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{{quote| ''"[[Ironic Nursery Rhyme|Though I know not what you are, twinkle, twinkle little star...]]"''}}
 
''Dead Space'' is a video game released for the PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. It is the first game in the ''[[Dead Space (Franchiseseries)|Dead Space]]'' series.
 
[[Closed Circle|The game takes place in the Ishimura]], a spaceship of the Planet Cracker class, a series of ships which find mineral-rich planets and literally lift whole chunks of them into space for mining. During a mining excavation on a faraway planet, the miners discover a strange artifact of apparently alien origin. The artifact, dubbed the Marker, was apparently causing problems amongst the colonists who were working on the surface of the planet. Eventually, it's decided to transport the Marker to the Ishimura. [[It Got Worse|It did not end well.]]
 
Luckily (or not), a [[Distress Call|distress call]] managed to get sent, and a crew of (two) [[Space Marines|space marines]], led by Sergeant Zach Hammond, is sent to investigate. Along with him are two engineers, tasked with helping repair any damage done to the Ishimura that might have caused the distress call: systems engineer Kendra Daniels and [[The Engineer|mechanical/electronic engineer]] [[The Hero|Isaac]] [[Action Survivor|Clarke.]] Clarke also has a personal reason for undertaking the mission: his [[Distressed Damsel|girlfriend]] Nicole is part of the Ishimura's crew, and he fears for her safety.
 
What they find is the ostensive definition of [[Hell Onon Earth]] (or rather, {{smallcaps|[[In Space]]!}}): the crew of the ship has been annihilated by a series of creatures (dubbed Necromorphs by the Ishimura's scientists) who have [[The Virus|the ability to infect dead tissue to raise their numbers]]. This results in [[Zombie Apocalypse|zombie-like]] [[Body Horror|mutated monsters]] infesting the entire ship. Even worse is that there is apparently a cult called the Unitologists, who believe that the Marker is actually of divine origin. The name of the game is now not rescue, but survival: Isaac and the rest of the rescue team must now [[The Great Repair|find a way off the ship.]] Using his engineering skills and whatever [[Improvised Weapon|hastily-weaponized power tools]] he can find, Isaac must help his fellow survivors escape this hellish situation... [[Go Mad From the Revelation|if he doesn't crack first.]]
 
Gameplay wise ''Dead Space'' shares a lot of similarities ''[[Resident Evil 4]]''. There is one button to aim and one button to fire; ammo, health, [[Apocalyptic Log|audio logs]], and money are found scattered about the Ishimura, but are in limited supply, so the player has to ration everything accordingly ([[Blatant Item Placement|though Isaac will almost always manage to find health on corpses when he really needs it]]); and there is a store where Isaac can buy ammo, new weapons, upgrades for his weapons, and upgrades for his suit, and store extra items cluttering up his inventory.
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An interesting gameplay variation is that Necromorphs cannot be killed with head or body shots. Instead Isaac has to shoot the limbs off of Necromorphs to "kill" them. And since the Necromorphs come in many different shapes quite a bit of strategy is required. Isaac also has a Stasis module which can slow enemies down to the point of looking frozen, and levitate objects to solve puzzles.
 
In 2011 Iron Monkey Studios released a game for the iPhone and iPad also called ''Dead Space''. It takes place in the same universe, but has more to do with ''[[Dead Space 2 (Video Game)|Dead Space 2]]'' than ''[[Dead Space (Videovideo Gamegame)|Dead Space]]''. Though since it has the same name, tropes for it are kept on this page at the bottom.
 
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'''Please Note''': This game has a separate page for the sequel, ''[[Dead Space 2 (Video Game)|Dead Space 2]]''. Please add game-appropriate tropes to the correct page.
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** Though sometimes one has to wonder, what with all the Quarantine Lockdowns that trap you with a mob of Necromorphs, and how ''smug'' she sounded after that stunt with the tomato plant in Hydroponics...
** The only real human-built AI, named "CECL," only officially appears in the [[Alternate Reality Game]] "No Known Survivors" (though one of the recurring whispers you hear in the main Dead Space game is a recording of some of the things she says). CECL is a "Litigious Risk Computer" which can be consulted for survival/accident odds, or ''dating advice'' odds, and is even capable of simulating conversations between two people to a remarkable degree. During No Known Survivors' intermission, CECL speaks with rough disdain of the human need to have closure and "happy endings," but isn't really malevolent.
* [[Alone Withwith the Psycho]]: Various things in the game show evidence of Doctor Mercer's madness.
* [[Alternate Reality Game]]: [http://www.noknownsurvivors.com/ No Known Survivors].
* [[An Economy Is You]]: Semi-justified. The items available at the stores on board the ''Ishimura'' - futuristic power tools,<ref>Albeit ones stated by [[Word of God]] to have been illegally modified into weaponry by the crew in an attempt to fight off the Necromorphs</ref> ammunition for futuristic power tools, safety equipment suitable for using futuristic power tools, repair/upgrade supplies suitable for futuristic power tools, [[Healing Potion|futuristic first aid supplies]](which you would most likely need if you regularly use futuristic power tools) - are things you would expect from vending machines on board a futuristic mining ship, and just happen to be quite useful for surviving a [[Zombie Apocalypse]]. But it would have been more realistic for them to offer food, drinks, and toiletries as well.
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* [[BFG]]: The Contact Beam. To get an idea of how powerful this weapon is, the damage from most weapons range from 5 to 20. The damage from the contact beam without any upgrades is ''100'' and ''175'' when fully upgraded.
* [[Big Bad Ensemble]]: {{spoiler|Kendra, Dr. Mercer, and the [[Hive Mind]].}}
* [[Bigger Onon the Inside]]: Due to a [[Special Effect Failure]], the version of the ''Ishimura'' shown in the introduction is vastly smaller than its own interior, to the point where it could comfortably fit inside itself several times over.
* [[Bilingual Bonus]]: The PA system occasionally plays public addresses in French. One of those translates to ''"Attention please, we would like to remind you that body searches may be performed at any moment. Body damage suffered in these searches is not covered by health insurance."'' Some of them are also in Spanish.
** Also, the name of the ''Ishimura'' itself, which means "Rock-Village" in Japanese. Rather fitting for a mining ship.
* [[Bittersweet Ending]]: You live, but {{spoiler|all of your companions are dead, as well as the people you knew on the ''Ishimura''. You find out that your girlfriend killed herself long before you arrived, and that you've been talking to a hallucination of her produced by the Marker - which, by the way, almost certainly drove you at least a little insane... And there's a sequel}}.
* {{spoiler|[[Black Dude Dies First]]: Of all the named characters who appear in the game, Hammond is the first one to die. That said, he manages to survive until about 4/5ths of the way through the game, and after he finally buys it most everyone else follows suit pretty quickly.}}
* [[Boom! Headshot!]]/[[Removing the Head Oror Destroying Thethe Brain]]: Played straight and subverted. Shooting a Necromorph's head will kill it... if you've blown off at least one of its other limbs (or two, depending on what you're shooting). Shooting one in the head from the get-go, however, will only make it go berserk.
** However, after the head is removed, if you throw it or shoot it, it pops like a melon filled with firecrackers.
* [[Boring but Practical]]: The Plasma Cutter and the Line Gun are all the player needs to utterly dominate the game on any difficulty setting. The Plasma Cutter is the first weapon as well as the only free one, but both appear early on and can perform the job of any of the more [[Awesome but Impractical]] weapons faster, more cheaply, and without encumbering Isaac. There's even an achievement for completing the game using only the Plasma Cutter.
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* [[Corridor Cubbyhole Run]]: Chapters 3 and 4. First, you have to run a circular through a now-active centrifuge to reach an elevator and leave the area, ducking into large niches in the walls when the arm goes past or being torn to shreds. In the next chapter, you have to run over the outside of the Ishimura and hide behind metal walls to avoid getting splattered by asteroid impacts. Made interesting as you are exposed to space in both cases, so if you take too long, you asphyxiate, while Chapter 3 also has Necromorphs pop up in each cubby.
* [[Continuous Decompression]]: Averted. When an airlock opens, the air will rush out in a second or so.
* [[Cutscene Power to Thethe Max]]: The Necromorphs are ridiculously more powerful when they're not directly facing Isaac; they can one-shot anyone who happens to be behind at least one pane of unbreakable glass. It's also implied that a single Leaper somehow managed to destroy the ''Kellion'', and a single Slasher killed almost the entire crew of a fully-armed warship, then ''infected'' them despite that Slashers can't do this at any other point in the game.
* [[Dangerous Windows]]: The Ishimura doesn't have many windows. But it does have chest high vents that act the same way as windows for incoming monsters.
* [[Darkness Equals Death]]: Sometimes you are forced to kill enemies in pitch blackness (Isaac's tools have mounted flashlights), and sometimes it's a false alarm.
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* [[Decontamination Chamber]]: Which takes exactly as long as it takes for Isaac to kill several Necromorphs. However, the ship's AI considers Necromorphs to be Bio-hazards (which they are), so it isn't much of a stretch for the AI to wait until the bio-hazards have been dealt with before finishing.
* [[Dead Character Walking]]: A glitch that sometimes causes necromorphs to [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhXarjJPBMg endlessly run around in circles], making them invincible until you block their path.
* [[Death Byby Irony]]: {{spoiler|Hammond. When you first fight a brute, he warns you that the only way to harm it is to shoot it in the back. Much later in the game, a brute corners him, and he panics and fires right into the creature's front, doing nothing and getting him torn apart. To be fair to poor Hammond, though, he was cornered and up against a vastly tougher version.}}
* [[Destruction Equals Off Switch]]: Or on switch in the case of certain doors with exposed fuses.
* [[Diegetic Interface]]: ''Everything'' is a [[Hard Light]] [[Holographic Terminal]] projected either by Isaac's RIG or the equipment he's working on. Your HUD is the indicators on your back (for health), the ammo counter on your weapon, and that's it. And you don't see the ammo counter unless you're aiming.
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* [[Elite Mooks]]: Dark versions of the Necromorph types are tougher, faster, and deal more damage. They mostly show up in the later levels.
** The Valor soldiers with their Stasis unit merged in their Necromorph form; they're ''fast.''
* [[The End - Oror Is It?]]: {{spoiler|In the ending cutscene, Isaac seems to be attacked by his dead girlfriend, who has been made into a basic Necromorph. It's all imagined by Isaac, he survived the encounter and reprises his role, plus actual spoken lines, in the sequel.}}
* [[Energy Weapons]]: Or in this case, energy power tools and one weapon.
* [[Everybody's Dead, Dave]]: ''"Everyone!"'' as Kendra claims.
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* [[Exploding Barrels]]: They're technically canisters, and presumably filled with Hydrazine fuel or fuel for the ship itself.
* [[Eye Scream]]: It's no big spoiler that the captain of the ship is already dead, but it's a semi-spoiler when you learn he was {{spoiler|stabbed in the eye with a needle by Dr. Kyne in an attempt to calm him down. Made even worse when you read a text log stating the needle went all the way past his eye and into his brain.}}
** The cover art for the second animated film ''[[Dead Space: Aftermath (Film)|Dead Space Aftermath]]''.
* [[Faster-Than-Light Travel]]: Shockpoint drive. How does it work? In this game you can ''[[Rule of Cool|dismember alien zombies]],'' so who cares?
* [[Fetch Quest]]: Pretty much any level will be about finding arbitrary object A and taking it to place B, which is often right near where you start.
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* [[Forced Tutorial]]: USE RUN TO MOVE QUICKLY OR ELSE.
* [[Foreboding Architecture]]: Is there a time where entirely artificial, metal-based architecture doesn't make one suspect a hideous murder is about to happen?
* [[Fun Withwith Acronyms]]: The first letter of every chapter title. Together, they spell out {{spoiler|NICOLE IS DEAD.}}
* [[Game Breaking Bug]]: There's a couple, but a big one is in Chapter 5, where the [[Fetch Quest]]-link can be broken ({{spoiler|Isaac can't activate the panel to turn the Chemical Mixture W/DNA into Poison}}), possibly by saving/reloading during the quest, preventing the player from continuing further. Reloading the game may fix this, but usually the only way is to completely start over with a new game.
** Also, don't save after moving the Marker into the second to last shutter. (IE, don't put it in the shutter, then go and save at the nearby save point.) Even after you open the other Shutter, the Marker will refuse to move onto the tracks.
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* [[Jump Scare]]: A particularly unexpected one happens at the very end.
* [[Kill'Em All]]: {{spoiler|Everyone dies except Isaac.}}
* [[Kill It Withwith Fire]]: You can buy the flamethrower during gameplay, but its usefulness against most Necromorphs is debatable.
* [[Laser-Guided Karma]]: {{spoiler|Kendra steals the Marker from its pedestal. ''The only thing keeping all the horrible space creatures neutralized.'' She's smashed into paste by the massive Hive Mind less than five minutes later.}}
* [[Late to Thethe Party]]: By the time the ''Kellion'' makes it to the ''Ishimura'' to repair the subspace array, most of the crew is dead. At most, there are 20 survivors, and of these, all but 4 are too far gone to be saved. The entire ship is overrun by the infection, and Necromorphs have free reign over it.
** And the ''Valor'' after that. Not a good day in the Aegis system.
* [[Luck-Based Mission]]: Level 5 of the Shooting Gallery can be this. The targets pop up just fast enough that shooting a red target can accidentally blow away a blue one behind it in the same shot, thus ruining the score.
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** Then there's that incident with the tomatoes...
* [[Screamer Trailer]]
* [[Sealed Evil in Aa Can]]: Doctor Mercer introduces himself and his insanity by releasing he Hunter from the tank right behind you.
** Oh, and for the Aegis VII miners? Moving the Marker off its pedestal was a bad idea.
* [[Second-Hour Superpower]]: The Kinesis Module. This is probably one of the most useful tools at your disposal, along with your plasma cutter.
* [[Senseless Sacrifice]]: The engineer that shot off his own limbs. He thought that he could prevent the infection (or at least not be able to hurt anyone if he turned), but he's the first Necromorph you see when you step out of the elevator.
* [[Shooting Gallery]]
* [[Shout-Out]]: [[Isaac Asimov|Isaac]] [[Arthur C. Clarke (Creator)|Clarke's]] [[Tuckerization|name]].
** At one point, you have to salvage a "Singularity Core" from the ''USM Valor''. Said core looks an awful lot like a [[Back to The Future|flux capacitor]]...
*** The first loading screen, which is a graph describing the ''Kellion's'' Shockpoint jump, also states that the "Flux Capacitor" is a component of the FTL engine system. Other components include The [[The HitchhikersHitchhiker's Guide to Thethe Galaxy|Improbability Drive]] and [[Star Trek (Franchise)|Warp Field Generator]].
** On the Medical Deck, a woman address a corpse as [[Star Trek: theThe Original Series (TV)|McCoy]].
** Mercer also possesses a medical manual in his office for '[[Star Trek (Franchise)|Galaxy Class]]' starships. There's also a "Storage Room 47".
** Having to mix up poison and use it on the hydrophonics deck? Guess [[System Shock|the system has been shocked]].
** A visual shout-out to ''[[Alien]]''; when encountering danger for the first time, you run down a dark hallway full of flashing yellow lights, almost identical to Ripley's retreat from the Nostromo.
** The promotional comic [http://deadspace.ea.com/#flash/mediaid=beat2swfbiggame-20100610014929325 The Big Game] is one of [[Chick Tract]]'s.
** [[Word of God]] says that the Divider enemy and its howl were inspired by ''[[The Thing (Filmfilm)|The Thing]]''.
* [[Shown Their Work]]: The ''Dead Space'' wiki talks about the hydrazine fuel of the flamethrower and its use for melting ice on comets for mining. Such a fuel is used in space travel already, ice is plentiful on comets, and it's all very well thought through, except that in the game, the flamethrower doesn't work in a vacuum. [[Zig -Zagging Trope|Hmm.]]
** Ever wonder why flies would populate something that's floating around in space? The ''Ishimura'' is designed to be self-sufficient. It has hydroponic gardens, probably recycling centers and whatnot. As such, flies would be completely necessary for breaking down organic waste and many of the gardening processes.
** The [[Game Pro]] article, The Science of Dead Space.
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** [[All There in the Manual|The motion comic]] goes into more detail on this, showing a corpse infected by contact with a bacterial colony transforming into an Infector and proceeding to reanimate other nearby dead.
** Not to mention the book, in which a scientist {{spoiler|injects himself with suspicious alien tissue, becoming an Infector soon after.}}
* [[Voice Withwith an Internet Connection]]: Kendra and Hammond, for most of the game.
* [[Was Once a Man]]: Pretty much all of the things Isaac graphically dismantles used to be members of the ''Ishimura's'' crew, excluding the [[Hive Mind]], and possibly the Leviathan and Slug.
** It's implied (admittedly more [[All in The Manual]]) that the [[Hive Mind]] is physically composed from the reshaped corpses of, A: the majority of the colonists, B: the original poor bastards who became Necromorph chow when they first reverse-engineered the damn DNA codes, or C: both of the aforementioned.
* [[We Will Spend Credits in Thethe Future]]
* [[Weaponized Exhaust]]: {{spoiler|Used to kill the Hunter.}}
* [[Weapon of Choice]]: Not exactly canonical, but given that the Plasma Cutter is perhaps the most useful weapon in the game (see [[Boring but Practical]]), as well as the first weapon you get, and the only weapon you get for free, it's not surprising that Isaac is usually portrayed in promotional material as using it.
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* [[Chainsaw Good]]: In contrast to Isaac, who was limited to punching Necromorphs, Vandal starts out with a one-handed plasma saw (essentially a chainsaw with an energy blade) for melee attacks.
* [[Corrupt Church]]: You play as a newly-converted Unitologist engineer recruited to unleash Necromorphs into the Sprawl.
* [[Downer Ending]]: After defeating the final boss, {{spoiler|Vandal is seriously wounded and tries to get help but no one answers. The game ends with Vandal's helmet lying on the ground, with a trail of blood starting from where she was lying down. Meanwhile, [[The Bad Guy Wins|Tyler reports to his superiors that his mission has succeeded,]] setting the table for ''[[Dead Space 2 (Video Game)|Dead Space 2]].''}}
* [[Face Heel Turn]]: {{spoiler|All this time, Tyler Radikov was setting up Vandal.}} And boy, does Vandal get pissed off by this betrayal.
* [[Foregone Conclusion]]: If you've played ''[[Dead Space 2 (Video Game)|Dead Space 2]]'', you know this game is not going to have a happy ending.
* [[The Hero Dies]]: {{spoiler|In [[Dead Space 2 (Video Game)|Dead Space 2]], Isaac discovers a recording next to Vandal's eviscerated corpse ; the aforementioned conditions in which the log is found, combined with the fact Norton notes that that was her final log, indicate she died in the end. Or does she?}}
* [[Interquel]]: This game takes place between ''[[Dead Space (Videovideo Gamegame)|Dead Space]]'' and ''[[Dead Space 2 (Video Game)|Dead Space 2]].''
* [[Karma Houdini]]: {{spoiler|Tyler Radikov}} gets away with {{spoiler|manipulating Vandal/Karrie Norton into allowing the Necromorphs to spread throughout the Sprawl}}.
* [[Mind Screw]]: Vandal's hallucinations get very creative and mind-boggling. At one moment, you think you've transformed into a Slasher Necromorph, only to find out it's one of the protagonist's hallucinations.
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