Poll: SPOILERS Dead Space 2 has gone too far.

[GotMalkAvian]

1. How is it that in a medium that regularly deals with drug abuse and trafficking, murder, torture, rape, prostitution, violence, gambling, mental illness, terrorism, and theft, children seem to be the only true taboo left? It might just be me, but I think virtual children, just like any other virtual humans, are fair game.
2. The creatures you're fighting aren't really babies anymore. The necromorphs are horribly mutated and mutilated creatures using human bodies as a kind of combination template/host. They're no more human than a piece of beef jerky is a fully-functioning cow.

 

[Ickorus]

IT'S SUPPOSED TO BE DISTURBING.

If this were a movie, it'd be praised for it's emotional depth and shit.

This is pretty much exactly what I would have said.

Also about the sacred comment:

The monsters don't give a crap what is sacred and what isn't, that's kinda the point of it.

 

[Soviet Steve]

Part of horror can be to make you do horrible things. It doesn't all have to be bogeymen jumping out of cupboards.

 

[jackpipsam]

devs are going to far on things now

 

[Dead Eye II]

Psh you think that is offensive? Go play FEAR 2, now that is a giant holysh*t part of gaming history.

Spoiler

You, the player, get raped by a dead woman and she has your child.

cant agree more with this, i shit my self when that happend.

i dont think the whole shooting the crawlers is a that big a deal, you on a freaking space station full of necromorphs that only have one purpose, to kill and make more necromorphs, there not gona stop at kids its like dantes inferno when you first incounter the damned babies its to make you hesitate

 

[Bad Cluster]

SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS

you have been warned.

basically, im playing thorugh Dead Space 2 now, im about 3 hours through, and i'm shooting babies. i've already shot about 60 children no older than 12, but im now walking thorugh a nursery, listening to crying children and shooting mutated babies, which explode.

fuck MW2's airport scene, fuck Medal of Honours Taliban, this strikes me as over the line. had i known in advance there was this sort of content i would probably not have bought it.

Well, you can always go and hug those cuddly little babies, like that nurse behind the glass in the first room.
But you didn't! You had to shoot them!!!

Now seriously, the game has the proper rating, it says it all on the box. What did you expect to see there when you made the purchase?

PS
Did you know that if you throw any light object with kinesis at those babies, their heads fall off, they don't explode and you can use them as grenades?

 

[Noxshadow]

Dead Space 2 is a horror game. It's designed to make you as uncomfortable as possible. Having packs of necromorph children is a brilliant way to do that. And the tiny exploding fetuses are a brilliant idea. Gameplay wise, they are really dangerous but also hard to hit, or spot in a crowd. But on a psychological level, they prey on our instinct to protect and help something as small and vulnerable as an infant.
Besides, Dead Space 2 is made by Visceral Games, who delight in gleefully bandying about this kind of horrible content. People who complain about them 'going to far' COUGHDANTESINFERNOCOUGH are just feeding the trolls.

 

[Doc Cannon]

Why is people so touchy about babies in horror fiction?
Reminds me of this huge discussion I had about the maternity ward scene in AVP Requiem.

The best thing about the exploding babies in DS2 is that I didn't feel they were included just for shock value, they were there because they needed small exploding enemies (and to explain what happened to all the babies, duh).

Also: maybe they included exploding babies to prevent people from complaining about the Pack (the children necromorphs).

EDIT: And it was hilarious when the woman gets blown up after hugging one.

 

[Pcpfanatic]

Nothing is sacred when there is money at stake.

Nothing is sacred, ever.

 

[H20 Pirate]

I don't really have an issue with it, I just saw it as a crash course in parenting.........

But on a serious note there are many books, films, and pieces of art that can be considered to be crossing the line, this is not really one of them, in fact I've seen more disturbing things on Deviant Art.

 

[ThePinkAcidSmurf]

It's a game, it's allowed as long as you've been warned about possibly disturbing content.

 

[LordLoudmouth]

you kill babies in the first one too, so no big deal.
Also, it aint anything new: Drakengard the first one have you kill giant man eating babies while riding a dragon.

 

[Jonesy911]

I'm actually more upset that I'm killing grown people who used to have relationships and familys etc. Babies have done jack shit so I dont really care, it sounds psycotic but the little devil on my shoulder says I'm normal.

Also don't buy the sequel without playing the original silly >

 

[Caliostro]

had i known in advance there was this sort of content i would probably not have bought it.

Ahem:

"In Dead Space? 2, you join Isaac Clarke, the Systems Engineer from Dead Space, as he wakes up three years after the horrific events on the USG Ishimura. The Ishimura was a Planetcracker-class starship besieged by grotesque reanimations of its dead crew, known as ?Necromorphs.? After unearthing a strange artifact known as the Marker, Isaac finds himself on the Sprawl, a giant space station in orbit around Saturn. Unable to remember how he got here and plagued with demented visions of his dead girlfriend Nicole, he must survive another nightmarish outbreak of Necromorphs as he fights his way towards an answer he hopes will end all the chaos."

You didn't expect THIS game to have shocking content? Really? What, honestly, did you expect to find? "Hug a unicorn"? "Pet a child"?

This is the same game that taunts as one of it's key features that you can "strategically dismember your friends in multiplayer". If you honestly bought it expecting any less that kind of says more than you'd like about your cerebral capacity...

 

[Samurai Goomba]

DOOM 3 had evil flying demon babies, and that game is old now.

Hopefully not everyone has said that already.

 

[KaiRai]

In my head I was shooting my sister and her smarmy 12-going-on-22 year old friends with their stupid JLS tshirts.

Too far? Absolutely not.

OT (I guess): Dead Space 2 was my first experience with the Dead Space series and I think it's absolutely amazing.

 

[ShadowsofHope]

It amazes me that contemporary audiences can still get offended by things like this. It amazes me even more that said easily offended audience would even consider such a product. You don't even have to have done your research to know it would involve something horrific. Aside from that 18 rating, surely you must've known what the original was about. And that the original involved shooting new born babies as well, called Lurkers.

Yeah I have to admit I wouldn't be bothered. I'm saving it for a spring purchase so I haven't played it yet. The only thing I'd say is that it's not a weakness to be horrified by such imagery.

Not everyone said he was "weak" for having the rant. Just that it would be more reasonable if the "babies" in Dead Space 1/2 were still babies when they attack you, and not mindless necromorphs that want to rend your flesh. Or actually resembling a human being besides having two arms, two legs and a head anymore. If you are uncomfortable by this fact, then the game succeeds at that it is trying to do. Nothing on the Sprawl is safe anymore, and no one is left behind unscathed by the necromorph infestation. That is the point.

It's all gone to hell, at this point.

 

[Rancid0ffspring]

Snip

Did you play the first one?

You do realise the wall crawlers with the 3 tentacles are babies too right?

As for The Pack and the explodey babies, whilst I though it was very dark, you do need to take into account you are in a human city in space. What do you think would happen to the children or babies? Maybe the Necromorphs could simply ignore them because they are obviously consientious and have morals about innocence.

I appreciate what you are saying but I like the the game because it's a very grim psychological horror.

Think about it... The Xenomorphs in Aliens didn't ignore children.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

Hell, I'd still try and shoot them even if they weren't zombies.

(thinks back to wasting a bunch of ammo on Baby Marie in The Pitt)