The second I hit the expo floor at PAX I made a straight sprint to the dark cave EA had set up to house Dead Space. There were two stations going for demonstration, and I was amazed all weekend long that this baby didn’t get the massive line it deserved. After a ten minute wait I was cautiously navigating through the darkened Ishimura, getting to know Isaac.

The demo had me in an area that’s been internet’d to death already, but I didn’t care. It felt really good to be in control; it felt good to have Isaac’s back. He didn’t need to worry anymore. The character movement is responsive, but slow enough that the environment of a space station is reflected well, along with Isaac’s weakness and mortality. Don’t get me wrong, dude’s badass. However, he is a man, he is a miner/tech guy, and he is afraid. That really comes through well. The controls are intuitive as far as aiming, shooting, reloading and melee are concerned, though the latter seems a little off, or perhaps intentionally nerfed would be more accurate. When fighting enemies that can only be stopped via total evisceration, a knock on the head with the butt of a gun shouldn’t be particularly damaging, should it? The displays for health and ammunition are intuitive and gorgeous, and the menu, brought up as a hologram in front of Isaac, keeps the pretty going and is well streamlined. The icons are a tad hideous, but now I’m nitpicking.

I quickly stumbled into a zero-G chamber with four different chunks of space garbage I needed to expel from the ship using telekinesis. Simple button presses pull the objects toward you (any object, including corpses!) and the right trigger fires them forward. Simple and fun, especially when you mix it into combat. The huge room could be navigated around through the use of the zero-g flying/super-jump mechanic that allows you to walk on any flat surface, regardless of angle or orientation. It was easy, and the animation for landing looked a great deal less janky than in videos I’ve seen. After leaving Puzzleville I pulled into Combat Town for a tussle with some horrifying freaks. Standard bipedal slashy-zombies kicked off the festivities, and the highlight was the realization that, while aiming, the angle of the reticle could be altered from vertical to horizontal to maximize limb-removing efficiency! A tap of the right bumper does this, and the effects were tremendous. Lopped off zombie-dicks everywhere! After basic baddie came dudes with giant, volatile, explosive death-fists they dragged along the ground. The nice demo-man told me that if I could remove the arm without hitting the bulkhead of the thing, I could pick it up with telekinesis and use it on my other foes. Stasis was remarkably helpful here, allowing me to freeze the bastards long enough to carve their arms off. Stasis is helpful. Helpful and a lovely sky blue.

The next enemy to appear would be the one to take poor Isaac’s life. A morbidly obese zombie approached, screaming and shaking his belly like a bowl full of space-jelly. Before the nice man scrutinizing my every terrible move could shout “DON’T!” I had emptied my pistol into his stomach, spilling at least thirty baby raptor/crab/slug things onto the floor. They swarmed poor Isaac, climbing all over him. The game provided me an opportunity to escape by tapping “A,” but it was too late. One big part of this game is the vivid imagery, particularly that found in death. The creatures burrowed into Isaac, tearing off first his arm from the inside, and then exploding out of his stomach, tearing him in half at the waste. As my skin turned white, I left the booth, shaken and sad, yet still wanting more.

The comic series covers the events preceding the Ishimura’s blackout and Isaac’s call to action, and fits very well with the motif and feel of the game. The setting is dark, the attitude tragic, and the characters are vivid. Though not the best graphic novel I’ve come across, it feels like it’s part of a video game. When you look at it as a fan, it’s just a wonderful feeling to see EA go so balls-out on giving Dead Space a legitimate narrative. The final issue of the comic will be releasing in September, followed by an animated movie covering the last hours before the Ishimura “goes dark.” Without spoiling too much, the comics center around conflict on the planet that humans are harvesting raw materials from, and the Ishimura, a city-sized ship comes to do the “planet cracking” necessary to gather the ore. It’s definitely worth checking out, and it seems like EA’s created a universe that’s worth exploring.

The game demoed just like I thought it would. It’s had a lot of coverage coming into the summer months, and with an October 21st release just around the corner, what I got my hands on was definitely close to a final, polished product. This one definitely deserves some top of the list consideration for an overcrowded October.