Questions & Concerns About Dead Space 3

The old saying would have us believe that the third time's the charm, but we're not buying that proverbial propaganda until we've played Dead Space 3 on PC for ourselves! This is our Questions & Concerns article, in which we play the skeptic to cut through the zero-visibility blizzard of marketing hype surrounding an upcoming big release and examine the known and unknown factors that might give you pause before preordering. Today's subject: Dead Space 3, coming out on Tuesday, February 5th. Note that nothing here is meant to suggest that we think Dead Space 3 will be a bad game -- we wouldn't even be talking about it here if we weren't looking forward to it -- only that we're not ready to declare it awesome yet!


The no-frills PC version

The surprised reaction to the recent news that the PC version of Dead Space 3 is going to be a straight, no-frills port of the console version was a little confusing. Since neither Dead Space nor Dead Space 2 had any of these features, and this is and always has been a console-first series. We don't know what anyone was expecting there.


That said, we don't have to be happy about it. We all want HD textures and DX11 effects that make our games look spectacular so we can lord them over our console gaming friends and win them over to the glorious cause of PC gaming with more than "just" our higher resolutions, smoother framerates, and laser-precise mouse-aim skills. We also want reassurance that the past issues with the Dead Space ports, such as a lack of remappable keys and a v-sync bug that caused major mouse lag in the original game (both since patched), won't be an issue. This lack of special attention by developer Visceral, especially when compared to recent quality ports like Sleeping Dogs and Borderlands 2, does make us wonder why the PC version of Dead Space 3 should cost $60 when both of those higher-quality PC versions went for $50.

Of course, we're pleased that there's a PC version of Dead Space 3 at all -- console exclusives suck. If you want more information on exactly what features the PC version will and won't have, we've got you covered: we'll have a Port Authority feature for Dead Space 3 shortly after it launches, so you'll be informed if the quality of the port here has regressed or (fingers crossed) improved.


Will co-op make single-player less satisfying?

In our experience games tend to either have strong single-player campaigns or strong co-op gameplay, but rarely both. We'd be happy to see Dead Space 3 break that trend, but one of our primary worries is that it's designed as a co-op game first, which might lead to disappointment for fans of the first two parts of the series.


Don't get us wrong -- it can be great fun to sit down and play a cooperative game with a friend, but games that are designed as co-op experiences often see their single-player experience suffer as a result of those efforts. While playing Resident Evil 5 in single-player, for instance, it's often just as challenging to manage your companion's inventory and ammo management as it was to take on Plagas-infested villagers. FEAR 3's Paxton Fettel companion is simply absent except when he needs to appear for story reasons, which makes him feel tacked on and awkward -- and it's pretty obvious that you're running solo through levels built for two.

Dead Space 3 takes an approach similar to FEAR 3 as it brings in Sergeant John Carver to back up Isaac Clarke in co-op play, but Visceral has said that if you choose to play in single-player mode Carver will not appear as an AI follower, instead crossing paths with Clarke on occasion just like any other NPC. We'll be curious to see how accurate that statement is.

As a bonus, there's also the concern of whether playing a horror game like Dead Space in co-op will take away from the creepy vibe, as it does in FEAR 3 and RE5 -- things just aren't as scary when you've got someone there beside you.


Very worrisome microtransactions

One of the most controversial aspects of Dead Space 3 was only recently revealed: it'll feature a variety of microtransaction options to help players who want a quick way to boost their abilities in combat via "resource packs." These range anywhere in price from one to five dollars, but they won't actually add any new content. Visceral has stated plainly that they're intended largely for casual gamers who wish to gain an advantage over the Necromorph hordes to speed through the story. Visceral also insists that none of the microtransaction options are exclusive or otherwise unobtainable; Isaac will still be able to find enough resource packs to beat the campaign on the highest difficulty without shelling out more cash.


Here's the thing, though: the original Dead Space has a feature that allows casual players who want to speed through the campaign by getting extra health, weapons, ammo, and money, too: it's called entering a cheat code, and it's free. Which means that, in Dead Space 3, Visceral is essentially charging players for the privilege of entering a cheat code.

All of this, by the way, is on top of the fact that the Dead Space games already have easy difficulty settings that are pretty damn easy, even if you're a relative neophyte to third-person shooters. So we have to wonder... is the difficulty in Dead Space 3 going to be amped up to encourage more players to dip into microtransaction weapons? (That might not be a bad thing for hardcore players, of course.) If not, then where's the supposed audience for microtransaction weapons that make an already easy task fractionally less difficult?

We'll just have to wait and see next week.


Will this be a satisfying conclusion to Isaac Clarke's story?

Visceral hasn't indicated that Dead Space 3 is to be the conclusion to a trilogy, and there's no particular reason why they should draw the story of their universe to a close before they feel like they're ready to do so (or, in other words, we stop buying them). At the same time, there's a lot of potential for heavily narrative-driven series to linger too long, and it'd be a shame if we're still watching Isaac Clarke being improbably dragged into a one-man-against-an-entire-space-station-of-monsters situation in Dead Space 6. (Although maybe its release date coming just a couple of weeks before the sixth Die Hard movie is some sort of sign.)


Remember: horror franchises often rely on the continuity of their antagonists, rather than their protagonists. Witness the disposable heroes of Friday the 13th or Nightmare on Elm Street movies, or the revolving cast of the Resident Evil games. Ending Isaac's journey at the conclusion of Dead Space 3 might not be a popular choice among the series' fans, but it still might be the right one. And with the establishment of John Carver as a playable character, it seems like Visceral might already be grooming Clarke's successor in the unending war on necromorphism.

Far be it for us to dictate the terms of a story, but it feels like it's time for Isaac to find some well-deserved peace after the trauma and mental anguish that he's suffered in the first two games. The world-building that Visceral has done has set a solid foundation for other adventures in the Dead Space universe, and while Isaac is a character that's easy to root for, the series has smartly been marketed around the visual of the RIG suit rather than his face. It'd be easy enough to slip someone else into a RIG in Dead Space 4 after Isaac bites it through some tragic act of noble self-sacrifice. Let's hope he gets the ending he deserves.


Will "more action" mean de-emphasizing horror survival elements?

The Dead Space team seems to be ambivalent about the controls in their first two games, and have announced that Isaac and Carver in Dead Space 3 will be more mobile and fluid while traversing the environment. The heavy-duty RIG suits have always seemed an appropriate excuse for Isaac's sometimes sluggish movement, but apparently he's been taking tumbling classes: he and his teammate will both now be able to roll along the floor to escape enemy attacks, as well as utilize context-sensitive cover to more carefully take on the Necromorph hordes.



Predictably enough, cries of "What is this, Dead Gears: War In Space?" echoed wide and far on the internet, and such a reaction is understandable. One of reasons we've empathized with Isaac in these games is because he's a simple engineer who's swept up into horrible situations (not unlike Gordon Freeman), not a steroid-infused space marine who mocks Necromorphs for their pitiful maximum bench presses before ripping them apart with his bare hands. It's fine and good for Visceral to want to introduce some new maneuvers, but pushing Isaac too far towards becoming an action hero will make it more difficult to identify with his plight, not easier.

EA and Visceral have downplayed the importance of the new action emphasis, with EA President Frank Gibeau saying, "we tried to open up the accessibility of the IP a little bit by adding a little bit more action, but not undermining the horror." In the end, the ways in which enemies move and attack you is probably more important to establishing the sensibility of Dead Space's combat, but we're still concerned that Isaac's new moves might make the combat more intense than creepy. We have enough intense action shooters to play; creepy horror games are a lot more rare.