Dead Space 1 almost has a reputation for being one of the greatest horror shooters ever, and although I wasnt the largest fan of it - I thought it was just OK, what does Dead Space 2 do different or offer?
Well actually, not much is new as far as I can tell. Dead Space 2 is basically the exact same as the first game, just with new levels and campaign. All of the same mechanics, controls, graphics even. Since it largely plays the same as the first game, wheres what I can say about it:
The story is pretty vauge and hard to follow, admittedly I forget much of the first games story, but it never seemed to be the strong point of this series. You're stuck in space stations crawling with bizarre monsters and you must escape. Good enough for me.
In dead space two, you start off in a straight jacket, clamboring just to get your basic gear and health. This is a nice touch and was an immersive start to suck you in.
Your character talks now, as in the previous game he was just a silent protagonist. I have no opinion either way, as most of the dialogue which happens is such a blurred mess of radio static and mental patient mumbling through delusions and stuff it wasnt that big of a deal, there are some moments where your protagonist has some interesting things to say but its always just a side note more than anything.
Where Dead Space 2 excels is by far its atmosphere and enviornmental storytelling. This game is definitely up there in terms of nailing the sci-fi horror atmosphere. The monsters are so creepy and interesting alone that its always exciting to discover more of them. And this game does have quite a lot of enemy variety, and many of them are pretty damn edgy. Trying to describe them would be a disservice so you have to just look at them to see for yourself. A lot of them have different attacks and strategies such as some shoot projectiles across the screen which slow you, some of them are little babies that explode,
Some of them even deliberately play 'hide and seek' with you and you watch them poke their heads out from corners, devising a plan how to ambush you. Admittedly, these guys are pretty fucking annoying and can soon wear out their welcome as whenever they rush you they knock you into this animation where you crawl around on the floor for 10 seconds and it turns into this obnoxious cat and mouse chase that frequently pops up in the story.
Another enemy type are these stupid stationary explosive bugs that more often than not surprise you by sticking to the roof or wall that you can never see, and as you turn a corner you just explode and lose half your health, theres just barely any way to see them half the time and its more obnoxious than engaging. So while the game has a great and interesting variety of enemies, encountering some of them over and over can be pretty tedious and obnoxious.
As you're going through the game you will make your way through space station after space station metallic linear cage rooms where it will spawn a bunch of enemies running towards you, and usually to progress you have to find some object to interact with, some puzzle to solve, or some physics thing to do. But really the chapters do feel very samey. There is not much variety in the actual locations you visit. Much of the game does feel like the same generic space corridor you've been through many times already. Infact, one point I was beginning to feel Deja vu, only to discover the chapter I was on was literally called 'Deja Vu' because it was a series of revisted areas from the first game.
However there are some very memorable and unique chapters, such as an entire chapter where you go through a sort of elementary school, and it introduces these really creepy child monsters that swarm towards you in packs as you explore this weird elementary school. Other than this area though, not many locations stand out.
Sometimes you will be in these 'zero gravity' sections where you float around in space and are tasked to complete various objectives to progress, and I really did not like any of these sections and they felt more annoying than anything fun. You float around with the camera zoomed so far up your ass you can barely see anything, its super dizzy, the controls suck in these parts, you have to go around and do these physics puzzles picking up these 'thrusters' and attaching them to objects, to shoot them, to move things, and the whole thing is just nauseating and super tedious and boring. Theres random shit being shot at you, knocking you around, the camera is bad. Fuck these sections.
Sometimes the indoors puzzles are way too ambiguous and tedious as well, such as one part where youre crawling back and forth between crawl spaces needing to pull power objects out of walls, stare at a diagram on the floor, and put the power back in the right order or something. Not very thrilling stuff, things like this happen frequently in between gunfights.
Another thing that I thought was disappointing and not rewarding is basically the entire upgrade system and the weapon arsenal. You come across these stores in the game, and the first time I found one I was so overwhelemed. I think Its because I have all of the DLC - but from the get-go I had like 30 different weapons avalible, some of them were free? Some of them cost money but were slight variations of the same gun? I didnt understand any of it. I think the DLC inclusions like ruined the entire store experience. None of it made sense. You end up unlocking schematics for new guns and stuff, but none of the guns were appealing or I didnt find myself excited to buy them and try them out.
Mostly for the whole game I just used the default plasma cutter pistol, fully upgraded it, and used some sort of Plasma rifle and did the same. I don't think the way they handled weapons is particulary enjoyable. Like, you should be able to find temporary versions of these guns in the enviorment to try out first, and then once you understand what they are, purchase them. But no, the guns are just hobbled together bizarre pieces of scrap metal and youre never sure WTF they do until you buy them and equip them and ttry them out, theres so many of them and none of them even seem worth using. Not to mention the entire store interface is crappy and you cant even see what the weapons look like before buying them, just such a disappointment.
The combat and mechanics are largely the same as the first game, Basically I try to shoot off the legs of any monster first, as it reduces their mobility and threat, and then finish them off. The gore system and physics is pretty fun, and going around collecting items ammo and health feels rewarding at times too. You can save some upgrade points to unlock certain doors in the enviorment and its usually worthwhile to do so as you find schematics and supplies, but like I said, unfortunately the store experience isn't great.
So where does that leave things? Well to summarise, the upgrade and weapon unlocks isn't very compelling , the enviorments tend to be very samey except a few highlights, the enemy variety is great and exciting but sometimes they can be very tedious, the atmosphere and enviornemntal storytelling is pretty great and theres always something creepy and cool to atleast look at, some of the cutscenes and moments are pretty memorable such as the infamous eyeball scene and the exploding baby in the nursery, but overall, just like the first game, it carries the same sort of downfalls for me personally.
I mean its pretty disappointing how theres a few 'boss' fights in the game, but its really just the same big monster encounter repeated a few times. Also the game goes a little bit too heavy on the quick time cutscenes, and some of the 'interactive' cutscenes are a bit too Michael bay, but its a nitpick. Towards the end of the game theres monsters that you cant kill that just keep regenerating, so it turned into some kind of speedrun romp to the end of the game that felt kinda awkward.
Also, the controls kind of suck in the sense that the same button for something as precious as health kit is almost the same button as picking up objects, so frequently I would be accidentally wasting health packs. The controls in general could have been more refined. Like the fact you cant see how much ammo you have left unless you press Dpad and look at your weapons.
Tl;dr, locations could of been more memorable, weapon and store mechanic could have been better, enemies cool but sometimes tedious, combat fun good gore and physics but weapons not that fun to use. I played on Normal difficulty and it wasnt particularly difficult, wouldnt call it 'survival horror' , maybe I should have played harder, but the same kind of critiques I have wouldnt of been any different.
6/10
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