Week o’ Scares Day 6: Dead Space
By Dustin Mendel | October 29, 2011 | Features | No comments | Share
For years now, as someone who is primarily a console gamer, I’d all but given up on the horror genre. As PC gamers got gems like Amnesia: the Dark Descent and Call of Cthulu, PS3 and Xbox owners had to settle for stinkers like Vampire Rain. That all changed in 2008 when a small developer best known for a handful of licensed games introduced the world to Isaac Clarke and his friends, the Necromorphs. Since then, Dead Space and its sequels have become the pinnacle of survival horror, and the original game is without question the scariest game I’ve ever played.
In Space, You Can Still Hear Me Screaming
The game’s premise is not unlike most horror movies set in outer space: an enormous spaceship responsible for harvesting resources from planets has gone quiet, and a team of engineers is sent to try to get the Ishimura up and running again. Needless to say, Isaac and his crew find more than a broken antennae, and a whole lot of screaming and dismembering ensues. One of the biggest things that rattled me about Dead Space was the intensity of the game, almost from the opening moments.
There are times when the game chooses to just creep you out, allowing the tension to build to the point of madness, like when you get to explore the area where the Church of Unitology has been camping out, but for the rest of the game, the scares are relentless and explosive. Within minutes of starting the game, you’re forced to sprint down a hallway, unarmed, in a desperate attempt to reach an elevator before a handful of Necromorphs rip you to pieces. I’ve played the game’s opening chapter a half dozen times now, and it still terrifies me.
There's a Necromorph right behind me, isn't there?
The developers did a fantastic job creating an enemy that can terrify gamers even in its most basic form. Necromorphs will often play dead, waiting for you to get within inches of them before leaping up and gnawing your face off. Other times they’ll pop out of vents, or hide behind doors. The game never lets you lower your guard, and even when you have an open room where you can see them coming for you, it isn’t any better. Rather than having Necromorphs slowly shamble after you, these things sprint full speed, their meaty claws slashing at the air, screaming in a way where I’m often torn whether I want to mute the game to spare myself the additional terror, but desperately needing an audio cue that something is about to sneak up on me.
A Symphony of Scares
The sound and music in general is one of the best parts of this game, and the developers manage to give me heart palpatations with even the smallest noise. The music swells to a hysterical crescendo while you’re being attacked, but sounds like rattling pipes, creepy singing wafting through the blood soaked corridors, or that ridiculously scary static that kicks in whenever you get a message from your team.
Earlier this month, I named a specific scene in Dead Space as the best unexpected scare in video games, but it almost seemed unfair to limit the game to one moment. The game is good for at least one major scare in each chapter, whether it’s the opening chase scene, the first time a tentacle bursts through a wall and tries to drag you into its lair or finding what’s left of the crew of the USM Valor. Even the first time you fight a Necromorph, blowing off its legs with a well timed blast from your plasma cutter, only to see it dragging itself along with its claws, still pursuing you, it’s enough to make your eyes roll up in your head.
These awful things are pretty upsetting too.
It may seem like you need to have an appreciation for movies like Alien to enjoy this game, but Dead Space provides such a myriad of scares, that fans of games like Silent Hill and Resident Evil will feel right at home too. If you’re looking for something scary to play for Halloween, turn the lights down, turn the volume up, and see how far you can get through Dead Space. I bet you don’t last long.
Week o’ Scares
Day 1: The Lurking Horror
Day 2: The Call of Cthulhu Dark Corners of the Earth
Day 3: Eversion
Day 4: Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines
Day 5: F.E.A.R.
Day 6: Dead Space
Day 7: System Shock 2
