Official Website

Platform: PlayStation 3

Genre: First Person Shooter

Number of Players: 1 - 4 (online 1 - 40)

Support: HD 720p, PS Network Compatible

Peripherals: Ethernet Broadband

You really can’t have the launch of a much anticipated video game console without having a first person shooter or two for gamers to select from. The PlayStation 3 has a very impressive selection of titles to choose right from day one, and there are in fact FPS’s among them. Resistance: Fall of Man marks the debut of Insomniac games on the PS3, and while it may not be a Ratchet and Clank game (that’s coming next year) the company truly shows off what they are capable.

The year is 1951 . . . now hold up. I know exactly what you’re thinking; the market already has enough games based around and after World War II, but this is NOT Call of Duty, nor is it Medal of Honor. Resistance is set in an alternate world where neither the Great Depression or World War II or even communism occurred, but there is in fact a war on the horizon. England is being invaded and it’s not by Hitler or anyone else that you may have learned about in history class, but the deadly Chimera, a strange race that is taking Earth’s people as it’s own in this battle. The story itself is told in tow parts. In the game itself, you are U.S. Army Ranger Sgt. Nathan Hale, a recent addition to the war effort in the U.K., however the back story and description of events is told by a member of the British forces and she believes that there is something more to Sgt. Hale than meets the eye.

Resistance is impressive, very impressive indeed right from the very beginning of the game. I’m sure every has already seen the glorious transition for computer animated cinematic into the game itself as featured in the PS3 version of Killzone, and you’ll find the Resistance provides the same experience which easily pulls you right in. Not to worry though, it’s very easy to distinguish between watching and playing, though it’s also not a far stretch to get wrapped up in the surrounds for a moment to two and just try and take everything in.

The gameplay is fast and furious in Resistance, and you’ll find that you’re going to have to be fast on your feet to avoid enemy fire from the Chimera. They start out easy enough, though as you move farther into the game, they get a heck of a lot tougher and players are going to find that the Stalker, a mechanical construction that has some similarities to classic science fiction films, is an enemy to be reckoned with. The stages generally have you playing solo, though there are times when you’ll have a bit of backup on your side. What’s nice however is that unlike many FPS titles on the market, your team isn’t impervious to enemy fire, and while they may follow blindly behind you, they can quickly become nothing more than a corpse on the battlefield.

Resistance has a nice quick change feature where, by hitting the R1 button, you can either cycle through your weapons without the need to pause or hold the button down to change to another weapon without the need to run through them all until you get the weapon you desire. All of them have a primary firing ability as well as a much more powerful secondary, and while you may start with human weapons, you quickly gain access to Chimera weaponry, much more deadly than anything that the military could provide for you. The sniper rifle found in the game offers up an interesting twist which allows players of “concentrate” for a short period to focus their shot a little better. There are also a variety of grenades that can be lobbed at unsuspecting foes, and my favorite would have to be the Hedgehog, a nasty orb that sends out a shower of needles when they detonate. On the opposite side though, you will also find Hedgehog mines which are so powerful a single hit takes a full life bar from your health. Run through a field of these and you can quickly expect to start the level over.

Aside from handheld firepower, the game offers a few other means to eliminate the Chimera. Early on, players will find themselves behind the turret of a tank (and even later, a jeep), plowing through the city streets and launching powerful shells at helpless enemies trying to destroy the armored death dealer. There are also cannons that can be mounted to make quick work of the Chimera. You’ll also find that Insomniac still is in love with the skill point method of play, and though the game won’t tell you what you need to do (that really wouldn’t make it any fun) score skill points and you’ll start to unlock hidden artwork and other features of the game.

There are a few areas I can see that Resistance could have stood for improvements in. The one that that I truly dislike in any FPS is “invincible lighting,” and I think you know exactly what I mean. Far too many games in this genre overlook things such as shooting out lights, destroying furniture, and in general, making anything and everything nothing more than fodder. Resistance does allow you to do things such as shoot out windows, break open wooden boxes and things of that nature, but there are too many items that are impervious to your weapon fire. I’m the type of player who loves to make a mess of everything, and that’s where games like Black and Red Faction II come in quite handy, but Resistance really lacks in the area of ultimate destruction and instead limits you to only a few select items.

Resistance sports some incredible graphics, and keep in mind as well that this is merely the first generation of games that are available on the PS3. Only time will reveal what developers and designers discover that they can really do with the system, but already, the future looks brighter and better than ever before. Rotating and moving through the game doesn’t have any slowdown or blur as far as the graphics are concerned. If you see a wood grain for instance and get right on top of it, it looks exactly the same without any pixels or breakup in the image. The trees and other plants in the game don’t’ look like someone simply assembled together some flat graphics and called it a tree. They have depth and it’s quite easy to stop playing and simply remark at what the game has to offer.

What I really like though are the enemies, in particular, killing them. Expose a Chimera to something that will burn its body and you’ll see a burned out husk remaining when the damage is done. The creatures also have parts added to their bodies to keep them cooled down, and there are instances where you will see one of them slump to the ground while smoke and steam shoot out from the devises on their backs. This is one of many extremely cool effects that Resistance offers players, and when you add in some fantastic explosions, dirt and dust flying on the screen when you toss grenades into areas with earth nearby, you have a new level of realism added that only the next generation of games can provide. Also, the flashlights that you will use later in the game are done wonderfully, and much of the darkened areas remain difficult to see while you try and use a small light source to navigate through the stage. If you mix that in with smoke and steam effects which the designers love to use, you’ll find that Resistance really has challenges all across the board.

Aside from the campaign mode, you can also play Resistance in co-op mode with a friend playing through a split screen version of the game and, with any luck, making short work of the Chimera. However, where the game is really going to be a huge hit is the online mode. Any of the hosted games can support up to 40 players, and that’s a lot of players shooting each other down. Like SOCOM, you have two teams, in this case humans and Chimera, and of course the enemies have a few deadly tricks that can make being a human rather annoying. Also like SOCOM and many other online games, you can establish clans, but the game also keeps track of your stats such as how many games have been played, your total number of kills, how many flags you’ve captured, head shots and a variety of other things. You will also earn ribbons and medals depending on your performance. The online mode features games with players that have similar skill levels meaning, thus avoiding a frustrating game where you’re fragged constantly by other players who have nothng better to do than play Resistance each and every waking hour.

In the multiplayer mode you can customize your character and participate in the classic Deathmatch in either a free-for-all style or team play, but there’s also conversion mode. This is the same as free-for-all, but here when you die, you will respawn as a Chimera, but die again and you’re out of the game. There is also a capture the flag mode as well as Meltdown where you’ll need to overhead the other teams reactor or you can go for the same type of match in breach, only the object here is to destroy the reactor. If you have no interest in playing online, you can play the same games in an offline mode, though bear in mind that you will need to new, wireless controllers.

Resistance: Fall of Man is going to easily become one of the top ranked games among PS3 owners for quite a few reasons and it goes far beyond just online play. The game is fantastic, the story is great, and it’s a title that has a lot going for it. Plus, I don’t think that Sony and Insomnia have plans of dressing someone up like the main character and marching into Hollywood with a half-baked idea of turning it into a film with a huge list of ridiculous demands to go alongside it. No, Resistance is all about gameplay, it’s all about fun, and it perfectly showcases just a taste of what you can expect to see with PS3 titles in the months and years to come.

-mike-