Dead Space

The premise of Dead Space might seem, to some, very cliched. Big spaceship, overrun with aliens and lots of gore. Aliens, Event Horizon, Doom, etc, etc, all spring to mind when trying to explain the game.
But you'd be wrong to think this was anything else but brilliance!
This game has taken the best of the hard sci-fi horror genre and crafted it into a astonishing piece of technical mastery. Its that good.

The setting for Dead Space is a large mining ship names the USG ISHIMURA, you play as Isaac Clarke, a miner, who whilst arriving onboard realises that something is terrilbly wrong, as the vessel is crawling [quite literally] with beings known as Necromorphs. These half-alien/half-human hybrids literally want to suck the flesh off of your skull.

GRAPHICS-
After playing this on a 32" HDTV I can honestly say its one of the finest looking games I've played. It even rivals Metal Gear Solid 4 and Uncharted: Drake's Fortune in terms of sharpness and graphical detail. The lighting effects are spot on and the gore is freakishly realistic. The USG ISHIMURA feels incredibly claustrophobic as shadows of Necromorphs flicker and dart around you. The Necromorphs themselves are severely mutatated and animated superbly and disturbingly, as you blast a leg off, and it continues scuttling towards you! OVERALL 10/10

GAMEPLAY-
The 3rd person perspective works very well and the camera is surprisingly responsive. The games core mechanic is fright and dismemberment which work brilliantly. Quite often strategically shooting a certain limb after the Necromorph has jumped out at you, scaring you half to death, is very rewarding, especially playing on the harder difficulty setting. The weapons are balanced and no one weapon has a distinct advantage over the other. [The Ripper is a personal favourite of mine!] OVERALL 10/10

SOUND-
The sound effects are some of the best I've heard. Having it on loud will guarantee a swift change of underwear. Everything from the demented howls and blood curdling screams are very well done. Quite often what yo hear is scarier than what you see, and theres nothing more un-nerving than hearing scuttling in the vents above you, not knowing when or where it will ambush you. OVERALL 10/10

TROPHIES-
Thankfully, EA has included Trophies out-of-the-box. And they all seem fun and a nice reward after you've nearly given yourself a heart attack. They range from completing levels, to severing x amount of limbs, and there loads to get which adds lots of replay value.

Overall its a well made horror masterpiece, can't wait for the sequel!

*The Obsidian Suit is a must have, downloaded from the Playstation Store! Its superb.

OVERALL 10/10

What a sleeper hit Dead Space has become! And rightly so. It has to be one of the scariest games I have ever played along with some amazing graphics and gorgeous lighting. Not only that but I do have to comment on just how silky smooth this game looks and runs on the PS3. I haven't encountered one bug through the entire game and the level of detail that has gone into making the USG Ishimura appear real and authentic is quite something.

As you enter the USG Ishimura you get a sort of Bioshock feel with voices from loud speakers announcing that you have arrived and numerous advertisements on the walls stand out at you. You really feel that the ship is real and the surfaces of the floor and walls and particularly glass are some of the best looking I have seen all combined with fantastic lighting.

Instantly you feel on edge and you know that around every corner something may be waiting to jump out at you, or not. That is what Dead Space does so great, it's never predictable and will tease you with eerie sounds and distant screams to make you feel uncomfortable to proceed forward. This game can really make you jump many times, the sound effects are brilliant and the enemies so gruesome and evil looking.

Use of weapons in Dead Space is one of my favourite features. These weapons, although very useful, aren't your standard rifle and shotgun business, these are tools/items cleverly crafted to become lethal objects. My favourite has to be the Ripper, a magnetic razor sharp blade that takes limbs off in a way that leaves you feeling more than satisfied.

And boy will you need your weapons, at times you can find yourself trapped in a room with a load of enemies and you'll have to work hard to manage them all at once as they only die for good once their limbs have been cut off.

The story is interesting with twists here and there and is told through video/audio logs keeping you totally immersed in the game. The fact that there's no HUD in the game works well too and the various suits Isaac wears are pretty sweet.

Overall a fantastic scary well-made horror game that keeps you hooked from the moment it starts to the moment it finishes. Some amazing space effects and graphics are displayed and the game runs very VERY well on the PS3. The fact it also has trophies and on the Playstation Network you can download other suits for Isaac to wear also adds to make this game one of the must have of 2008.

10/10 Can't wait for Dead Space 2!

After playing `Dead Space' for just an hour or so, I knew straight away that this was going to be one of the best games of 2008 and now that I'm about 10 hours into the story, I'm not wrong! Why is it so good? First of all it takes the excellent over-the-shoulder perspective of the classic Resident Evil 4 mixes it with the ground-breaking physics of Half-Life 2 and then has all of the scares and a similar setting to the terrifying Doom 3 which ends up as one of the best all-round survival horror shooters ever.

The graphics are some of the best I've seen on the PS3 with some very impressive lighting effects and very detailed surfaces and characters. The music and sound effects are really scary, especially when playing this using a surround sound system or with headphones. The HUD and maps etc are all on a display that comes out of the main character's helmet - there is no pausing to look at where you're going or use your inventory so you'll need to use your best tactics to find a safe place to do this! Video logs from your colleagues or others from the ship are also displayed this way, which is good as it stops long cut-scenes and you can continue exploring the ship whilst they are playing. You can also slow-down time and move objects using telekinesis (similar to the gravity gun in HL2). Another good feature is the zero-gravity rooms where you can jump to other platforms and items and enemies float around the environment. The action is fairly fast-paced and is also very gory. The puzzles are quite challenging at times and using the character's special skills will take one or two attempts to get right on occasions.

Overall this is a very good game that has kept me really entertained and I'm not near the end yet. I highly recommend it to fans of survival horror, shooters, sci-fi horror and basically anyone after a really decent action game.