It isn’t often that a game is able to take you through a range of different emotions; one after the other, but EA’s new property - Dead Space - manages to do it on a relatively regular basis.
To begin with, the introductory sequences are much of a muchness - albeit very nicely done - and give you a false sense of security. You know what’s going to happen, and you know what your goals are going to be…more or less. Then…BAM! The game slaps you in the face and wakes you up. It gives you a taste of what it can do, so that you don’t dare underestimate it again. Two minutes later, you’ve become bored of being stealthy and are sprinting around towards your next objective, plasma cutter in hand. BAM! IT GOT ME AGAIN! This time, though, you truly weren’t expecting anything to happen. Right…this time, I’ll be more careful. What was that noise? Step quietly…is that the floor giving way? Who’s coming around that corner? I JUST SAW SOMETHING MOVE! Don’t be silly…it would just be cruel to throw in a surprise right now after shocking you twice in five minutes…it wouldn’t do it to you aga…..BAM!
Welcome to Dead Space.
The game is a third-person shooter to all intents and purposes, with a little Resident Evil-style puzzling and adventure thrown in for good measure. What sets Dead Space apart from the “me-too” games of its ilk though, is the fact that it is uncommonly good at what it does. And what it does, is keep you on the edge of your seat for a large portion of the time. To go into too much detail would be to spoil the game, so I am purposefully skirting around the finer points of the plotline and not going into too much detail about the logistics of the whole thing. I apologise for this, but you truly will thank me later.
As far as the gameplay mechanic goes, things have been done very well, on the whole. I was particularly impressed by the gunplay, as the over-the-shoulder aiming style genuinely works, and you can aim at various parts of your enemy’s body without needing any sort of illusion-breaking “zoom” camera. Add that to the fact that your gun emits a decent amount of light - which is needed on lots of occasions as you search around the dark corridors - and you have a pretty decent package. It’s clear to see that most of the things that we take as staple parts of the genre have been rethought and built from the ground up, too. Take your bog-standard “pause” menu as an example. In practically every other game out there, hitting your pause control would bring up a stationary full-screen menu that takes you right out of the game, destroying any feeling of immersion that the developer has toiled to create. In Dead Space, the pause menu appears as a holographic representation that sprawls out of your character’s suit, whilst the action carries on around him. Your health and ammo controls are other fine examples. Standard games have them splashed at the bottom of the screen at all times. Dead Space has a light trail running up the spine of your character’s suit to represent health, and holographic ammunition displays on your gun’s sights, when drawn. Stellar.
There are only two downsides I that I can see as being obvious downers. Firstly, the game has serious issues when it comes to using the “stomp” command to bust open boxes. Many times, you’ll have to stomp three or four times before you actually hit the thing that you’re aiming at, as the game doesn’t do so well at targeting the old boot for you. Secondly, some people will find that the game becomes somewhat repetitive. Essentially, you’re constantly using the pathfinder control to locate your next objective, and then getting to it by stalking through the corridors, taking out any enemies that you encounter along the way. Upon completion, you begin your next objective, which essentially pans out in the same fashion. As I say, some players will feel this way, but the majority will be so gripped by the story and by the fact that they actually WANT the game to scare them again that it won’t matter.
When you consider that Dead Space contains very few flaws, sound design and execution that slathers on the atmosphere by the bucketload, pleasingly smooth graphics and a control system that genuinely makes you feel like you’re in control of your character, you have a game that is worth every penny of the asking price. I wish that I could go into more detail about what occurs but as I’ve mentioned, it would be cruel to do such a thing. This is an experience that is best digested fresh.
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