The Callisto Protocol

Striking Distance Studios' debut title is a horror game that delivers a high-quality experience all the way through. It won't sway anyone new to scares and frights, but fans of the genre should make this a priority.

What The Callisto Protocol lacks in truly original ideas it more makes up for in presentation and atmosphere. A game this polished and confident from a newly formed studio that had to work through a pandemic is nothing short of impressive. While it won’t change anyone‘s mind who didn’t like the spiritual predecessor Dead Space, this brings back unsettling space horror at its peak.

From the outset, and playing on Xbox Series X, The Callisto Protocol is a genuinely jaw-dropping visual assault. It might have the most detailed interiors of any game I’ve ever played, and the variety in art that accompanies these is staggering. From the initial prison sequences through to deep underground spaces where you’ll be navigating an old, abandoned colony to the surface of Callisto itself, the game serves up a terrifying feast for the eyes.

The Callisto Protocol is a raw and brutal sci-fi survival horror with extremely physical, challenging, and visceral combat and a first-rate graphical compartment. Even if it feels inadequate from a narrative point of view and its linear structure smacks of somewhat dated game design, the overall result is still convincing and it manages to keep interest high until the end. Definitely recommended if you love survival horror and claustrophobic sci-fi settings.

Overall, Callisto is a really good survival horror experience. If you like Dead Space, you need to try this game. The main campaign has a lot of passion put into it and I had a bunch of fun with it. The game definitely has some problems here and there, but I think true horror fans will admire it for its fantastic campaign. I really feel that this series will have just as interesting of a world as Dead Space if the series continues beyond this first installment. The story is overall good and the ending begs for DLC or a sequel. Be sure to try this game if you’re in the mood for a cinematic horror experience with a lot of intensity.

The Callisto Protocol is an exceptional horror adventure title. It will be hard for Dead Space fans to ignore the similarities, but it should be enjoyed on its merits. With slick combat, amazing aesthetics, and an incredible plot, this needs to be played.

The Callisto Protocol is an engaging action horror, focusing on close combat and a powerful, oppressive atmosphere. It's a shame that the storyline is merely serviceable, but fortunately there's also the visceral, fun gameplay, the best we've seen in survival horrors in many years.

An unflinchingly violent and gruesome survival horror that ratchets up the tension from the get-go and doesn't let up, The Callisto Protocol is superlative stuff, and a must for anyone with even a passing fancy for Dead Space and its ilk.

The Callisto Protocol is a deeply immersive sci-fi horror experience that firmly grabs you at the start and doesn’t let go. While this immersion shows its cracks during the transition into new areas, it’s not enough to ruin the overall experience. The Callisto Protocol is an impressive first outing for Striking Distance Studios, and the latest entry in the pantheon of excellent sci-fi horror stories.

The Callisto Protocol is like a game from the PS3/360 era. No open world, no RPG elements, and no other self-imposed AAA features that plague the industry these days. It’s a flawed game, but most important, it’s fun and intense, and we wish there were more games like it.

Thinking back on the game as a whole, though there’s obviously that Dead Space DNA running through it – from the over the shoulder camera, the stomping on corpses for items, the diegetic UI and more – this feels like the successor we probably should have received instead of Dead Space 3. The action is here but it still managed to keep the survival horror flavour and tone intact. It’s not perfect, but it’s a solid outing for Striking Distance and one we hope they can build on in the future.

In space, no one will hear you scream... with joy or anger? Building on the rock-solid foundation of the first Dead Space, The Callisto Protocol dodges the photocopy with its intense, difficult, but not as precise melee combat as we would have liked. Despite a certain lack of audacity, Striking Distance managed to steal Saturn's rings in order to slip them on the ring fingers of sci-fi horror lovers. Fasten your asteroid belt, the Space Mountain gore will shake you up, even if the trip turns out to be as imperfect as it is classic.

This game wants to be Dead Space really, REALLY, bad, but what’s interesting about that is I haven’t even finished the first Dead Space game and I can see it. Is this a bad thing? No, it’s really not as Callisto Protocol isn’t a trash game at all, they tried some new things with the controls and stuff some of it worked but for me a lot more of it didn’t. The game’s depiction of excessive violence is fun but even it wears on to the point of feeling overboard, especially when you think why they have giant grinding machines in the open like this in the middle of a prison. The story, while predictable, was an enjoyable adventure, but as far as graphics this game looks incredible. But as most of us know by now, looks aren’t everything and so it is with Callisto Protocol.

Fans of the original Dead Space may find The Callisto Protocol lacking in comparison. The story is inferior, combat isn’t quite on the money and the enemy variation is lacking. That said, there is still a good sci-fi survival horror game hiding within.

The Callisto Protocol has the qualities to have been a great survival horror, but we found too many execution problems that end up dragging down the experience.

As a great fan of horror games, who sees one of the best moments in Dead Space, I do not hide that I ended my experience with The Callisto Protocol with a bad taste in my mouth. I found myself faced with a graphically remarkable game, with an honest albeit banal story and with a gameplay that works until you are confronted with the basic mechanics. On all of this, however, some conceptual and game-design problems have arisen. From an unrefined and substantially outdated user experience, to a disastrous Italian audio track, passing through the lack of a terrifying element, the cornerstone promise of The Callisto Protocol. In my memory will remain a game that I played from start to the end without serious technical or structural problems, but which will probably soon fade in my memory because it lacks a strong personality, a desire to stand out and the fundamental element for its genre: adrenaline.

The Callisto Protocol plays it safe. It sustains its playable base on the pillars that made Dead Space an icon of space terror and that is fantastic news for fans of Visceral Games' work. Perhaps some imagination, innovation or narrative unpredictability is missing, but the new work from Glen Schofield is exactly what Dead Space fans could expect. Its raw and violent gameplay is addictive and the beauty of its settings is astonishing. Unfortunately, the title is weighed down by a very poor technical section that fails in performance, in sound and even in such a basic aspect as the correct placement of checkpoints. Despite everything, space terror fans and especially Dead Space fans will find exactly what they came looking for. And that's okay.

Despite some cumbersome combat systems and performance issues, The Callisto Protocol successfully builds on Dead Space's legacy.

Considering its short length and current lack of replay value, it is somewhat difficult to recommend The Callisto Protocol at full price, but it is a must-buy when the price comes down a bit. The Callisto Protocol is an excellent game let down by some hugely important missing features, but hopefully future updates will help it live up to its full potential as a worthy successor to the Dead Space franchise.

Visually, The Callisto Protocol is one of the only games for the PS5 and Xbox Series X that feels like a next-generation game. But that ambition has clearly come at a cost. For all its bells and whistles, The Callisto Protocol isn't doing much of anything new with its story or design. It's not just a Dead Space imitator, but it does manage to take a lot of the ideas from earlier action horror games and execute them half as well. Alongside myriad factors and the fact that New Game Plus and Hardcore modes — staple features of the genre — aren't coming until next year is evidence that The Callisto Protocol should have been given more time to have a smoother, fully-featured launch.

The Callisto Protocol is my biggest disappointment this year. While it nails the aesthetic and is one of the most beautiful games I’ve played this year, it misses the mark in almost every other department. I think it can be refined to at least be more fun, but in its current state, the story and gameplay weigh down this new entry to the survival horror genre from the potential it so obviously has.

It's a shame that, despite looking great and having a good concept at its core, some poorly-executed ideas lead to a frustrating experience overall. For a new studio to produce a brand new IP is obviously a mammoth task and commendable, so here’s hoping the team get another chance to get a grip on this universe and tighten up the experience.

The Callisto Protocol feels like a throwback title, for better and worse. While the Dead Space comparisons are unavoidable, director Glen Schofield’s return to survival horror does bring with it several new concepts, but many, like the melee combat system, suffer from poor execution. Still, if you’re looking for a fun, B-movie disaster story with some famous Hollywood faces and a more straightforward, linear single-player experience, you could do worse—at least until the Dead Space remake launches next year.

The Callisto Protocol really is a game of two halves. Striking Distance Studios has served up a slice of sci-fi/horror that gets off to a reasonably strong start, introducing a jaw-dropping world and punchy new combat system that impresses until it becomes strained by busy enemy encounters, a handful of miserable boss confrontations and a narrative that goes absolutely nowhere. As much as this one dazzles from a graphical perspective, overall it's a shadow of the game that it most closely seeks to emulate. With little in the way of replayability and a final act we genuinely never want to sit through again, we'll be returning to the USG Ishimura for our action horror kicks long before we set down on Callisto again.

This isn’t to say there isn’t a good game oozing within the sticky flesh of this Frankenstein, though; it just feels like it’s not what Striking Distance wanted it to be. It’s not the next step in horror gaming, the evolution of Dead Space, or a proposition unlike anything you’ve seen before – it’s the opposite. An amalgam, less than the sum of its parts, whose main focus becomes overwrought and frustrating by the time you’re halfway through its short run-time. The scariest thing about The Callisto Protocol, sadly, is all the potential that’s been wasted on a small moon in Jupiter’s orbit.

The Callisto Protocol isn't necessarily bad, but it doesn't do much to verify why survival-horror fans wanted these types of games back in the first place. With a bit more depth to its various systems and mechanics, The Callisto Protocol could have been far more enjoyable from start to finish. Instead, my main takeaway from Callisto has simply been that I'm now that much more excited to play a number of other survival-horror games that are set to release in 2023.

There’s a solid game at the heart of Black Iron Prison, but every opportunity the game gets to subvert expectations or do something new is instead a moment of deferral to one of Callisto’s many inspirations. It’s nice to see Callisto try to be a new brew, synthesised from many parts, but an entirely new vision would have stuck around in the bloodstream a little longer.

The Callisto Protocol is a gorgeous mess. I cannot recommend it at the full launch price. The combat is miserable, and the story is simply not interesting. If you are a massive fan of survival horror it lets you down by not being scary either, instead relying on jump scares the entire time. It is highly competent technically though, and I hope the team at Striking Distance gets more time for their next title, which very well could be a sequel to this one.

Overall, individual elements of The Callisto Protocol are just at odds with one another too often. The enemy design and melee-focused combat mechanics lend themselves to these incredibly tense and fun close-quarters brawls when you're only fighting against a couple of targets at a time, but the game regularly locks you into frantic moshpits or frustratingly difficult boss fights instead. And despite the vocal talent and mocap skill on display, The Callisto Protocol's story isn't all that interesting, save for an intriguing final twist. Some genuine horror might have improved the experience of this survival-action game, but The Callisto Protocol instead leans too far into absurd high-octane spectacle, dampening the tension and adulterating the narrative core of the experience.