Dead Space
PlayStation 3
Nostalgia Factor:
I first played the original Dead Space back in 2009. I'm a big fan of the survival horror genre, and I had heard so many good things about the game, that I came into it with the expectation that it would completely blow me away. Instead, I walked away from the game shrugging my shoulders and saying "eh, it was okay." In the years that have passed, I've played both of its sequels. Each title seemed to get worse in quality, to the point where I actively didn't like Dead Space 3 one tiny bit.
Random trivia - Dead Space 3 was my first review for this blog 9 years ago. Read it here.
Anyway, since it has been so long since I've played the game, I decided to come back to it and give it another chance. And you know what? I liked it a lot more this around. Keep reading for my full review.
Story:
You play as Isaac, a silent protagonist. Isaac and his crew come across a station in space that is completely radio silent. They land on it, and quickly discover it's been overtaken by horrifying parasitic alien creatures. While exploring the station, you find out that a giant alien monolith had been brought aboard from the planet below, and that this artifact is what was causing the insanity. You have to get rid of the artifact, blow up the station, and get out of dodge.
That's the super quick version of the game's story. As you play, you interact with members of your crew, along with the people you meet on the station along the way. Audio logs detail what was happening right before the collapse of the station. The whole thing has a very Bioshock feel to it - minus the plot twists and shocking moments.
Gameplay:
This is a behind-the-back shooter, at least I consider it more of a shooter than I do a survival horror game. Objectives are fairly linear. You can just follow the blue marker to where it is that you need to go next. It is worth veering off the beaten path, though, so you can find extra health items, ammo, money, power nodes, etc.
Combat is pretty fun. You have to aim for your enemies' limbs. You can fire into the body and beat them that way too, but taking out the limbs is much faster and more efficient. As you make your way through the game, you gain access to stores where you can buy new items, weapons, and suit upgrades. You also can find hidden power nodes to upgrade your equipment.
Issac has the ability to slow time, which is helpful when you need to zoom in and target the limbs. These enemies move pretty quick. He also has a gravity gun that you can use to pick up and throw things. I find that throwing things at enemies was fairly ineffective, however.
As I said before, the whole game consists of following the blue marker. You make it to an objective. You complete whatever the objective is (usually it is something easy like throwing a switch). Then you go back to the tram station and move along to your next objective. You fight a lot of enemies along the way. Oftentimes you enter rooms where you have to beat waves of them before you can move on. There are tough boss fights scattered along the way as well. Combat is pretty easy to get the hang of. The controls are responsive, and the weapons are very user friendly. But like I said, this game is definitely more of a shooter than anything else. Yeah, the environments are a little scary and the game presents itself as a horror game, but let's not kid ourselves. You do more fighting than puzzle solving. You do more fighting than you do anything else. It's a shooter.
I had a fun time with the game. I was glued to it, moving my way from chapter to chapter, of which there are 12 in total. It is fast paced, and easy to pick up and play. And it does not overstay its welcome, wrapping up around the 10 hour mark for me. Did I enjoy it more than I did the first time I played it back in 2009? Yes.
Graphics:
It's crazy to see how much graphical advancements in video games have stalled out in the past 15 years. For example, compare Super Mario Bros. which came out in 1985 to something that came out in the year 2000, like Majora's Mask or Perfect Dark. The difference is night and day. On the flip side, compare this game, which I last played in 2009 (it's actually a year older than that), to something released here in 2024, and the difference is not that vast.
This game still looks good. This game looks like it could have been released in the last few years. I'm sure if I wanted to nitpick the game, I could. But to me, it looks fantastic. Great character models, great haunting atmospheric design. It's a very engaging and cinematic game, from start to finish.
I'm a little curious to play the recent remake. Part of me is wondering if a remake was even necessary for this game, due to how well it still holds up. I didn't think the Resident Evil 4 remake was something that was necessary either. In fact, I didn't even think it was an improvement on the original game at all. I imagine I will probably feel the same way about the Dead Space remake.
Sound:
This game sounds great. I have nothing to complain about. Voice acting is good. The ambient music and sound effects fit the tone of the game perfectly. You really feel like you're wandering around this broken down space station, with computers humming and pipes hissing and distant clanking sounds as unseen aliens make a ruckus offscreen.
Overall:
I will gladly admit I was wrong about this game. I don't know why I was so unimpressed by it when it first came out, but I appreciate it now. It's fun, fast paced, and very focused. You won't be lost for hours wandering around aimlessly in the bowels of this ship. For the most part, you know where you are and what you are supposed to do, with each objective contained within one of the game's 12 chapters.
I think maybe I was expecting Resident Evil in space the first time I played this. I may have been let down by the lack of puzzles, intriguing side characters, plot twists, and overall feel of terror and tension while playing this. It is true, the game is not very scary. You'd think it would be considering how dark it is and how terrifying the monsters are. But when you know you can just blow everything away with little to no trouble, it really makes it hard to be scared. Even when you do die, the game's automated checkpoints put you right back to before you died, and you can just try again.
I appreciate Dead Space for what it is - a fun and entertaining shooter with a science fiction setting. I played through the whole game in just a couple of days, which is rare for me because I have such a limited window of time each day to play games. But once I started, I just could not put it down.
I wouldn't say Dead Space is an all-time great, but it is a darn good game.
THE GRADE:
B+
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