Dead Space sequel semi-confirmed by EA

by Stevie Smith - Feb 26 2009, 17:00

Although certainly some way short of being concrete confirmation, third-party videogame publisher Electronic Arts (EA) has indicated a multi-platform sequel to survival horror epic Dead Space will arrive in the not-too distant future.

According to Glen Schofield, who served as executive producer for the nerve jangling horror game set on a gigantic Planet Cracker orbiting mining facility, the original release performed well enough with critics and consumers to warrant more time and effort on EA’s part.

“We haven’t announced anything yet,” said Schofield while talking to GamesIndustry.biz at the global unveiling of new EA title Dante’s Inferno, “but I don’t think you take a game that’s rated 89 and just go, ‘Well that was a failure.’”

“And you know what, we’ll figure that out,” he added, “because the hardest thing is the quality. If you figure out the quality, then at some point we’re going to figure out how to get that out there.”

The “89” Schofield mentions is in relation to the aggregated 89/100 score (Xbox 360) amassed by Dead Space across 79 different critiques posted to review collation Web site Metacritic since the game was released in October of 2008.

Schofield also suggested that Dead Space suffered somewhat on the sales front due to the gaming industry’s continuing belief that triple-A games should be released at supposedly peak times, which then results in a software pileup and a marketing-fuelled scrap for dominance.

With many EA releases in 2008’s holiday season failing to meet sales projections due to the resulting congestion, Schofield points to the massive anticipation built for games such as Killzone 2 (Feb. 27) and Resident Evil 5 (Mar. 13), neither of which are positioned in traditionally favourable calendar slots.

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