By John Walker on January 13th, 2011 at 10:36 am.
How would you, Simon Hawthorne*, like to see the official Dead Space 2 launch trailer? Well, today is your day in which you can do a thing that you are interested in doing! It’s below. It’s rated M for My Goodness, What A Lot Of Scary.
Releasing a “launch trailer” two weeks before a game comes out always seems a little weird to me – the game is out Jan 25th. But hey ho. It’s pleasantly noisy.
*Wow, wouldn’t it be weird if your name were Simon Hawthorne?
13/01/2011 at 10:42 Rich says:
Frankly, I’m concerned for the man’s mental health.
Perhaps some yoga, or meditation, would help?
13/01/2011 at 10:44 Longrat says:
Much as I am hoping this game will succeed, I am kind of disappointed by the voicing of isaac. I really liked the fact that most of the game’s plot was played out while you’re in character, rather than through cinematic cutscenes.
And then there’s the whole immersion thing.
13/01/2011 at 10:48 Dominic White says:
I don’t know about you, but I certainly feel more immersed playing a completely mute character, even when everyone and their dog is talking to me and acting like I’m giving coherent responses!
There’s a good range of living people to talk to this time, so having Isaac talk is the only way to go
13/01/2011 at 10:52 Longrat says:
True, it makes sense to have the main character speak if there’s people actually talking to you rather than giving you orders and/or spouting general bullshit in your direction. But once you add too much talking and interaction with NPCs in a game, it becomes significantly less scary, in most cases. But I’m fairly sure that Visceral chose to emphasize the “action” part of the “Action/Horror” rather than the “Horror”, because, in all fairness, most people prefer shooting down alien scum than being scared helpless.
13/01/2011 at 10:55 Alexander Norris says:
Here’s a better solution: have Isaac actually be mute. As in, have a recognised disability.
That would have actually been interesting.
13/01/2011 at 11:03 Longrat says:
And then have whatever he wants to say pop up above his head through the in game UI technology.
Now that would’ve made for a strange one
13/01/2011 at 11:07 MrMud says:
“But I’m fairly sure that Visceral chose to emphasize the “action” part of the “Action/Horror” rather than the “Horror”, because, in all fairness, most people prefer shooting down alien scum than being scared helpless.”
Case in point: I finished Dead Space (not scary) but I havent even started Amnesia (potentially scary)
13/01/2011 at 12:04 Menthol says:
Case in point: I finished Dead Space (not scary) but I havent even started Amnesia (potentially scary)
Yet for me, I found Dead Space fairly scary, but Amnesia not at all. I ended up just running around the monsters in Amnesia, and if I died I died; for some reason not having the ability to fight them was immersion breaking for me and I never got into it, even playing alone in the dark.
13/01/2011 at 13:13 Jsnuk says:
The scare in Dead Space wore off about 5 minutes in, however this wasn’t a problem as I allways saw it like aliens, or a zombie movie, considered horror but more or a thriller or a drama really. Also, I don’t like being scared, I like creepy ideas and feelings of oppression and lonlieness though; jumpy crap pissed me off.
Also, I thought Dead Space was underated and overlooked when it came out.
13/01/2011 at 16:32 jonfitt says:
I’m just now playing the first one and it’s plenty ‘scary’ for me. Scary in the way of making me jump every time. For some reason knowing that something is going to jump out of a wall any moment doesn’t make me jump any less when it does. Once the monster is out of the closet I deal with it like a seasoned alien killer, but it’s the waiting that’s the worst part.
Doom3 got me the same way. It’s not intelligent or particularly difficult to do I think: dark corridors, spooky music and voices, BOO! MONSTER! I’m just one of the people that works on.
Also, every now and then the cat jumps up on the back of my chair and scares the bejeesus out of me.
I’m looking forward to talky Isaac, hopefully the plot will be able to be a little deeper when there’s actual dialogue and not just monologues!
13/01/2011 at 20:53 Shih Tzu says:
I’m probably alone in this, but I play the Half-Life series thinking of Gordon Freeman as someone who’s actually mute in-character. Like, he’s autistic or has some other severe social disability, so he doesn’t talk to anyone or interact in ways that are usually socially acceptable, but he’s also one of the most brilliant physicists of his generation, and also apparently great with guns, so everyone tolerates him jumping on tables punching the wall while they’re over there having important expository conversations.
So far, it’s worked out perfectly!
14/01/2011 at 00:30 Miles of the Machination says:
As much as I find the process of the player filling the void of the character’s silence quite interesting, I’m of the opinion that the game really just doesn’t accommodate for that kind of characterisation. Dead Space 2 is a big space action-romp these days, not a staggering feat of interactive narrative. I find this to be a somewhat noticeable contrast to the first one in which the plot wound its way toward the exposition pertaining to obvious spoilers. The good thing about this was that the character wasn’t mouthing off every time something inexplicable happened, dissuading the player from formulating their own opinions.
Honestly, it’s a case of “let’s wait and see”.
13/01/2011 at 11:13 KillahMate says:
“You’re a dangerous secret… I’m not running anymore, I know what I have to do… If we stick together… Just a liability… I know you’re confused right now, but you gotta trust me… Go go go!”
Oh for heaven’s sake. It’s the launch trailer! Can’t they come up with some original lines?
13/01/2011 at 11:52 Nova says:
Well he is wrestling with a syringe that’s quite original.
13/01/2011 at 16:07 The Great Wayne says:
Looking at the guy’s face and eyes, I’d have bet he’d have been wrestling with a joint instead, but go figures.
13/01/2011 at 11:19 adonf says:
I didn’t watch it, just listened to the soundtrack. So it’s a game about a catholic priest and a confused boy scout, right ?
14/01/2011 at 01:56 Miles of the Machination says:
Engaged into a century-long guitar battle on Mars with Mogwai. If Mogwai decide to show up again after the teaser trailer.
13/01/2011 at 11:24 Mechorpheus says:
Good giddy aunts I’m excited about this game. That trailer was fairly meh, but I loved the hell out of the original Dead Space, so have this one pre-ordered already. Here’s hoping that we get an official RPS WiT on it, and it doesn’t get lashed too harshly!
13/01/2011 at 11:43 Dominic White says:
The demo up on consoles at the moment (yes, yes, platform traitor and all that) is a lot of fun. It definitely has a little more action feel to it, but it all works out pretty well. The wall-hopping zero-G stuff has been replaced by actually flying around, but there’s still the usual range of broken things to fix, horrible monsters (now somewhat more varied) to stomp and so on.
There’s some nice details, like an enemy type that vomits on you. Normally this would do damage, but when you fight them in a cryogenics facility, they spew cryo-goop on you, covering you with half-frozen mush and slowing you down.
The new gun featured in the demo was fun, too. Effectively a bloody great speargun that skewers enemies to walls. The altfire on it electrically charges the last spike you fired, letting you either finish off your target, or hurt adjacent enemies with the storm.
13/01/2011 at 11:45 SimonHawthorne says:
Wow, weird…
13/01/2011 at 11:51 Fatbubba says:
Seems another classic case of weird music choice by the marketing department of EA. I love this song from Smashing Pumpkins, just like I loved the song from Marilyn Manson for the Dragon Age, but they just don’t fit the trailers…they really don’t.
Not to mention that horrible 30 Seconds to Mars crap they used for a Dragon Age II trailer. I guess they’re trying to appeal to the masses with popular music, but it kind of has the opposite effect on me.
13/01/2011 at 12:07 markside says:
I love grey!
13/01/2011 at 16:43 Rich says:
If you think grey is good, wait until you see brown!
14/01/2011 at 00:00 outoffeelinsobad says:
I genuinely laughed aloud.
13/01/2011 at 12:07 Ravenger says:
A demo would be nice – I’d like to see if they’ve fixed the control issues that plagued the original game before I buy it. With no demo I guess I won’t be pre-ordering this, instead I’ll wait for the user reviews and pick it up when it’s discounted.
13/01/2011 at 13:55 thebigJ_A says:
Demo on consoles. Just don’t mention you played it here. People might ridicule you.
13/01/2011 at 14:55 Ravenger says:
A console demo won’t show me if they’ve fixed the PC control issues. I’ve no doubt the game itself will be good. It’s the quality of the PC conversion that concerns me. From a gamplay, graphics quality and sound point of view the first game was an excellent conversion. Its controls implementation was terrible with unbindable keys, and a mouse aiming system that was broken unless you forced v-sync in your graphic card control panel.
13/01/2011 at 12:43 Navagon says:
It’s supposed to be playable on PC this time around too.
13/01/2011 at 13:06 Dominic White says:
Hurrr, how about we parrot wildly innacurate memes about how Dead Space was unplayable on the PC some more? I’m sure that’ll make us look intelligent and witty!
No. Just no. There was one bug – the Vsync in-game was borked – which was fixable using a 30-second workaround (turn it off ingame, force it on in video card settings), and aside from that it was better than any other version.
13/01/2011 at 13:17 FCA says:
And disconnect all non-xbox 360 gamepads/joysticks/steering wheels etc from your computer, or edit some config file in the electrontic arts directory (that’s not a typo!) to get the game to ignore the controller (I couldn’t stop spinning around otherwise).
That’s just plain lazy porting.
13/01/2011 at 13:17 Subject 706 says:
Agreed. Dead Space was very playable on PC, and a lot of fun too. Looking forward to the sequel.
13/01/2011 at 13:57 Navagon says:
The controls were shit, v-sync or no. I had to use a hacked version of the controls to make it at all playable. It’s the only game I’ve ever had where I’ve had to do that. Even then it was very inaccurate and generally awkward.
When 15 year old games have vastly superior controls I think it’s something that deserves criticism.
13/01/2011 at 15:00 Ravenger says:
it was the un-bindable keys that got me. As a lefty I use the arrow keys and you couldn’t re-bind them from the menu controls, until someone worked out a way of hacking the binary control config file. Far too much messing around needed to get the controls playable:
1. Disable v-sync in game
2. Enable v-sync in your graphic card control panel.
3. Edit the game config file to up the mouse sensitivity beyond what was possible in the in-game sliders
4. Hack the control config file so you can use some of the non-rebindable keys.
Even once you’d done that it still wasn’t 100% right.
Good game, lousy PC controls.
14/01/2011 at 00:03 Navagon says:
@ Ravenger
Exactly the same story here. I think it’s probably us lefties that had the biggest beef with the game. It’s a shame though as, dodgy port aside, it was a pretty good game.
14/01/2011 at 11:40 impar says:
Dead Space was unplayable on PC.
According to Steam, managed to spend 2 hours in the game battling the controls and camera.
There is absolutely no excuse to have a game on PC with locked keys, jumpy mouse and weird camera angles.
And why should I suffer with image tearing in a game?! Vsync is enabled on all games I play.
13/01/2011 at 13:15 Jsnuk says:
in the first game I only ever used the first pistol thing you get, wonder if any other weapons will tempt me this time around.
13/01/2011 at 20:08 Dougal McFrugal says:
I did the same, the other weapons just werent as much fun – frantically backpedalling trying to reload having already figured out you that if you didnt miss ONCE you might just survive this room.
Cracking stuff
13/01/2011 at 13:28 Skaaltel 79 says:
I always wondered why only “our hero” was able to be sane when everybody else in the entire dead space story goes stark raving mad.
And I quite like the idea of the main character narrating. I never really personally identified with a hunched over slow walking space miner in a tron suit. For some reason.
13/01/2011 at 13:40 Dominic White says:
“I always wondered why only “our hero” was able to be sane when everybody else in the entire dead space story goes stark raving mad.”
He isn’t sane, though. Even in the demo, he has a few freakout moments, hallucinating all over the place.
13/01/2011 at 16:11 The Great Wayne says:
If it’s the only immersion-breaking or illogical stuff that stroke you in DS, I’d advise you play it again by paying more attention. Plus, effectively, he’s not *that*sane.
That said, he’s super-plummer in space, so it’s ok if he does stuff other people can’t.
13/01/2011 at 14:00 Caiman says:
Wow, what a terrible trailer. And what a change from the atmospheric, subdued trailers of the first game. So here I am, as a huge fan of the first game, wondering if this is just PR fucking up again, or whether this reflects a “no thanks” change in direction in the sequel. Dominic’s reaction to the demo is more encouraging, but I’m going to have to wait a while and see how this pans out.
EA did the same thing with Dragon Age as well. I was pretty excited for the game until the PR dept. got their hands on it. I was sufficiently unsure that I missed that initial opportunity to buy it new. I’m still waiting for the right sale price.
13/01/2011 at 14:20 Shazbut says:
This looks and sounds like Dawson’s Creek in space. All that flesh, blood, and horrific abominations of nature and it still seems safe, familiar, angsty, and inoffensive.
13/01/2011 at 16:12 The Great Wayne says:
Actually, it is, or a simple engineer wouldn’t have survived the first episode.
13/01/2011 at 20:12 Chiller says:
Did that guy actually say “terrible terrible danger”?
Oh, boy.
13/01/2011 at 22:44 Deccan says:
1) That was a terrible choice of music for a Dead Space trailer.
2) I’m pretty sure I heard Nathan Fillion’s voice in there, so at least one thing about this game is guaranteed shiny.
3) The idea posited above of Isaac actually being mute (whether naturally or as a result of his experiences in Dead Space) is a great one.
14/01/2011 at 00:04 outoffeelinsobad says:
Where’d you hear the captain? I got all excited and re-watched, and he isn’t there, Deccan. He isn’t there.
14/01/2011 at 00:37 Cradok says:
“Besides, we’ve got a better chance if we stick together.” sounds like it could be him, but I’m pretty sure it’s not.
14/01/2011 at 05:22 Deccan says:
IMDB seems to confirm his non-presence. Still, multiple listens of that line do not leave me able to definitively say “it’s not him”. Dammit Fillion, get out of my brainnnnn!
14/01/2011 at 01:48 Muzman says:
Wow; Smashing Pumpkins, Hell is other people,. It’s teen angst In Spaaaaace
It’s all symbolic you see; Isaac’s an outsider, an ordinary schlub who finally finds his voice. But he’s beset on all sides by horrid conformists (the mutant monster things) and secret authoritarian conspiracies. He will overcome these things and achieve true liberty (zero G sequences).
It’s basically a gigantic metaphor for high school, man. Jocks and joiners on one side, the faculty on the other. One true geek rebel in the middle. This is that edgy new take on the universal themes of Pump Up the Volume we’ve all been waiting for.
The mutants jump out of lockers on occasion too, right? Q.E.D
14/01/2011 at 04:12 DOLBYdigital says:
I also hope the PC controls are better, sure they weren’t ‘horrible’ but they were far from good. It didn’t break the game but you could just tell it was a crappy port. I tried the demo for 2 to see how it plays and its very similar but still fun. The enemies are more varied which is great and the weapons were sweet, though I still like the plasma cutter the best. The multiplayer could be good or could be a mess, either way its good to see more asymmetrical teams in MP.
Finally I agree with others that I would really like a game where the main character was mute and/or had some other disabilities. Very under used concept but I do recall some games using that idea…
15/01/2011 at 06:13 eclipse mattaru says:
From the last two articles I read, one called FEAR 3 “spooky” and the other called Dead Space 2 “scary”. So, when did IGN take over RPS? Where you planning on telling us about it at some point or what?