The Blogtastic Blogfest That Is Getmeoutofthis.net!

I played Dead Space: Extraction, and that was kind of shit because pointing at the screen with the Wiimote is kind of shit. Then I played Dead Space the iPhone game, which was shockingly good, if not always the easiest to control. At this point, I decided I really needed to play the actual game. I had turned it down originally because “it’s like RE4 and that’s not a game for me,” but my experiences with RE5 and going back to RE4 made it clear that no, it is a game for me, I just didn’t know it. When Dead Space 2 came out, I finally gave in. Gamefly sent me the original Dead Space.

I’m years late to the party here, but fuck, Dead Space is fantastic.

Now, much like RE4 and RE5, Dead Space is not scary at all. You are way too empowered as a player for the game to actually be very scary. Though your weapons are “improvised,” you still have tons of weapons and ammo to take care of anything the game might throw at you. It gets you with some jump scares once and awhile, certainly, but I didn’t really find myself nearly as scared as, say, when I played Silent Hill: Shattered Memories, which has no combat. So, yeah, it’s pretending to be a scary game, but that’s really not what it is. What it is is a fantastic third person shooter with addictive upgrade mechanics.

I once listened to a podcast with Shawn Elliott where he called Dead Space brilliant because of its “focus on skill shots.” I didn’t completely buy it at the time, but now that I’ve played the game, that is totally what sets the game apart. Having to shoot off limbs seems a bit odd and questionable from a story perspective, but once you get into the gameplay, there’s no doubt that it makes the shooting feeling unique and fresh. Not having to aim for the head for once, and having a wide variety of arms, legs, and tentacles with which to come up with strategies to hit well really makes you think about combat completely differently. It’s tense trying to shoot an array of wriggling tentacles in the air above your enemies, instead of their heads, because those tentacles are harder to hit, but cutting them off will do way more damage than pumping many rounds into their body. They make it worth your while to try these shots, which I normally wouldn’t do, and it really makes you rethink what weapons are good and how you shoot.

On top of this solid shooting action, you have really additive upgrade mechanics. An upgrade system is always welcome, but they’ve set up their system in a fairly unique way. Buying upgrades to your equipment requires “power nodes,” which essentially work like skill points you can put in the various trees of your weapons and space suit. Some spaces on the tree, though, give you no benefits other than letting you connect to other spots on the tree. What’s more, you don’t get too many of these in the world: you have to purchase them. You get some money from enemies, of course, but most of your money comes from selling excess ammo to the store. This creates another reason to want to make those skill shots and make every shot count. Instead of giving you no ammo and potentially frustrating a player by having to restart again and again, they give plenty of ammo, but really reward you for not using it by letting you buy more upgrades. It’s really genius.

There is a story to the game, which is… okay? There’s a crazy cult making monsters. Sure. I didn’t really get attached to any of the characters, though the setting is really nicely realized, and you mostly feel like you’re in a real spaceship interior as you walk around, which is appreciated. I’m sure someone who cares about world lore could get attached to that stuff, but I’m not that person. The game also gets a bit weak near the end, with you having to slowly drag this monolith around with you in between combats. It’s really annoying. But the gameplay really covers any rough edges. It’s really solid, and a lot of fun, and I hear the second game fixes a lot of those rough edges and makes it even better. I can’t wait to play it. For now, though, I’m glad I went back and played this one. It’s a good time.