I never really planned to get Dead Space when it came out, but it was on sale at my local JB Hi-Fi for $60 AUD only a few months after coming out. I’ve always been a pretty big fan of the survival horror series finishing Resident evil 1-3 and Silent hill 2 being one of my all time favorite games. So with those two things in mind I went ahead and brought a copy and I’m very glad I did.
Dead Space is a 3rd person survival horror game from EA, who have made a decent game for once. The story plays out a bit like Event Horizon and a bunch of other popular B grade sci-fi’s. You control Isaac Clarke (named after sci-fi writers Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke). Issac is a engineer on-board the USG Kellion which is dispatched to investigate a distress signal sent out by the the USG Ishimura “Planet Cracker” ship. It seems something on board has gone awry and you must repair the ship the seemingly abandoned ship when Necromorphs attack your crew.
I didn’t find the game to be really scary at all (even late at night). For one the controls are really good which lets you fight without panic most of the time which strips some of the horror away. The resident evil series along with the silent hill series have pretty bad controls which added to your fear, which was probably unintentional. Dead space on the other hand makes you feel like nothing really bad is going to happen. The pacing and mood were also a bit of in regards to adding a sense of dread and horror. I also found it hard to empathise with Isaac as he never talks.
The game itself looks great with no present GUI on the screen. Your health meter is Isaac’s suit and your ammo is displayed on the guns themselves. I have to say every time I turned the game on I would really love what I saw. The weapons were all fun and very violent, I think the saw weapon was a bit over the top.
