Dead Space 2

Dead Space 2 was released this week for Playstation 3 and XBOX 360. I played some of the original Dead Space and loved it, but for some reason I held off on making a purchase until the sequel came out.

At any rate, I picked up Dead Space 2, and it's nothing less than an incredible gaming experience so far. The biggest compliment I can give this game is that it takes the 'survival horror' mantle from the Resident Evil series of games and runs with it.

If you're not really a gamer, and/or you only know Resident Evil from the godawful series of movies they made, you do not know Resident Evil. Forget about that shit - the movies don't even remotely resemble the games. No offense, Milla Jovovich - you are stupid hot and I'm sure you have talents. But those movies are terrible. The original Resident Evil game was revolutionary at the time - a video game that was genuinely scary to play.

In Resident Evil, you played a special forces cop (You were part of a team called S.T.A.R.S.; I do not recall what the acronym stands for and I'm not looking it up) investigating a spooky mansion. Turns out the mansion is riddled with zombies, thanks to a virus unleashed by the nefarious Umbrella Corporation. You're armed with guns, but only have a limited number of bullets. The zombies lumber along nice and slow-like, but underestimate them at your own peril...a gang of them can surround you pretty easily, and then you are fucked. Before you know it, they are feasting on your brains.

As you progressed through Resident Evil, greater threats would emerge. Like zombie dogs. Those were a bitch, and they sure as hell weren't slow. There would be moments of terror - you'd just be walking down a hallway, no enemies in sight, and then holy shit, two zombie dogs crash through the window behind you! Now you don't know when you're safe, or when something's gonna suddenly appear to rip out your throat.

The idea with 'survival horror' games such as Resident Evil and now Dead Space is to take the thrill from watching a horror or intense action movie and take it the next level. You're not just watching some poor soul running for your life - you ARE that poor soul running for his life.

Not having played the first Dead Space game to completion (I played my friend's copy for about a half hour), I don't know the whole story here, but I know enough. You play a dude named Isaac. Your wife is dead and you are in space. You encounter a nasty breed of aliens known as Necromorphs, and shit hits the fan. People are getting brutally killed by the Necromorphs all around you. Isaac has encountered these creatures before, and the experience essentially drove him insane. So yeah, you have madness to deal with too.

It probably goes without saying these days, because most modern games aim for this, but damn, this game is cinematic. Competes with major motion pictures for pure visual thrills. Looks gorgeous. Those 'terror moments' I mentioned above from Resident Evil are here in spades. Sometimes they are an imminent threat, other times they're fake-outs. *CRASH!* "What was that? Oh, a damaged structure collapsed. But no evil aliens in sight. Guess that was just a fake-out scare...oh my god, there's 3 of them!"

These Necromorphs are some nasty fuckers. They're a bit like giant insects - think Starship Troopers (awesome movie). They have a lot of legs. They vomit acid at you. If you let them get close, oh boy, they are gonna tear you to pieces, real fast.

You are far from defenseless - at least, after the first couple of minutes. I was slaughtered by a Necromorph almost instantly at the very start - at this point you are still in a straight jacket (Your character is insane! You start in an asylum. In space.). For those first few minutes of the game, all you can do is run. Run away! You must flee! I was still getting used to the controls and let one of those bastards get me (excuses, excuses).

A bit later, you are armed with telekinesis. Not sure exactly how that's explained - I imagine I will learn when I go play the first game. But you have the power to pick up objects with your mind and toss them - at your enemies or whatever. You have psychic powers! You would think that maybe that wouldn't work too well with the madness and all. Maybe it won't. We'll see. The trick is that something actually has to be around for you to manipulate and turn into a weapon, and you have to spot it. It is very cool to see a pipe lying on the floor, levitate it with your mind, aim it at the beastie in front of you, and *woosh* impale it with the pipe.

You are also given more conventional weaponry - yes, you get guns. There's an interesting change in the dynamic though, vs. most other shooting games I've played. You are NOT trying to shoot these Necromorphs in the head, primarily. Who would have thought I wouldn't always be aiming for the head shot?! There's YEARS of training I have to undo now.

It's not that shooting the Necromorphs in the head doesn't hurt them, and wouldn't eventually kill them. It's just not gonna do the trick *fast enough*. Meanwhile, that thing is running towards you at full speed, and when it closes the gap, you are done. So the tactic, as I've learned thus far, is to shoot the Necromorphs in the legs, disable them, cripple them. Get it so they're lying on the ground with no legs, and now the tables are turned - they are defenseless.

At this point, you run in for the kill. That is, if you don't have other Necromorphs who are still fully mobile to worry about. (If that's the case, you should probably take care of them first). This is another nice touch to the gameplay of Dead Space 2 - it's very visceral. You're not shooting at these creatures from a safe distance with your sniper rifle and then calling it a day. Shoot first - to disarm. Or dis-leg, as the case may be. Then you run in and STOMP THE SHIT OUT OF THAT FUCKER.

You do have a 'pistol whip' type move that comes in handy, but when you wanna make sure an evil alien is good and dead, nothing beats stomping it over and over with your boot. Stomp that thing to a pulp, like the damn dirty insect is. Great way to take out your aggression. You feel it squish and splatter all over the floor. You know the thing is dead when you are rewarded with an item / power-up. Doesn't mean you can still stomp it some more, just to be extra sure! BUT you probably have other things to do, like killing other Necromorphs, restoring your sanity, etc.

Rescue other people? That doesn't seem to be a top priority, at least not yet. Every person I've encountered in the game thus far is good and dead. There's even one moment when a man screams to you for help, and Isaac is like "hold on, I just need to get this gun", seems to take his time with that task (it's a plasma cutter he has to pull off of a crane, or something like that, so it does take a bit of time) while the man is brutally gutted by a Necromorph. Then Isaac is like "I'm locked and loaded - now I can help". But that dude is already super dead, nothing's gonna help him now.

"Thanks a lot, jerk" -The spirit of that dead guy

These are only my early impressions - I'm still in the first chapter! But I had a lot to write about just with my experience so far. We'll see how the game develops as I continue - does it tell a worthy story? A coherent story is not essential for a good video game, but when it's highlighted as it is here, it should be pretty decent. Will Isaac regain his sanity, or at least learn to deal with his insanity?

Another question: Will Dead Space 2 maintain the fear and shock throughout the game, or will it get boring? (I would say that's unlikely). Right now I'm fighting one type of Necromorph with one type of gun. Still pretty thrilling with just these basics, but I'm certain I'll be seeing a variety of both baddies and weaponry.

One more point - I work in market research, so the marketing of this game is interesting to me (Sorry if it's not interesting for you - go click on another one of my blog entries! You're done with this one. Hope you liked it. I mean, continue if you want, but don't say I didn't warn you).

Electronic Arts have decided to market Dead Space 2 not by claiming that you'll love it - rather, they tell you that your mom will hate it. Yes, they're dragging your mom into this. You just wanna see this cool new video game, and they're talking shit about your moms. But this isn't a 'yo momma' joke (well, maybe it is). EA want to convey that this game is repulsive, and terrifying, and violent, and all the qualities that would make a mother despise this game are exactly the qualities that YOU want to see in this game.

You mom's hate = Your love [for video games, and ?]

Where else is this true? Does this rule similarly apply for movies, TV shows, food, girlfriends/boyfriends, regular friends, after-school activities, vacations, places? You could write a thesis on this (and if someone would give me an advanced degree in return, I'll do just that).

It's decently clever. Who wants a mom-approved video game? Nobody, that's who. I mean, I guess if your mom has any knowledge / power / control over the types of video games you play, you're kind of fucked. But kids are pretty crafty. And the forbidden nature of a game (or ANYTHING) will only make them want it more. They'll find a way to get their hands on Dead Space 2 - they're not gonna miss out on this.

Also, a lot of parents will just buy the game for their kids without even taking a look at the content. We know, as EA has told us, that the moms will absolutely hate Dead Space 2 once they see it for themselves, and they may forbid their kids to ever play it again, but they've already bought it, it's too late! EA already has your money. I guess EA isn't counting on these mothers hating the game so much that they take it back to the store and return it, trade it in for Epic Mickey or something.

So why does EA have to go with this workaround solution? Surely they're not REALLY looking to earn the enmity of mothers everywhere. That can't be the end goal of this enterprise - there's no business in mother hatred. Wouldn't it be easier just to say "You shoot the fuck out of horrible aliens! It's scary and intense and will get your blood pumping - you'll love it! Violence and thrills and space - it's everything YOU want in a video game!"

Well, as we all learned from Inception, you have to be subtle when putting an idea in someone's head, or it simply won't take. The person will realize that the idea wasn't his to begin with, and will reject it. You have to make someone think that he came up with the idea himself for it to stick. (As an aside, we still have no gender neutral pronoun for 'person', and it's 2011? C'mon people, we have to develop this English language a bit more).

So EA simply makes the assertion that moms will hate Dead Space 2. They even have a website that says it quite directly:

http://yourmomhatesthis.com/

That's the website. 'Your mom hates this' *dot com* takes you to a Dead Space 2 trailer. You're crazy for this one, EA!

Anyway, you receive the suggestion that your mom will hate Dead Space 2. EA anticipates that you yourself will be aware of the idiom that your mom's hate = your love. Thus it will dawn on you: this game, which my mom would totally hate, is really cool. I MUST purchase it. And there ya go, EA just performed inception on you, and all without entering a shared dream state, and confronting terrifying dream representations of your dead wife.

Now that you know EA's plan, you can resist this inception, and wake up from the dream! But why would you want to? Dead Space 2 is awesome, you should totally buy it.