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Dead Space Wants To Scare You
Kotaku recently ran a story questioning whether the survival-horror genre still exists, and how Dead Space may or may not fit into it. With reviews for the game starting to come in, Ars Technica reports that the game is, indeed, both scary and good. Gamespy wrote up a Dead Space survival guide, and Gamasutra has a lengthy interview with the game's senior producer. In the production of the game, the developers studied things like car wrecks and war scenes to increase the level of realism. They also want the game's sounds to terrify players, including appropriately timed silence. The launch trailer is also available, though it does contain spoilers.
I disagree with the idea that people aren't scared anymore. Horror is like humor, it has to be surprising to be effective. The first part of Doom 3 was scary for me because I was caught off guard when stuff jumped out at me. But eventually I learned to constantly watch all sides and I got pretty fast at switching between gun and flashlight. The problem was there were monsters in EVERY ROOM. I could even accurately estimate how far I would get into a room before I was attacked. There was one good level, and it went like this: for the first third or so there were no monsters, just creepy ambient sounds and dark rooms. When a gasket blew it scared the hell out of me because I felt uneasy the whole time. I saw shadows crawling across the ceiling, but nothing was alive. I was hoping Doom 3 did that more, but it went back to pure monster closets afterward.
I'm not a horror connoisseur, but the scariest game I've played thus far is the Afraid of Monsters mod for Half Life. I gave up on the game before I even fought a single monster. Why? Because as soon as the 2nd level loaded I felt incredibly unsafe. There were tons of doors around me, in front of me, and behind me. Any one of them could spew out a bunch of monsters. But none did, yet. The worst part was the ambient sound that kept me completely uneasy. It wasn't obvious stuff like monsters or whatever, it was just a carefully crafted sound that made me uncomfortable the entire time I played. To compound the issue, I wasn't a superpowerful space marine. In the game I was an unarmed drug addict who was hallucinating. Even in broad daylight, with other people in the house, I just couldn't bring myself to play it. I tried several 2 minute plays before I gave up. It was too scary for me. I never saw a single monster. That is good horror.
Right on. System Shock 2 is in my top 5 games of all time.
Sorry to hijack your point, but I picked up Dead Space yesterday mainly due to the decent reviews it was getting and the fact that it shared a lot with SS2 (RPG elements, sci-fi setting, horror) and about 3-4 hours in I'm sorely disappointed. I replayed SS2 a few months ago, and was absolutely engrossed over the few days it took me to finish it. The screeches of those fucking monkeys still creep me out. Dead Space just kind of feels lacking.
I want to be scared by Dead Space, but so far I've only gotten startled once by a loud noise while turning a corner. Keep in mind, I've been playing in a dark room with the sound turned up and the difficulty on hard. People claiming it's the scariest game of all time clearly haven't played SS2, Call of Cthulu, Silent Hill 2, etc. It feels a lot like Doom 3 in 3rd person and awkward controls, while I was expecting a cross between SS2 and RE4. That said, I'm enjoying it quite a bit even if it is a bit disappointing.
There are definitely some cool things about the game - the fact that there's no HUD (your health is displayed as a meter on your back) definitely helps immersion, but Call of Cthulu pulled it off better (and is FAR scarier than Dead Space). The Zero G bits have potential, but I've only been in one so I haven't had a chance to see what they do with it. The stasis effects are nifty too. I like the gore, even though it can get a bit silly sometimes. I've yet to see anything as visceral as getting decapitated by one of the chainsaw sisters in RE4 - though a few death animations come close.
SO yeah, to sum it up DS is pretty fun, not scary (so far), but probably not a must buy at this point. GOTY contender it is not in my eyes.