Dead Space

With such an extensive upgrade system in place, it's rather a shame that the choice in weapons is rather shallow and limited. You get only a handful to pick from through the game, most of which are pretty much useless. In fact, you can actually finish the game with the first weapon you get, provided you upgrade it sufficiently.

Since the focus on action is so prominent, you're probably wondering what exactly is it that makes Dead Space a horror game. Apart from the obvious presence of reanimated corpses, there's an underlying atmospheric feel to it that's as eerie as SS2. There are audio/text logs scattered throughout the game that tell you pieces of the story from the perspective of its residents. This way of conveying the story passively has been done by many prominent games already, such as SS2 and BioShock, but it doesn't seem to get old when it's done as brilliantly as in Dead Space.

Everything from these logs to graffiti on the wall help give you a glimpse into the horrific experiences the residents had before the brown stuff hit the fan. At one point I came across a survivor who'd gone mad with fear. As I approached her, she laughed and slit her own throat. As you can see, the game has an undeniably dark side to it that sets the mood for a well-crafted horror experience. If you've got an active imagination and a keen sense of observation, this game will draw you in much more than a bucketload of cheap horror games.

Visually the game is easy on the eyes, but it isn't the best looking of the lot. It's on par with BioShock, but suffers from a number of jaggies and blurred low-resolution textures. This however, isn't too much of an obstruction since the framerate never drops and stays rocksolid from start to end. The pretty particle effects help too. The spooky background score goes a long way to help create a cocoon of terror. It picks up pace right when you enter combat, and fades at the right time, falling silent with nothing but a faint whisper echoing in the distance. Creepy indeed.

At the end of the day, Dead Space comes out as a winner in both the horror and the action department. It isn't the scariest game out there, but then again, it isn't trying to be. It's an incredibly intense shooter that'll draw you in and refuse to loosen its grip until you've devoted 12 hours of your life to finish it. I have no hesitation recommending this game to fans of horror and action alike.