As a 3rd person shooter it's clumsy and antiquated. As a Dead Space game, it is completely out of context with its predecessors, the story and writing are hackneyed, derivative, uninspired, lazy; its just bad, no way around it, cringe inducing. A game developed with a focus on ticking off boxes in order to appeal to a wider audience.

By far the worst game in the series and plainly, just a bad game. Saves load you an hour before the last point you should be (guess the fathers of the creators didn't teach them numbers correctly). Also a fact as I am Greek, the producer's surname (Steve Papoutsis) means his d|ck is a grandpa, mine on the other hand (KOKK-IN-EASS) means something much better. Games like this make me feel good that these people are just so inadequate. To the next failure, losers. :D… Expand

Where to start? Well the whole micro transaction (Where they have things to "help" you play their game) thing is bs, on top of that they have a lack of I'm going to call them materials so unless you're deep into the game you won't get to touch their "dev team" weapons. Wait there's a solution! pay them money to access the materials needed to get their guns that are not worth the space they're hosted on.

The campaign is crap to put it blunt, the first two were amazing granted they wanted to step away from the whole jump scare thing that got them to the dance in the first place but this campaign (Especially on a second play through) was too easy and often frustrating as nothing was really clear in certain parts on what to do and I often felt like my deaths were the games fault for throwing me into situations that were hard to get out of.

On my second play through and late half of my first one It felt too easy once I figured out "Wait a minute, I can slap a rocket launcher on this thing" Ammo was few and far between UNLESS you made it on the work bench and kept your inventory loaded. That's another gripe for me was the limited space of inventory, how about upgrades for more space? A lack of multiplayer really hurts this games replay ability and the add ons don't really add much to the game so spend your money on something else and wait till this game hits the bargain bin.… Expand

I'm fairly disappointed with this game. too many bugs and glitches just make this game not fun..infinite ammo just from save quitting from the practice room? how did this pass QA? the scavenger bot going missing, again how did all this miss QA? oh but the micro transactions seem to working just fine.

it really shows where companies priorities are these days. back then when you couldn't hot fix bugs with internet/DLC/online services, your game HAD to be in top condition before release or you suffered harsh criticisms and ratings from the public. nowadays it seems like they care more about monetizing than actually making the game playable because they know they can hotfix it "later"...and that's bullcrap. I do not want the future of gaming to turn into this.

this game is fun, and i already guessed it'd be coop considering they had to do something different. But there's too many cons that outweigh the pro's in my mind.… Expand

Gears of War/Halo/Doom.... all games this one copies, no originality, everything happens in threes, you spend more time running around scavenging for on the other side of the level because you need it to open some door or fix something.... Frustrating and forgettable... should have saved my money

Really slow moving character that runs into a lot of things. No brightness change. Poor story and characters. Weapons customizing not on par with New Vegas or AoT and third person gameplay below par. Comparable to RE6.

This is a very average repetitive action game. I am very disappointed because all the elements that made Dead Space what it is were removed. I understand you want money EA and in so you need to make it more appealing to most audiences but this is not the way, why don't you just create a new game. I'm just sick and tired of all GoW and CoD and all the other third person action games. We had something unique with Dead Space and you just blew it, way to go. So as an action game is average, as a survival horror game it's dreadful. I just hope Visceral Games finds another publisher for Dead Space 4. I want Dead Space back, I want to feel terrified, I want a good story, I don't want repetitive bs. I don't want GoW clones. Shame on you EA, way to ruin Dead Space.… Expand

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. By now you probably know that Dead Space 3 isn't a survival horror game like its predecessors, but rather a third person action shooter. This isn't necessarily a bad thing if it's done well, unfortunately in Dead Space 3 it is a complete failure. Most of the combat (and there is a lot of it) follows this pattern:

-Isaac enters a small, cramped room.
-Room gets locked down.
-Wave of necromorphs spews out of vents.
-Another wave of necromorphs.
-...and another.
-...and another.
-...and another.
-Room opens up.
-Move on to next room, repeat.

The strategic dismemberment that was so enjoyable in the first Dead Space game is completely gone. Each of these waves has so many enemies charging at you so fast, that you will repeatedly end up backed into a corner while you mindlessly empty clip after clip into an undifferentiated mass of arms and legs and tentacles. Impalement is also of little use, since there is no time to stop shooting at the dozens of enemies who are mobbing you, and if your telekinesis picks up the wrong object from the gigantic pile of limbs and items, then you're as good as dead.

Not all the combat is atrocious. The end boss is one of the most epic I've ever seen, and there's another memorable boss fight around the middle. Unfortunately most of the boss fights will be against the Snow Beast, who seems to have no shortage of respawning tentacles. Perhaps the combat is more enjoyable in co-op, since the game was clearly not designed around solo gameplay, but I don't know. Both of the co-op partners I found in message boards have flaked out. That's another thing that is extremely frustrating about this game; if it was designed to be played by two people on two separate consoles, why does it include no tools for finding a co-op partner?

The game has other flaws, such as generic, one-dimensional characters; formulaic dialogue; a clunky weapon-crafting system; and an in-your-face microtransaction system. The game also froze my XBOX 360 a few times. As extremely annoying as these things are, they are small potatoes compared to the epically bad and frustrating combat I've already mentioned. I could overlook these other flaws if I actually enjoyed playing the game, but the bottom line is that the combat is so pointlessly long and repetitive that it ultimately turns Dead Space 3 into a game that is just simply not fun to play.… Expand

For me, the most obnoxious thing about Dead Space 3 wasn't the game mechanics or overall story, both of which are adequate, but the very character you play. They really should have left Isaac Clarke mute like he was in Dead Space 1. In that game, you could project whatever personality you wanted onto him: I personally thought of him as someone who would under normal circumstances be thoughtful, self-controlled, and quiet, like many real-life engineers and scientists tend to be. I like people like that, so I liked Isaac. Unfortunately, in Dead Space 2 they gave him a voice, and did ever he use it. I no longer liked him. The trend is ramped up even more in Dead Space 3, making Isaac Clarke one of the most exquisitely annoying video game characters in recent memory. There's something wrong when you regularly have to suppress the urge to yell "Shut the f**k up and quit your whining!" at your own character in a single-player shooter.

What is it, exactly, that makes Isaac so grating? First there's the voice itself: he sounds like he's about eighteen, even though he looks at least twice that. It's jarring. Then there's the melodramatic moaning and groaning during combat why does Isaac have to shriek like he's being tortured on the rack every time he falls down or takes a punch? And then there's the frequent and usually pointless chattering, both to himself (essentially to remind the player of the goals of a mission, in case they've been forgotten since the previous reminder two minutes ago) or with the other members of the team exploring Tau Volantis. All the talk-talk-talk makes you appreciate how the general lack of dialogue in games like Bioshock, Half Life, and the first Dead Space adds to the eeriness of their atmospheres. But worst of all is Isaac's personality, which emerges fully in a puerile love triangle side-story that has been unnecessarily grafted onto the plot. Isaac's endless sulking and complaining made me understand why Ellie left him for the far more dignified Norton. He comes off like a self-obsessed, self-righteous, self-pitying high school student mooning over an an unrequited crush, and not like the embittered and traumatized adult he's presumably supposed to be.

I don't know why the developers chose to make Isaac such an immature putz maybe it's just lazy writing, maybe the marketing department wanted them to appeal to a younger demographic, whatever. But I'm seeing this trend more and more in games the strong, silent (and undoubtedly scared s**tless) type of computer game main character seems to be going extinct. Someone ought to make a mod that lets you replace Isaac with the Doomguy then you'd have a pretty good game.… Expand

First off I am a long time, die-hard, 100% Achievement in both DS1 and DS2, faithfull fan. However...
I cannot wait to see the day when EA crashes and burns like any third installment in their franchises.
Once again, like so many unfortunate developpers before them, Visceral Games have allowed their beautifully crafted, rich, compelling, niche title to be bastardized, reduced, simplified, and "cookie cutter'd" by EA's pursuit of money and sacrificial expediancy. I am writing this review not even having completed the game yet, which is a first. I have about 20 hours in, with a co-op partener, and have experienced everything from intense frustration, to sheer apathetic bafflement in regards to many aspects of the game.
Atmosphere and Setting: While a serious departure from the previous two titles, DS3's arctic setting is actually quite refreshing in most aspects. The weather is believable and the buildings and ships are satisfactorily done. The best part about Dead Space was suspense about when an attack was coming. While several upcoming encounters were obvious there were always completely unexpected jumps between the snail speed crawls through corridors and corners. The overall feel sufferes intensly at the hands of non stop, almost labourious combat, and LITTERAL "copy pasted" levels such as the side missions. All the same corridors, the same encounter timing, the 3 step lowering of the supply pallet at the end... Even nintendo in the 1980's would facepalm at such repetetiveness. The soundtrack: Both musical and ambient noises, are inaudible over the constant fighting. Dead Space one's elevator and door noises still make me scream in side my head "SHHH SHHH SHHH BE QUIET YOU'RE GOING TO GIVE ME AWAY :S" That sense of trying to sneak around and not be found was epic... and totaly lost when Isaac, now apparently profficiant in millitary weapons and their design, runs around with rocket launchers and bulpup rifles. World credibility: Remember the time when each enemy type had a backstory or at least an origin? The normal Slashers were everyday people, the Lurkers and Crawlers we're infants and toddlers, the Twitchers came from hosts with stasis, The Pack were children... There are so many missing peices to some of these enemies and the world itself. If this was a super top secret military research zone where are the children coming from? Why can't a door malfunction and not be followed by an attack? Or better yet, not magically un-malfunction the second the attack is over? And wasn't this game supposed to be about scavenging? There was a time when I never used the safe, never sold ammo (for the one or two guns I was using), and actually had a chance to run out if I didn't MANAGE MY INVENTORY properly. I remember that being a selling point of the earlier installations. Now, even on Hard, I am leaving stuff behind because I can't carry it all. Other Frustrations: Autosaves vs Save Points: I really hope there are manual save points in single player. Several times now I have been set back two or even three whole missions, yet kept my gear from them... Bugs and glitches: Can't say I've had any deal breaking problems here. But lets say the stories of some other people's bugs are more frightening than the game has been so far. New Weapon system: Took a bit to get used to. Overall I miss when Isaac was an engineer, not rambo with a welding ticket. A lot of trial and error to figure out how it all worked. The blueprints were quite confusing and the lack of a more well laid out tutorial was a setback. But since I'm always complaining about developpers dumbing things down I really can't make a stink about this now can I? Quick time events Instant deaths Enemy Generation Enemy Reactions.
-QTE's are for games that lack developper talent to create open, intelligent combat scenarios. I'm getting way too sick of "mash (A) to not die" -Instant deaths are a real let down in a game. They fail to reward quick thinking and ingenuity and make you grind through a multi step scenario where you learn from one death how to get to the next death until all the steps are over. The rappelling sections and Snow Beast are perfect examples of this. I've had several occasions where he runs at me undodgeably, hits me, and stomps on me non stop till I die without even the slightest chance of even getting up. -While I've been avoiding the "Gears of Space 3" whining, since when could Stalkers pop out of the ground like locust? -Apparently being hit by anything short of Contact, Force, TK impale, Rocket or Grenade causes no reaction in enemies. Didnt we used to have trouble shooting their limbs off with bullets? Hence the Plasma Cutter, which is unsuably weak despite a plethora of +2 Damage circuits. I'm running out of space here but you all get the idea. While the game is begrudgingly frustrating it's still somewhat fun. But this is NOT my Dead Space. Hey EA, do better, suck less.… Expand

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. I'll start off by stating probably the only positive thing about this game: the graphics are stunning and the environments appropriately desolate and grimy. Having said that, this is one of the most dissappointing follow-ups to one of my favorite games of all time. Pretty much everything in this is a step in the wrong direction, either completely out of left field or backwards. At the end of DS2, Isaac defeated the Marker both from without and within, and with his new friend Ellie, rocketed off to freedom. Well, in this game, Isaac has not only hooked up and boinked with Ellie (because in video game storylines what else are you supposed to do with a woman), but they've split up because Isaac has become a self-pitying recluse who is thrust back into the fray at gunpoint and spends the game complaining, wondering what the hell he's doing here (I can relate). When the game lets up on the Quicktime events to actually let you start playing, Isaac starts shooting at...dudes with guns. In a franchise that was supposed to be about shooting zombies to pieces, you start out by ducking behind cover and shooting dudes with guns in the face. Welcome to Call of Duty: Dead Space. The Unitologists, who made for great enemies with their methods of infiltration and subterfuge in past games, are now dudes with guns. They've managed to take over all of Earthgov, who were the totalitarian enemy in DS2, and have now reduced them to a SINGLE SQUAD. Wow, for a game that features alien monoliths that turn people into zombies, this game is making all this VERY hard to buy. So after the intro to Army of Isaac, he reunites with Ellie, who proceeds to lock lips with one of the jarhead military guys right in front of him. And now the zombie shark has officially been jumped. Ellie is Bella and Isaac is Edward. With the fate of humanity in the balance, Isaac now gets into p***ing contests with Military Jacob over stealing his girl.

The rest of the game is a tedious fetch-quest much like the 1st game, but whereas you felt put upon with the two other NPCs sending you here and there, now you fly through space and trudge in sub-zero terrain while a crowd of token characters like Bald Chick, Old Guy, and Redneck Jarhead tell you where to go while they sit back do jack squat. Meanwhile, you get to grab this thing and open this door and start this engine while you collect "resources" and "spare parts." Remember how players complained Dead Space didn't have the best weapons? Well the developers have passed that job down to us as we now construct guns like rusty Legos and find out that they're all still just as weak as ever, only now you, the player, have seen how fruitless your efforts are. That's pretty much how you experienced Dead Space 3; you don't play it, you work on it. You know, I can practically see the stiff-suited market researchers sitting around thinking how much crap they could cram into this game for the sole purpose of hooking more sales. We need that Twilight dollar, let's put in an overly dramatic and unneccesary love triangle! We need that Walking Dead dollar, let's add more useless NPCs that will serve no purpose other than to die at some point! We need that Mass Effect dollar, let's make the players pretend this is an RPG all of a sudden and collect parts!

I never quite understood why EA was painted as a money-grubbing, artistically-bankrupt company, but now I know all too well.… Expand

they killed it. dead space a great game its a bit scary. dead space 2 awesome game. dead space 3 lost planet. i mean really i have only 1 question: why? ps. why do you kill humans its not cod its dead space a zombie game+ its really boring and lazy writing

If you feel the Resident Evil and Final Fantasy series have continued to slump into some awful abyss, then you will likely find the third installment of Dead Space to fit the same category. They have destroyed a strong environment of survival and horror, and changed it for some 13 yr old kids shooter style; albeit in third person.

Why did they have to ruin this series too? I just dont get it. EA did the same thing again in their lust for sales and wrecked the gem Dead Space (1) was. They made Isac into an idiot from this mysterious silent protagonist. Mystery is really the thing whats missing in this, its just a dum linear actiongame instead of great puzzles and atmosphere. In DS1 the whole setting was different and the horror was really there. Isac never said a word and he stayed the mysterious character all the way, making it so interesting. Now the made him say some stupid oneliners and crappy jokes etc. bs.. totally ruined it. This game is completely different from what it was. Now its just a 3rd person shooter with monsters and QTE. And why am I shooting ppl instead of necromorph? Why? I cant see any other reason for all these bad decisions but to get CoD gamers to buy this crap. What a waste. I hate EA for this now more than ever.… Expand

This certainly isn't the Dead Space we used to know. It's much more Action oriented than the first two.
This paired with the fact that the whole story seemed to be kind of standardized in every way turns this into an utter letdown. Even Ellie, who in DS2 was pretty much the most badass female in any videogame ever has been turned in to a standardized damsel in distress for the main characters to fight over, without any significant influence on the story whatsoever. What a disappointment.

While I at first welcomed the more expansive storyline and universe of Isaacs tale I have to say that it severely dilutes the classic horror aspects of Dead Space. Nothing beats the terror of being in the middle of some horrible outbreak with no idea how to deal with it and no possible allies in reach. Nothing is more horrifying than complete and utter desolation. n DS3 on the other hand everything is explained from the start, and every five minutes one of your buddies calls you and tells you what to do and if you don't play coop it leads to weird situations when carver (the coop PC) suddenly pops up from nowhere, insults you for no reason and then disappears again.

What's left is a standard actiongame with nice graphics and a standardized and occasionally ridiculous story. The action is solid but soon enough looses its excitement. At least after you have descended to the planet and walked through the 50th recycled bunker-corridor and killed the 500th monster jumping out of a suspiciously placed air vent you just can't help but feel exausted.

And don't you dare spend any money on the microtransactions! Shame on EA for insulting its customers with crap like that!… Expand

Skip this game unless you you enjoy running down repetitive hallways fighting the same uninspired enemies over and over again. Case in point, you are only ever attacked when a necromorph comes out of the ground or out from a vent, over and over again and again. Dead space 1 was by far the best game, good survival horror with a fun story. Dead Space 2 was a bit of a departure from that combination and a little less fun. EA has since taken over and made this into an average 3rd person shooter with no personality. I don't see the purpose of the multiplier it seems like it is tacked on so EA can make more in micro transactions.

All in all this game was unnecessary if they were going to make Dead Space 3 in this fashion. Without the survival horror aspect of the game it has become an mediocre 3rd person shooter... maybe worth a rental but not worth buying.… Expand

Disappointment is the single most relevant word to Dead Space 3. If it were only that it wasn't a survival-horror game, but still a fun action game it would be great. Instead it plays like an unfinished game; designs get reused too frequently, details and character interaction is missing, and a certain level of polish is absent. Most of the action is walking into a room and fighting a huge wave of enemies, followed by a similar room with another wave of enemies. Backtracking is quite frequent, and during these quiet moments there's nothing to fill the void except boredom to get out. Side missions are especially prone to this, and because of this the game feels both small and dragging on for too long.
The story is easily the weakest part. It begins confusing as so much of the game world has changed radically since the last installment, and important character development fails to pull through. By the time changes start happening it's hardly effective as the level of involvement from the additional human survivors is minimal, and relies much on the players own assumptions. Worse is the dialogue, it is cringe-worthy awkward, and at times uncomfortable to sit through. Unfortunately there is no button to skip cutscenes.
Overall the game feels rushed out of production to meet a deadline; hopefully future installments will have a larger team, a smaller scope, or a longer time table to complete the game.… Expand

This review contains spoilers, click expand to view. Let me start by telling you what games I do like. Mass effect 1,2&3. Dead Space 1&2 and Bioshock 1&2 to name a few, just so you know what page I'm on. This is one of the worst games I've played in a long time for the 360. I bought it due to the reviews on game.co.uk and because I loved 1&2. For the first time in a long time I didn't do my research properly. Big mistake.! I found that you spend more time trying to build a gun in the beginning than using one and even if you do get it right, killing the necro's is like trying to take down an elephant with a pea shooter. The stasis is nearly useless as it runs out after a couple of goes and you have to be very accurate with it. It takes a lifetime to recharge and even if you do hit your target by the time you have reloaded your pea shooter you will find them all over you anyway. The game play isn't horror! At best it's jumpy and that's mainly because every door that you open and close sounds like you are about to be attacked, speaking of doors, you need to be 5mm from the panel to open it and don't think that you can stand back from it to give yourself a fighting chance because if you do it will just close again. You feel as though you are being dragged through the game and after a while you just want it to end, either through boredom or frustration. It might be my imagination as I've not played DS 1&2 for a while but the controls feel different and clumsy. I admit that the graphics are quite nice when you get a chance to look out of a window but the rest of it is dusty (probably to hide the low res graphics) I've only been playing it for about 8 hours and I had to restart it after about 3 and a bit because I built a gun that was rubbish, my bad I think? I can appreciate that many of you will be thinking that I shouldn't be giving my opinion at this early stage and normally I'd agree with you but I have very little desire to pick my pad back up again. I bought the limited edition version because it only cost £2 more from game's £43 price tag but as far as I can make out unless you're doing a co op the only thing you get is the use of two suites for 24 hrs, EA making more money off DLC again, what a surprise! Please don't buy this game, if you have play it then rent it but the best thing I can suggest is to believe the game died with Dead Space 2. It's that bad. Roll on Bioshock 3.… Expand