the answer to our hunger. Introducing The House of The Dead 2 (Well, there’s a surprise, a sequel to the big hit.). This time, it is run under Naomi board so you can see the gorgeous graphic what House of The Dead was meant to be. Of course, the Dreamcast version of House of The Dead 2 has something more than what the arcade has shown us.

First of all, I used the StarFire LightBlaster by InterAct since this is the only light gun avaliable for Dreamcast. Why Sega never came out with its own light gun like the Japanese did? Because they were having some problems with the light gun accuracy and the adjustment did not help. Therefore they never distribute it for the US launch. But believe me, StarFire LightBlaster works with House of Dead 2 in a harmony. Since Sega knew a third party would make a light gun for Dreamcast, they kept the accuracy adjustment option in the game and InterAct’s light gun shoots pretty accurate. I played House of Dead 2 with both light gun and a controller and frankly, I prefer the light gun to the controller. Since it was a gun game at first, you do not feel the same when you use the controller having a target cursor scrolling everywhere when you can just point and shoot on your TV screen.

If you seen House of Dead 2 on arcade, well, you better believe it that Dreamcast version’s graphic is identical to the arcade version with Naomi board perfect conversion. With detailed textures, real time lighting, realistic blood splatter, well designed zombies and creatures, and most of all, you can barely see any pixels at all. Although some of the zombies design look the same as the one in the first installment. Not only that but the innocent bystanders sometimes repeat levels after levels.

I must tell you that I have beaten the Japanese version so many times, I can kill these zombies with a blind fold on (Well, maybe not but you get my point). Basically, the difficulty for one player action is not hard for me at all. But as I mentioned before in the import review, House of The Dead 2 is much more difficult than the first installment. Zombies, water creatures, bats, and owls will come out of everywhere you might not even expected. Sometimes they are hard to hit too with all these fast agility dodging of your bullets or use their axes to form a shield. One thing that I have noticed is when you first encounter any regular zombies, they will slowly walk forward towards you. Until you hit it one or two shots, they then start running but it will be too late since you will fill that zombie up with a few more bullets. But when you turn up to Very Hard in the difficulty, no matter what, zombies will run towards you so you barely have time to kill it.

For one thing that really annoys people is the dubbing. Sega has never successfully dubbed a game with great voice acting that uses emotion and lip sync with the character perfectly. Take Sonic Adventure as an example, come on, it seems like if its the same people who voice Sonic also took the job to say “Thank you for rescuing me.” in House of Dead 2. Sometimes you just wish you never saved the innocent civilian and listen to his or her horrible dialogue. The music varies from slow eerie instrumental to fast industrial rock when you encounter any boss.

To make House of Dead 2 more replay value, Sega has thrown in Original Mode, Training Mode, and Boss Mode. Original Mode is where you are playing the same original game but you also have to find secret power-ups, character selections, extra life, or infinite continue. Training mode is where you master your shooting skills from surviving to fast reaction. The loading takes whiles but these mini games are worth it. Last, the Boss Mode is where you fight the boss and tried to beat your own time record. All of these modes does make House of Dead 2 a little bit more than your beat it once gun game.

But in the end, it still does not quite add up. Despite that Sega never distribute their first party guns and let third party guns get the profit. These new modes still do not make House of Dead 2 a great replay value game. Even with different paths depends on your action in the game but you still one day will have explored all the paths and complete all the training. In sum, House of Dead 2 is a great light gun game and it is highly recommend for light gun fans. But for an average gamer, you may want to rent this first before you made your final decision of buying it.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 05/29/00, Updated 08/07/01