Reminiscent of the calls players received through a walkie talkie in the first Dead Rising, executive producer Josh Bridge described, ”You’ll get calls from a character that are only on the SmartGlass device. So if you don’t have SmartGlass, you won’t get those calls from that guy. Which also means you won’t get those missions.”
Players can finish the game without SmartGlass, but the special missions do tie in with the main storyline. ”Without it, you’re not losing out on what the story is,” Bridge reassured, ”But you’re getting more out of the game.”
SmartGlass is available to most smartphones and tablets; Microsoft isn’t reinforcing Windows 8 with it. So long as it isn’t Otis haranguing players for being rude for hanging up on them, most gamers won’t complain.