It took me a while to figure out why I wasn’t really into Dead Space 2. The realization came somewhat as a surprise to me since the game garnered stellar reviews, and I thoroughly enjoyed butchering swarms of zombified aliens in the first Dead Space. At first I thought it was just the pacing and aesthetic that left me feeling unfulfilled, but I came to realize that I also took issue with protagonist Isaac Clarke’s characterization. In the first Dead Space, Isaac went about his business almost matter-of-factly, as he severed countless necromorph limbs in almost complete silence. I didn’t really need Isaac to say anything for me to empathize. In fact, I didn’t want Isaac to say anything.  Because really, when you’re all alone on a dark spaceship with murderous freaks around every corner, and your dead girlfriend keeps showing up, are there any words that could possibly suffice?

Dead Space 2 places an almost dogmatic emphasis on abrasive and repetitive gore. It’s an emphasis that usurps atmosphere and anticipation: the staples of any good survival horror game. The first iteration is guilty of some of this as well, but the sequel is unapologetic and unrelenting in its pointless blood spattering. This increased visceral emphasis can be traced back to the largely vilified “Your mom hates this” advertising campaign that led up to Dead Space 2’s release. Regardless of whether you found these ads amusing or offensive, they showed us what this game was really all about before any of us killed our first necromorph. The message was fairly clear: This game is so gross it will make your mom cry and wish she had never birthed you. However, subtlety is an important part of the equation in any good survival-horror game, and EA’s message leaves absolutely no room for subtlety. Having already exposed gamers to the series’ main hook, the severing of alien limbs, the sequel should have focused more (not less) on what happens in between the gory combat scenarios. What Dead Space 2 fails to realize is that if every single encounter is supposed to be climactic, then the player is left with no climax.

Both the cracked out pacing and the relentless emphasis on gore in Dead Space 2 revolve around a change in the series I found somewhat puzzling, and this change relates to characterization. In Dead Space, Isaac plays the silent protagonist, serving as a vessel for the player. But just as the sequel plays up cheap, unfulfilled visceral thrills, it also tries to connect with the player on a deeper level. This game attempts to turn its protagonist into a character with a face and a voice. Isaac Clarke removes his bulky mask and shows us what’s underneath: a man that struggles with guilt and despair; a man that pines over a new love interest as he mourns an old one; a man that has feelings. But Isaac’s voice speaks inconsistently. The same voice meant to display this man’s humanity also screams, almost as if it were delighted, every time he stomps a bloody corpse to pieces. One minute Isaac nonchalantly scrapes alien brains off his boots, the next, he shows us his sensitive side. Dead Space 2 tries to show us Isaac Clarke’s soul right after it throws blood in our eyes. As a result, the player gets two polarized Isaacs: 1) The Isaac you play the actual game with, who represents that which “your mom hates.” 2) The Isaac from the cut scenes, who you can supposedly take home to mom. The game’s excessive emphasis on blood, guts and cheap scares undermines Isaac’s emotional turmoil, and his characterization further staggers what is already a poorly paced game.

But perhaps I’m being harsh. The problem of implementing realistic character traits onto a previously silent character is no easy feat. Plenty of other series have tried and failed. But does this imply that certain character types are simply a better fit for certain types of games? It sounds like oversimplification, but there may be something to the argument that genre can conflict with characterization in video games. The Dead Space series attempts to convert Isaac into a developed character, a John Marston or an Ethan Mars, but in the context of the game’s mechanics , pacing and aesthetic, the added “depth” makes far less sense then the silent vessel to which players had grown accustomed.

It’s difficult to talk about characterization in video games without mentioning Bioware, a developer that prides itself on creating provoking narratives and deep characters. Since Bioware aspires to present well-developed characterization, but at the same time give players a say in how they act and react in a game universe, all of their protagonists turn into hybrids of two different character types. Commander Shepard is a strange combination of the courier from Fallout: New Vegas and John Marston from Red Dead Redemption. He is both a blank slate, defined by perks, stats and dialogue choices, and a developed character with his own opinions and emotions. This duality makes Shepard’s characterization feel thin, conflicted and unresolved. Bioware tries to flesh the commander out with impressive voice-acting and camera angles, but there’s simply not much room for complexity in the way he is constructed. In Bioware’s defense, I have yet to see a better compromise for this dilemma—the seemingly unsolvable problem of offering both open-ended narrative and solid character development. The Fallout series opts to present the protagonist as nothing more than a blank canvas. In some ways, no characterization is better than flawed characterization, but this approach has its drawbacks, as well.

From the previous examples we can determine that the silent protagonist compliments the survival horror genre, and blank slate characters work for nonlinear games that emphasize choice. But where does that leave other types of characters? There’s no clear answer to this question. I do find it encouraging that some games are trying to break down conventions regarding genre and characterization. It means the medium is growing instead of remaining stagnant. However, it becomes problematic when the vision for a game’s main character isn’t considered within the context of its implied universe. So yeah, EA, maybe you should have given mom some credit. After all, I hear she’s a good judge of character.