Dead Space 2, the long-awaited sequel to Electronic Arts' hit survival horror title, is due to hit retailers in just two weeks. To make sure that the hype reaches a fever pitch, the company has released the official launch trailer for the title. Looks good.
The most noticeable thing in the new clip is just how much face time Isaac gets in this installment. The character was a mute hidden behind the mask of his spacesuit in the first Dead Space, but that's changed dramatically in the follow up. This new clip shows Isaac running around without his helmet, and speaking regularly. We knew this was coming from earlier clips, but it still feels kinda shocking. I get the vibe that Isaac is going to be a radically different character this time around—and it makes me a little nervous.
A film critic by trade, specializing in Euro-horror, cult exploitation, and Asian action cinema, Mike has written reviews for a diverse group of print and online publications. He covers horror news, movies, books, and games at TheHorrorGeek.com and Horrorsquad.com and spent two seasons as The Horror Geek on Comedy Central's pop-culture game show, Beat the Geeks.
Mike's childhood was spent playing videogames any time he got a chance. His parents had a Pong console and his grandmother had an Atari 2600, where Mike cultivated his skills by playing hour upon hour of games like Space Invaders, Berserk, and Asteroids. From those early experiences Mike learned one thing: he loved games.
In 1999, Mike became a staff reviewer at Cinescape Magazine's website where he spent a year learning the craft of game criticism. After internal changes led to Mike leaving Cinescape in late 2000, he joined up with RPGFan in 2001 and spent several years writing reviews for them. Happy, but looking for an opportunity to expound on a wider variety of titles, Mike joined GameCritics.com and hopes to help Chi, Dale, and the rest of the GC staff bring a higher level of respect to the field of game criticism.
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Well… yet another stereotypical white dude hero in a space suit. I’m actually disappointed of how he looks. What happened to diversity? The big pro of having a faceless dude in a suit is that he could be anyone. They could have even pulled a Samus Aran. But instead they went for the safe choice. In terms of giving him a voice I’m torn. It could be good if the dialogue would make sense. It could go all downhill if he tries to be Nathan Drake in space (I like Nathan Drake in Uncharted, but please don’t put him in… Read more »
In fact, he looks like a bit of a doofus in this video. I’d have preferred faceless Isaac\player.
Isaac really wasn’t a character in the first DS. He was a shell for the player. Making him more drawn won’t change the immersion much, though it will remove our feelings/expectations about who he is, and replace them with more action trope oriented things, from how this is looking. Uncharted 2 Space? I like the idea of a more urban techno shopping mall, futuristic day of the dead design. That’s a good thing! More action set pieces, that’s good. But I don’t know how they’re going to beat the feeling of total doom the first game created… it was soooooo… Read more »
I agree that the time to have Isaac speak was in the original. The emotional experience that he was having, given his unpreparedness and the situation with his ex would have been really affecting, if there had been any indication that he had an internal life of any kind. Now that Isaac has been transported to some space station and everyone seems to think he’s a big deal, I expect generic badassery, possibly perked up with some doubt about his sanity. That’s too bad, because putting the player in the person of a Space Janitor has possibilities, particularly for a… Read more »
Generally speaking, I don’t have a problem with him talking — at least not in principle. The silent protagonist thing seems pretty dated, but I don’t mind it now and then. What worries me more is what you point out — that they’ll let the guy talk and the dialogue will suck. If they’re going to give him cheesy lines, catch phrases, or any of the other assorted action game crap then they might as well leave him silent. I think my only real interest in Isaac as a character is that he’s a pretty ordinary Joe — he’s not… Read more »
Honestly, survival horror has become a catch-all title for horror games in general. We can all sit around and debate the finer details of survival horror vs. horror action, but that’s about as interesting as the “is Zelda an RPG argument?”
I’m all for critical lexicons, but I’m not particularly interested in splitting semantical hairs over ammo counts and the like. What constitutes too much ammo? What if I suck and run through three times as much ammo as someone else and am always low in a game where player X wasn’t? It’s a whole big dumb can of worms.
I actually thought the silent protagonist bit was a weak point of the original Dead Space, so the fact that Isaac speaks doesn’t bother me. I’m frankly kind of irked that we’re stuck with this guy again, as he seemed to be a bit of a lump the first time. I’m not sure why anyone would be excited to be playing him again. Perhaps something will happen in this game to make him an iconic character. But, judging by this dialogue, probably not.
Survival horror is a misused term RE1-3 is a survival horror game, System shock 2 is a survival horror game. Dead scape is a horror action title, mainly because you rarely if ever run out of ammo and rarely if ever have to run from a confrontation.
Now other than that I do want to play dead space 2 when it comes out.