Highly immersive, sheer terror and massive doses of good fun.
I won't get too detailed about the plot (as there are many other readily available sources of info for that) except for the fact that in DS you get to play as Isaac Clarke, an engineer who is dispatched (along with two people who are members of your team) to the USG Ishimura, a 'planet-cracking' mining ship way out in outer space-to repair its communication arrays. Unbeknown to you (or your team members) the Ishimura has been taken over by Necromorphs, these are the alien creatures that have killed and taken over the bodies of the Ishimura's crew and whilst on board you need to fight them not only to stay alive but to complete the job that you were assigned to do.
This is one scary game and if you have a low 'scare' tolerance then it is likely you won't make it past the first half, never mind completing it. It took me 'ages' to get past the first three chapters (twelve in total) because I could only play it in short sessions; each session coming to an abrupt end because the built-up tension of negotiating that next dark corridor complete with blood splattered walls and strewn human and necromorph corpses while simultaneously anticipating the next necromorph "ambush" simply becomes too much to bear.
What contributes to this heightened sense of fear and dread? Three things: sound, game controls and graphics-and precisely in that order. Most of the game play takes place on the Ishimura a 'planet-cracking' spaceship. It is built for industrial purposes. And that is evident in the ship's design which is free of any aesthetic appeal. Walls are metallic hued and grimy. Pipes run along the ship's infrastructure, hissing and releasing vapours and gas. This is no USS Enterprise from Star Trek. Think 'Alien" and "Event Horizon", instead. The thudding vibration of power plants, hissing pipes and sounds that the necromorphs make as they scurry through the ship's ventilation system unseen by you-really heightens the sense of dread.
DS's graphics are excellent, almost as good as Crysis and Far Cry 2. I was able to play DS at 1280 by 720 resolution on my Toshiba A300 laptop with Radeon 3650 (512 mb) graphics card with all graphic options set at medium and was able to achieve an FPS of 55-which is very playable for a non-gaming laptop with very medium specs. Note DS's third-person view is not as well done as Gears of War. First of all there is a shuddering effect when you left then right (or vica versa), especially if you do it quickly. It has a disorientation effect that can rob you of precious seconds as you try to get your bearing in a fight. Secondly, the 'from behind the right shoulder' view is positioned to so as to present a blind spot in the area that is immediately to the front of your left shoulder. My opinion is the game developers deliberately engineered the third person view as such to heighten sense of helplessness and fear. The whole idea is emphasise the fact you're fairly helpless engineer combat-wise not a Bruce Lee/Terminator kickass super soldier.
It's a bit sad really, I never really got to enjoy the grand view through the Ishimura's glass windows/walls of the meteorites flying by in space against the backdrop of stars and black space-because I was too busy keeping an eye out for necromorphs. I kept seeing them even when they were't there. In fact, a bit like Ed (John Voight) in 'Deliverance' (hold the 'purdy mouth' jokes etc please) I kept seeing necromorphs in my sleep for a while. But don't let that put you off. This is one fantastic game so get it. I give it a 9.0 out of 10.0 rating.