With the first title taking place overseas, and Resistance 2 being set on the West Coast, Resistance 3 rounds out the experience with levels ranging from Oklahoma to St. Louis and, finally, New York City. Players assume the role of Joseph Capelli, the private who killed Nathan Hale in the previous title. Beginning with Capelli and his family in hiding, the Chimera soon stage an attack. As the survivors escape, Capelli is recruited by Fyodor Malikov to travel with him to New York to stop the Chimera once and for all. With the promise of a better life for his wife and son, Capelli reluctantly agrees and heads East with Malikov.
En route to New York, players will encounter numerous other groups of survivors, some friendly, some not. The journey is constantly plagued by Chimeran attack, and the game does a good job of slowly introducing new enemy types along with new weapon types designed to even the playing field.
Gameplay is standard FPS fare with a few on-rail vehicle segments on the linear path to the story’s conclusion. Resistance offers variety with the inclusion of numerous weapons of Chimeran origin along with the usual lineup of human weaponry, and this variety is easily the strong point when it comes to gameplay. Players will rarely find themselves sticking to one type of weapon, as doing so severely hinders one’s ability to combat the Chimeran invasion.
The gameplay extends to the Multiplayer modes, which include the expected series of killstreak bonuses, perks, and loadout customization, though the latter is somewhat limited compared to other current offerings. Multiplayer maps are designed well enough, but the entire experience is a bit rough around the edges in that it doesn’t exceed expectations, but rather just barely meets them. And seeing as Resistance 3 requires an paid online pass for anyone who buys the game used or rents it, we expected something more refined and polished. As it stands, the multiplayer is decidedly average, falling short of the single player campaign, and not worth the extra money if you happen to rent the game.
Visually, Resistance 3 soars over its predecessors, all of which featured an oppressively gray and brown color palette. Resistance 3 substitutes the dreary environments of the previous games for ones filled with pleasingly contrasting pastel colors, a visual aesthetic that extends to the Olly Moss box art. Graphics are crisp and highly detailed, and performance was excellent throughout, though there were a few times when the game glitched up and we couldn’t continue, forcing us to reload our last checkpoint.
Resistance 3 goes out with a bang, standing as the best title in the series, and one that’s worth playing even if you haven’t played the others. Unfortunately, the multiplayer fails to impress, and that, combined with the restrictive online pass that damages used sales and rentals, prevents us from recommending a full price purchase. The game is worth renting for the single player campaign, but nothing more.
– – – – – – –
Name: Resistance 3
Available on: Playstation 3
Developed by: Insomniac Games
Published by: Sony Computer Entertainment
Release date: September 6, 2011
EG Score: 3 out of 5 / “Worth Trying”
Very good review, after watching this I’d like to play it, looks good but I haven’t played the others. I played the demo of the first game but couldn’t change the controls to more comfortable ones, not sure if this is just in the demo?
That multiplayer looked ‘tacked on’ at best, reminded me of the multiplayer on 007 quantum of solace I think it’s called, just rubbish.
Good thing I don’t really care about the multiplayer if the single player story and gameplay are good, unfair to people renting it or buying it though, I don’t like all this online pass rubbish.
The multiplayer for the first game was actually pretty robust, and has a strong following to this day. R2 is the game that fell flat with multiplayer fans (although the coop was pretty fun). I would reccomend picking up the first game for the awesome weapons and solid story, but the second is skippable.
And with the online pass… you do get a 2 day or 1 week trial period right? this would make renting the game ok for multiplayer. At the end of the day, the publishers want to make money on the game they worked on. I don’t blame them. I have a harsher attitude against online DRM protection for single player games.