Dead Rush

Before Cancellation

Before Dead Rush was cancelled, it was intended to be a seemingly different take on zombie games at the time. The game would have been set in a town called Eastport. In Eastport, a large scale earthquake destroyed much of humanity as well as the city itself. The player would have taken the role of Jake who would be suffering from amnesia. The player's job was to try and find out exactly what happened to him as well as others in Eastport, which is now overflowing with The Undead.

Dead Rush's biggest draw involved driving various vehicles left among the rubble of Eastport. These vehicles would serve not only as transportation but could be used as makeshift armor. The zombies would target the player's car, seeking to damage and slow the car down as well as kill Jake. There also existed a crafting system, allowing the ability to build new cars out of the wreckage of old ones such as motor parts, doors, and so on; Jake would use these to upgrade and create a more powerful, faster or safer vehicle.

Like in other open world games of the time such as Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, Dead Rush would have featured little to no loading times past initial boot.

Dead Rush was first shown at E3 2004 and was set to be released in 2005. It was cancelled shortly thereafter; Quoting Ron Doornink, Activision Publishing CEO at the time: "We gave it an opportunity, but it didn't meet our standards as a big proposition."