3 out of 5

Director: Chuck Patton

If you dug the first game, this movie will be a surprising addition to the narrative told therein. If you have not seen the game, the lack of backstory and pacing will probably make this seem like a typical sloppy cartoon, and make it easy to miss the highlights that occur between the shooting scenes. Downfall tells of the events directly prior to the Dead Space game. The game, a third-person shooter, was influenced by many space isolation/alien films – alien, event horizon, the thing. By taking the most fear-inducing elements of a lot of these stories and fleshing it out with an interesting cultural history, the game-makers had a worthwhile narrative on their hands that proved worth exploring. And so came downfall: earth has used up its resources and so has taken to mining other planets. On one such mission, a type of disease is unlocked that infects people and renders them into mindless, killing creatures. Downfall shows this mission, and how the infection initially spread, as, for gamers, explained in all of the text and audio logs in the game. The animation and acting is surprisingly good, except for the female leads dialogue being way too swear-heavy in attempt to be serious. You also wish they had taken some more time to explore the background of the dead space universe instead of automatically tossing in game baddies as a nudge-nudge to gamers. So: its 74 minutes of half swearing and blood, and half worthwhile expansion of the story. Entertaining first and foremost to gamers.