CU plays Dead Space 2

ClockworkUniverse

Because I don't want to clog up Vidya Gaems.

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So, started Dead Space 2.

I think a summary of the game thus far is worth posting.

So, we get a quick recap of the first game as Isaac is interviewed by a therapist. So far so good...

Then Isaac wakes up in a ruined mental hospital. Okay, so we're jumping right into stuff happening. A guy walks up to him and...is brutally killed by a necromorph that sneaks up behind them. Okay, that was pretty startling, but startling is the only aspect of horror Dead Space has managed thus far, so let's see how it does with subtlety.

The guy then turns into a necromorph, on screen, extremely well-illuminated, taking up the entire screen. We even get to watch his eyes fall out. This was probably supposed to be terrifying. I laughed out loud.

Then Isaac somehow manages to shove the necromorph so that it stumbles slightly off-camera, at which point it either evaporates or loses interest and wanders off.

Then we take control. And...we're in an abandoned insane asylum overrun by necromorphs, unarmed and in a straightjacket. Okay, maybe that first bit wasn't indicative and the game has learned a thing or two about horror! The necromorphs are even offscreen and indicated by shadows a lot of the time! This is awesome!

But...this brief bit took me four tries. Here's why.

• Attempt one: got tackled by a necromorph at the end due to a scripted thing. Turns out it's a quick-time event, but this series increases immersion by not having a traditional HUD, and in-keeping with that, the button prompt is transparent, nowhere near where the composition of the scene makes you want to look, and offscreen a fair portion of the time due to shakycam. I thus fail to notice it until a spike thing has been shoved through Isaac's skull.


• Attempt two: Isaac clips on a thing that he isn't even standing within two feet of, runs in place for a bit, gets eaten.


• Attempt three: Made it to the quick-time event, now if only I can find that button-prompt...what does that say? "L?" It went offscreen right after I found it. Am I supposed to left-click, or press L? I'll try both...OH, IT'S E! Well, too late, I'm dead. I'll try E next time.


• Attempt four: success.

So...not horribly impressed, so far.

Okay, kept playing anyway.

So two soldiers shot at me, and a necromorph in the ceiling took the opportunity to kill them both. That was pretty well-handled.

Then I walked into a room and a scare chord immediately played. I had to look around the room for awhile before I figured out why it was scary, though. It was some sort of unethical experiment room, I guess.

Next room, a guy with a knife is...mumbling exposition. I only make out like half of it, but he's apparently responsible for what happened? I guess? Anyway, he cuts my straightjacket open and gives me a health pack and flashlight. Then he holds the knife up in front of his throat and drags it through the air in front. As he does this, MS Paint quality decals of blood appear on his shoulder, legs, back, and other completely unrelated parts of his body, but not, you know, his throat, hands, or chest.

This game is really pathetic so far. I mean, I liked the first because it felt like a pretty good action game, so maybe once it stops trying to be the horror game this series is bizarrely marketed as, it'll be good?

Okay, now some chick is telling me to go places over the intercom. So there's a bit of a walk in the dark with a flashlight, which starts off building tension really well, with a shadowy figure moving in another room but vanishing before you can spot it and stuff like that, but then we keep getting random pointless jump scares like a TV coming on and blasting static for a bit or a pipe dumping out some water. Also Isaac hallucinates a bit.

Then we crawl through a pipe and a necromorph almost attacks Isaac, but realizes that he has no way to defend himself and thus the game would end, so it wanders off.

The air vent collapses and Isaac lands next to a corpse being suspended by some science thing. Isaac dismantles the science thing and uses it to make...well, he has the gravity gun now, basically. Because nothing says survival horror like infinite ammo. So he takes some metal rods and uses them to knock out the glass around the room.

Some necromorphs hear the noise and they...well, the animation indicates that they're running, but I've rarely seen someone in good health even walk that slowly. Anyway, they lazily charge at Isaac, who fires more metal rods at them like spears.

...Wait. Didn't the first game make a big deal about how you had to sever all of the limbs to incapacitate a Necromorph? Because they animate all of the dead flesh and thus can't be beaten by other means? It's kind of their whole thing?

Gah.

Well, I can confirm that at least DS2 Isaac still has the leg strength necessary to sever limbs cleanly with a stomp. Probably not appropriate for a supposed horror game, but I always loved that.

Found a guy who was in the middle of an open-heart surgery when the Necromorphs showed up and is still restrained with his chest open. Okay, that's legitimately pretty horrifying. There's a plasma cutter aimed at his chest...why is there a plasma cutter aimed at his chest? Those things fire cutting beams that can easily pierce through an entire body, about a foot wide. WHY WOULD YOU USE THAT FOR SURGERY. In the first game, IIRC, it was an engineering tool -- something you'd use to sever a steel beam.

Anyway, Isaac sets about deactivating the thing and trying to recover the cutter, but a necromorph bursts in and he...keeps fiddling with the computer, instead of using the weapon he already has that has proven capable of taking out Necromorphs.

The necromorph kills surgery guy, conveniently RIGHT as Isaac gets the plasma cutter! Guess we couldn't have another character or anything; he might make it obvious how bland Isaac is. So he then goes about killing a few necromorphs with it.

Huh, apparently decapitation kills them now, while in the previous game it only made them mad because the heads of their victims are entirely useless to them. That's...:/

Radio Girl tells Isaac that he has to dismember Necromorphs to kill them...even though that wasn't true a minute ago.

This game.

ClockworkUniverse

Passed through the obligatory ironic gift shop, with balloons, teddy bears and such contrasting generically with the bloodstains and decaying corpses.

Then went through an airlock. Naturally, an explosion blew out the exterior door, so I had to hit the switch to reseal it. Where is it? Above the door, of course! You have to shoot it. Reasonable game design, but suicidal ship design. Reached the store and...that's a lot of adjectives in front of the weapons. Guess the equipment system is more complex now. This intimidated me a bit, so I didn't buy anything. Until I walked up to the next door, which told me that the next room was decompressed and to get a suit. So I bought a Line Gun and a Vintage Suit. These...were both free, for some reason? Whatever. Probably just some DLC that got included when I bought the game. That tends to happen when you buy games years after they come out.

Vacuum lasted for one room, in which nothing happened. Guess they were just trying to force you to get a suit.

Yay, giant necromorph monster fight. Was pretty awesome, though they just had to get in some of the jump scares they love so much.

Anyway, exposition! Isaac's memory from between the games is gone because the marker put a signal in his head that is making him go crazy/die, and the doctors were delaying it by suppressing his memory and keeping him asleep as much as possible.

ClockworkUniverse

Several jump scares later, we've established that there's another Marker and that Villain Guy (whose name I don't actually know at this point because I suck with names and the voice acting is really mumbly) wanted it because "it's powerful." Zombie game villains are so fucking stupid. Tigers are powerful, but if you keep one in your bedroom, that won't make you become as powerful as it. It will just eat you.

There are more jump scares, some "oh no you have to wait for the door to unlock" rooms, and then a room with a hallucination, which is actually legitimately mildly creepy.

Then there was a bit where I activated a train, then spent awhile waiting for it to get where it was going, only to realize that I actually had to start walking along the train for the setpiece to end. So I did that. Then there was a cool bit where one of the carts was missing, but because zero gravity, Isaac jumped across the gap. Only halfway through this jump did I realize it wasn't a cutscene and I was actually supposed to be playing it. This all culminated in a crash leading to a fucking awesome action setpiece wherein Isaac had to fight off a huge number of enemies while dangling upside-down. Loved it. This is what Dead Space is good at.

ClockworkUniverse

Found a place with kid-ish stores, and got attacked by a crapload of zombie kids. That was probably supposed to be more disturbing than it was.

Went through some Unitologist quarters. Apparently recruitment is way down after their repuation took a hit recently. I know, right? You try to murder humanity and turn their bodies into vessels for mindless abominations one time (twice now, but as of then it was just once) and you never hear the end of it!

Did a zero gravity bit in a trash compactor. It was a neat bit, but I liked the old game's surface-to-surface zero gravity better than this one's more jetpacky means of navigation. It's all good as long as they have interesting things to do with it, though.

After that, went through some more Unitology quarters, including a baby's room! Because children make everything meaningful.

On a more interesting note, there's a gunship following me around the station. That can't be good.