A spiritual successor to the incredible Dead Space with the survival-horror master Glen Schofield leading the development while getting total freedom to do whatever he wants. Needless to say, I was hyped for this release since I was so ready to experience a masterclass in horror games once again. The Callisto Protocol certainly looks and sounds its part but is it as entertaining and thrilling as Dead Space? Let’s find out.
One last job
The story of The Callisto Protocol kicks off with our protagonist Jacob Lee, a cargo ship pilot that’s on his way to deliver his final job but sadly became a victim of fate. It all goes south when his ship is attacked by a group of rebels led by Dani Nakamura, the group wanted to hijack the ship going during its flight between Black Iron Prison and Europe. This results in some heavy shooting, forcing you to make an emergency landing on the closest planet, the icy Callisto. The beginning of the game is just disaster after disaster since you were forced to crash land your ship on Callisto, a planet you didn’t have any permission to land on, things only get worse for Jacob. Your co-pilot died in the crash and the first thing you’ll face on Callisto are the bars of your cell. The security didn’t want you here so the safest place for you on the planet seems to be the cell. Not exactly a warm welcome.
A game where you’re stuck in prison on a distant cold planet isn’t fun to play so the true plot kicks in a couple of minutes after your crash. The planet is populated with a dense population of Biophages, mutants that will go in for the kill no matter what. Before you know it, the Black Iron Prison is crawling with Biophages and you’ll need to find a way to escape to safety. Not exactly an original plot but it kicks the story into gear.
Dark atmosphere
When I started playing The Callisto Protocol I had high hopes. With Glen Schofield leading the project there’s no way around comparing this game to the iconic Dead Space games. During my first minutes, I remained very hopeful since the team really nailed that dark and unsettling atmosphere of being isolated on a hostile planet. The game is gorgeously created and watching the story unfold in those beautiful cut scenes never felt like a punishment. The overall atmosphere and sound design truly are amazing and are by far some of the better parts of the game. I played this on my Xbox Series X and never faced game-breaking performance issues. I love how dark and gory this world is with danger lurking behind every corner. During some moments this reminded me of the feeling I got while playing Dead Space for the first time. You’re never safe here and you always need to prepare for some brutal combat. Although the game certainly has an amazing visual style that will suck you into the world, it sadly isn’t enough to keep you entertained or on the edge of your seat throughout the entire horror adventure. The main issue with The Callisto Protocol is its combat.
Linear and predictable combat
Besides the atmosphere, combat is the crucial gameplay element and sadly it falls short. You won’t find a lot of ammo in the world, which makes sense since you’re fighting mutants on a prison planet, so you’ll have to rely on your melee skills. When you’re facing one enemy at a time, the melee combat works perfectly fine, it’s pretty brutal and the controls feel rough, just like a real fight with a mutant would. It’s not easy to take out a mutant with your melee weapons but it’s frustratingly difficult when they attack in packs. The issue is the way you control Jacob. The dodging mechanic isn’t as precise as you would hope for so I dodge straight into another enemy’s attack multiple times, resulting in a new death. Dying is part of the game, hence the countless of epic dying animations. I don’t have a problem with harder games or games where you die a lot but I do have a problem when this is a result of lackluster controls. Dodging and fighting a group of enemies with your melee weapon is just frustrating and not something that could have been solved with a new patch. This is a gameplay problem and it seems like the developers intentionally created clunky controls to give you an extra layer of fear and realism, similar to what the first Resident Evil game did. The big difference however is the fact that it feels extremely unfair in The Callisto Protocol. There’s no fun in dodging and landing directly into the claws of another mutant, there’s nothing realistic about that, to be honest.
To make it even worse, the game follows a rather linear path with a lack of variation when it comes to the enemies. At first, you’ll get scared by the mutants and your first encounters will definitely send shivers down your spine but when you’re facing the same type of enemy over and over again, the horror gets lost and swaps places for boredom. It’s like in horror movies where they show you the monster in the opening minutes and expect you to be on the edge of your seat each and every time the monster pops up again. That’s not how horror works and I was expecting a game like this to understand the basic principles of good horror. It’s a shame really because the foundations certainly are there and while I was playing this I wanted to love it as much as I love the Dead Space games but sadly, there’s too much going wrong in The Callisto Protocol. Besides the lack of variation, the game also struggles with countless bugs, performance issues and automatic save points right before you die, forcing you to reboot the game to one of the earlier checkpoints.
Conclusion:
The Callisto Protocol could have been one of the best new IPs of this year but sadly fails to deliver. The foundations are all there but the gameplay and technical performance keep it from reaching its true potential. It’s a mediocre but good-looking horror experience that could be great to pick up next Halloween when you’re able to buy it for ten bucks. As for now, stay away from this and wait for the Dead Space Remaster instead.
