Resistance: Fall of Man
Every launch needs a must-have title. This is it.
Published: November 28, 2006
Still, the meat of the initial experience (and where you'll learn to use the weapons properly) is in the single-player game, where the pacing is entirely different. It's also where you'll have the time to appreciate some of absolutely insane detail. Sure, there are maps where you'll have a few dozen characters running around fighting their own AI-driven battles, but even here you can stop (for a moment) to peek at the detail in the models; glass breaks and shatters more realistically than any game before it, the Chimeran soldiers' cooling packs have hoses that can be shot out, normal mapping gives human clothing creases that react to bending limbs, and through it all, England and what's happening to the land are sort of a main character all its own. All of these things go into making a world that's instantly believable and continues to get cooler the more you play.
The audio no doubt plays a major part in this too; 7.1 surround gives audiophiles' ears as much to chew on as graphics whores. While the game may run at a locked 30 frames a second and "only" 720p, the increased horsepower of the PS3 was used to sell the aural capabilities as much as visuals, and it's something that can't be understated enough. Tons of aural cues, little surround effects, true 360 degree sound -- these were all things that the PlayStation 2 was never really able to do, and Resistance does it wonderfully.
The game's score is also noteworthy, not only because it plays out across so many channels, nor that the effects artists and composers apparently got off on melding their work into something that feels completely seamless, but also because the music in the game so expertly blends a sort of driving, militaristic series of themes with more spooky, almost horror movie-like segments. The audio enjoys messing with the player -- either amping them up for a fight or creeping them out in the more claustrophobic sections.
The game isn't perfect; the AI occasionally wigs out, and there are some odd clipping issues or weird bugs, plus the approach of narrating the game means that you rarely experience some of the more obvious moments through Hale's eyes, and there are some fairly huge loading times, but then this is a launch game. That doesn't excuse things, but the errors are all minor, and it's actually hard for me not to pour more time into discussing how good the game is -- not just for a launch game, nor for a PlayStation 3 game -- but just in general. This is, despite minor gripes, one of the most polished and solid shooters ever made, and things like a basic non-gimmicky implementation of the SIXAXIS controller's motion sensing stuff (you shake the controller to get face-hugging enemies off you) shows restraint.
And, amazingly, it continues to get better the more you play it. Unique Skill Points lifted from Ratchet return here, rewarding you for things like sniping multiple targets or blowing up multiple enemies at once, and they in turn unlock some great bonuses. The story has enough nuance that you notice more stuff the second time through, things like the vehicles are spaced out so perfectly that when they come along, it feels like a little break while you're still playing the game and moving things forward, the level design really can't be praised enough -- despite the fact that it's all rather linear (but then so were those Halo and Half-Life games I keep going back to.
Insomniac nailed the sense of scale, and delights in alternately throwing plot twists and growing and shrinking level designs to keep things interesting throughout the experience. That I played through the game twice -- not because I needed to, but because I couldn't help myself -- and that I've been hopelessly addicted to the online multiplayer (and I don't like playing console FPSes online), it all just shows how solid the game really is.
The question, then, becomes the same one people have been asking about the PS3 since games first started appearing: is this worth plunking down about $600 for (with taxes and this $60 game, even the $500 version will set you back about six bills). Honestly, for someone who has moved away from the first-person shooter, it's even easier for me to say this: yes. Hell yes, this is a system seller, just as Sony had hoped, and it demonstrates the single best value for that $60 you can get on the PlayStation 3 right now.
So there you have it. This is the PlayStation 3 game to get. It's good enough to buy a system for. Now there's just the issue of getting a system.
