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One of the biggest challenges for a remake, besides being appealing to new generations, is the ability to keep even those who have already played the original game interested. Developers from EA Motive, the authors of the Dead Space remake, took on this task with great dedication, developing the so-called voltage regulator.
Dimmer, specifically designed for Dead Space Remake, is a dynamic system that constantly generates new situations in order to maintain high tension and minimize predictability of events. Eric Baptizat (Senior Game Director), Dan Kim (Senior Systems Designer) and Steven Ciciola (Lead Assistant Level Designer) detailed this in their columns on the Electronic Arts official website.
“The dimmer is a way to control the voltage level of the player to ensure that there is always something going on. It allows us to control emotions and tension, as well as keep the player on their toes and alert at all times.” Baptizat said.
“The system includes content organization, regeneration and synchronization,” added Kim. “According to our calculations, there are more than 1200 unique events in the system with a huge variety of possible combinations. Various elements such as changing sound or lighting, fog, steam, regenerating enemies. All this, combined with each other in a layered way, creates tense situations.
Ciciola gave an example of how a voltage regulator works:
“We monitor the intensity of the game as we move from room to room. Maybe a light room, with a few sounds here and there, and that’s it. But then you can enter another room and all of a sudden a Flesh Tearer will pop out of a vent in the wall, and the lights will stop working, plus the environment will be fogged up and the intensity will skyrocket. But then it’s time to take a break. Because we’re essentially monitoring the peaks and troughs of the voltage to make sure the game isn’t just a continuous sequence of high-intensity events. It would be emotionally exhausting.”
Dead Space Remake Coming January 27th for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X | S and PC.