While there’s no release window forThe Callisto Protocolyet, interest is growing in the debut title from Striking Distance Studios. The sci-fi horror game will be set on the titular moon of Jupiter in a prison colony, and it’s worth noting that development ofThe Callisto Protocolis being headed up by Glen Schofield, who helped to co-create the popularDead Spaceseries.
Unexpectedly, for a survival-horror set in 2320,The Callisto Protocolis set in the same universe asPUBG. This oddness aside, it seems from everything seen so far that the title will share more similarities with Schofield’s previous work.Dead Spaceis probably the most famous sci-fi horror gaming series, though the third title drew criticism for moving away from its survival roots, so here’s howThe Callisto Protocolcan avoid making the same mistakes.
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One of the most difficult questions when creating a sense of fear in a survival-horror game is how to handle weapons. Many different approaches have been tried, with some games avoiding weaponry altogether, while others heavily limit ammo availability or weapon durability. Thefirst twoDead Spacegameswent for limited availability, forcing players to conserve their ammo when faced with the Necromorph hordes.
While there was an upgrade system to improve weapons, it was limited to minor stat increases. InDead Space 3however, the upgrade system was massively expanded, allowing players to create and combine their own weaponry. This choice has borne a lot of the blame for the thirdDead Spacetitle’s failure to live up to its predecessors and its shift away from survival-horror. With care and experimentation, players could create all kinds of powerful, ammo-efficient weaponry. This had the effect of quickly turning them from the hunted to the hunters, a mistake thatThe Callisto Protocolwill have to be carefulto avoid.
While powerful weapons can easily dull the sense of fear in a survival-horror game, adding a second player can be just as bad.Dead Space 3was the first game in the series to include co-op, and many fans noted that the addition of a second player was a factor in the game’s shift toward action-horror.
Truly inciting a sense of fear in a player is difficult enough, but doing so with two at once is even harder. If one of the players is less immersed, then it can easily drag their partner out of the game too. Having a friend to lean on can help people make light of anything, which is a real problem when it comes to creating a survival-horror atmosphere. While we don’t know whetherThe Callisto Protocolwill have co-operative gameplayso far, Striking Distance Studios will have to be very careful if it chooses to include it.
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The Ghost at the Feast
Of allcriticized features inDead Space 3, perhaps the one that stirred the most anger was the inclusion of microtransactions. Seven years on, and microtransactions in single-player titles are still a highly contentious issue. At the time, Visceral Games and publisher Electronic Arts drew huge amounts of ire following the announcement of its inclusion.
To make matters worse, the microtransactions were tied to the game’s crafting system, allowing players to buy the resources they needed to build high-tier weaponry. While these resources could also be found in the world, it was time-consuming to collect them. The idea of players paying, not to improve the game but to actively destroy the sense of fear that made the first twoDead Spacetitles so loved, was a hot-button topic among fans and critics.
It was later revealed by the game’s Creative Director Ben Wanat that the original pitch forDead Space 3had neither microtransactions nor action-heavy elements, and it was the intervention of publisher Electronic Arts that brought these changes about. The good news for playersgetting hyped forThe Callisto Protocolis that the new survival-horror title will be published by South Korean company Krafton. While Krafton have produced several games with microtransactions in the past, it has almost exclusively been multiplayer, free-to-play titles.
The Callisto Protocolwill launch in 2022 for PC and unspecified consoles.
