Why do you find Dead Space scary?

[Tropicaz]

It was just jump scares. In one it also felt like any time the dramatic music came on something was going to jump out. It just didnt impress me that much.

 

[Hawk of Battle]

Slightly off topic, but I don't think any games have been actually scary since like, the original Silent Hill and Tomb Raider (no seriously, I actually find Tomb Raider to be one of the scariest, most atmospherically haunting games ever). And I'm not exactly one for much horror myself. Always makes me laugh when friends get me to play like, Fear or Stalker, games they found scary, and then watch as they expect me to be creeped out and terrified of them, only for me to wander through without batting an eye.

Though admittedly I have only played a tiny bit of Dead Space, most I remember was a room with a giant spinning ball in it that was basically a rip off of the engine room from Event Horizon, and some place where a bunch of screaming corpses suddenly appeared out of nowhere for a few seconds before vanishing again. My reaction was the same as the characters, blank stoicism.

All those supposed-scary games suffer from a small problem:

You can't be afraid if you are a walking death machine. You simply can't. If I can hide behind a fuck-off gun and my character is wearing a suit of armor that'll put knights to shame then there is nothing scary.

Though I never thought of STALKER as scary. It has certainly atmosphere and there were parts where I got tense due to what happened around me and the previous lack of enemies that went beyond physical attacks.

Yeah, that was kinda my feelings as well with all of them, any game where the primary gameplay mechanic is shooting things dead with a vast array of weapons really can't be scary. Even less so if those weapons are upgradable, or if your character can also be upgraded to turn them into a walking death machine. How can I be afriad of a vast horde of deamonic monsters when I have 4 weapons I can quick change between at any point, all of which can eviscerate my enemies in numerous ways?

Fear was even worse, my friend was watching me play through it, shitting himself every time ghosts and shit appeared, and there I am slowing down time and blasting things with a shotgun like it's the Matrix or something. And then I got into a giant mech, became invincible and mowed down hundreds of mooks before getting bored. How are you supposed to be terrified when you're a walking tank?

 

[Nieroshai]

I wouldn't say it was scary, the atmosphere was good and suspenseful though.

 

[sir neillios]

Scary..... I'm really not sure if I found it scary or not, I'm not going to brag that I wasn't scared at times. Let's be honest, it uses elements that do add to a tense atmosphere. Tense discordant music, enemies that can render you helpless in very short order, and the knowledge that there is a narrow margin of error in combat, if you miss a shot you'll pay for it.

Since then I've played amnesia, totally different game. I enjoyed playing dead space 2, amnesia I had to force myself to finish, it cannot be stated enough how comforting the ability to fight back is.

 

[Twilight_guy]

I though the first game had a good atmosphere of creepy shit happening, at least initially. Eventually it goes off the rails and turns into an action game on the last level. The second game was an action game all the way and not scary except in a couple of sections designed as such.

 

[ShinyCharizard]

I don't find them scary. The games are tense and exciting but never truly scary.

 

[w9496]

It was unsettling at best.

Nothing Dead Space can try would even come close to the damn mannequins in the Condemned games. Oh how I hated them.

 

[health-bar]

I never found the game itself scary, its attempts at horror are too predictable to induce fear. in fact when I first played it with a couple of friends I "ruined the scary" by calling all the horror cliches before they happened. (eg: long hallway, lights turn off and I call the oh so predictable unseen monster roar etc.)

but, in contrast to horror games like amnesia, the gameplay is actually thrilling. I actually feel like I'm fighting for my life rather than simply cowering and waiting for the monster to go away. Fighting tooth and nail to NOT DIE is a much more exhilarating experience than just psyching myself out when the monster only shows up for 30 seconds once every half hour.

The fighting and imminent horrific death should a wrong move be made are what made the game enjoyable and gave it a pleasing tension.