i didn't have any plans to play the dead space remake, i thought it looked very pointless of a remake and i thought a port of the trilogy would have been a better idea, but after playing through the game using my roomates PS plus, they asked me to play it so i figured i'd give it a try, i have to say i was kind of right and that it is kind of pointless, mostly. i mean, it goes without saying about any remake and I've said before that games don't age and i still very much stand by that, now moreso than ever as we hit peak remake culture, but thisgame really does just prove it, the game is so not meaningfully different from the original that it might as well just be a fanmade 4K graphics patch on it and it showcases to us just how much we've hit the point of diminishing returns both graphically and mechanically. all of its changes being more of a master quest remix with a balance patch moreso than anything really meaningfully different like what other remakes in the space like resi 2 are pulling and many of its changes do make for a worse experiance, it could have been better served being a port with the other games thrown in, but i don't regret my time with this remake at all, a worse dead space is still dead space and dead space is still one of the best games ever made, but i do question why this exists at all.

okay well i know why it exists, money, EA saw how much of a hit resi 2 was and wanted their own, completely disregarding that, oh darn! we shut down the studio! and instead passing it off to another team made up of very few people, if any, that worked on those original titles, i won't trash that team because they don't deserve it and i think people need to do better than to hate on them when this is very much a corpo issue, same with bloober on SH2 honestly, sure bloober suck but just leave them alone. i might be coming across as super negative but i promise you this is the end of it, this is still a good game, just not as good of one as the original, i won't be talking too much about the basic game itself, i'll cover the original sometime and do it there, i mostly want to talk about what this game does differently and the things it changes and weather you should check it out (after playing the original version of course). yeah? kinda? i mean, do you want to replay dead space but you want something slightly different? then yes! give it a try, there's enough here that it'll make it feel slightly fresh, but i wouldn't say to spend too much money on it, i played this for free since my roommate pays for ps plus and i think that's the ideal way to play.

so what's different, the graphics i guess, the original game looks fine and this game does look more advanced, but not always for the better, the necromorphs i think do look worse but i will credit the team for how good they made the gross gore stuff, they came up with new systems and stuff for the flesh that sounded like it would change the gameplay but it never really did, but it does strip more naturally and stuff and if you use the force gun it even stips them entirely to the bone and thats, gross, but cool i guess, but the environments are very hit and miss, some like hydroponics and medical look great and the bridge too looks really good, but other areas like the final stretch or the other ship you enter look worse, i do think the lighting here is nice though, but some areas are just too bright, like that final level which loses all of its scares in this version, same with the final boss, the lack of the dark storm really hurts the atmosphere, maybe its just that the lower fidelity made the original scarier, i'm not sure, sound design i will credit them is a little better, there's more to it and the voices you hear are very cool, even if i think it makes the games final twist a little too obvious, still, fantastic sound design and it is the one area i do think this version is far better with. it's very impressive, though the games music is very limited and there isn't much of it, though what is here is not super memorable bar one really creepy rendition of twinkle twinkle little star (i remember the original having this in one of the trailers and it was what sold me on that game years ago), but that sound design and the ambient noises more than make up for it . the Ishimura here is still one of the best environments in any video game, being here is so stressful and there's very few games as scary as this, even with the remake, very few games make me feel as stressed and scared exploring as dead space do and doubly so make me feel actively afraid of being in a new area instead of excited, because you don't know what kinds of unimaginable horror could be in that next area, the world is so well done that you really do feel like anything awful could happen, a sense of fear that really only hits in games like this or forbidden siren, the ship is as much of a character as anything else and it's a place that will stick with you long after the game ends.

the gameplay changes are kind of minimal and kind of not, there's nothing here as game changing as resi 2's perspective shift or silent hill 2's combat or until dawn removing everything that made the game cool, here it's just a few changed mechanics and level designs, for a start the very cool system of having to choose between upgrades or opening doors for supplies is now gone, those rooms are still there but now you instead have to get security upgrades to gain access in a like, metroidvania thingy that goes in with the games added backtracking and open hub structure, this is a change for the worse, the original was there for a reason, sure it was a difficult choice and it could be frustrating but that was the point!! it was a real decision you had to make and it was supposed to make you agonize over whats right for you, but now its gone and replaced with a 5 min trek to a nearly empty level and it destroys the games pacing at times, sure you can ignore it but its still just a shame its like that at all. the games new ai director does try and spice these trips up but i think it just makes things more annoying honestly, encounters feel so much less bespoke and it cheapens them when you start to figure out how and when the ai will jumpscare you with one and any time you can tell its just trying it it makes it feel like a waste of resources, not a fan of that bit. weapons are different a little, one good change is the new upgrades, these will add some small changes like massively improved capacity or bonus damage that stacks and they're really cool, they incentivise using the weapons in new ways and its cool, but the other changes i'm less into, instead of buying weapons you find them in the world, which is fine, but it also means they swap the weapons placement a lot and you can miss some if you don't engage with the annoying security clearance stuff, it also means my beloved line gun only comes in almost halfway in!! the line gun in general is so nerfed here, its a real change and it sucks, but to make up for it the force gun is super buffed and so is the plasma cutter, thankfully my other favourite gun the ripper is still good, if they ruined it too i'd be so sad, but these changes all do make the game feel worse to play for me, the pacing and gunplay just feel less fun and it can feel sloggy at times, especially in the second half which already had pacing issues in the original and it has those worse here. the zero G stuff also works differently, with giving you full movement and removing the cool space jump, its an improvement i will admit and they do some cool stuff with it like some improved fights with leviathan and the asteroids, though at the cost of removing all the cool turret stuff, i liked the turret stuff, but for a lot of people getting rid of those will be a good thing.

there's things like new rooms here and there that add new lore, some old rooms will now make you choose between different things to power like having to pick lights or air and this doesn't happen a lot but when it does happen it's very good and one of the highlights of the game, though again it never matters too much beyond a few select times, usually the choice is between two doors to open in a different order. the tram is now just a fast travel instead of a level transition/save room, this is a huge shame since now you lose that sense of relief when you enter one, in the original the tram was very much your resi save room and it felt like such a sanctuary, this is super lost here and that sucks! since levels are interconnected at points via doors and pathways to them, medical and the starting zone being an example, sure you can go back now but thats an issue itself like i mentioned earlier, but still, it does make the game different and that does make this worth playing a little more than a faithful remake. there's some sidequests, 3 of them and they're kind of neat, leading you to new rooms with plot relevance and showing you some more side lore, it's cool and it makes the backtracking almost worth it at times, though do know you don't get miuch for these, they're just there for lore heads and to give you something else to do, but i like them overall, the best change i think. the new lore goes well with how the story is changed, and this is also mixed, giving issac a voice i'm not super into, i feel like the games story with the SPOILERS is issac crazy and just hallucinating things works better when he can't communicate with people and here that is lost a bit, weather or not that was intentional to begin with it harms the atmosphere, he also looks like adam sandler and that keeps weirding me out, but the new story is fine and i do really like how expanded the lore is with the church and the marker being more prominant, it still works and the Ishimura is just such a cool place to be that anything new of it i will happily take, though i do think the overall story is less strong than it was in the original. there's also some new unlockables like some new suits and a new ending that you can do after finishing a fourth sidequest in new game plus, a good ending too that i really like and they do add some good replayability, the game is also longer than the original by a good few hours because of the new stuff and backtracking, but i do think it's to the games detriment.

the game was made by motive studio, a studio who's mostly seemed to work in support roles on EA games like star wars battlefront 2 or battlefield 5 or anthem, they did one original project before this which was the star wars flight sim: squadrons, which seems like a neat game and this is their newest work, they seem like a talented studio that havent been given much room to do anything really original, i hope they get that chance. now it might seem like i'm being super negative on this game, and i am in a way, but don't get me wrong, this is still great, under all the changes both better and worse it is still dead space, that original game is one of the best games ever made and a worse version of one of the best games ever made is still an amazing game and this still absolutely is and i hope i don't give the impression that its somehow a bad game, because its not. its production might be a little cynical but i do believe the teams heart was in the right place and you can not go wrong with any version of this game, but i will always reccomend the original more.