Damn! Is it just me, or is EA trying really hard to move in on Resident Evil’s territory? With Dead Space, the new IP released late last year, many fans of the survival horror genre felt that the newcomer took many of the elements found in the blockbuster Resident Evil 4, improved on many of them ways, (being able to move and shoot and a unique game play gimmick that focuses on shooting limbs to name a few.) It ended up being a much more atmospheric, frightening experience, something RE hasn’t been in years. Now that the fifth Evil game has come and gone looking like the old veteran that can’t hold a candle to the new blood, (in this writer’s humble opinion,) Dead Space is looking to move in on the genre and console that Resident Evil had a large amount of success in. Dead Space Extraction is an on rails shooter in the same vain as Umbrella Chronicles, and looks to bring the same feeling of isolation and terror that the original did, while attempting to surpass its closest competitor.

Right from the start, it is obvious this game is much more story focused than most rail shooters. After your player’s ship gets shot down and crash lands on the infected space vessel from the first game, The Ishimura, either one or two players can begin inspecting the ship for a way off. As always, this is easier said than done, once the monsters known as the Necromorphs appear. These vicious creatures will attack relentlessly to make sure you don’t make it out alive, and can only be killed by dismembering them instead of relying on your first instinct to pop their heads off. The odds are stacked against you, but you’re not going into this fight unarmed.

The demo started off with the signature plasma cutter weapon that shoots a laser like beam horizontally or vertically when you activate its secondary fire option by turning the Wiimote on its side, or “gangsta style.” Other signature weapons included from the series were the very useful Line Gun, a more powerful version of the Plasma Cutter which can also shoot timed bombs, to the horribly useless flamethrower, that takes half the ammo to kill one enemy, (why isn’t it stronger? It was bad enough the first time!) The game doesn’t hold your hand, being that all of the weapons have limited ammo, so you’ll have to keep a close eye out for item boxes if you don’t want to be left defenseless. When all else fails, you can melee by spazzing out with the Wiimote, which is you know, apparently what the Wii was made for.

Exploring the rotting ship feels like much more of an experience than most rail shooters since the conversations between characters feel so genuine and creates an air of tension. Listening to them banter back and forth while desperately trying to survive is like a horror movie in game form, (a good one at least.) Even without dialogue, the game does an amazing job of designing the same type of creepy atmosphere as its more powerful cousin on PS3 and 360, which really shows what a developer can do with enough time put into a Wii game. Everything from the video logs, audio logs, lighting effects and jump out of your seat scares are in tact, which is especially hard considering I was surrounded by distractions on the busy E3 floor. On the subject of tension, near the end of the demo, my partner and I had to reattach electrical wires by moving them down a grid with the Wiimote pointer. There was one problem, the endless waive of Necromorphs charging at us. We had to alternate with one player fixing the wire and the other holding off the monsters. It was scary, it was tense and it was a lot of fun. Most rail shooters consider co-op to be two people shooting a bunch of crap, but in Extraction, there promises to be more moments like this where you’ll have to work together and watch each other’s back in order to escape. And of course, when something goes wrong, at least you’ll have someone to blame. It could never be YOUR fault.

When we finally escaped the room, we were confronted by a shady group of characters. Guns were pointed, words were exchanged and a cheap shot was taken before we could start our game of, “Which one of you generic characters will be killed first!?” As my character faded away, so did my time with the game. It’s shocking how much of the original feel could be retained in a rail shooter, on top of the unique co-op and exploration options that are usually restricted by a genre that relies on being linear. With a dynamic story, horrifying settings and so many unique elements, Dead Space Extraction has an honest shot at dethroning Umbrella Chronicles as the best pound for pound rail shooter on the Wii. Those shoes are quite big to fill, but if the final package can impress as much as this E3 showing, Capcom will really have something to be scared of.