Wake The Dead: Reawakened is a remake of Pixelberry's visual novel Wake The Dead, set to be released October 2026, five years after the initial release. It features more choices, more customization options, more Nightmare Fuel, more CGI scenes, and overall less diamond choices.
Tropes:
- Adaptation Expansion:
- The Nerve Score from It Lives is added. Certain choices require Ash to have a high enough Nerve Score to access them, and this replaces some diamond choices (for example, the diamond choice in Chapter 4 to set off Angel's explosive trap requires Ash to have a Nerve Score of at least 50). Conversely, bad choices are automatically grayed out if Ash's Nerve Score is high enough (for example, the "get the hell out of here" choice during the graveyard fight in Chapter 11). Most of the Sadistic Choices affect the Nerve Score in some way.
- Ash has more customization options, and can also be customized as non-binary.
- You can lose relationship points with characters as well as gaining them. Having a low relationship with a character can lead to disaster. Here are a few choices that greatly reduce a character's relationship score:
- Killing Angel's parents in Chapter 4.
- Leaving Shannon to the zombie in Chapter 8 and telling her to stop moping after she's traumatized by the incident (by contrast, helping Minna and then telling Shannon that you couldn't be in two places at once and that you're sorry won't negatively impact the relationship).
- Getting angry at Troy for his Fake Defector gambit in Chapter 11, even though he did it to help you escape.
- Shooting Eli in Chapter 12 (and then refusing to apologize in Chapter 13, with Ash saying I Did What I Had to Do).
- Sledge has her own CGI cutscene of rescuing the gang from the Zombie Hive in Chapter 17 (she's also the one carrying the shotgun instead of Knuckles), and Brynn has her own CGI cutscene of sacrificing herself to kill the Zombie Queen in the final chapter.
- Ash's Zombie Killer rank is tied to certain choices, unlike the original. For example, having a rank of "Slayer" or higher enables you to use Angel's flamethrower in Chapter 14 without having to pay diamonds.
- Dirk's "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Ash in Chapter 18 has a few more points added:
Dirk: We've had to go hungry because of your piss-poor leadership! (if food supply is low)Dirk: No wonder I chose to side with Blackstock, your so-called "followers" are damn miserable! We might as well be back in the Tower! (if morale is low)Dirk: You're not cut out to be a leader, you're far too weak-willed! (if Nerve Score is low)Dirk: How many zombies have you killed in the last month, a dozen or so? That's basically nothing, most of us killed more than that today alone! (if Zombie Killer rank is lower than Hunter)Dirk: You left Troy, your best friend since childhood dangling from a rooftop so you could play hide-and-seek with a child! (if Ash chose to look for May instead of help Troy in Chapter 14)- Mack, Darren, and Walt will only sacrifice themselves in Chapter 19 if the Final Battle is going poorly. If it's going well, they will fight the zombies valiantly without needing to perform a Heroic Sacrifice.
- Any of the five love interests can die in the final chapter. In the original, Brynn sacrificed herself to kill the Zombie Queen, causing all remaining zombies to scatter. This time, however, if Ash fares poorly over the course of the book, Brynn will struggle against the Zombie Queen, since she's more powerfulnote . If this happens, when Ash escapes the hole, there will be a zombie waiting for them, and the love interest with the least amount of relationship points will be killed by the zombie. There are five different factors that influence this outcome, and it will occur if three or more of them are at critical level:
- Nerve Score: 40 or below
- Zombie Killer Rank: Hunter or below
- Injuries: Three or more
- Relationship Points: Less than 25 across all five love interests
- Colony Defense in Chapter 19: 13 or below
- Character Customization: Much like the original. This time around, however, Ash can be customized as non-binary (much like the later Choices stories with a gender-of-choice protagonist, starting with Crimes of Passion). If Ash is non-binary, fellow NB teammate Hatchet will comment on it.
- Sadistic Choice: Just like the original, with some differences:
- Some of the choices from the original have a third option, represented by scales in equal positions. However, some third options are tricky; they might seem better than either of the choices presented, but will ultimately turn out to be worse.
- More sadistic choices are added, such as whether to help Troy on the rooftop or continue looking for May in Chapter 14.
- Different outcomes are added to existing choices. For example, taking Angel's parents with you in Chapter 4 increases your Research Score, and sparing Trent in Chapter 9 allows you to build the warhorse stables for free, since Aliyah isn't upset with Ash.
- Sanity Meter: The Nerve Score from the It Lives series is featured in Reawakened, having a similar purpose. Unlike both instalments of It Lives, Ash can still survive with the lowest Nerve Score, as long as they perform well enough during the Solstice and have few enough injuries.
- Take a Third Option: Several of the Hard Choices from the original have third options, each with their own outcome:
- Chapter 4: Rather than kill Angel's parents or take them with you, you can leave them at the mall with enough food to last them. However, the mall is revealed to have collapsed in Chapter 15, and Angel is devastated, causing you to lose morale.
- Chapter 12: Rather than shoot Eli or fruitlessly try to reason with him, you can knock him out instead. Eli won't call you out for trying to shoot him or blame himself for trying to strangle you, but choosing this option requires having a Nerve Score of 70 or more.
- Chapter 18: You can choose to spare all traitors except Trent (if you spared him in Chapter 9). When Trent asks why he's the only one not being spared, Ash retorts that the other traitors only betrayed them once, while Trent betrayed them twice. Additionally, if he was punched in a premium scene earlier in the chapter, he'll comment "You already punched me in the face, isn't that enough?"
