A launch title for the PlayStation 3 garnered a great deal of positive reviews 2 years ago, that title was Resistance: Fall Of Man, a first person shooter from Insomniac.
In retrospect this was one of the games I really didn't understand the hype behind.
Resistance is an FPS that ticked all the right boxes for its launch on the PS3, beforehand we'd known it was well along in development before the launch of the PS3 and was designed to cover everything from trophies to online multiplayer. In a very quick summary it's fast and never lets up on the action, there's a lot of action for your money, especially now that it's one of the first platinum range (greatest hits in the USA) budget releases.
The most negative points to be levelled at the game are the lack of follow through on what seems an almost complete trophy system and the lack of a co-op campaign. Split screen however, in a time of every game opting for online co-op instead is the perfect addition and only helps what is already an excellent game.
The setting is England, north to south, the Chimera have invaded and taken over Europe with only Great Britain remaining for the first large stronghold to be controlled. An American by the name of Nathan Hale joins the resistance in a move from the USA to aid the british in their final hour and all hell breaks loose. From Grimsby to London this is a fresh adventure with care put into what could've easily been a shambles of a storyline and it pays off.
Insomniac offer a somewhat old-school feeling to the game with a bolstered on arsenal of weaponry making for quite a pleasing gameplay scenario based in the 1950's had WWII not occurred. Throughout the game you'll move from rustic villages to scaling cities not to mention a bus depot and finally some alien constructions in a similar manner to Half Life 2. The catch.. Half Life 2 is only one of the main influences! From Halo to Killzone you'll find all manner of discrete and not so discrete nods to the best of the genre.
Plagiarism should be bad but it's definately not when you know exactly what you want from each of these certified classic FPS adventures. Halo being an obvious culprit provides the inspiration for some great vehicle action sequences and thankfully not on-rails for once.
The massive array of weapons offering secondary fire such as the bullseye allow you to send a marker and then take cover as bullets hone in on your victim and even the bog standard machine gun packs enough punch to remain satified with when only using a select number of weapons if you're as safe as I am with ammo.
The single player mode (and co-op mode which works great) never lets up and despite some minor bugs of enemy AI not being activated the campaign pushes enough set pieces of a wide variety that it never feels as stale as I expected in hindsight.
Last but not least is the multiplayer mode, although my personal choice would go to Call Of Duty 4: Modern Warfare for the best online experience on any system Resistance's multiplayer is solid and sports a large capacity of players with a wide range of customisability and extra maps you'd only wish were in the single player campaign (the US Navy ship for one).
All in all this is a solid game and though Uncharted has its trophies which should by default make it the better choice from the platinum range, this game should be right up there. With R2 just around the corner it's the prologue to what's definately shaping up to be the next Killer-App for the PS3 and the perfect entry to the Resistance franchise.. now if only they just put the damn trophies in!
Verdict:Great
