gamingeek said:

SteelAttack said:

gamingeek said:

Get it at a lower price.

Or don't.

Yodariquo said:

Archangel3371 said:

The first one is badass and the second one is adorable because I can picture him trying to kill me but never succeeding as I pick him up and pet him saying how cute he is meanwhile he's thinking "Damn you!" Kind of like Stewie and Lois in Family Guy. Actually that fits the first cat better but the second one is still adorable.

And it's the cat who's crazy...

Foolz said:

Please no lolcat thread, pls.

I thought it was caturday.

Dead Space Extraction Post Mortem Interview

IGN: So let's chit chat about Extraction. We had a chance to talk to you the day the game was announced, we've reviewed it, and now we're here chatting about it again. We've gone full circle at this point! I'm sure the team is psyched to have the game out there for people to enjoy. There were a lot of skeptics out there -- specifically about the game's on-rails design -- but from what we've seen Extraction converted a lot of people. How has the overall feedback been so far?

Steve: First off many thanks to you and the IGN crew for awarding Extraction Best Wii Shooter of 2009, that literally made our year. The feedback on the game has been solid. We have seen a lot of positive reviews and gamers that have played the game seemed to have genuinely enjoyed the experience. It's really satisfying to see that people now finally understand what a "Guided First Person Experience" meant.

IGN: Have you read or heard about any comments specifically that were funny or insightful about the game? The Dead Space fanbase is pretty vocal...

If you haven't already, check out the video review above. Or if you're like me, watch it again since this game is awesome.

Steve: I've been reading a bunch of the message boards and have stumbled onto a few interesting quips. My favorite was about Gabe Weller and how people hope he is in DS2 because he is such a badass. We also enjoyed seeing all of the comments about the ending of the game, folks tended to like that.

IGN: So let's hit on a few things about the game's development, since that's what this whole shindig is all about. First off, how long did the game take from start to finish? From what you've seen with EA's other Wii properties, was it a shorter, longer, or pretty average dev cycle as far as time goes?

Steve: The game took about 14 months to develop. We spent a bit more time working on the original Dead Space, but with Extraction we had the benefit of a predefined art look, location, weapons and all the other good Dead Space stuff we designed for the first game.

IGN: Visceral Games also had the chance to work with an independent developer on Extraction with Eurocom. How did the relationship between the two companies work out? It's an interesting strategy, since EA is looked at like this huge powerhouse publisher, but the game was really made by two smaller, really passionate teams.

Steve: Partnering with Eurocom went well. The core Visceral folks on Extraction and myself spent a lot of time out in Derby, England working directly with the Eurocom team. Eurocom was eager to make a quality game and with our guidance we are very happy with the results we achieved. As the folks in England would say "It was the mutts nuts".

IGN: Extraction definitely pushed the Wii system in the visual department. Was that a challenge? That may seem like an easy question, but a lot of developers are complacent on Wii's graphical power these days. I'm curious how much work that took to achieve.

Steve: Thanks for the compliment regarding the games visuals, this is an area we are very proud of.

When we set out to make Extraction we knew we had to live up to the visuals found in Dead Space so we made it a priority to push the bar visually on the Wii. Our game design direction really helped us with the visuals as we always knew where we would be pointing the camera. This allowed us to focus our pixels on the area of the screen that mattered most.

That's a good looking game.

As far as the approach other developers are taking I'm not sure how they kick off their projects, but I will say that in any line of work or life for that matter you need to have a plan. If graphics are important make sure you are pushing on them. If developers set off trying to do everything all at once there is a good chance they are going to fail in one area or more. Be sensible with your areas of focus and you should be able to nail them.

IGN: Since Extraction was based on the events previous to the first Dead Space you had source material to work off of in the anime and motion comics. Did that prove to be a challenge with continuity and all that, or did it help out in the end since you had a template?

Steve: Being able to draw from all of our other IP extensions certainly was helpful. Since the team at Visceral created all of the story lines it helped us with nailing down our story and the way it fits into the greater timeline of the Dead Space universe

IGN: Did you take any specific creative liberties from what was established in the anime/comics?

Steve: Not really, it's very important to the Dead Space franchise that we stay true to the fiction so we did our best to do just that.

IGN: Some of the most interesting info we get during these postmortem interviews comes from the content that didn't make it into the game. Any stories on that front? Did you have any enemy types, weapons, or scenarios you thought about and just didn't use?

Steve: Well there were a lot of crazy ideas we talked about throughout development. At one point the story had a guy hiding on the ship who was wearing a cloaking device that made him invisible but also was killing him at the same time.

We had some ideas for other weapons, that we just didn't have time to do at the correct quality level.

Weapon design was as important to the core game as any of the story, characters, or technology.

At one point we were experimenting with a version of Zero-G that let you jump any where you wanted during those sequences. This as you can imagine became very tricky for players as they were used to the guided portion of the game, we focus tested it and it was not very fun.

There was a boss we thought up that would rely heavily on Scent and Sound. He was going to be awesome; you would have to distract him using TK to make a sound away from you while you attempted to flank him. You would wind up killing him by using a trash compactor type of machine that would rip off the flesh on his back exposing his weak spot. I really wish we could have made that guy happen in the shipping game.

We also talked about having Necromorphic Unicorns but somehow that never made it into the game. Go figure. Some of these ideas by the way are completely made up and never were discussed...

IGN: I'm not going to lie: I really wanted to kill a necromorph boss version of Weller while it taunted me with 80's one-liners...

Steve: Weller is awesome, he has that take charge kind of attitude that would make him an asset to any team, or video game website staff...

IGN: What's your take on the prequel story of Dead Space? Is there more to explore there, say in a potential Extraction sequel, or do you think the tale of the USG Ishimura and this specific outbreak has been told to its fullest. If you did get the go-ahead for a Wii sequel are there any areas you'd love to explore specifically?

Steve: The Dead Space Fiction is massive, I mean super duper deep. There are tons of areas to explore in the time frame before Extraction. We hint at some of the stuff in the past in Extraction *SPOILER* specifically the mysterious resource wars. So there is a lot to pull from. Not to mention the discovery of the original Black Marker.

With source material like Extraction's motion comic and anime movie there was plenty to go off of for a prequel Wii offering.

IGN: Ok, a couple wrap-up questions. First off, what's EA's take on the sales for Extraction so far? We would have liked to see more sales personally, but is it considered a "success" yet internally?

Steve: Visceral Games and EA are both very proud of Extraction. We set out to create a high quality Wii game and we feel we nailed just that. Everyone that has seen or played Extraction at the company has high praise for the quality of the game. The team are very proud of what we were able to accomplish with Extraction.

IGN: You've heard the fans clamoring on about it. Is it technically possible to port the original Dead Space to Wii, and would you ever want to do it from a creative, storytelling standpoint?

Steve: I think it is very possible to port the original game. The biggest thing would be making the right compromises and having enough time to do justice to the original.

Just to remind everyone another certain Survival Horror game that was ported to the Wii took almost 6 years of development before showing up on that system. So it's not as easy as flipping a switch to make those types of things happen. Even when you are starting out with a game that runs on very similar hardware to begin with.

Already blasting Necromorphs along with us? Check out our tips and tricks video above.

IGN: And finally, word on the street is that there are hints in Extraction about the events of Dead Space 2. Care to elaborate on that?

Steve: *SPOILER* If you listen to the end dialog in Extraction the survivors set a course for "The Sprawl". That's the location where DS2 takes place.

IGN: Thanks for your time, and congrats again on the release of Extraction. Any final shout out to the fans?

Steve: Thanks again to you and everyone who has supported the Dead Space franchise. It really makes work awesome when you know that passionate people are enjoying the work you do. Thanks again

Foolz said:

"Steve: Thanks again to you and everyone who has supported the Dead Space franchise. It really makes work awesome when you know that passionate people are enjoying the work you do. Thanks again"

All 12 of them!

Hilarious how they dodged the sales question.

If you look at the comments on the interview its the same thing, all about being on rails.

EA really fucked up. Simple as, they killed any commercial success this game could have had by doing that.

And I hear that darkside chronicles might be selling less than the original. I think people are getting sick of on rails games.

gamingeek said:

I think people are getting sick of on rails games.

Finally!

ASK_Story said:

Hey GG, I got DS Extraction! Picked it up at a Wal-Mart by price matching it with a Gamestop's ad! LOL! It was sold out at Gamestop too, those suckers!

I haven't played it yet but I'm looking forward to it. I will write impressions later!

It's about 5 to 6 hrs. Suprisingly short, this is why I can't reccomend it at full price.

The length wouldn't be a problem if it had the traditional pacing of a lightgun game, as you could replay levels for scores and just for enjoyment. But because its got interactive movie like pacing repeat play can be cumbersome to say the least.