Game Review #1: Dead Space

As a child, I remember sitting on the floor in my grandparents living room, my grandpa sitting in his chair to my left and my grandmother sitting in front of me in her chair with her lamp illuminating the crossword puzzle from the local newspaper, telling me about seeing the original Wolfman, Dracula, Frankenstein, Nightmare on Elm Street, and many other horror movie greats.  I remember thinking to myself how brave she was because, at the time, I hated anything from the horror genre (I’d like to thank Chuckie for my inability to sleep in my own room until about the age of 8).  But I have noticed that the women in the Smith family tend to like horror movies so I have grown to not fear these movies anymore.  My lack of faith in the supernatural and other farfetched scenarios presented in these types of movies have also helped to quell any fear I used to have as a child. The only horror films that fascinate me now are of the zombie variety because it seems to be the most likely of scenarios we will ever have a chance of coming across.  With that said, I still enjoy the occasional tense, albeit silly, scary movie that will undoubtedly be released some time in the fall.

I think there is something about horror films that truly captures the imagination; they pull at our empathetic strings and ask us, “what would I do in that exact situation?”  I think this is why the horror genre is such a good and fun type of film to see, but what if you could actually interact and experience that film?  This is what video games do for us today.  With the advent of the horror-survival genre in video games (thank you Resident Evil, the first real popular game in this genre), you are now able to be the character you’ve always wanted to be, and feel what it is like to be thrown into the situation of a horror film.  

Dead Space does exactly that.  The game takes place on a deep space mining vessel, the USG Ishimura, somewhere within our galaxy.  The character you play is Isaac Clarke, nothing more than an engineer, who is thrown into an extraordinary situation where a virus, or plague of some sort, breaks out and kills/transforms every living human being into a mindless, killing machine.  They don’t just become zombies, they grow blades of bone, with distorted mouths of teeth, and posses the inability to feel pain.  And unlike in other zombie movies, a head shot will not kill them, you must sever multiple limbs before they die.  This concept of limb severing is revolutionary in its own, and it adds a whole new element to the first person shooter concept.  The game is also very freaky.  With tons of creepy moments of people with dementia committing suicide and homicide in front of you coupled with these monsters jumping from out of no where, they use the ventilation system to travel, it makes for a very tense and freaky several hours of game play.  

Game play is obviously an important aspect of video games nowadays, but for me the story is what causes me to play for 8 hours straight, and the story driving the plot of this game is pretty captivating.  The mythology that has now been created has spawned 2 animated movies and a series of comic books.  The story begins with miners finding an ancient relic which later on is discovered to possess some kind of mystical powers.  It is later revealed that the mining vessel was sent to find this relic by some religious cult back on Earth, known as the Church of Unitology, and a conspiracy unravels.  Whether or not the game developers were providing social commentary on religious cults and how people will absolve their humanity in order to support the leaders of their church, I cannot say, but I would say the Unitologists had some similarities with Scientologists.  I won’t go too deep into it, and this is just my own jaded opinion, but a lot of the turmoil and conflict that arises is due to the fact that the people allow for the Church to impair their judgement and think of courses of actions in a pragmatic way.  Now with that said, the relic was also supposed to cause dementia, thus the suicidal and homicidal behavior, but there were plenty of chances for the people in charge of the ship to relinquish the scourge brought aboard the USG Ishimura.  So in a way, the characters in this story are very frustrating, but it allows for great tension and conflict to arise, things that are needed for a great story to be told.  By the end, however, a cliff hanger is left as the hero of the story, Isaac, begins to succumb to his own dementia.

Now, as Dostoyevski would use the city of his stories as a character, so does Dead Space use the USG Ishimura.  The spaceship itself has died and is transforming just like its inhabitants.  The atmosphere created by the low lights, moving shadows, and eerie sounds of alarms never being turned off creates a very immersive experience that allows the player to lose one’s self in the setting. Yet another aspect to this great game to make your heart rate increase and eyes dilate.  The setting itself is a very integral part in producing that adrenaline rush and that “fight or flight” feeling one might get when they are woken up by a loud bang from the kitchen.  I can’t think of too many games that I play where I have to stop playing because I just need to catch my breath and relax a bit.  

Overall, this game was amazing.  I know I’m a few years late with this review, but I don’t see the need in rushing through great pieces of art.  Needless to say, one of my next purchases is going to be Dead Space 2, but my only worry is that it turns out like Bioshock 2 where it was really just the same game in the same setting.  I think the ability to expand a setting to fit into an entire world and mythology is difficult to do, but Dead Space has already begun to explore the many different possibilities that can be built upon the first game.  If you like to be scared and enjoy a good story with a captivating conspiracy, then this is the game for you.