E3 2010: Dead Space 2 gameplay adds guns, better anti-grav, bigger everything

Speaking of enemies, expect quite a menagerie, expanded from the first game’s already gruesome army. As we explored an abandoned Church of Unitology, we countered the Puker, who vomits caustic green acid even after you’ve shot it’s head off, as well as a small, razor-armed baby enemy that attacks in overpowering swarms. The Tripod, you’ve seen – it’s the three-legged beast with the very long tongue that showed up in screenshots awhile back – it’s a bastard to kill unless you can sharpshoot the glowing weak spot on its tongue as you’re being mauled.

We also encountered two other enemies whose names were not revealed to us, but that certainly made an impression. After flying up a shaft using our new zero-gravity thrusters (which enable full 360-degree movement in zero-g this time) and fighting through a host of foul beasts, we found ourselves looking out a beautiful glass wall – but only for a moment, because some sort of spaceship with ultra-halogen headlights appeared and opened fire, shattering the glass and causing explosive decompression. We clawed our way down a tiny air shaft, landing forcefully in a dark room filled with junk.

Then it appeared - a mammoth creature, all spikes and arms and raw, seeping flesh; it knocked us into a pile of rubble, then tossed aside a massive pillar and proceeded to pound us some more, picking Isaac up like a rag doll. Luckily, we were able to chip away at a weak spot on its arm, so it kept dropping us. We got loose and made a break for it down a hallway, hitting it with stasis to slow it down. We TK’ed a door open with our telekinesis and charged into another room with a gorgeous view of space, thinking perhaps we were safe. That was dumb.

You can probably guess what happened next. Our pursuer burst into the room at the exact same time the spaceship that shot at us before reappeared. It opened fire and both Isaac and the monster were sucked violently into the vacuum. We thought sure we were done for, but then we noticed a trail of red canisters leaking out from the fissured hull, right behind our angrier-than-ever enemy. We fired off a few rounds, and a white-hot explosion signaled one of our rounds had found its target, triggering the end of the demo.

Think Dead Space 2 isn’t going to be as scary as the first one? Maybe not in a “Boo! I got you!” kind of way – but considering we saw what happens to Isaac if you don’t outrun that fleshy leviathan at the end, there – you’ve still got plenty of reason to be afraid.

June 16, 2010