Resistance 3 Review

Game: Resistance 3

Developer: Insomniac Games

Publisher: Sony Computer Entertainment

Available on: PlayStation 3 only

When the PlayStation 3 first came out so did the first Resistance game. Launch titles have got certain expectations to live up to and Resistance certainly didn’t disappoint, being the first game on the new system to sell 1,000,000 copies. It’s now 5 years later and the third entry into the Resistance franchise is in our hands, the Chimera are up to their usual tricks and it’s down to a single person to sort things out; you. Does Resistance 3 live up to the first game in the series or has the story gone on too long now? In a world that’s littered with First Person Shooters, what makes Resistance 3 and its predecessors stand out?

STORY: The story in Resistance 3 follows straight on from the events of Resistance 2. Nathan Hale has failed in his attempts to keep the Chimera out of America and detonating the mother ship over Mexico only served to activate a wormhole over New York. With most of the world dead there’s not much else to do except keep fighting back, and the survivors of the attack on America have moved into underground tunnels in an attempt to stay as far away from the ever increasing number of invaders as possible. The player will take control of Joe Capelli throughout Resistance 3, one of the SRPA members who served under the leadership of Nathan Hale during the events of Resistance 2, as he makes his way towards New York to try and shut down the wormhole that’s slowly, but surely, freezing the entire planet.

Throughout the game, players will have to fight their way through the broken and destroyed cities of North America, from St. Louis all the way to their final destination in New York, encountering numerous Chimera along the way as well as small pockets of resistance fighters. The overarching question that lingers over the head of Joe Capelli being “is it enough?”; you’re here to make sure that it is.

GRAPHICS: The type of visuals that developers are able to squeeze out of the PlayStation 3 has come on leaps and bounds since the system’s initial release back in 2006 and Resistance 3 is no different, Insomniac Games have pulled and pushed, squeezed and stretched, every single drop of graphical power available in the 5 year old system; and it paid off. All of the environments in the game look amazing with each of the enemies that are in them showing just how much attention was paid on each of the game’s models, no matter how little they are in the game at the end of the day. Where Resistance 3 truly shows its graphical prowess, however, is in the cutscenes, all of them wouldn’t look out of place in something that you’d pay to see in the cinema. Coupled with the top notch voice acting, the quality of the visuals really go a long way in conveying the story and leaving you entrenched in the world of Resistance; and with a story as deep and primal as that of attempting to take a broken world back from a slew of invaders, keeping players invested in the story is extremely important.

SOUND: As you would expect from a highly anticipated title such as Resistance 3, the sound design is up there with the best of them. Everything from the sounds of the guns firing to the voice acting is treated with the same care and attention that would be afforded to a Hollywood movie. In regards to the weapons, with most of them being realistic weapons that have been augmented with Chimeran technology, they all sound more or less as you would expect but with just enough of a change to indicate to the player that not all is what it seems. The voice acting throughout all of the game, from all of the people involved, is some of the best examples of acting in video games right now. All of the characters do well at conveying the emotion of the moment while also being able to perform the slightly comedic sections, as few as they are, with perfect comedic timing. Just as you would expect from the developers that bring us the Ratchet & Clank games.

GAMEPLAY: Resistance 3 is your typical first person shooter, enemies come towards you, aim for the head and pull the trigger to take them down before they take you down. What sets Resistance 3 apart from the rest of the sea of First Person Shooters is the quality of the single player experience. From the moment you start the game all the way through to the end, the story is exemplary, filled with emotion and oozing quality, it is one of the main reasons that people will continue to play no matter how many times the bottom right hand corner of the screen says “Checkpoint Reached”.

The shooting mechanic always feels natural and never feels too easy, as most console based first person shooters can by adding methods to help the player aim. That being said, Resistance 3 isn’t too hard either, and all of the weapons have a secondary fire that will help most people out of sticky situations while keeping them rare enough that they never feel overpowered, ensuring that players will only use them when they REALLY have to. On top of the actual gameplay of the single player experience players will also notice that while using weapons in single player they will be “levelling up”. Upgraded weapons have added abilities such as the shotgun’s incendiary ammo, which means that players will do well to keep changing up which weapons they’re using in order to level them all (or at least the ones that are used most often) up at the same time so that when you get to the end of the game you’re not required to use a level one weapon. While it’s entirely possible to win using a level one weapon ,it’s not advisable.

PlayStation Move is also supported by Resistance 3, adding an entirely new sense to a game that would otherwise seem, at least at first glance, a little standard. Connecting a Move controller to the game allows players to aim at the screen using the device and use the ‘T’ button to shoot, which all feels natural while using the motion controller. One of the most impressive uses of the motion controller is while performing a melee action. In order to whack the offending Chimera in the face the player has to literally whip the motion controller in the same action as the character is. This all adds a sense of immersion to the game that wouldn’t be there without the motion controller. What’s better than a little exercising while beating Chimeran faces? Nothing, that’s what.

Being a first person shooter a lot of people will be looking towards Resistance 3 as something they’ll be able to waste away the hours on in multiplayer, levelling up, gaining rewards and otherwise having as much continuous fun as possible and, in this regard, Resistance 3 certainly doesn’t disappoint. There’s plenty of multiplayer modes to keep even the most hardcore multiplayer fan entertained for hours, from classic deathmatch (kill everything that moves) modes all the way through to the more modern team objective modes. Whichever mode you decide that you’ll be playing, you’ll be able to earn experience points for just about anything you manage to do. Each point of experience goes towards levelling up your profile and each time you level up you gain access to new and improved weapons, skins and perks which will keep most people coming back for more and more.

LONGEVITY: With the multiplayer aspect of Resistance 3 being as well made as it is, the longevity of the game is about as long as you want it to be, but that doesn’t mean people that are only interested in the single player campaign will have nothing to do once the credits are rolling. Players of the multiplayer nature can continue to play the multiplayer section of the game to their hearts content, levelling up, gaining perks and shooting their opponents in the face, while those of the single player persuasion can play through the single player campaign attempting to gather the credits they can use in the in game shop, unlocking new skins, artwork, videos, etc. If you want to keep playing Resistance 3, there’s something for almost everyone to do, at all times.

VERDICT: The combination of an amazing story, some stunning visuals and plenty of gameplay to keep you entertained for hours on end means that if you own a PlayStation 3, and you don’t end up picking up Resistance 3, then you’ll be doing yourself a disservice. The Resistance series of games are a PlayStation 3 staple and with this third entry into the franchise it’s not difficult to see why.

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