Dead Space started life on the original Xbox

by Jem Alexander { Feb 12th 2009 at 11:45PM }

It seems that Dead Space has been around a lot longer than we'd have thought, originally taking form on the original Xbox. You can check out some early footage from the game in a video found after the break. There's not a whole lot to see really; it's very dark footage. What you can see looks very much like the Dead Space we know and love. Still, it's always interesting to see a game concept's humble beginnings. Plus, it might give us an indication as to what to expect from the Wii version.

[Via VG247]

Tags: dead-space, EA, EA-redwood-shores

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

Gun Barrier @ Feb 12th 2009 11:49PM

i guess this makes it easier to out it on the wii.

Eh @ Feb 13th 2009 12:12PM

Theyd still have to tone down the graphics

Cash @ Feb 13th 2009 8:28AM

Aside from more blue colors, it looks the same to me. I was able to recognize every level shown. Weapons looked a little different, but other then that, looked like a beta build of the finished product.

Dr Jeckyl and Mr ESC. @ Feb 13th 2009 12:08AM

Yeah I remember the Asteroid level,I died a lot in that level the first time.

flanker22 @ Feb 13th 2009 12:09AM

i dunno about that game seems incredibly close to the final product. plasma cutter still looks the same (maybe not the projectile), even the zero gravity spinning ore was the same. that looks incredible for a xbox1 game.

DemonGSides @ Feb 13th 2009 1:58AM

People tend to forget how awesome the original Xbox's graphics were.

Poisoned Al @ Feb 13th 2009 7:19AM

Yes. When people think of lst gen, they think PS2. The first Xbox was WAY ahead of that thing (it was released a lot later before the funboys get in a tisy). It was huge for a reason!

zuburi @ Feb 12th 2009 11:56PM

I could've sworn I remembered hearing about an unnamed horror game set in space during the original Xbox's lifespan.

Of course, it could just be another acid flashback.

snarfoogle @ Feb 13th 2009 6:36AM

That was probably Halo 2. Oh god, the plasma/BR combo... the horror... the horror....

B3astofthe3ast @ Feb 12th 2009 11:57PM

Note to EA: Copy and Paste RE4Wii's controls onto the port, and you'll have an awesome game.

ShadowMonkey987 @ Feb 13th 2009 6:02PM

you do know that dead space has a run and gun style meaning you can walk while you shoot

in res evil 4 you stand and shoot you cant move while you shoot

so copy and pasting those controls would either make the game alot harder or just not make sense because people expect to move and shoot not just stand and shoot

WiNG [XBL&Steam: WiNGSPANTT] from lifeinagame.com @ Feb 13th 2009 9:46AM

Note to Beast of the East:

You never played Dead Space. The controls are nearly perfect.

Jerk Face @ Feb 13th 2009 10:05AM

They really were perfect. I can't think of a single aspect of that game that wasn't, to be honest. I love me some Dead Space.

WiredKnight @ Feb 13th 2009 2:48PM

Just to be perfectly clear, Dead Space does not have "run and gun."

When are people going to realize that there's a medium between "run and gun" and "stop and pop?"

SirFishouse @ Feb 14th 2009 12:01AM

Heh, Stop and pop. Sounds like your mom's favorite medium.

Chris Are @ Feb 13th 2009 12:01AM

Looks more like a shooter and less like a survival horror game- otherwise pretty damn similar. Makes me want to play it again.

Gehodra @ Feb 13th 2009 6:41PM

In other words... it's the same...

Skaz @ Feb 13th 2009 12:03AM

Heck of a lot of blue. Looks pretty impressive to original Xbox standards... I think...

Fanboy #23 @ Feb 13th 2009 12:33AM

Xbox games always looked better than GC and PS2 games.

R.I.P Original Xbox ='(.

megapenguinx @ Feb 13th 2009 4:41AM

We all know the PS2 had the most dated graphics of last generation (I hate using that term). But the Xbox didn't have the best, little known fact: the Gamecube did oddly enough.

Poisoned Al @ Feb 13th 2009 7:23AM

Yes it did in the strange, parallel universe you live in megapenguinx.

The Dark Wayne @ Feb 13th 2009 7:35AM

Xbox-# GPU and system chipset: 233 MHz "NV2A" ASIC. Co-developed by Microsoft and NVIDIA.

* Geometry engine: 115 million vertices/second, 125 million particles/second (peak)
* 4 pixel pipelines with 2 texture units each
* 932 megapixels/second (233 MHz x 4 pipelines), 1,864 megatexels/second (932 MP×2 texture units) (peak)
o Peak triangle performance (32pixel divided from filrate): 29,125,000 32-pixel triangles/s raw or w. 2 textures and lit.
+ 485,416 triangles per frame at 60fps
+ 970,833 triangles per frame at 30fps
* 8 textures per pass, texture compression, full scene anti-aliasing (NV Quincunx, supersampling, multisampling)
* Bilinear, trilinear, and anisotropic texture filtering
* Similar to the GeForce 3 and GeForce 4 PC GPUs

Gamecube- * 162 MHz "Flipper" LSI. 180 nm NEC eDRAM-compatible process. Co-developed by Nintendo and ArtX.
* 8 Gflops
* 4 pixel pipelines with 1 texture unit each[7]
* TEV "Texture EnVironment" engine (similar to Nvidia's GeForce256 "register combiners")
* Fixed-function hardware transform and lighting (T&L). 12+ million polygons/s in-game.[9]
* 648 megapixels/second (162 MHz × 4 pipelines), 648 megatexels/second (648 MP × 1 texture units) (peak)
o Peak triangle performance: 20,250,000 32pixel triangles/s raw and with 1 texture and lit
+ 337,500 triangles a frame at 60 FPS
+ 675,000 triangles a frame at 30 FPS
* 8 texture layers per pass, texture compression, full scene anti-aliasing[9]
* 8 simultaneous hardware light
* Bilinear, trilinear, and anisotropic texture filtering
* Multi-texturing, bump mapping, reflection mapping, 24-bit z-buffer
* 24-bit RGB/32-bit RGBA color depth

*
o Hardware limitations sometimes require a 6r+6g+6b+6a mode (18-bit color), resulting in color banding.

* 720 × 480 interlaced or progressive scan
* Integrated audio processor: Custom 81 MHz Macronix DSP
o Instruction memory: 8 KiB RAM, 8 KiB ROM
o Data memory: 8 KiB RAM, 4 KiB ROM
o 64 channels 16-bit 48 kHz ADPCM[9]
o Dolby Pro Logic II encoded within stereophonic output
I dont even unerstand any of that but the xbox has bigger numbers so im gonna say no

Foetoid @ Feb 13th 2009 8:47AM

Ouch fanboy. After playing many many GC and Xbox games, i can safely say that Twilight Princess looked better than Fable 1 and both Prime games looked better than both Halo games. The GC was slower than the Xbox on paper, but the powerPC architecture, coppermine CPU and faster ram let it run games that looked as good as, and sometimes better than, Xbox 1 games. It's only multiformat games that suffered since the tiny 1.8gb GC disks meant multiformat games became compressed and ugly. Games built from the ground up for both looked better on GC. You Phail.

Dirty @ Feb 13th 2009 10:25AM

Wow, you guys are still arguing about this? BTW Genesis was wayyyy better than SNES.

Xta Large, Unfanboy Extraordinaire @ Feb 13th 2009 10:53AM

If you honestly think that the GC is more powerful, Foetoid, fine, but don't use anecdote as a way to 'prove your point'. The Xbox was a more powerful console than the Gamecube, inarguably. Yeah, the Prime games (or at least Echoes) looked better than the Halo games.

Ever play The Chronicles of Riddick? Get it, or just look at some videos. That game was more technologically impressive than any of the games avaliable for the Gamecube.

And Twilight Princess certainly did not look better than Fable. Disgusting textures at times, some iffy environments, and other issues hold the game back. The art style of TP was good (though a little uninspired), but come on.

Xta Large, Unfanboy Extraordinaire @ Feb 13th 2009 10:58AM

Oh, and, the Xbox was doing HD before HD was cool.

Kizzle @ Feb 13th 2009 1:52PM

Foetoid: "can safely say that Twilight Princess looked better than Fable 1 and both Prime games looked better than both Halo games."

Wrong. Remind me never to get in a car with you, your idea of "safe" is asinine.

Skaz @ Feb 14th 2009 3:05AM

Why certain games look better than others on stronger hardware? The sense of design and choices of where they put highlights on their characters. Rogue Leader on Gamecube still wows me, and I think Killzone 2 still looks many times better than Crysis, no matter how many "volumetric clouds" it may have.

WiiFTW @ Feb 13th 2009 12:10AM

WII PORT CONFIRMED

LiqwidZero @ Feb 13th 2009 7:15AM

It's been confirmed for some time now, actually.

Levisemail1347 @ Feb 13th 2009 12:10AM

Well, dead space's graphics engine didn't look much different that Doom 3 to me. Obviously there are some differences, but I think the game shines because of the good art direction and 1080p output (for once!). This doesn't surprise me that much.

I am looking forward to the Wii game quite a bit.

JetPogi @ Feb 13th 2009 12:23AM

It's an AA game but it could have been a AAA if it came out last gen that looks really good.

fischju @ Feb 13th 2009 12:25AM

Harsh burn on the Wii. ...but sadly true :(

WiredKnight @ Feb 13th 2009 12:29AM

So THIS is the real reason they revamped the entire concept for Dark Sector.

All joking aside, there's something to be said for early prototyping.

MrKlorox @ Feb 13th 2009 12:51AM

I thought the gameplay style felt rather last-gen when I played it. This pretty much explains why.

jorojoserojas @ Feb 13th 2009 12:53AM

That looked pretty damn impressive. I'm officially intrigued by the Wii Dead Space game now.

DWells55 @ Feb 13th 2009 3:17AM

Not to be anti-Wii, but I doubt the Wii version will look as good as the Xbox version. This game was late into the Xbox's lifecycle when developers knew how to really use the system and it's arguably a more powerful system anyways. The Wii is yet to produce graphics as good as later Xbox titles such as Black (not that great a game, but it looked good).

snarfoogle @ Feb 13th 2009 6:37AM

@DWells: Sick burn, but you're right. RE4Wii looks worse than RE4Cube. :\

dronesensor @ Feb 13th 2009 2:17PM

totally sick burn, bro! let's go cruise the dunes in our quads, brah, they're hella sick tight right now!

(saying "sick burn" unironically automatically makes you an idiot.)

oh, and the guy who said RE4Wii looked worse than the original needs new eyes. or, he's an idiot, too. either way; their own opinions discredit themselves by how dumb/uninformed they are.

Michael @ Feb 13th 2009 12:53AM

am i actually watching a video, of someone watching a video...wow lol

The Dark Wayne @ Feb 13th 2009 7:46AM

that's deep man, like far out

eldee @ Feb 13th 2009 1:26AM

hahahaa.. love the little Wii burn at the end of that post.

mgsrocks1 @ Feb 15th 2009 9:52PM

What burn? You might want to check your eyes...

Bobby S. @ Feb 13th 2009 2:03AM

Great graphics, I guess this would have been one of the last Xbox games to come out for the original console.

One thing though, if the game was already pretty far into production; why did it take another 3 years until it came out on current gen consoles?

Either way, looked awesome back then as it does now.

Poisoned Al @ Feb 13th 2009 7:30AM

You would have to redo EVERYTHING, else it would look like crap. Everything needed to be remodeled, everything needed to be reskinned and a new engine had to be made. This shit takes time.

EclipseCDN @ Feb 13th 2009 9:27AM

LOL! Your giving the Wii too much credit on that one -- try running the original Halo against pretty much any Wii game. That old box had more power than the Wii, no doubt about it. That and you know...it had discreet 5.1 surround sound -- the Wii doesn't have that either.

Just think, Dead Space minus proper surround sound and high end graphics. Sure it'll be good, it just wont be great.

dronesensor @ Feb 13th 2009 2:21PM

hahahaha. you need new eyes. or a new brain.

if you think halo 1 (or halo 2, for that matter) look better than, say, metroid prime 3, you're either: a) a complete and utter moron, b) a troll, c) haven't played MP3, or d) all of the above. in any case, you're an idiot and anyone who knows their shit can tell you you're wrong.

EclipseCDN @ Feb 13th 2009 4:37PM

No I haven't played MP3 -- I've been told it's a great game though. I loved the first MP - total classic. I'm actually surprised we don't see more games like it, just because it's such a great game.

That said I stand by my comments. I did a lot of homework on the Wii, it's CPU and it's GPU. It's a hobby of mine (for instance, my rig at home has a CPU overclocked by about 70%, took liquid to do it) to read up on this stuff and understand as much as I can about it. When I ran my little comparison of Halo vs Wii, it was a long time ago ... right after launch. I figured we'd take a high end first pary launch xbox game (halo) and put it up against a high end first party launch wii game (zelda).

Before I go any further, one qualifying statement - I'm not comparing how good say one game looks over the other but rather the technical complexity of the scene being rendered on the screen at a given time. The Wii was hooked up to a 30" HD screen with component cables @ 480P output while the xbox was hooked up to a 24" sony trinitron TV with composite cables, so it was outputting at 480i.

Probably the biggest thing that stood out to me when looking at zelda on the Wii was just how "flat" all the surfaces looked. Halo seemed to be applying shader effects to every surface, so you got this sense of light playing across the different guns and characters. We also noticed a lot of reflection in Halo along with some very nice draw distances and reasonably complex AI behaviors with a good number of entities on screen. Zelda on the other hand seemed to have simpler looking environments with a lack of shader effects on pretty much any surface (so you didn't get the sense that light was moving about the scene). We also noticed a real lack of reflections of pretty much anything (even the water in the area we were in wasn't reflecting elements of the world around it) and the scenes seemed to be less complex than the ones shown in halo.

So I was comparing Zelda to Halo, launch title to launch title. I figured zelda should have looked miles better given that the platform it was launching on came out 5 years after the launch of the original xbox. I was honestly disappointed- I really wanted zelda to look great -- I really wanted this platform to be awesome but it let me down.

All that said I still think that the original xbox has more processing power than the Wii. MP3 probably looks awesome, (maybe even better than the first halo) but does it look as good as Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory or Escape from Butcher Bay? I doubt it - mind you it doesn't need to look as good as those games (it's about art direction right?).

Last point - Dead Space on Wii is going to be lacking in both surround sound realization (sorry, but Pro Logic II isn't the same as 5.1 discreet) and the graphics themselves will be limited in many way. I'm glad EA is making it - it's a great franchise that deserves to make money, but man -- the Wii version is going to be lacking.