As a professional gamer who has banished ungodly horrors in the best survival games, I was drooling to probe the dark secrets of The Callisto Protocol (CCP). This grisly new IP from Dead Space creator Glen Schofield aims to revive the calcified corpse of AAA horror games. While CCP delivers deliciously vicious combat set in a haunting sci-fi prison, it lacks the brains, variety, and attention to detail that elevated its spiritual predecessor. Read my full review as a discerning horror connoisseur.
A Glimmer of Hope Against an Inexorable Grind
CCP thrusts players into the space boots of Jacob Lee, an intergalactic trucker who crash lands onto Jupiter’s moon, Callisto. You awake imprisoned in Black Iron Prison, but this state-of-the-art facility soon devolves into riotous chaos as inmates transform into disfigured “biophage” mutants. Trapped with these ghouls, Jacob must cleave through squirming mounds of flesh and bone exposing the chilling secrets festering under the penal colony’s skin.
This setup oozes with potential, but the payoff proves mushier than a boiled biophage head. Little narrative thrust pushes you forward outside surviving the inexorable onslaught. As this lone inmate with little initial stakes in the catastrophe, I never felt motivated in my survival outside baser gameplay loops. Jacob himself demonstrates bafflingly little psychological response to the viscera-strewn landscape, shrugging off spine-chilling rituals as just another locked door to unlock.
Compare this uncompelling emotional core to SOMA’s existential dive into humanity’s legacy or Resident Evil Village’s fatherly drive to rescue a child. The Callisto Protocol misses the bleeding heart that made Dead Space’s Isaac Clarke a compelling anchor to experience hellish forces through. I could customized Isaac’s suit, decoding his murky past through unlocked texts. By contrast, Jacob feels like a hollow huskAnimations Can‘t hold things alone.
Black Iron itself brims with environmental narrative grace. Flayed corpses and desperate graffiti poems reveal better stories than many heavy-handed cutscenes. It’s the finer worldbuilding brushstrokes that excel rather than the broad milquetoast strokes of the main plot. Even Jacob’s monotonous stomping feels more meaningful than his stale relationships thanks to satisfying bone-crunching feedback. If only the player character and his motivation matched Black Iron‘s finely chiselled edges.
Meat First, Meaning Second
Combat certainly sates the primal hunger thanks to crunchy dismemberment and a varied arsenal. Shotguns blast flesh cleanly off mutant bone while spears sizzle pustulent pores. The feedback reflects gruesome foley brutality channeling Dead Space’s limb-lopping glory. The wet squelch of rent viscera and shatter of severed cartilage will make the most seasoned horror vets wince during the first few frantic hours.
Borrowing from Dead Space, players can shoot appendages off tactically to inhibit freakish movement or slow them down by severing limbs. Decapitating three-armed goliaths with an electrified shiv through the spine offers those small victories crucial to lamentable heroes like Jacob. Stomping mangled corpses keeps gameplay active without pause, fluidly converting fallen foes into precious resources. These systems retain those tense resource dynamics fundamental to survival horror traversing. I delighted in mulching monsters into ammunition and health injections keeping my slaughter spree sustainable.
However by the 8-hour mark, the campaign descends into a mindless grind. The limited 5 enemy archetypes repeat ad nauseam without adding new behaviors or synergies. The clever biophage designs, like brutes with bone shields or crawling mutants who attack in packs, astonish early on before familiarity breeds contempt. CCP needed 8 archetypes minimum with advanced forms mixing up strategy later on to sustain fear. Their predictable patterns dampen the danger through rote routine.
Recycled boss encounters also eliminate climactic stakes essential to pacing. Jacob battles the same undulating leviathan a ridiculous three times rather than introducing an original mechanical challenge for each new environment. The addition of basic grunts mid-fight, a common ‘tension escalator’ in games like God of War, rings equally hollow here. The unoiled gears behind CCP’s limited bestiary grind the experience into papier-mâché well before the final credits.
Stunning Imagery, Disappointing Execution
Still, few can deny The Callisto Protocol is one exquisite ugly ducking. Black Iron Prison dazzles on PS5 and high-end PCs with ray traced puddles reflecting gnarled piles of forgotten corpses. Blood smears, glowing graffiti, and crumbling concrete sell the setting as a breathing ruin. I often felt compelled to pan my camera and soak in the battered machinery, flaming wreckage, and writhing undesirables festering in the crevices. This astonishing fidelity fully sells Black Iron’s identity.
Shapeless things spill into uncanny valleys between Cells, sinew glinting in what little light spears the encroaching dark. Pustulant fluids splash across Jacob’s face during close calls while errant shots char crumbling architecture. It’s visual storytelling through exquisite environment and models that outshines lacklustre writing. If only NPC dialogue carried the same environmentalStomping through familiar locations wearing familiar skins.
Every gunshot splinters bone and tears flesh with visceral grace. The adaptive trigger support on PS5 controllers reflects each weapon’s unique kick. Vaulting around with my kinetic GRP tether whipping enemies into giblets flows smoothly from a mechanical standpoint – these components all function beautifully in isolation. But their repetitive implementation reiterates the limited scope contrauding so much promise.
However, on PC CCP faces its own horrific execution thanks to launch performance frightening for the wrong reasons. Severe stuttering, crashes, and glaring issues manacled playability like an iron ball through therapy centres. Only after two substantial patches weeks later did CCP lurch into stable standing on PC. These failings imperil an otherwise narratively and visually dull experience, but their ruination must be highlighted as a warning sign for substandard ports. Consoles ran adeptly, but last-gen machines still suffered sluggish performance ironically better suiting the gloomy Heartbeat Sensor.
Once You Leave, Don‘t Look Back
The Callisto Protocol tells a tightly constrained narrative benefitting multiple playthroughs less than a Saw-style torture sentenceBlack Iron brands you with. Once Jacob unties his final knot freeing himself from Callisto’s fetters, scant reason exists to hang around. The perfunctory New Game+ offers the same exact campaign garnished with dug-up collectibles for microscopically more backstory. No new enemy placements, bonus objectives, or difficulty modifiers meaningfully enhance the experience. At a paltry 14 hours with no challenge modes, alternate modes, or enticing reasons to max out weapons, CCP flings you back into the abyss after a single tour.
As a horror connoisseur who previously raved about innovative experiences like Visage or Scorn, CCP neither reinvents nor refines the genre. It retreads classic survival horror ground with its brilliantly grotesque monster closet chock full of gnawed off legs and enough red rum for the Overlook Hotel. Yet it confines itself to formula at the macro-level despite standout micro-elements like bone-cracking stomps or the gristle gun’s buckshot barrages. It never pushes boundaries or builds truly surprising synergies from brevity bereft of bravery.
The Callisto Protocol will not be inducted into the survival horror pantheon simply because it lacks the daring of its eldritch peers. But for bloodthirsty gamers content witnessing the same few shrieking freaks reduced to meat piles over and over, CCP delivers ample anatomical anarchy per dollar. Want to blast off faces or inject agony into aortic arteries? Callisto overflows with opportunities to the brim. Just don‘t ask it to respect your time – or explain why we‘re doing any of this.
3 / 5 – ABOVE AVERAGE
Mark my words: this won‘t be the last gut-wrenching prison riot Jacob sees. Image Source: VeryAliGaming
