Dead Space

[miffy495]

So, given all the amazing press this game has been getting and the fact that it was staring me in the face for an 8 hour shift today, I picked up Dead Space for the PS3 as I was leaving work today. Stupid working in a games store making me spend money... Anyway;

After playing the first (of, I believe, 12) chapter, some initial thoughts:

- This game really, really[/b] wants to be RE4: IN SPACE! but unfortunately, the creepy alien things they have coming at you all the time simply aren't as quietly unsettling as the Ganados. Those of you who played RE4 will probably remember the fight fairly early on in the game with the high-priest guy in the barn, where hook things sprout from his shoulders and he swings from the rafters beating the crap out of you. This was a pretty frightening sequence, as the sudden shift from fighting slow-moving villagers to fighting this giant spooky-lookin thing was quite shocking. Now imagine that every enemy in the game was a weaker version of this monster. The shock kinda goes away when you're constantly being jumped by them.

- So far, not so much on the creeping dread factor. While generally spooky, the scares that come are more of the "HOLY CRAP SHOOT IT SHOOT IT!" variety than the disquiet that comes from a well crafted psychological scare. Again, I'm only 1/12th into the game, so this could change as I get deeper in, but the initial mood seems to be more of a creepy action game than horror.

- Again, may just be a symptom of chapter 1, but I actually have more ammo than I know what to do with. I expected to be constantly watching my ammo tick away as I grow more desperate. Even in the early going of RE4, I was constantly hovering around the 10 bullets left mark in what seemed perfectly balanced. Right now, my cup runneth over.

- The camera is a tad dodgy. While completely serviceable, it is always zoomed in a little more than I'd like with the character taking up almost a third of the screen. I'd definitely like to see more of the impressively detailed environments and less of my own back.

Now, all of these are negatives, but contrary to this I am quite enjoying the game. Most of the negatives come from my going in expecting survival horror when it actually delivers action. Don't make the same mistake, and it's really quite a good game. Imagine if Doom 3 were made a third person game and then substantially better. Then make it so that all you face are imps who can't throw fireballs but blow apart real pretty. It's a very nice game, but I don't know if it's something I'd recommend to everyone. I'm not regretting my purchase, but it's not blowing me away either. I'm certainly going to keep on playing, and here's hoping the terror really takes hold later on in the game.

[Wrestlevania]

Dead Space seems like a missed opportunity, judging by the few genuinely considered accounts of play I've been reading. I was quite looking forward to it, but it seems to be fairly pedestrian in it's general execution and challenge.

I was really hoping Dead Space would in fact be Resident Evil (4) in Space, with a good dollop of System Shock, Event Horizon and Sunshine mixed in for good measure. But it all just sounds a bit forgettable, ultimately. Which makes me sad.

[miffy495]

Hey, if you're psyched for it, don't let me dissuade you. I just went back and played another hour simply because I wanted to see more. Finished the first zero g segment, which was pretty cool, especially when the monsters started getting involved. There's some cultist subplot brewing as well, which is a nicer touch, although I had to go off the beaten path and spend an otherwise useful upgrade token to get some of the meat of it.

It's definitely a good game. As far as games that take themselves quite seriously go, it's so far one of the better ones I've played this year.

One other annoyance, while I'm at it. Why am I a jedi? I've now faced puzzles that have required me to move gigantic objects using a grapple field (ie: Force Push) and can slow down my enemies and the environment around me by using a stasis weapon. It kinda takes away from the fright of a situation when you can force throw an exploding barrel at an enemy in the middle of combat. (Yeah, there are exploding barrels. There are always exploding barrels. Even RE4 had them...)

On a more positive note, those tentacle-spider-baby-things are scary little bastards. I think they can take more punishment than the standard scythe-arm and scorpion guys, too. I've also run into weird little leech things that squirm around and latch onto you to suck your health. You can blow a ton of ammo on a swarm of those things. In a nutshell, the enemies are becoming much more varied after only a little more play time. Things are looking up, jedi powers aside.

[Chris]

I've seen a lot of people comment that the game isn't enough of a "horror" experience. It's a fair observation I suppose, but why not just play the game for what it is, rather than what you thought it might be?

(This is the reason I enjoyed Fable while a lot of people criticized it for failing to live up to whatever Molyneux was spouting.)

[Wrestlevania]

I have very few hours a week for gaming nowadays, so I'm turning into an elitist snob.

[toblix]

I don't know anything about this game, but isn't it fair to be disappointed if you buy something that's marketed as a horror game and it turns out not to be? If you order chicken and get beef, you're allowed to be upset even if the beef's good, right? So, with this game, it's like a restaurant marketing their new fabulous chicken dish, and you make reservations and drive down there, order the chicken and get the beef. You're well within your right to, say, take out a gun and start shooting up in that bitch.

[Chris]

I don't know anything about this game, but isn't it fair to be disappointed if you buy something that's marketed as a horror game and it turns out not to be? If you order chicken and get beef, you're allowed to be upset even if the beef's good, right? So, with this game, it's like a restaurant marketing their new fabulous chicken dish, and you make reservations and drive down there, order the chicken and get the beef. You're well within your right to, say, take out a gun and start shooting up in that bitch.

This game wasn't built to your order.

[toblix]

Oh yeah?

[twmac]

Dead Space has some great moments in it, probably one of EA's best releases this year. The opening section is pretty good in terms immersion (albeit with some slightly annoying unskippable cutscenes) and there are a few jumps at the beginning.

The gore and dismemberment is a laugh for a bit...

Then you realise you can melee everthing and that every section is scripted (Miffy's comparison to Doom 3) if you replay a level the monsters appear in the same place, the music that presents them at exactly the same time. This gets really annoying as you may have pottled over to a corner to investigate a crate only to get the DUNH-DUH-DUNH sound effect which means that there are some monsters somewhere. The new guns are pretty pointless and I didn't bother using most of them.

Then some of the on rails bits really annoyed me too.

I can't help but wish they had made a game about the animated comic book they released instead.

If you haven't played either of the condemned games (especially the first) then you'd be better off there

[Wrestlevania]

I can't help but wish they had made a game about the animated comic book they released instead.

I thought the Dead Space comic book was superb, except for the mysterious decision to ridiculously sensor the language from the second episode onwards. Seemed like a conceited and entirely pointless action to me.

[miffy495]

I've seen a lot of people comment that the game isn't enough of a "horror" experience. It's a fair observation I suppose, but why not just play the game for what it is, rather than what you thought it might be?

(This is the reason I enjoyed Fable while a lot of people criticized it for failing to live up to whatever Molyneux was spouting.)

That's sorta what I was trying to say...

Most of the negatives come from my going in expecting survival horror when it actually delivers action. Don't make the same mistake, and it's really quite a good game.

Anyway, yeah. I really like it, but there was a lot of initial adjustment to realize that this is a really good action game pretending to be a survival horror game, not a really good survival horror game. Now that I've done this, I can begin to enjoy the beef on its own merits.

twmac's point about the new guns being pointless seems to be pretty valid. For god's sake, the game gives you a trophy if you play through the whole thing with the gun you started with, which I think says something about its difficulty.

I didn't see the animated comics, but now I feel that I should really check them out. I think I'll need to go do that now...

[twmac]

The animated comics are what got me enthusiastic about the game, for a bit I even considered lifting my 'Don't buy any EA games ever again' embargo for it.

BTW if you can find a reason to use the flamethrower then you are a better and more dilligent gamer than me.

[lobotomy42]

This game wasn't built to your order.

Neither was my beef and chicken. It was the primary item on the menu at some restaurant with a huge sign out front that said "We serve beef and chicken! It's great! Really beefy AND chickeny!" So I said "Fine, I guess I'll order the beef and chicken." And then there wasn't any chicken.

[toblix]

Anyway, I hate it when an awesome game comes that I know I have to play, but that is also going to scare the shit out of me. Like the Silent Hills, the Resident Evils (which reminds me, I have to pick up RE4 again, now that I have a Wii), and now this. I'm such a pussy, but I love horror. It tears me apart every day.

[toblix]

No thread with this title, might as well start one:

Tits

Stepping on shit

Crazy new UI

"You have to repair the tram!"

[toblix]

Well, I'm still not loving this. I can play it just fine, which is weird because I usually fright quit all the time playing games like this. It still reeks of generic sci-fi shooter, though, with the radio messages about repairing generic sci-fi machines and activating generators, and the sci-fi corridor base environment And the controls feel horrible and clunky. Still, there are some neat touches that makes me think there may be some kind of awesomeness ahead. It doesn't feel rushed -- the UI is awesomely fresh. And the stomping is awesome.

[syntheticgerbil]

Just curious, Toblix, what other kind of quits do you do?

[toblix]

I think I just do rage quits and fright quits.

[Cigol]

Difficulty spike quit?

[toblix]

For me that's a rage quit, but whatever. By the way, I'm liking the game more and more. One silly thing I experience quite a lot is going through a door or stepping out of a lift and looking around, and then the Hitchcock fright sound comes, and I hear some crazy ruckus, shit breaking and stuff, and I look around to see a monster standing there. Obviously I was supposed to be looking right at him as he made his dramatic entrance bursting out of the vent or something, but it seems these guys never heard of look triggers.

[twmac]

Yeah, you got that too. Happens all the time. Some of them seem to be timed triggers. You'll flip a switch, and if you don't go in the right direction you'll completely miss the fright.

A couple of friends I know have taken over playing this, they are absolutely loving it in contrast to my loathing. So maybe it just isn't my kind of game.

[toblix]

I've completed Chapter 1, and I'm giving this game up. I feel the same way about it as I did about Gears of War. It's more polished than most games, and I'm sure there are tons of awesome shit in it, but to me it just feels boring. Whenever I hit a save point I think it's a good place to call it a day, my mind subconsciously considering playing a chore. It's probably not a bad game, just not for me.

[miffy495]

Wait, all this is from just one Chapter? Give it a bit more of a chance, man. Think of the poor little dollars you spent on it!

[toblix]

Yeah... but will it get any different? Everything I've read indicates this is what it does. It does it consistently well, but still.

Sure, I'll do the next chapter too, just to see.

[Wrestlevania]

Have you played any of the unusual environments yet, like low/zero gravity? Those are supposed to be very good.