It’s been 2 years since the launch of Resistance: Fall of Man, a game designed to be the first true first-person shooter experience for the Playstation 3. It’s also been 2 years since the launch of the Playstation 3 itself. With a few bumps along the way, the Playstation 3 has been chugging along nicely, for the most part. Fall of Man refreshed the first-person experience with a war game set in the bowels of Europe that wasn’t during World War 2. The 1950s setting gave it a unique look among the crowd and gave Insomniac Games a new universe to play around in. With Resistance 2, the Chimera fight is taken to the United States but has this sequel delivered a keeper or has the fight been lost?

Gameplay

Resistance 2 picks up almost immediately after the first ended, with Nathan Hale the lone survivor of the chimera invasion of Europe. Hale was brought into the United States for safety and a re-build of himself to get back in the action. He gets picked up by the black ops special research projects agency or otherwise known as SRPA. The chimera have been quiet for the two years that Hale has spent with the United States, but suddenly disaster strikes when the alien race decides to invade America in a full scale invasion that feels massive but unfortunately linear.

Hale is joined by a group called The Sentinels, who like him have been able to resist the Chimera virus, within SRPA, but you never really get to know who they are otherwise. As the Chimera invades the US, you get to visit a few well-known cities in the nation a few other choice locations. Throughout the battle, various objectives fall out of no where and again set you up for the waves of chimera that you run into along the way. The story itself sets up a nice surge with one goal in mind in the overall campaign.

Insomniac, this time around, decided to stick more with the constant that first-person shooters have fallen to lately. Only 2 weapons at a time are available for use on your player, and our old friend the health regenerator returns. This health regenerator business is something I take issue with but that’s for another time.  Your weapons give you the option of an alternate fire which expands the use of each weapon beyond its original intention. There are some new weapon additions to give things a fresh new look in the arsenal cabinet, like a limb tearing splicer that is pretty much self explanatory. Vehicle levels are no where to be seen, which keeps you on your feet and in the action at all times.

New chimera has been added such as brainless grimes and cloaked chameleons as you get help from your Sentinel friends or the regular Army. You don’t have much time to play around with the new weapons unless you want to spend your time dying a lot. What’s a little convenient is the fact that there always seems to be the appropriate weapon lying around for boss fights and in the most obvious location as well, so it’s not hard to figure out what you should be doing especially with the radio help you get at the time of the fight. Battles may make you think like you’re fighting a massive scale war but in the end, it’s a linear experience that most average first-person shooters fall into.

The multiplayer experience will offer the more “bang for your buck”. It offers two modes, Competitive and Co-Operative. Competitive offers your standard modes that you see in almost every shooter to date like Deathmatch, Capture the Flag and so on. However, what isn’t seen normally players battling it out against 60 other players. Aside from that, however, there is one bright light in this shroud and that is a game type called Skirmish. Players are split into teams with objectives befallen on them that must be completed and the other team will be given the goal of stopping you in completing those objectives.  There isn’t much lag, surprisingly, when given the stance of the 60 player match games.

The 8 player co-operative is a beast in itself. Each player is given the option of choosing one of three classes and is thrusted into the single player campaign. There is no deviation from this, so if you were expecting some kind of exclusive map to play with, then you might be disappointed. With experience points involved, it makes Resistance 2 look more like it took inspiration from World of Warcraft and that’s not to say it’s a bad thing in most cases. After choosing your classes, you are set in the campaign but have a very different pace with waves of enemies launching themselves at you soaking up the damage and giving out XP with every kill. Since Call of Duty 4 launched, we’ve been seeing more and more first person shooters falling towards the scheme of leveling up and earning ranks.

Resistance 2 does its job of filling the sequel category but falls short in certain areas, these mostly being in the single player campaign. Levels, while have decent pacing, fail to feel as epic as some might be making it out to be. Boss battles are essentially boiled down to hitting certain target points causing damage until said boss is defeated. There always seems to be the right weapon lying around giving you an easy opportunity to get the job done. This eliminates the effort of strategy and the overall thought process of defeating the boss.

Sound

The 5.1 Dolby surround sound included in the box is a nice treat. Battles are given new life and cut-scenes act as if you’re watching a movie thanks to the high quality in design. The musical score gets extra credit here for creating an environment that makes each level in its own identity whether you’re in a boss fight or fighting off waves of the Chimera. Voice acting is done fairly well for the most part, but might feel a bit off center every now and then.

Graphics

Out of all the games on the Playstation 3, Resistance 2 offers some of the best graphics in its library. The massive boss battles are your wow moments and everything in between just seems like filler. There are some graphical tearing and texture pop-in issues here and there, but no game is perfect. You’ll be seeing a variety of colors and environments that change up the traditional brown castle, brown building we’re always used to seeing in other shooters these days.  The cinemas look good with the motion-capture giving Nathan Hale an all too human like appearance.

Plasma Factor

Resistance 2’s biggest plus is its multiplayer. While, the single player campaign is solid with 10 hours of gameplay, there is more to behold once the credits roll across the screen. The 60 match player count is impressive and offers a whole new dynamic to the experience. While the graphics in multiplayer are toned down, it doesn’t eliminate the fun that is undeniable in multiplayer. After playing a couple of matches it seems like the time flies when you realize its already been over an hour then you were intending to play in your session. The 8 player co-operative is deep and should keep you busy for quite a while, especially if you’re addicted to the leveling.

The Competitive multiplayer gives you a fair share of decent deathmatch and capture the flag moments. What’s great is the new Skirmish mode which has players split into teams and given objectives to complete with the other side attempting to stop you at all costs. With support on the official website, it’s hard not to get lost in multiplayer after the single-player is all said and done.

Conclusion

Resistance 2 is easy to recommend simply because of its multiplayer component. The single-player ends up feeling like it’s just there and only serves to build the bridge in the inevitable possible conclusion in the 3rd game. The 10 hour campaign is nice but not without its various design issues and strategy. The multiplayer is where you’ll more than likely be spending the bulk of your time. The Co-Operative and Competitive modes really bounce off each other well and balance out the gameplay overall. Gamers looking for a great multiplayer experience will find their $60 well spent on Resistance 2.