Dead Space Review (Leo)
I'm amazed by how well they manage to pull this off. It's like the RE1 remake of Dead Space.
First of all, the game is close to flawless on release, a staggering difference compared to other recent releases. Some people have complained about missing mission objects but I haven't experienced any of that and I tend to break games. There is some stutter when entering rooms. While i hope they can iron it out in time It's nothing close to Stutter Ring or the Stutter Protocol. Shaders are precompiled so that shouldn't be the issue this time around.
All gameplay changes are for the better IMO. You move more like DS2, making you feel more in control. This might remove some of the tension like removing tank controls in RE but I always felt DS1 was a bit sluggish. They have also mitigated that loss of tension with the new "director" that can throw encounters at you when you don't expect it. The backtracking and sidemissions add a lot of enjoyment and the world feels a bit more "alive". It's just the perfect incapsulation of what it set out to be, RE4 in space (no, you still can't roundhouse kick the necromorphs. you're pretty much an engineer in an old school diving suit).
Models have obviously gotten a lot better and some people don't like seeing the wrinkles on Nicole (who is probably the same age as Isaac, 40s) and she is actually pretty if you stop being childish for a moment. You're entitled to your opinion but having a 40yo engineer and a 20yo, well educated and experienced, doctor doesn't make any sense (the people running defence also show their colors saying "not everyone can look like model", but she could literally still be a model with her face but she might be a bit short for that vocation). The raytracing also does wonders to the characters faces so turn that on if you can.
Some of the story changes are great and add to the atmosphere while others seem silly, they tried to add a bit more depth to a specific character and it fell flat for me. I did play the original and if you didn't you might not feel the same way, the idea itself is somewhat clever.
The same can be said about some other changes you've probably heard about, they don't necessarily feel natural especially the bathroom one. I just don't see why they would have three figures instead of just the one with halfpants/halfskirt, or just a sign saying bathroom since there are no gendered bathrooms on the ship from what i understand. It feels contrived and unrealistic which might take away from immersion for some people.
I've played through the game once, on NG+ now and still having a lot of fun with the mechanics. Cutting limbs off of necromorphs with an engineers tools somehow never gets old (unlike Nicole amirite huehue).
Amazing utilization of Raytracing, my stock settings had it turned off and turning it on was like night and day. I haven't seen many games where it's this prominent.
Atmosphere is great with a lot of background noise keeping you on edge, weapons are fun and somewhat diverse (I mostly use the plasma cutter, and the flame thrower for those small creepy crawlies though), upgrade system is enjoyable and pushes you to play ng+ in a good way, the addition of keycards and backtracking gives a lot to the hoarder in me and ofcourse Isaacs iconic suits are just *chefs kiss*.
I recommend this with all my heart and will now go and buy the bonus stuff just to show the developers that i love what they're doing and hope to see more in the future.