The Callisto Protocol review: A relentless horror spectacle
Game details
Developer: Striking Distance Studios Publisher: Krafton Platform: PS5 (Reviewed), PS4, Xbox Series X, Xbox One, PC Release Date: Dec. 2, 2022 ESRB Rating: M for Mature Price: $60 Links: Amazon | Steam | Official Website
In the survival-horror genre, building tension and ramping up a sense of dread is the backbone of the experience. As a new sci-fi horror IP coming from the creators of Dead Space, The Callisto Protocol homes in on that creeping sense of unease as it forces you to confront its many grotesque threats head-on. When playing The Callisto Protocol, I always felt on edge, even during moments when I could have let my guard down.
The game takes some strong influences from its spiritual predecessor Dead Space and puts its own spin on a more visceral type of horror experience. That said, The Callisto Protocol's influences and genre are abundantly clear, and it occasionally falls back on familiar tropes and some frustrating combat encounters. Still, it maintains its solid, relentless poise as an unnerving yet still thrilling survival-horror game.
Welcome to Black Iron Prison
You play as Jacob Lee (Transformers’ Josh Duhamel), a far-future freelance cargo hauler with a murky past who crash lands on Jupiter’s titular frozen moon. After getting abducted by the ruthless head of security, Captain Ferris (Days Gone’s Sam Witwer), Jacob finds himself trapped in the mysterious and inhumane Black Iron Prison.
Eventually, a mysterious viral outbreak mutates nearly everyone inside, turning them into ravenous monsters called Biophages. Launching an escape with other prisoners, including the enigmatic anti-corporate activist Dani Nakamura (The Boys’ Karen Fukuhara), Jacob delves deep into Black Iron Prison and the moon’s lower depths to uncover what happened and make it out alive.
Right from the start, and despite the grotesque, over-the-top horror setting, there’s a palpable sense of realism to The Callisto Protocol’s story and visuals. This is hard sci-fi through and through, in the vein of Paul W.S. Anderson’s Event Horizon or John Carpenter’s The Thing (or the original Dead Space series, unsurprisingly). The game plays it straight with its unsettling vision of a future gone awry, which provides a rich environment to play in. Aside from rare one-liners, there’s not much levity, which keeps with the game’s bleak narrative and atmosphere.
As a cinematic, story-driven game, The Callisto Protocol keeps its pace and structure tight, focusing on Jacob’s ordeal as he’s ferried to different encounters and events in a mostly linear fashion. Aside from chapter breaks and more in-depth cinematics, you’re always viewing events from Jacob’s perspective. The performances from the main cast do an effective job of selling the plot's sense of urgency and dark tone. While the story largely keeps its twists subdued and doesn’t venture far from its initial premise by the end of its 12-plus-hour campaign, it still succeeds as a solid vehicle for an intense and brutal horror game.
What truly sells The Callisto Protocol and its setting are the fantastic visuals and sound design. The presentation is incredibly effective at establishing mood, with small details combining together into the most impressive and effective survival-horror tapestry I’ve seen in a long time. This is especially evident in the gruesome design of the Biophages, as well as the numerous, wince-inducing death scenes.
When the visuals and sound design all work in concert, it creates a stark sense of dread and unease that sticks with you to the end. One section had me explore the depths of the prison while the power was fluctuating, creating moments of darkness for the enemies to move around unseen. Just trying to keep track of where these monsters were put me on edge. It was an unnerving section that really showcased the craft of the game’s impressive presentation.
While Black Iron Prison is slightly similar to the USG Ishimura from Dead Space, the setting comes into its own once the game’s scope expands, showcasing fantastic views of the outside frozen lunarscape and the darker depths of Callisto. The game’s linear progression and tight pacing cut down on backtracking. That said, there are still moments where you can venture off and explore hidden rooms, mainly to uncover some intriguing clues and audio logs about Black Iron Prison history and what came before.
While environmental design sets The Callisto Protocol’s terrifying tone, the game occasionally relies on some cheesy jump-scare tropes. And although some of those jump scares are quite effective, the game repeats some of these no-longer-so-surprising tricks numerous times. These end up feeling like shallow “gotcha” moments that unfairly rattle or even harm you before an upcoming battle. Despite all that, The Callisto Protocol provides an exceptionally well-crafted approach to horror narrative and environmental storytelling.
Frames or pixels?
Playing on the PS5, I mostly stuck with the standard graphics mode, which showcased the game’s visuals at their most detailed. That said, the optimal experience would probably be the performance mode, which slightly lowers the visual fidelity in favor of 60 frame-per-second gameplay that generally feels better to play.
Survival of the fittest
One of the most compelling things about The Callisto Protocol is how it constantly works to get you out of your comfort zone. The game's opening hours are effectively a trial by fire. With only a lead pipe in your arsenal and no way to run from your foes, you have to quickly learn how to survive the carnage on Callisto the hard way. It's a great opening that highlights the game’s intense action and often unforgiving aggression, which further escalates as things ramp up in the later hours. There’s not much running past threats here; you constantly need to stand up to the hordes of Biophages while keeping your health and dwindling resources in check.
The game also offers Jacob plenty of utility via different skills and a wide-ranging arsenal. On top of standard melee strikes and firearms, a telekinetic gadget called the GRP offers a bit of variety. While you have options for stealth kills—using a prison shank to kill off unsuspecting Biophages—direct combat is always inevitable.
Then there’s the essential dodge mechanic, which allows you to bob and weave through enemy strikes to land a powerful counter hit or skill shot, thus opening up an enemy’s weak point. It can be very satisfying to pummel Biophages after dodging their attacks, which can add to your confidence even as pressure mounts.
Many survival-horror games lose their sense of danger once you get more weapons and resources, but The Callisto Protocol keeps things focused on the survival aspect. Even with fully decked-out weapons and additional armor, common enemies that appeared throughout the game could still tear through me if I was caught off guard. That risk is always front of mind, and it never lets you get too safe or comfortable.
The pace of combat is relentless, in some cases overwhelmingly so. Generally, I enjoyed this unforgiving pace, but I found that some encounters extended themselves a bit too long. One wrong move can lead to a cascade of other failures, which makes working through extended encounters exhausting, especially during repeat attempts.
While crowds of enemies generally aren't too difficult to handle, eventually the game introduces different variations that are more fearsome and require more effort to take down. This includes mutations, where a Biophage can evolve into a more powerful form during a fight, heightening the sense of urgency to end a fight quickly or else face an even greater foe.
Coupling this with additional enemies that either hit you at long range or run in for quick strikes, I found that Jacob's movement speed and attacks can't always keep up with the flow of intense combat, especially when going against some of the game's toughest enemies. One particularly frustrating encounter featured a hulking elite Biophage with powerful attacks that could lead to instant death (a fate I suffered multiple times, each with an unskippable death cutscene).
These punishing encounters are generally outside the norm. Still, they resulted in some extended periods of frustration during my playthrough, making me feel like I hit a wall in progress.
A new spin on horror
Despite these frustrations, I still enjoyed the combat and the game’s ever-present sense of tension. Playing a survival-horror game that’s constantly forcing you into a more offensive position is an exciting change, and the game does a good job balancing moments of power with encounters that will quickly humble you.
When I think back on playing The Callisto Protocol, what sticks out most is the mounting sense of dread throughout. Right up through the story’s conclusion, I felt satisfied and excited by how much the action and scares kept ramping up. Still, the story did leave me wanting a bit more during the closing act, even as the conclusion clearly set up some potential follow-ups.
Even when I felt frustrated by how overwhelming combat was during the most intense encounters, I was still taken in by the game's flow of action and the impeccable atmosphere. While The Callisto Protocol doesn't totally evolve from its predecessors, it's still a thrilling and intense spin on survival horror that makes its own mark on the growing genre.
The good:
Stellar visuals showcase grim environments and grotesque monsters.
Brutal and thrilling combat that keep you on edge while offering some satisfying moments of action.
Fantastic sound design that enhances the atmosphere.
Great variety in level design that leads to some interesting encounters and story moments.
The bad:
Some frustrating combat encounters that seriously test your patience.
Overuse of jump scares and familiar enemy encounters dull some otherwise tense sequences.
The ugly:
Loading manual saves will roll you back to earlier checkpoints, forcing you to repeat some sections.
Verdict: This breakout horror game stumbles occasionally, but it still stands tall as a thrilling survival-horror experience. Buy it.
