What Year Does Dead Space Take Place? 2508, 2511, 2514

Dead Space takes place in 2508, Dead Space 2 in 2511 and Dead Space 3 in 2514, so the series runs through the early 26th century. The first game is on the USG Ishimura at Aegis VII, the second on Titan Station, and the third on the frozen planet Tau Volantis. (Dead Space; Dead Space 2; Dead Space 3)

The full chronology, with every film, book and comic, is on the Dead Space timeline. This page keeps to the game dates.

What year does Dead Space take place?#

2508. In the timeline, the CEC's illegal survey of the Aegis Cluster is in 2505 and the preparations to crack Aegis VII are in 2507. Five weeks before the game, in 2508, workers rediscover Marker 3A, and two days before it the Ishimura starts the planet crack. (Dead Space; Dead Space Wiki, Timeline)

The 2023 remake keeps 2508. The wiki timeline files the original and the remake together under that year, and our timeline page flags the details the remake changes. (Dead Space Wiki, Timeline)

What year does Dead Space 2 take place?#

2511. The timeline has Unitologists sabotaging the Government Sector on Titan Station on 7 February 2511, and Dead Space 2 begins in that year. Titan Station is destroyed, and Isaac Clarke and Ellie Langford escape and settle on the New Horizons Lunar Colony. (Dead Space 2; Dead Space Wiki, Timeline)

When does Dead Space 3 take place?#

2514, with a prologue much earlier. Dead Space 3 opens on 18 June 2314 on Tau Volantis, where General Mahad carries out Scenario Five, and then jumps two hundred years to 2514. (Dead Space 3)

Dead Space 3: Awakened picks up in the same year, on Tau Volantis and then the CMS Terra Nova, ending with the Brethren Moons already at Earth. Why that matters is covered in what happened to Earth in Dead Space. (Dead Space 3: Awakened)

The dates in order#

1. 2214: the Black Marker is found in the Chicxulub crater, and Michael Altman is assassinated the next year.
2. 2314: Scenario Five on Tau Volantis, the end of the Sovereign Colonies and the birth of EarthGov.
3. 2508: Dead Space.
4. 2511: Dead Space 2.
5. 2514: Dead Space 3 and Awakened.

(Dead Space Wiki, Timeline)

Canon notes#

The wiki timeline puts Dead Space: Aftermath three weeks after the first game and Dead Space: Salvage a month after it. Both sit with the 2508 entries rather than in a new era. (Dead Space Wiki, Timeline)

Interpretation: my read is that the three-year rhythm makes the games easy to place, and that the real jump is the Dead Space 3 prologue. Mahad's Scenario Five in 2314 ends the Sovereign Colonies, and the games, set two centuries later, keep digging up what that purge buried.