Boss Project V: Dead Space

Boss Project V is more or less a dungeon crawler created by Ephiam. The game's protagonist is a young man named Jason, who recently passed away but due to actions that may or may not be entirely his fault, he cannot enter a peaceful afterlife. He's been sent into a realm called the "Dead Space," and the only way he can reach paradise is by venturing through it, overcoming any obstacle thrown at him in one piece. This is just barely scratching the surface of the game's overall story, which gets more and more twisted (in a good way) the further along you go.

GRAPHICS: 2.5/5 - I found the graphics to be decent. Everything is fairly consistently, and nothing is hideously ugly to the point where you'll be reaching for the F12 button. While the mapping isn't spectacular, it gets the job done. Some areas are really abstract, but given what the Dead Space is, it was totally appropriate. Not the most gorgeous graphics I've ever seen, but I am very obviously not a graphic nazi so they didn't bother me. Ephiam managed to create a dark, haunting atmosphere using well-known Final Fantasy character sets, so he deserves some credit!

MUSIC: 5/5 - Most of the soundtrack comes from various MegaTen titles from the playstation 2 era, so I've heard a few of them before. However, there were a number of songs I didn't recall, and those songs were some of the best ones. Each piece is used really well and does a great job creating whatever atmosphere Ephiam is trying to convey for that particular scene or area. Each track fits, nothing was out of space, and the songs themselves were pretty darn good. Absolutely no complaints here.

STORYLINE: 4/5 - The storyline starts off simple but gets deeper the further along you go. The storyline moved at a decent pace, giving you just enough to want to keep playing to find out more. The main character is Jason, and while you fight with three other people in battle, they don't speak at all and are never acknowledged, so I'm not sure exactly what they were supposed to be. I don't want to spoil the game, but the plot gets somewhat strange with viruses and experiments thrown into the mix, however nothing seemed "random" story-wise and each plot point was explained and made sense, so confusion shouldn't set in unless you're not paying close attention! The only drawbacks for me is that I found one twist in particular pretty predictable and although this is clearly not a character-driven game, I did find some of the supporting cast/villains interchangeable. A little bit of personality to make them distinguishable would have been nice, and I also would have liked to get to know the people who Jason was traveling with a little better as well. Nothing too deep, just a little bit of info on what they were like on Earth, and what they did to end up in the Dead Space in the first place. Overall though, the storyline was great and reminded me a lot of the SNES-era MegaTen games. It's not complicated, but a storyline doesn't need to be complicated to be good.

GAMEPLAY: 4/5 - Fighting in this game can either be frustrating and pretty easy, providing you know what you're doing. Battle-wise, each character use spells of a specific element (Fire, Ice, Earth, Wind, Lightening and Spirit) as well as a host of supporting skills, and you can use the gold you get from the monsters you slay to purchase new abilities. Given that you're constantly fighting, it's pretty easy to build up gold, and several of the skills are so useful (Magic Regen is a LIFE saver!) that character skills will probably the only thing you'll want to spend your cash on. I rarely bought armor and weapons, unless I needed something to increase my speed (speed can all the difference in some fights--sometimes, getting a certain character to act first can change the entire outcome of the battle in your favor). The random encounters don't require much tact to overcome, and the game is kind enough to drop several healing points throughout the area. Running out of magic points should never be an issue, especially you since can recover them in battle anyways by choosing the "defend" option, and you'll never have to travel too far to find a healing spot. The bosses, however, are all difficult but never impossible (I only died twice), and each boss requires a different strategy to beat it. I loved that the game forced you to use the supporting skills at your disposal. In most RPGs, supporting/de-buffering skills can be all but useless, but in this game, those skills will play a key role in your survival. Yes, it may get somewhat annoying spending the first two, at times three, rounds of each boss fight casting regenerate on all of your party members, reflect, and lowering the boss's elemental defenses before you can dish out the damage, but you'll have a tough time surviving if you don't. Each boss presented a new challenge so the game was never boring. You can save anywhere as well, which was a plus.

VERDICT: 4/5 - The game is challenging but rarely enters the realm of cheap-difficulty. The characters were not as distinctive as I would have liked, but then again they're not the focus, and the storyline is dark, interesting, and leaves you wanting to know happens next. If you want to play something that's a little different from the normal/what you're used to, gives this a download.

- Adrian