Resistance 2

In short Resistance 2 is exactly what a sequel should bring. It doesn't necessarily give alot of new gameplay mechanics to offer with its overall gameplay scheme, but still improves on virtually everything Resistance: Fall of Man did right and even fix some of the things it done wrong. That said R2 can safely be put under your fast paced run n gun FPS category. All the same basic formulas are here but it still gives you a top quality equivalent to all of those aforementioned formulas.

R2 offers you three different sections to play these mechanics. It has its single player campaign, while isn't exactly the highlight, is still a fantastic and memorable 10-12 hours or so. Its utter tension throughout will never cease to have you worry for this alternate reality's human race.

Throughout the single player you'll come across hordes of chimera, the alien race that is invading our humble planet, of all sizes ranging from your humanoid hybrids to 80 ft tall chaotic monsters that look like something that could find themselves going up against Godzilla in a soon-to-be released Japanese sequel. You'll traverse through a number of environments some rather bland ones however. Mostly the Chimeran shuttle areas that all have that yawn look of them with shiny futuristic walls and high-tech hexagon buttons and switches. There's also plenty of wonderful scenery to behold in its single player still, such as the American Cities which have all now more or less become one giant brothel for the Chimera with eggs littered everywhere .Chicago especially will show you alot of wreckage and sure going around America's streets fighting aliens is all done before, plenty of times, but R2 least has this popular cliché as fun as it ever was. 

Some other notable changes from R-FoM's campaign is no more co-op - which is a shame but easy to overlook with its own delightful replacement - and Nathan Hales pockets being thinned so he can now only carry two weapons at a time. It works well and adds much more suspension and the need to make every bullet count. Fortunately the weapon that you'll probably be wishing you had for the current situations you'll find Nathan in will be awaiting around the corner so weapon choice is still fluid and accessible. Weapons this time have had abit of an overall haul too. Many weapons have been made extinct but have still been replaced with many new destructive toys to dismember chimera with. Favourites include the Splicer, which can cut off Chimeran limb's, which is always a treat to see especially against the zombie like Grims as they charge at you only to have their legs dismembered. Great stuff.

So with an overly epic and sizable campaign mode with 4 difficulties and plenty of trophies that will require multiple playthrough s, R2's single player is a dominant success. Only gripe is its abrupt ending that leaves alot to be desired.

Once you've managed to squeeze every bit of blood and gut out of every Chimeran scum Nathan has to contend with, you then have plenty more with its much lengthier co-op campaign. Ranging from 2-8 players, you will assign yourself one out of three classes to play as, all suited to match everyone's MMO choices. There's the Tank soldier class, the DPS Special Ops and of course everyones favourite overpowered Healer Medic class.

All three vary in practically every aspect from their weapons to health to how they gain experience boosts. You could just constantly switch through classes per level, but there's plenty of reason to stick with a class to level up due to how many upgrades and new weapons become available. The ways to purchase the majority of upgrades is through its currency called Grey Tech which is some sort of peculiar type of resource that plays a pivotal role in the co-op campaign's ''story''.

The co-op campaign may be sizable and varied with multiple difficultie settings, which are based by how many players are in session, and many different areas to storm through (including some locations from R-FoM), but it still does have alot of blank spots. One is from the missions themselves. Each area has around 8-12 missions or so, but each mission consists of the same 3 sections just in different order. The different order of sections will determine the end boss, but for the most part you will eventually be running through the exact same objectives per mission. What's more, while a story is evident throughout thanks to the Intel your treated too before each mission, there's no cutscenes or anything like that, and again even with so much information displayed in the text intros, it doesn't match just what your doing and takes away a sense of purpose. You'll be constantly destroying that same STALKER machine or taking down those same Titan Chimera to which somehow seems to get you closer to finding Daudelus, the current General of sorts for the Chimera.

Besides the lack of story amidst the gameplay, the intros per level still give plenty of extra insight into R2's overall story and sheds alot of light on plenty of plot specific-segments.

Then of course there is R2's competitive multiplayer, which isn't really anything special in most regards. Sure it can have matchs that can contain up to 60 players, but the way I see it is it's not down to how many players are in play,but the game modes themselves to which makes the competitive multiplayer fun. Sure it's still enjoyable and plenty of trophies require you to do some rather impressive feats in the competitive multiplayer, but the lack of innovating game modes does sort of make R2's competitive side seem very plain, as a polite way to put it

What's there is your standard Deathmatch,Team-Deathmatch, Capture the Core, which is yet another varient on capture the flag, and Skirmish mode. Which is ironicallu R2's less interesting C-M game mode despite being the one that really tries to stand out. It varies around squads performing different objectives but these objectives literally boil down to two. You will either find yourself trying to take over or otherwise defend a beacon or tasked with trying to kill or otherwise defend a specific player. With you constantly doing the same objectives for so long I frankly found myself not bothering with Skirmish mode and just stuck with playing through deathmatchs most of the time.

With all that said though R2's Competitive Multiplayer has all the basics to keep you coming. From ranks to unlockable skins to show off to other players to a still very fun take on everyones favourite three Competitive Multiplayer game modes. Skirmish may be a hit and miss effort but the other three still stand strong as enjoyable, bloody and with servers full of foreigners to kill.

How everything plays is very fluid and responsive. R2 is a rather hard game at times during its single player and cooperative campaigns, but it's down to some very conniving AI and not gameplay faults or technical issues. Graphically it's not the best out there but still gives alot that you must witness for yourself and the character models at least are impressive. R2 is also much more bloodier than its predecessor with limbs flying through the sky and painting the enviroments red a common occurrence throughout R2.

Sound is rather good too. The single player has some solid voice acting, though passable script, and the sound effects are all appropriate. The Chimeran Bullseye weapon is as menacing as ever and those Hedgehog Grenades should still force an OH SHIT. Music though isn't very prominent through R2. The single player campaigns soundtrack does its job yet it's forgetful  while the co-op and competitive don't have any musical themes of the sort.

Overall R2 is definitely a must have fan of the fast paced FPS. It's a sure truimpth for the ps3 offering an addictive multiplayer experience and memorable single player campaign to which its ending clearly shouts out a sequel. It's just too bad they couldn't of hinted the sequel concept a little more subtly.