These days, remakes and remasters are not a new concept for the video game industry, or the wider entertainment industry. Companies love to tweak and iterate on old concepts and repackage the games and movies we liked in the past in an attempt to bring these products in line with modern sensibilities and in the process, expose these great artistic works to even more people than was previously possible (and with that, rake in more money than ever before). Remakes and remasters for video games can often garner a mixed reception from players because the quality often varies significantly. Is this a low-effort cash grab banking on nostalgia, are the developers straying too far from the original creator’s vision, and is this remake or remaster even necessary are many questions that concern players when a beloved classic is being brought back. All of these questions have been asked of the recently released remake of Dead Space, but I can gladly share that you can cast these worries aside, because not only is the game faithful to the original 2008 release, but it’s also been expanded in all the best ways it could have been.
The original Dead Space was developed by EA Redwood Shores (later renamed Visceral Games) and published by EA and saw release in 2008 on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. Dead Space is a third-person survival horror game that was heavily inspired by the revolutionary gameplay pioneered in Capcom’s Resident Evil 4, but with a fascinatingly well-realized sci-fi setting. You take control of Isaac Clarke, an engineer part of a small crew embarking on a rescue mission to the USG Ishimura, a mining ship that has gone dark. Isaac has a personal investment in this mission as his romantic partner Nicole is a medical officer aboard the ship. The crew discovers the ship has been overrun by nightmarish creatures designated as “Necromorphs”, members of the Ishimura’s crew that have been horribly mutated and lost their minds. Isaac’s mission is to find Nicole, fix the Ishimura, and try to get out alive.
The remake follows this story premise fairly closely, but introduces a lot more nuance in its delivery than was present in the 2008 original. Characters are a lot more subtle and behave a bit more naturally when compared to the original where the members of the crew were pretty much at each other’s throats in the first minute. The remake introduces a handful of new characters that pop up throughout the story, which is a welcome change that makes the Ishimura feel less like its Isaac vs. 1000 necromorphs and more like a ship that is in the process of complete collapse. These new characters also shake up how some of the scenarios from the original play out which as a returning player are fun to experience and see how their role ends up folding back into the story. Overall the story tugs on different threads and explores new ground in interesting ways while not straying too far off the path of the original narrative.
One major deviation from the original that pertains to this is the fact that remake developer Motive Studio gave Isaac a voice. In the 2008 original, Isaac was primarily a silent protagonist, occasionally offering a gesture or various grunts as he stomped his alien opponents into paste serving as his only real moments of character. This time around, Isaac actually speaks to the characters around him offering his thoughts and reactions as events unfold. Later entries in the Dead Space series also featured a voiced Isaac Clarke performed by Gunner Wright, who is back to reprise his role as Isaac once again. The choice to give Isaac a voice for the remake was a great one because while silent protagonists were more common when the original game released, it always felt a bit out of place in the original, especially during some of the big reveals in the story where you as the player felt like Isaac should have said something, but doesn’t. Giving Isaac a voice here not only removes many of these awkward situations that come about during the story, but it allows the story to explore the new narrative branches more naturally, such as there being a sense that Isaac and Nicole weren’t on the best of terms the last time they spoke. It’s a change that paints a more complex and emotionally rich story that wasn’t able to be told the first time around, while also never feeling radical enough that they drastically change the original intention of the story.
One worry prior to launch was that by giving Isaac a voice, the developers may fall into a familiar trap of many modern video games of going overboard and having him constantly chatting and remarking on things. Thankfully, Isaac only talks in areas where it makes logical sense and the fact that he is voiced by Gunner Wright makes it interesting for returning fan’s hearing his voice commenting on and experiencing the events that we as fans are already familiar with. It’s a sensation similar to watching a movie you have already seen with a friend to see how they react to certain moments or scenes. All in all, the story is satisfying enough for player’s that aren’t familiar with the series looking for an interesting sci-fi tale that delves into many different aspects of horror from the physical to the psychological, and it changes enough for returning players to feel like they aren’t just playing the original version all over again.
Similar to the story, the gameplay in the Dead Space remake stays close to the original while deviating in ways that improve the overall feel and fun. I mentioned above that the game is a third-person survival horror game inspired by Resident Evil 4, a game that pioneered the over-the-shoulder camera perspective that many third-person games still use to this day, light environmental puzzle solving, and a hyper-accurate aiming system that allows you to pinpoint specific body parts of incoming enemies. All of these systems you will find some element of in both the original and the remake of Dead Space, while usually tweaked in various ways that differentiate it from its influences.
Combat encounters in Dead Space are hectic clashes where players must balance positioning and precise aiming with hordes of incoming monsters usually in confined spaces. Isaac and the player have a number of tools at their disposal in order to paint the rooms of the Ishimura red with necromorph blood. Fitting of his status as an engineer, many of the weapons in Isaac’s inventory are repurposed and weaponized versions of mining equipment. A famous example of which being the iconic Plasma Cutter, a pistol-like side arm that has a reticle of three laser dots in a line that can be rotated horizontally or vertically for precise shooting. Gravity-assisted saws, high-pressure releasing cannons, a flamethrower and more flesh out the unique arsenal of weaponry that all feel satisfyingly brutal to use as you cut your way through an army of necromorphs. Isaac also has a couple other tricks up his sleeve like a stomp move that can damage enemies close to the ground and a telekinesis module that allows him to throw objects from the environment at incoming threats or even rip the sword-like arms off a necromorph and use them to impale enemies to walls. There’s also a stasis module that allows Isaac to freeze enemies and objects in the environment in place for a short time, useful for managing large crowds.
Unlike a traditional zombie, necromorphs in Dead Space need to have their limbs removed in order to halt their relentless assault. Enemies move fast and usually appear in numbers that can quickly overwhelm or surround Isaac. Keeping a cool head and steady aim is key to overcoming most of the combat encounters in the game. Weapons usually have their advantages and disadvantages like the Plasma Rifle being able to quickly fire a lot of shots but dealing relatively low damage, or the devastating Contact Laser having a reload animation that takes a long time to complete. Weapons have skill trees that can be leveled up by using power nodes that are discovered throughout the game as well as purchased in the in-game shop to improve their stats and even add new abilities such as the Plasma Cutter gaining the ability to shoot incendiary rounds. Managing your weapons, using the environment to your benefit, and paying attention to Isaac’s positioning are all factors you need to juggle during combat. Some combat arenas you will come across are in zero gravity zones which completely change the flow of battle where your positioning isn’t as restricted anymore, but your aiming might need some extra adjusting. There are a bunch of different types of scary necromorphs that require different strategies to take on which throws entirely new wrenches into encounters that keep things feeling fresh even into the later hours of the game. It’s a combat system that isn’t overly complicated but has enough depth to remain fun and interesting even after several hours.
As I’ve mentioned a few times above, the remake sticks close to this general system while changing small aspects of it mostly for the better but occasionally for the worse. In the remake, new weapons are discovered throughout the environment and are able to be used immediately whereas in the original you would find a plan for the weapon and would need to purchase it at the shop before being able to use it. This change makes the weapons feel like an interesting discovery and reward while also allowing you to try them out and see if they mesh well with your preferred playstyle, without forking over any cash for the privilege. Going off of that, power nodes are now solely used for weapon upgrades. In the original, power nodes had a double purpose, gear upgrades, and opening locked rooms that contained helpful resources. In the remake, these locked rooms now have new environmental puzzles designed around accessing them which makes the level design and exploration a bit more interesting while also enabling the weapon upgrade system to have a bit more focus.
On the topic of exploration, the USG Ishimura is fully explorable without loading screens in the remake. In the original, each chapter of the story is broken up with its own dedicated levels that were explored on their own and were connected to one another via the ship’s tram system. In the remake, areas now have connecting hallways and rooms that allow you to explore from one end of the ship to the other on foot. The tram system still exists, and tram stops can be activated as pseudo-fast travel locations, but even the tram operates in real-time, with the player still retaining control during the ride from stop to stop. There are also new side quests that you will come across that were not present in the original game. These side quests often lead to small new areas that weren’t part of the original game or require you to fully explore areas in order to find required items. These new side quests offer some additional background lore that relates to the overall plot of the game, as well as some worthwhile rewards for completing them so whether you are a new or returning player, you should definitely seek out and complete these new side quests.
As a result of some subtle rebalancing, enemies in the remake have a bit more health than in the original, which ends up making the enemies feel a bit more spongy than in the original, at least early on in the game. Damage sponge necromorphs were a problem in other Dead Space games, and until you get some worthwhile upgrades to your weapons, you will feel it present in the remake as well. Perhaps due to the improvements to animations or the change of the underlying game engine, the controls feel a tiny bit floatier than the original. They don’t feel bad by any stretch and it’s really a small nitpick, but the original game felt a bit snappier when interacting with objects or while aiming during combat. And possibly an even smaller nitpick and personal gripe is the stomp. The original Dead Space stomp is pretty legendary as far as game mechanics go, and while the stomp is good in the remake, it loses a lot of the impact and feeling that the original had. The combination of sound design, controller vibration, and camera shake made the original stomp feel heavy and devastating, while the remake’s stomp just feels weaker due to the more restrained use of the elements listed above. However, these are mainly gripes that come from my perspective as a returning player and fan of the original. Someone playing for the first time might not even recognize these aspects as issues. They are ultimately very small nitpicks that stood out to me having played the original in preparation for playing the remake.
Puzzles are the other areas of the gameplay that have received significant overhauls over the original release. The original had a number of environmental puzzles that usually involved Isaac using his telekinesis abilities to move large objects or leaping from wall to floor in zero-gravity areas. In the remake, puzzles have been reworked to add a bit more variety in how they are solved. For instance, a puzzle in the original involved replacing broken communications dishes with working ones, and was solved simply by swapping the broken dishes out with the working ones floating around the room. In the remake however, the room is laid out differently, and rather than just swapping out all the broken dishes, there is an added layer of having to connect the working dishes in a specific orientation in order to route power to all of them. Zero gravity is also handled differently in the remake. Rather than Isaac sticking to a surface and jumping point to point in the original game, the remake has a fully free-flowing 360-degree zero gravity system similar to what was implemented in Dead Space 2 and 3. The original zero gravity system always felt a bit archaic. The remake makes these zero gravity environments feel more natural and modern to navigate, while also subtly changing the approaches used for solving puzzles that were a bit more rigid in the original. And fans of the original who played on console that dread the brutal asteroid defense minigame can rejoice knowing that that section has been entirely reworked and is now much more fun to actually complete.
I have to take a paragraph to talk about the visuals in Dead Space. This remake is one of the best-looking games on the market today. While the original game had a pretty bland-looking color palette, the actual visuals and art direction still hold up in 2023. However, the remake completely overhauls these aspects to an astonishing degree. The lighting is perhaps the most striking aspect. Dark rooms are extremely dark, which heightens the fear that comes with your flashlight being your only source of comfort. There’s creative use of fog effects that cast these spectacular atmospheric god rays that look almost painterly in some instances. The lighting and shadows really do a lot of heavy lifting in establishing a spooky vibe to all areas of the Ishimura. The game does use splashes of color in smart ways from different temperature lights to subtle changes in areas of the ship like the medical ward using greens and whites on the walls to make it feel more like a hospital. The amount of details in the environments themselves is incredible, from the various bits of junk and debris to the different surfaces and materials on the walls and ceilings. Visually speaking, there is very little to criticize.
Similarly, the music and sound design are worthy of high praise. The Ishimura groans and creaks in a way that just fills you with dread. The cold voice of the ship’s PA system echoes throughout the halls and the sounds of movement scratching inside the metal walls will send shivers down your spine. The weapons sound fantastic in use as do the grotesque sounds of the necromorphs being eviscerated. The soundscape is heavy and industrial while never losing the high-tech sci-fi elements. The music also does a great job of subtly coming in and out to set the tone of whatever area you are exploring, as well as raising the intensity during fights. Like the other aspects discussed above, the music and sound design of the remake feel pretty close to the original while expanding on just enough to make them feel even more well-realized than they did the first time around.
Performance-wise, Dead Space is extremely well made. I played the PlayStation 5 version in performance mode and had a remarkably stable framerate for the entirety of my 13 hours of playtime. The game also has a resolution mode you can select that, at least to an average player, has a pretty minimal effect on the overall visuals but has a noticeable drop in framerate. Performance mode is definitely the recommended way to play if you want the smoothest experience. The game has a number of accessibility options at your disposal to tailor the experience how you like including color blind assist, content controls, multiple control schemes, and more. There was the occasional physics bug with the enemy ragdolls or an unintentional flash with the visuals, but besides that, Dead Space runs well and plays well.
Overall, the Dead Space remake is a fantastic remake of an already fantastic survival horror game. The original experience is fully respected and kept intact, while Motive Studio expanded upon it in interesting and meaningful ways that rarely detract from the original game. From the presentation to the gameplay, it’s as beautiful to look at as it is fun to play. Whether you are jumping in for the first time or are a returning fan, there is something for you to like in Dead Space, as long as you can stomach the usual trappings of the horror genre.
