Dead Rising 2 Case Zero & Case West Recompiled for PC

Dead Rising 2: Case Zero and Case West Are Now Native PC Ports

Two Xbox 360-only Dead Rising releases have been recompiled for Windows and Linux, and their latest updates bring online co-op back through a fan-made Xbox Live replacement.

Dead Rising 2: Case Zero and Case West were both tied to Xbox 360. Developer wivi514 has now turned both into native Windows and Linux ports through static recompilation.

This is not an emulator running behind the scenes. According to the project documentation, the Xbox 360 code is translated ahead of time into a native program using XenonRecomp and XenosRecomp, with Vulkan rendering, keyboard and mouse support, and the original game’s XMA audio. It lands in the same strange preservation territory as GoldenEye 007 being rebuilt as a native OpenXR VR project.

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Case Zero now has two-player online co-op

The stranger part is Case Zero. The original Xbox 360 release did not offer multiplayer, but the port developer says a large amount of Dead Rising 2‘s co-op code was still present inside the game.

Version 1.1.0 exposed enough of that code to add a JOIN CO-OP GAME option to the main menu. Two players can now play online through XenonLive, although the Military Arrival section currently drops the second player because running that section with both players can crash the host.

The latest v1.1.1 update arrived on September 17 and fixes more co-op problems, including guests falling through the map after loading and second players sometimes appearing invisible.

Case West has its original-style co-op back too

Case West officially supported two-player online co-op on Xbox 360, and the recomp now restores that through XenonLive. Both players need to launch through the XenonLive launcher for the online features to work.

The ports go beyond simply making the two releases boot on a modern PC. They include native keyboard and mouse controls, higher resolutions, 60 fps support, higher frame-rate caps, graphics options, and ultrawide rendering. Case West is documented as playable from start to finish, while Case Zero is described by the developer as essentially complete.

It is another example of players keeping unusual pieces of gaming history accessible, much like one of Robbo’s original DOS programmers bringing the game to Playdate 33 years later.

Players still need the original Xbox games

Neither project includes Capcom‘s game data. Players need to supply their own original XBLA package for each game, which is then processed locally by the port.

That is similar to other modern preservation projects where the new code provides the port while the player supplies the original game files. We have seen the same basic idea behind projects ranging from PlayDOOM’s unusual browser-based experiment to EmuVR rebuilding the whole environment around retro gaming.

Fix Gaming Channel has not tested either recomp ourselves. The playable status, compatibility, and restored co-op features described here come from the developer’s public repositories and current release documentation.

You can find Case Zero on GitHub and Case West on GitHub.