LTTP: Resistance: Fall of Man

LTTP or ‘late to the party’ pieces are opportunities for us to catch up and write about games we missed out on the first time around. They may contain spoilers.

It’s rare for me to pick up a console at its launch. To me, the games available at that time aren’t worth picking up and thus I ignored Resistance: Fall of Man when I finally picked up my 60 GB PS3 in mid-2007. The consensus for Insomniac’s first person shooter was “generally favorable“, but despite the praise, I didn’t deem it worthy of a $59.99 CAD price tag. With Resistance 2 on its way and my new appreciation for Insomniac’s work after the fantastic Ratchet & Clank: Tools of Destruction, I thought it would be a prime opportunity to play through Resistance: Fall of Man. So, I got my hands on the game via other means. Through a trade via CheapAssGamer no less! Let’s see if I made a good trade.

Resistance is nearly two years old and during that span of time many first person shooters came and went — Call of Duty 4, Half-Life 2: Episode 2 and Crysis to name a few. During that time, visuals have improved dramatically and despite all the advancements, Resistance still managed ‘wow’ me in one area: glass breaking physics. By today’s standards the animation and texture work is passable at best, but the glass breaking? It’s very impressive. I’ve never seen glass breaking done in such a convincing manner. Other praise worthy aspects of Resistance include its clean images (minimal jaggies) and silky smooth framerate. The only noteworthy complaint against Resistance’s visual presentation was the limited use of the color palette; it was a very beige game which blended a lot the stages together into one unforgettable clump.

Surprisingly, Resistance’s audio work was very lacking. The various weapons, explosions and overall atmosphere were lacking that battlefield and war-like grit. Resistance was unusually quiet and shy about expressing itself. Explosions lacked that satisfying bang and weapons were missing that grin worthy pop. Orchestral musical pieces helped intensify major battles, but in between these struggles against these Chimeras, I was only privy to an unusual silence. “Why is it so quiet?” I was asked by others passing by and I often had no answer. I definitely missed the company of the chaotic noise that was in Call of Duty 4.