“Is Dead Space dead?”, I asked Steve Papoutsis at the end of an interview about Battlefield: Hardline – the game Visceral is now making in lieu of a Dead Space 4. Here’s what Hardline’s executive producer said back to me, in what some people call ‘an answer’:
“Is Dead Space dead? Not for me it’s not. I love it, the team at Visceral loves it. Having worked on it for seven years, this was a good break for us to try something different.
“But there’s a lot of passion about that franchise, not just from me but from others in the company, so I think it’s an IP that’s important for the company. You never know where it’s going to go… I’d definitely be excited about what it would be like on this gen.”
With the poor sales of Dead Space 3, the closure of Visceral Montreal and the main Visceral Games studio working on Hardline, it seemed like the writing was on the wall for the necromorph-bustin’ series.
Fortunately, Mr Papoutsis has given us all hope once more. Well, more hope than when EA issued a rather non-committal denial that the series had been cancelled back in 2013.
Comments
23 responses to “Dead Space: Missing, But Not Dead”
Finishing 2 and starting 3 is pile of shame list….
Played 1 so many times (including this week).
The first one is still on my pile of shame. Played up to Chapter 10 when it first came out and then stopped for a while. By the time I was ready to go back I forgot how to play and realised I was at a hard section and needed to relearn it. Never ended up going back again. Started #2 a few months back, but then got into #3 co-op with @aliasalpha, had a ball and haven’t bothered going back to #2.
3 was a bit tricky without making in game purchases… got a ways in, could find components, wasn’t able to go further, wouldn’t buy in game items… already paid a lot for the game at the time.
No, you’re playing it wrong. You’re supposed to play it a little bit every day.
For reals?
No, it’s a joke in reference to Dungeon Keeper on mobile.
It sounds terrible that it dictates how much you should play per day. I haven’t gotten DS3 yet but I enjoyed 1+2 so I probably will.
I don’t really understand people who replay games. There are more quality games out there than I will ever have time to finish, I can’t waste time going back. Especially confusing is someone who’d go back to replay 1 while they were partway through 2 and hadn’t finished WHAAAAT?
It’s just the atmosphere of the first hasn’t been recreated for me yet… The Ishimura is perfect and awesome.
1 is my favorite it had the tension.
2 did a good combination of suspense and action.
3 it bored me to be honest.
I’d also suggest buying the 2 animated movies made, well worth it for story building.
What difficulty were you playing on? I lost my save halfway through (playing coop) and had to restart with the default gear and still managed to get quite a decent array of upgraded gear when playing on normal.
Ooh you know you can recycle stuff like old circuits at the bench to get components back don’t you? I know I missed that for quite a while. The side missions are also good sources of extra stuff as is making sure you stomp bodies after fights since you can’t be sure they’ve dropped stuff if they’ve just died. Also never miss a chance to send out a scavenger bot if you hear the resource noise since they give you heaps of resources including the ration seals which can be used to buy the DLC resource packs without spending real money, that way you can still get them but you have to earn them in game which feels fair.
I found Dead Space 2 too repetitive after awhile so I plan to never return to the franchise.
Definitely don’t try 3 then.
Dead Space feels like one of those IPs that would be ideal for that idea of mine where a franchise can have a new game or indeed a new style of set in the same universe without being a sequel. I’d love a dead space adventure game for example, think walking dead only with necromorphs.
They wanted to make something a bit more coop and action oriented with dead space 3 and that was fine by me but it annoyed survival horror fans and I sort of see why. If they’d made the core of that as a completely new game in the dead space universe with someone other than Isaac as the lead character it’d probably not have been viewed quite so badly as long as they also made more of a survival horror style game as well that was actually a continuation of Isaac’s story.
There’s plenty of people other than Isaac being chased by necromorphs and cultist maniacs (yes, I know its a tautology), surely there’s scope for stories about people other than him even if the story is just getting away with your skin intact rather than solving the marker problem once and for all.
I’m happy for the Isaac trilogy to be the end of it for a while, then let the thing compost for a while before re-emerging all frighteningly rotted and powerfully visceral again. Familiarity breeds contempt.
I’d too be happy for it to end for a while, except playing the Awakening DLC provides perspective on the whole chapter letter code thing and ends things on a cliffhanger, compared to the main game’s ending which had closure to that arc with just a small thread dangling (which became the Awakening DLC).
I think the whole franchise is done.
Sure make another scary space game, but the story with the necro’s and the markers is done.
Yeah? You feel like we’ve lost more than we gained with the knowing? When the mystery is gone, the fear is diminished? That’s pretty fair.
Personally, I’m with @aliasalpha in that I think there’s probably other things to be taken away. Like maybe a squad-based shooter, turn-based tactical game, puzzle-based survival/horror (whups, stop putting that combination in, and hide in a closet to avoid being eaten), or fuckit I dunno Necromorph dating sim.
yeah, exactly. I also feel it’s at risk of dragging on for too long like the assassins creed modern timeline story. I’ll admit they left plenty of story open at the end of 3, but I’m not really excited to finish the franchise anymore.
I’d play a turn based X-com rip off for sure 😉
Nec-Com? I’d play it
Yeah. I would have been happy for it to be a one off story beginning and ending in a single game. I mean it was fantastic and I felt like I wanted more, but I think I would have ultimately been more satisified with a spiritual sequel using a different setting.
I think they could get into a really nice/profitable groove pumping out a new horror story on the same engine every 18-24 months.
Dead Space deserved to die, unfortunately. It’s direction got so muddled and pulled in different directions it didn’t know what it was. – I’d suspect by a boardroom wanting to emulate whatever was perceived to be the key to success in other franchises without understanding the context.
Hmmm, passionate fan of the Dead space series but after the end of Awakening….not so sure they can revive it. Hopeful that they can in some way.
I kinda got some closure on the Dead space universe after that and even though it wasn’t butterflies and bunnies, it was an end.
In other words, EA ruins franchise’s appeal with latest entry, said entry sells like crap, and franchise’s future is now in question? Sounds like usual EA stuff to me.
Dead Space three’s idea of co op wasn’t a bad idea, the shift from survival horror to action orientated was. I still remember playing it the first time and in the first few areas I had found over 100 bullets for like three or four guns. Was like “wtf this isn’t dead space”. That first area had more ammunition then the whole two previous games combined.