Just like in Hollywood and the film industry, which seems to suffer from a severe lack of new and creative ideas and recycles classics, the gaming industry also turns to the easy solution of game innovations, under the excuse of the current generation consoles. It’s cheap, it’s fast, and the hope that new audiences will be exposed to the game tempts studios to release complete remakes of old games and charge full price for them. The latest among them is Dead Space by Motive Studio, which joins a pretty saturated game season. Is it worth the full price?
This time the main character speaks!
The new Dead Space comes out close to the launch of The Calisto Protocol, directed by the director of the original Dead Space and meanwhile considered a serious flop, despite being crowned as one of the factors influencing the success of the Dead Space franchise and perhaps also the reason for the re-release of the first game, which ignited the series. If you are not familiar with the title, the original Dead Space is the first entry into a successful franchise that includes several games, movies, comics and books. Dead Space is first and foremost a survival horror game. After that, it is also an action science fiction story, told in a non-linear way and across a wide variety of media – but at its core takes place in a spaceship that is taken over by aliens.
In the new version we get here a full dubbing for Isaac Clarke, the main character we play throughout the entire game, who was completely silent in the original game. From time to time, new characters will appear and move the plot, even if in the same familiar direction. The atmosphere of Dead Space is gloomy, dark, creepy and frightening. Although you play most of the time in a single spaceship, the journey of Dead Space throughout the campaign (about 12 hours or so) feels like navigating a tangled maze of horrors. The environments of the game change, and even if you go through corridors or rooms for the second or third time, it is doubtful that you will be able to recognize them due to the changing lighting (or rather, the changing darkness) and your pressure to escape from a certain situation. The horror element of the game does not always come from the mere existence of monsters or dangers on board, but more from the pressure of dealing with a complex and intense battle in a very small room while you just want to advance to the next save point.
Saving from a decade ago
Yes, as in the original game, here too you will have to save your progress in the game along its map. The first moment I encountered the thing, I suddenly remembered that once upon a time all games were like this and I got a rather pleasant feeling of nostalgia. Suddenly with the capabilities of the new generation of consoles and the focus on technology (Hi Quick Resume) – it was even a little exciting to actively maintain the point where I am in the game and thank God – to never go back to the stage that challenged me so much before. Another nice thing about saving – the game shows you the net time that has progressed in the campaign. That is, even if it took you several attempts to pass a certain part of the game, for many hours – eventually at your save point you will see a few minutes of progress. I assume that this is an old counting method that was already embedded in the game and they didn’t bother to change it, but it was quite a refreshing change compared to games that work hard to produce philaristic content and present an excessive double-digit number of hours of play, just because they fail you.
The game’s graphics have undergone miraculous improvements, starting with Isaac’s suit, which has undergone a significant facelift here and makes the original game’s look pale, to the mesmerizing environment design that will easily put you in the mood. Every element in every room of the spaceship you are in feels like it has undergone massive treatment and it is clearly noticeable, from the big details to the small details that the developers of Motive have done everything to make the game look much, but much more realistic. To encourage you to explore the new environments, the game’s map is much more open beyond, and you can go through areas in it much more freely, go back to previously unopened places, and improve your weapon system with them. Some of the redesigned areas were not only redesigned visually – but also game-wise. Thus, you can enjoy the cancellation of gravity in certain areas of the map and explore the environment you are in in a completely new way from the original game.
Not everything is renewed as it should be
But there are some things that don’t work in this innovation. Isaac’s movement in space fails to improve significantly from the original game, and this is very noticeable, especially when you have to run fast and calculate times to survive the arena you are in or in a boss fight that I found less convincing when my movement was so slow by necessity. When the main player moves so slowly, but his environment moves very fast – I can only wonder why the developers did not spend the time improving this aspect as well.
Despite the fact that the enemy characters here (disgusting monsters) look much better than ever, and that the dangers you will encounter throughout the game are varied, I can’t say that the work on their movement impressed me too much and sometimes in massive battles the bugs in the graphics are revealed, yet I remember for a moment that this is a novelty . At the same time, when they are defeated with the help of the game’s convincing battle system – you will discover a “final elimination” system that I will not go into the graphic descriptions of too much – but I will say that it is quite crazy, and in very difficult battles where you are one moment from death and manage to be saved – it is very satisfying. In general, the combat system of Dead Space works well and presents a good variety of weapons that you will find throughout the game, which were added in the remake version with new abilities that will make them even more powerful. Although the battles in Dead Space do not approach the level of intensity of DOOM, the level of difficulty of the game is high, and although you can change it – prepare yourself for a significant challenge in terms of the direction of your shots, resistance to pressure and dense battle areas even when you are presented with a small number of enemies – you will have to use Shoot each bullet in your weapon wisely to survive until the next save point.
After all – an excellent remake
The Dead Space remake falls under the same umbrella as the excellent remakes that have come out in recent years and gives due respect to the player, so it joins remakes like Final Fantasy (which was also my game of the year for 2018), The Last of Us Part 1, Mafia and more. At the same time, it should be taken into account that just like them, the significant innovation here basically concerns the graphics, and culminates in the design and rethinking of some of the stages you know, both in terms of gameplay and in terms of the story – so if you come to this game expecting completely new content – you may be disappointed. If enough years have passed since you played the original game or you have never played it – you are about to encounter a refreshing and very enjoyable experience.