Dead Space - Letdown of the year?

Dem · #1 11-03-2008, 04:13 PM

Dead Space was released some weeks ago, and I finally got to play it a bit... Can I just say... Letdown?

The overall response from critics seems generally positive? And this leaves me very much surprised...

For those of you who've never heard about the game:

Dead Space is a scifi horror / survival in which you play Isaac. Some random dude who goes looking for his wife on some spaceship in some galaxy. Once you arrive at the big spaceship she was on, you lose control over yours and you crash into the big one. Immediately separated from your team you of course have to find a way around the ship and find out what's wrong. There's blood everywhere with the occasional corpse and messages on the walls such as "Cut off their limbs".

That's right, instead of going for headshots you're supposed to tactically dismember your opponents. These are some nasty looking aliens that inhibit the corpses of dead people. You have to cut off their arms, legs or whatever till the point where they can't actually move anymore. Admittedly, that's a lot of fun.

The point is that Dead Space isn't a bad game. It has some new shiny gimmicks that are quite fun. But what happened to outcries such as "This is Silent Hill in space", or "Recreates the classics such as Event Horizon and Alien". When people start yelling that, I'm expecting a tense, oldschool, frightening scifi adventure with a major slow buildup...

But Dead Space has a buildup of about 2 minutes... After that it's shooting, shooting, walking through very narrow gray hallways, shoot shoot, find a dead corpse thats not dead, shoot shoot, listen to scary noises as you walk through more narrow gray hallways... Repeat. Where's the mindfucks? The atmosphere? Admittedly, I couldn't bring myself to finishing it, got so fed up with it at chapter 4... Is it gonna get better or is this the entire game? I tried continuing but I just get bored... I even tried watching that movie that prequels the game... But I got extremely bored of that as well (is there nudity later on?.

I am not impressed... If anything, it reminds me of Doom 3. It's almost Doom IV... Story is almost the same, and so is the setup of the game. Albeit the game is a bit slower than Doom and a lot harder if you're playing on top difficulty. But still... It feels like a fail. Still a 86-89% score on gamerankings is not bad at all... Maybe if I read some enthausiastic impressions I'll will myself to finish it...

Jodou · #2 11-03-2008, 05:59 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dem

is there nudity later on?

Nope, just brief male nudity, which was rather surprising.

I think Dead Space will be in the same boat as Fallout 3 for me -- bargain bin buys on a rainy day.

Dem · #3 11-03-2008, 06:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jodou

Nope, just brief male nudity,.

Shit keeps getting worse and worse.

Sensational · #4 11-03-2008, 09:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dem

Doom 3.

That about sums it up, it's Doom 3: The Space Mining Flying Boat version.
I was hoping for Silent Hillish, I was disappointed. Luckily I barely knew that this game existed before my buddy bought it, so there was no anticipation.

ScribbleN · #5 11-06-2008, 12:09 PM

I didn't buy it, but my bestest friend did. I borrowed it after he finished it, and just last night finished it myself. It wasn't -that- bad, it's just that it wasn't that good either.

Mostly the plot was just kind of lame and completely predictable even for a horror game, and even though it had a few good scares in it, for the most part I got bored with the scary stuff midway through. If those things had been paid a little more attention to I might be playing it through again some day.

Instead, I think I'll just watch Event Horizon, scariest movie ever made, and though Dead Space took some notes from it, they totally could have taken a few more.

Shademonger · #6 11-06-2008, 01:14 PM

Awww, I'm your bestest friend?

I liked it a fair amount, the gameplay was fairly decent, I thought. I enjoyed cutting off limbs and some of the little breaks from the standard run and gun setup, such as the moments where you enter zero G and have some kind of puzzle to solve. I feel like they switched up the formula on the enemies a decent amount, but could have stood to switch it up a little bit more. I felt that maybe you were given a bit too much time to get comfortable with one set of enemy before they introduced another type to adapt to. If there were a few more enemy types with different ways of killing them, it could have bumped up the gameplay a great amount.

Fragment · #7 11-08-2008, 04:24 PM

It's not really a letdown if there wasn't that much hype to begin with for it right?

Bishop · #8 11-09-2008, 04:44 PM

I tried to play the PC version of this complete pile of stinking garbage. DO NOT ATTEMPT AT HOME, or you may easily get infected with suck.

I have a feeling the console version might be interesting... but who cares? After such a let down on the PC, I'm certainly not going to risk getting a different version.

Thank you, EA, for another complete garbage port job. THIS is what makes people pirate stuff -- just to try it out and avoid getting burned.

amurphy · #9 11-13-2008, 04:28 PM

I think that Dead Space did well for a new IP. I myself never play horror games but the Event Horizon/Aliens talk got me interested. For someone who is usually a first person shooter who hates aliens and zombies I hope that I have an interesting take. I think the game took a lot from Event Horizon (the beginning with the crashing ship/etc) but just a little from Aliens. I liked how there was no HUD which made the game much more immersible and scarier. Additionally, I liked how the checking your inventory did not pause the game. There was even one time when I ran to the store and had to jump out because some necromorphs had dropped in behind me. The game was not scary all the time, but it did give a creepy vibe. I used the plasma cutter the whole time and I appreciate the lack of real military grade weaponry. When I compare this to games like Fallout 3 which I had just completed and the new sand-box type games, it is nice to have a constructed narrative. Maybe I am a little biased because I don't play horror surivival games, but I enjoyed it. I wouldn't buy it, but I'm glad I rented it.

jaod · #10 11-26-2008, 03:41 PM

I borrowed this from a friend. I also don't generally play horror games, but overall I enjoyed it. I didn't find the game particularly scary, but I was startled at times and it was kind of creepy throughout. I think they did the no HUD thing well and I hope more games adopt this. I really liked that feature.