Jacob quickly acquires a baton which can be used for both rapid combos and slower, more powerful swings. The first is the emphasis on melee combat. Black Iron Prison is now infested with mutated, disgusting and raging creatures, all of which have a hankering for severing your head from your body.Ĭombat-wise, Callisto Protocol deviates from the Dead Space mould in a couple of key ways. With Jacob’s escape attempts expectedly going wrong at almost every turn, he’ll be needing to battle his way out of numerous dire situations. Sam Witwer is also criminally wasted as a primary antagonist. The small cast would have provided a lot of room for interesting and subtle development which feels lacking here. It doesn’t help that The Callisto Protocol relies on old tropes to justify gameplay situations, like how you always get separated by a clearly bad decision from other people. It’s run-of-the-mill and you’ll know what’s coming well ahead of its reveal, unlike Jacob. Audio notes are present and correct, and while they offer some interesting tidbits, they don’t do nearly as good a job of exploring the world of Callisto as Dead Space’s. The ending also feels rushed and unfinished, further cementing the notion that this story needed a lot more fleshing out. It’s a typical “wrong place, wrong time” kind of approach which lacks any creative spin to make the conclusion feel satisfying. Isaac had a reason to be on the Ishimura, Jacob has no stakes in Black Iron Prison – why am I rooting for this guy? There’s a lack of development in both the overarching story and the characters within it that makes it fairly disinteresting. The tiny cast of characters are likeable enough, but their backstories are poorly handled and the emotional moments don’t feel anywhere near earned.Įverything is voiced superbly well and the performances are great for the material they have, but the problem is that as a player, I had little to really connect me with any of the cast. Jacob himself, incredibly, only realises what’s going on in the final chapter when every player and even in-game character has not only figured it out, but actually relayed this information to him already. Unlike engineer-turned-unwilling-hero Isaac, Jacob is fully voiced for his first outing and he has a couple of key characters aiding and obstructing his breakout.Ĭallisto Protocol’s story is both minimal and entirely predictable. Sounds familiar right? A certain Isaac Clarke faced an alarmingly similar situation. The story follows Jacob’s attempts to escape the calamity occurring around him. Black Iron is descending into chaos, with blood, bodies and destruction erupting all around. Captured by the security forces of Black Iron Prison, he’s subsequently incarcerated, only to wake to the hideous screams of people suffering. Set on Jupiter’s moon Callisto, Jacob Lee – our sketchy and rather aloof protagonist – has his ship boarded and unceremoniously crashed onto the dead planet. With all that out the way, grab your plasma cutter pistol and baton, suit up in your favourite orange jumpsuit, it’s time to delve into the violent and blood-soaked depths of Black Iron Prison. It’s almost impossible to speak about The Callisto Protocol’s strengths and missteps without referencing it to Dead Space, so please bare with the constant comparisons, as they’re essential to understanding whether you’ll like or loathe this new action horror experience. It’s a flawed spiritual successor that has lost the essence of what made the inspiration so spectacular, but it never truly fails. Which makes this all the more painful to write.ĭead Space is one of my favourite series of all time, yet The Callisto Protocol only just about manages the basics of what the 2008 entry achieved so perfectly. The Callisto Protocol is a welcome return for many of those pioneering developers, especially from my own personal perspective. It was an evolution in so many ways, while also perfecting so many elements of what makes 3rd person horror action so intensely gratifying. The immersive approach to HUD design, horrific Necromorph creatures and wonderfully terrifying atmosphere showed the kind of direction the genre could take. Survival horror needed a fresh injection of ideas and creativity, which Visceral Games’ magnum opus was all too happy to provide. The Dead Space series helped reinvigorate a relatively dwindling genre back in 20. The spiritual successor to Dead Space excels visually but can The Callisto Protocol match the quality of those that came before? The Finger Guns review:
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