Dead Space: Downfall Blu-ray Disc Review

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Title: Dead Space: Downfall

Media: Blu-ray Disc

Region: A

Genre: Animated Sci-Fi Horror

Starring The Voices Of: Nika Futterman, Bruce Boxleitner, Kevin Michael Richardson, Jim Cummings, and Kelly Hu.

Writers: Jimmy Palmotti and Justin Gray

Story And Characters Based On The Electronic Arts Video Game Dead Space

Director: Chuck Patton

Feature length: 74 minutes

Extras: Deleted Scene, Trailers, Photo Gallery, Isolated Soundtrack Cheat Codes, and Portable Digital Copy

Languages: English Dolby TrueHD 5.1 Surround Sound

Subtitles: English Subtitles For The Deaf and Hearing Impaired and Spanish Language Subtitles

Packaging: Blue BD Case

Sound: Dolby TrueHD 5.1 Surround Sound

Year of Blu-ray Disc Release: 2008

Home Video Distributor: Anchor Bay Entertainment & Starz Home Entertainment

MPAA Rating: Not Rated

Reviewer: Mark A. Rivera

When I was in grade school I had aspirations of becoming a journalist, but around the early 1980s and through high school I became interested in video games and then wanted to be a video game designer. I even entered a contest where I submitted an idea for a video game and won a prize though I don’t exactly recall what the idea was and how many people won. For all I know everyone who entered won something. Then I fell out of video games completely and fell into film and rediscovered my passion for writing. So perhaps it is no coincidence that ten years ago I fell into the world of online journalism and film reviewing, which sort of combines elements of traditional print journalism, writing about films and TV shows and the web design aspects of running my own site for the last nine years has put me into at least a small aspect of presenting things through a computer visually so in a way I could say I have combined elements of all three vocations into one and there are things I’m working on outside of site too. Video games have changed a lot as well. Now when a major game gets released, it not only released on three or four platforms. Now there are making of books, novels, comic books, toys, and animated films. Beyond that if the project is super successful, there will be a live action film series that will follow. So in a sense just as my own personal interests merged, the world of video games has merged with publishing and filmmaking and I am pretty sure that there is going to be a feature film based on Electronic Arts video game Dead Space to be released in the next two years or so. Electronic Arts has been around a great many years. I think I used to play some of their games on a friend’s Commodore 64 back in the mid 1980s. Now as a part of the multimedia tie-in that covers the back-story to the game from different perspectives comes the animated prequel movie to the EA game from Anchor Bay Entertainment entitled Dead Space: Downfall.

In the future a monolithic artifact was discovered that for a great deal of humanity would be perceived as proof of the existence of God. This religion will grow in political power as all organized religions do and subsequently will play a role in the exploration of deep space. Two hundred years later, on a distant barren world a second marker is discovered with strange hieroglyphs on it. Since up until this point, there has not been any evidence of life outside of Earth, there is great interest to see that the second marker is excavated and shipped back to Earth for further study. The USG Ishimura, a vessel that “cracks planets” for valuable minerals to be sent back to Earth is tasked with delivering the second marker too, By then strange things have already begun to happen on the mining colony planet side. People are committing suicide and or murdering each other and it doesn’t take long for the ship’s morgue to become filled after the artifact is loaded aboard. Then all hell breaks lose when after cracking the planet, something long dormant within the second marker activates an alien entity that rewrites the human DNA of victims and the dead in order to reproduce in a savage onslaught.

Presented in a 1080p widescreen high definition (1.78:1) aspect ratio with AVC encoding and an aggressive English Dolby TrueHD 5.1 Surround Soundtrack, Dead Space: Downfall looks and sounds impressive with a melding of cell animation and CGI enhancements. My only gripe was that after the film was over, I now either have to play the game or wait for the inevitable feature film to see what happens next. That is not to say that Dead Space: Downfall ends on a cliffhanger, it is more or less a self contained sci-fi horror tale that is perfect for Halloween viewing, but it is also a sequel meant to get the viewer prepared for the game and in both respects Dead Space: Downfall is successful. The traditional animation style is a bit like a mix of anime and Heavy Metal. In fact this could have been another entry in the Heavy Metal animated feature series were it not a video game prequel. The picture is pristine and soundtrack is effective and enveloping. I really enjoyed watching this film. English Subtitles for the Deaf and Hearing Impaired and Spanish Language Subtitles are encoded onto the Blu-ray Disc as options too. The film’s music score can also be listened via an isolated music track and the disc is BD Live enabled with hidden cheat codes for the game. A gallery of concept art and a trailer for both Dead Space: Downfall and the game Dead Space wrap up the extra value materials on the Blu-ray Disc. The menus run fluidly and are well rendered. There is also a bonus digital copy for PCs on a separate DVD included within the BD case.

Dead Space: Downfall is available on Blu-ray Disc now at retailers on and offline courtesy of Anchor Bay Entertainment and Starz Home Entertainment.

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