The most controversial change is the decision to make protagonist Isaac Clarke an actual character this time, to bring him in line with his appearances in later games and the extended universe. Flesh sloughs off with each pull of the trigger no matter what you hit them with. Certain weapons are good for limb lopping, while others are a peely good time. You can still do that in the remake, but there’s another layer to think about: skin. Using a range of engineering tools like plasma cutters, you lop off their limbs before stomping them to bits with your heavy gravity boots.

When humans are transformed, they spout new appendages – gangly limbs and claws – and it’s these you have to focus on to take them down quickly.

This manifests in a few ways, starting with the disgustingly named “peeling system”, which is exactly what it sounds like.ĭead Space’s alien threats aren’t your regular reanimated corpses. Rather than looking at other survival horror games, the team went right back to the original game’s concept art and inspirations, watching movies like Alien and Event Horizon before thinking up ways that they could improve upon Dead Space’s most beloved elements. “When you have sparks and those little pieces fall on the armour and fall on the ground, each of those are physics-based, and they also cast light and have shadows,” creative director Roman Campos-Oriola adds. “In the audio experience, the volumetric lights, and that’s also tied into the gameplay systems.” “There’s a lot of evocative things there,” art director Mike Yazijian says. Dozens of small details all add up to increase the richness of the world. Clouds of steam obscure your view, emergency lights flash, casting ominous shadows, and ventilation fans spin, tricking your mind into thinking there’s something scuttling in the corner of your eye.

On the visual side, the place is laid out exactly as you remember it, but the improved graphics also lend themselves to the atmosphere of the place. There’s a certain hollowness to it all that makes you feel like an ant trapped inside a discarded, haunted Pepsi can. It’s all around you, bouncing from ear to ear, and that’s without even mentioning the whispers, which sound as if they originate from inside your own head.

Dead space 2 story discussion