Much like its predecessors, Dead Rising 3 has a slew of DLC planned to expand the already beefy amount of content that it holds. Unlike the previous games, whose DLC was primarily new costumes and weapons, the soon-to-be-quartet of new content packs, called “The Untold Stories of Los Perdidos,” offer up new stories and new characters, each with their own missions that run parallel to the main tale of Nick Ramos’ escape from the doomed city.
The first of these packs, “Operation Broken Eagle,” follows Spec Ops Commander Adam Kane (real creative naming, guys) as he tries to bring in the President under orders from General Hemlock in order to further the General’s agenda. This immediately paints Kane in a less-than-positive light, as players who have finished DR3’s main campaign know just how treacherous Hemlock is and what the President’s capture means to the zombie crisis. However, much like Kane himself, the player is there to simply follow orders from a commanding officer, moral code be damned.
The DLC’s main mission is twofold: the capture of the POTUS and hunting down the members of Kane’s squad who are MIA in Los Perdidos. Tracking down most of your team ends in tragedy, with most of the soldiers reduced to rifle-wielding zombies but a handful remaining alive to join your side. This singular vision lacks the over-the-top fun of the main story, and the military background of Kane and his mission make the proceedings feel rather generic.
Exacerbating this is the lack of Safehouses and Costumes in the DLC. Combo weapons are limited to the handful of items scattered around the game world (a number which feels reduced in the DLC), and the main game’s Safehouses are now rendered unusable, except as a side mission where you infect the inhabitants. The one standout is Kane’s trademark combat knives, an incredibly effective melee weapon which reduces zombies to a heap of putrescent flesh with astounding efficiency.
In spite of its disappointing blandness and unnecessary restrictions, “Operation Broken Eagle” still manages to be a lot of fun, simply because it’s more DR3. The DLC goes hand-in-hand with the main campaign in that levels gained and items unlocked carry over back and forth between the two stories, which promises to be expanded even further in the remaining three “Untold Stories” packs. You can purchase “Operation Broken Eagle” for $9.99, or get all four in a Season Pass for $29.99.