There are few sagas that last in the memory of fans even being extinct.Specifically within the genus Survival Horror, there was one that left its particular mark: Dead Space.A franchise created in 2008 by Glen Schofield and Michael Condrey, which includes a trilogy (spin-offs apart) that stopped in 2013 with its last installment.A fleeting saga that remained practically at the top until it causes its own catastrophe.What was your mistake?Will the saga return?Today in Meristation we review this huge saga.

Aboard the USG Ishimura

“We enter the USG Ishimura.There is no trace of survivors.They seem to have devastated everything.The causes of what happened are unknown. "

The space, that great stranger.It is impossible to say exactly when humanity first dreamed of traveling to space.Interior space.Outer space.New worlds.Many films like Alien: The eighth passenger (1979), Final Horizon (1997) or books of the Asimov Calaña have approached us and warned us at the same time.It can be as exciting as fearsome.We can say that Dead Space is born under that concept.A title developed by EA Redwood Shores that arrived for PS3, Xbox 360 and PC in 2008. A Survival Horror set in the space that would mean the beginning of a saga and that would be crowned as a classic of space terror.

Initially Dead Space was designed to be a horror title although conceptually it had nothing to do with what we saw in its final version.The project was designed to be the direct sequel to System Shock 2, giving rise to its third installment.While the developer team was in the title definition phase, a new proposal for Capcom arrived to destabilize its plans: Resident Evil 4 (2005).Resident Evil 4 meant not only a revolution in the horror genre, but also that of action.Focusing on these two scenarios the study saw the possibilities that Resident Evil 4 could give to its new installment.They started with a new IP, and of course, that IP would be Dead Space.

In Dead Space we located in 2508. Planet Earth has exhausted all its energy and mineral resources forcing humanity to avoid its own extinction with the intergalactic mining business. One of the numerous mining ships aimed at collection of resources known as USG Ishimura loses its signal during one of its excavations, making a technical crew go to repair its damage. Here is our protagonist, Isaac Clarke. He is a systems engineer who maintains a romantic relationship with one of the Ishimura crew, the medical officer Nicole Brennan. This is only his beginning of his trip to participate in the operation voluntarily to find it. As soon as the prologue starts, the ship is unused and we soon realize that we are not alone. We discovered that the ship has been invaded by hostile species of unknown origin, and that the corporation behind these excavations could be more than involved. As in the U.S.C.S.S Nostromo, Alien's spacecraft: the eighth passenger (1979), the story in Dead Space develops inside the USG Ishimura spacecraft. An oppressive and claustrophobic scenario that also raises an interesting concept: the consequences and corporate interests of planetary overexploitation. In the title, we must find out what happened in the ship, survive the necromorphs and find an escape. In Dead Space we experience terror in every way and at the same time raise us as insignificant and vulnerable we are before the immensity of space.

Something that undoubtedly made Dead Space great was his game experience. A title that started from a film concept that wanted to make us feel protagonists from the beginning. An example of this was how it integrated some concepts linked to the gameplay naturally in the game. Isaac's life bar was incorporated into his rig uniform, located on his back. Through the protagonist's spine, the health meter is shown by breaking all traditional visualization conventions. One of the elements that also played with this idea was the use of a holographic interface, since it showed all the communications and notes that we collected in the game in real time without interrupting the game. Everything seemed to be cinematographically thought. An indicative that Dead Space was nothing more and nothing less than a proposal that wanted to approach his scenarios, his terror. And it was no wonder. The Dead Space developer studio had a lot of experience creating titles based on films such as: The godfather, The Simpsons the Videogame, James Bond 007: Everything Or Nothing or The Lord of the Rings: The Third Age. In that sense, Dead Space would not be less.

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The sound appearance was masterful.We are constantly surrounded by sounds.Either through ventilation ducts, among the narrow corroid corroids through oxide or by vacuum jumps.Any sound that originates outside the Isaac helmet is cushioned and barely audible, while those inside, we heard of his breathing.In Dead Space we are closer than ever of space since we practically touch it.The study knew how to create a unique experience, an immersive and cinematic sensation without equal.In the same way they did its stages.Ishimura becomes a labyrinthine space, a nightmare of multiple layers of corridors, recesses and interconnected habitable spaces built with metal walls and illuminated by stroboscopic neon lights.Meanwhile, Isaac is a vulnerable character, a simple engineer who has no tables in combat.

The title does not play the same rules that are traditionally used in a third -person shooter. We talk about dismemberment. Dismemberment in Dead Space becomes essential and essential during combat to end necromorphs. These beings are not simply satisfied with receiving a simple headshot, but we will have to dismember them surgically, precise and patient to weaken them. This plays against us due to the shortage of ammunition that we usually find, causing us to measure our shots more than ever. With a chamber perspective on the shoulder, it was possible to break the classicism of terror by contributing a sensation that fit fully into the game experience. This fact would be direct influence of Resident Evil 4. Unlike Resident Evil 4, Dead Space improved some aspects such as the possibility of moving to point and some other additional improvements to the zombie classic. The creative director Ben Wanat for Gamereactor "is quite obvious when you play Dead Space, look at him and say, 'Yes, it is almost as if they had decided to make Resident Evil 4 in space', which is exactly what we were doing." The game sold 1.4 million copies, which, since it was a new IP, was not a bad figure, although for EA, the publisher was not enough. However, he assured a new title to the franchise: Dead Space 2.

Dead Space 2: A new Isaac

In Dead Space 2 there were important changes in the developer study. The EA Redwood Shores company was called Visceral Games and the original director of the first installment was replaced by Wright Bagwell. His intention was to make a much more round game in every way. The reality was that I also had the pressure of EA to make a game more focused on shots and action to reach a broader audience. In this case, wanting to be Resident Evil 4 was no longer enough, Dead Space had created something new, had his own place and needed to modernize in this second installment. While there is always fear that second parts were never good, in Dead Space 2, it was not so. The title improved, expanded the mechanics of the former, although he added more action, enemies and gave more visibility to his main character. Isaac went from being a simple spectator who received orders to become a key piece of the narrative.

Year 2511. Dead Space 2 is located three years after the events of the first installment, and this time we face a new outbreak of necromorphs in Sprawl, a space station on the largest moon in Saturn. We continue in charge of Isaac Clarke, who wakes up at the space station without remembering anything that happened in Ishimura. His mind has been contaminated with some hallucinations of his beloved Nicole Brennan who chose to take his own life rather than being killed by the necromorphs that infested the ishimura. This is because while he was there, Isaac exposed himself to the influence of the red effigy that unleashed terror in the mining ship being this the reason why he was held at the space station. There they experienced with him with the intention of obtaining the data that contain the necessary codes to create an effigy. So our goal will be to destroy the project that is being carried out in Sprawl. In this delivery the plot was extended and balanced all its elements to offer a more round title. Everything was better integrated. Better control, better plot, good rhythm, in addition to adding a multiplayer mode. Dead Space 2 doubled sales, reaching 4 million copies although their production costs were subsequently discovered: 60 million. At that time they were considered low numbers, although nothing slowed them to launch a next delivery. Only this time the conditions for the new title would be defined by the Publisher Electronic Arts.

Losing the north on the ice cream planet

Many things happened with the arrival of Dead Space 3 in 2013. Change of direction, new tone for the saga, to a new monetization model. The Games Visceral Developer study gave its arm to twist before the publicator's demands: EA. Electronic Arts, the giant behind FIFA and other sports series with Loot Boxes knows how nobody sells. Electronic Arts's investment in the Dead Space series grew so much that Isaac Clarke and the company needed to find a greater audience to go well. The easiest way to do so was to eliminate what gave the franchise its identity and singularity, leading it to a more generic concept. Although that was a big mistake. After a small advance in the presentation of the EA of 2012, it was confirmed that Dead Space 3 would be much more focused on action, a concept that was also applied in the horror franchise in the industry with Resident Evil 5 (2009) and Subsequently Resident Evil 6 (2011). Dead Space 3 went from being a survival horror to becoming a space call. President of EA Frank Gibeau for Kotaku: "We wanted to focus on action without taking importance to terror."

Isaac Clarke, far from living a quiet and calm life, is again involved in this installment traveling to the ice cream planet Tau Volantis.Humanity has changed since the experiments with the effigies became public, which further radicalized the activity of the Church of Uniology.Isaac Clarke, completely paranoid and traumatized by past events, is visited by Captain Robert Norton in the Lunar neighborhood, as part of the last battalion of the Earth Government.This is acting against a uniologist terrorist group nicknamed as "the circle."They present us again the concept of the effigies, but from a religious perspective.

A continuous plot that was somewhat lazy with respect to the previous ones. Isaac went from being vulnerable to becoming an invincible tank whose weapons had no rival. There was no challenge, combat strategy or panic sensation. We go from the narrow halls to an icy scenario of the Lost Planet in which we face necromorphs, but also with humans. He added a cooperative mode, although what caused more controversy was its use of micropagues. The weapons creation system added microtransactions which broke the experience. Some mechanics and key concepts of the game were still intact as a house brand, but others were lost between a hybrid of genres and scenarios that quickly perished in oblivion. Dead Space 3 was the closure for the central trilogy of the effigies, although he did not do it in the expected way. The problem was that no attention was not paid to the game, but rather in the benefits it could produce. Leaving with it the community of his and everything he carefully built in previous deliveries. With sales results below those expected, the Games visceral developer study would end up definitively closing its doors in 2017.

Dead Space 4?

Shortly after Dead Space 3 many began to wonder if there would be a possible fourth installment. EA's response was clear: no, for the moment. In June 2013, the head of EA Games, Patrick Soderlund for Eurogamer: “The Dead Space franchise has not been canceled and remains an important brand for the company, the Visceral Games developers had not been asked to start working in a sequel, so they got involved in another project. ” A short time later, Visceral Games would close and with it, all hope of bringing Isaac back. Although not everything has been bad news. The director of Dead Space, Glen Schoefield, is currently directing Dead Space's greatest spiritual successor to date. The Callisto Protocol is the next third -person survival terror title that will arrive at approximately 2022. The game is being developed by Stiking Distence Studios and will have an atmosphere and plot similar to Dead Space. We want we do not miss.