Capcom has been very tight lipped about facets of Dead Rising 2, with much of the information about the zombie killing action sequel released in one press release and a few screens. We were keeping our fingers crossed that there would be something - anything - released about the upcoming game at GDC, and luckily, we managed to glean a few little nuggets from the show. During the Platform Independent Shader Development with mental mill - Making of Dead Rising 2 panel, Izmeth Siddeek, the character art lead from Blue Castle Games detailed how the development team needed to focus on creating large amount of characters that had to be lit and shaded properly, as well as a number of other design hurdles overcome with the mental mill program. Thanks to the program's shaders, the Blue Castle team was able to create unique eye and cloth shaders, as well as skin shading that looked natural and realistic that could be applied to large numbers of characters and zombies on screen at one time.

However, it was Laura Scholl, the Product Manager of mental mill, that made some of the largest bits of news out of the panel. Mentioning a conversation that she'd had with Siddeek about the use of the program, she stated that Siddeek confirmed that Dead Rising 2 will frequently track at least 800 separate clothing textures to provide the sense of unique zombies onscreen. What's more, thanks to the elements that Blue Castle are using from mental mill to quickly mass produce characters for the game engine, players could experience as many as 6000 characters onscreen during multiplayer sessions.

That last stat bears repeating for two separate reasons: first, there was no prior admission of multiplayer within Dead Rising 2, which will be a pleasant surprise for Dead Rising fans. Secondly, to face off against up to 6000 separate zombies at a time will definitely be a daunting, but thrilling prospect. Although no other details on multiplayer or the game were provided, it definitely was an exciting statement to hear. We contacted Capcom for comment, but did not receive any word as of publication of this news piece.