Dead Space 2 is still the same survival horror game you know and love

There’s been a lot of worry about Dead Space 2 becoming more ofan action game than a survival horror title. Well, you can put those fears to rest, people. Steve Papoutsis, Senior Producer at Visceral, told me during my preview time that “there were some comments that were misquoted, misunderstood about the game being too action-y or Call of Duty-like. The first thing I want to say is this is clearly not that. This is not a Call of Duty game, this is not a run-and-gun game — and I think you’ll see it when you see [Dead Space 2].”

To put it bluntly, Steve stated that they’re “not f*cking it up.” There are going to be some sequences where Dead Space 2 will feel like an action game, but “it’s certainly not ‘I’m Rambo!’ running through and just shooting sh*t as I go” action. As Steve explained, “You want to be creeping, you want to be paying attention. We want to be building the tension and the fear we had in the last game because that’s what people said they liked. We’re not trying to get rid of that.”

Another element to the action factor is what Steve calls “epic moments,” which are “punctuation marks throughout the game where we hope the player goes ‘HOLY SHIT! I can’t believe they have me do that!’ You guys posted that clip from PAX. Something like that, without going into too much detail. There’s this really cool situation where you’re doing something awesome and fun and maybe your heart’s racing and it’s action-y from that perspective, but it’s still going to have all the trappings of Dead Space.”

Steve reiterated that Visceral Games isn’t implementing change for the sake of change. “We’re not going away from our roots at all. We’re just trying to make a sequel that’s better than the first game. We just want to make a game that’s a worthy successor to Dead Space, that people enjoy and don’t think is like Call of Duty for whatever reason. I don’t know where that came from.” [laughs]