A Backlog Diary: Part 17- Four-eyed so-and-so's and potential genital inadequacy

I'm on a bit of a charge right now. With my internet connection having the conistancy of a Labour MP (that is to say, not very consistant), I have temporarily given up on playing Battlefield 3. Suddenly, things are becoming very Playstation 3 oriented.


The Playstation 3 backlog, now in colour!

Now the Playstation brand is one I've never felt very at home with. They slaughtered the Saturn, they knocked out the N64, they deaded the Dreamcast, and the DS? Actually better not go there... but the point is, they've tended to defeat every console I've ever owned up to the original Xbox; which meant that many of the games I wanted to play would not make it to my preferred system. A certain anamosity built up on part, one which was eventually broken when I shelled out for a PSP (which turned out to serve more use as a power guzzling MP3 player, but hey-ho). Until then, I had not owned a current generation Sony console, and it would be two years, in May 2011, before I finally caught up. I eventually bought a PS1 and PS2 to catch up on some classics I'd missed whilst playing Soul Calibur, Banjo Kazooie and Sega Rally Championship, but the PS3 purchase was significant, in that I was finally console-ambiguous; I owned all three, and could see the benefits to all. Having owned an Xbox, and then upgrading to the 360 in 2007, it was a strange sensation to be waltzing with what I once considered the enemy, but now, with several exclusives knocked out of the park, I'm starting to feel at home (but not at Playstation Home. I don't know what the heck that's all about!)

If you read this blog regularly, you'll know I played through the Uncharted series and the Killzone series; two big feathers in Sony's cap. I loved Killzone 3 and Uncharted 2, rather liked the other entries in those series too, but there was one other major Playstation player I was yet to tackle. Resistance.

Resistance: Fall of Man was released in 2007, and it damn well shows. I found it hard to believe how dated it felt. The graphics were bland and grey, the environments uninspiring, the weapons underwhelming, the plot forgettable, and the enemy rather crap too. The chimera reminded me heavily of some of the bigger Locust creatures from Gears of War, namely the big spider dude whose name I forget. They didn't really stand up to a certain military force from another well loved Sony exclusive series...


Hey yo, Chimera... we got our eye on you son!

Seriously, I know we bitch and complain about sameyness in our games, but hell, a lot has changed since 2007, although at times it felt like the game was copying a certain other well known console based FPS franchise. Alien enemy with unknown ambitions? Check. Scene where your whole squad gets wiped out by bugs/parasites? Check. Scene where you tear through the countryside in a jeep? Check. Yes, it felt like someone at Insomniac had played Halo: Combat Evolved, given it a few strokes of brown and grey, strecthed out the enemies, and ripped it off the ringworld and back onto Earth. Maybe I'm imagining it, but at the very least, it seemed to ape the pacing of the 2001 launch title for the original Xbox without quite getting it right.
Not to say I hated the game. It was quite fun blasting through York, London and Manchester cathedral (take that Catholicism!) and some of the scenes with the walkers and the spider dudes were quite cool. Also, those tall guys who run at you and claw you took me by surprise. And whilst the plot wasn't truly inspiring considering what we've seen in the last five years, at the time, I can imagine it was actually quite unique. I guess what I'm saying is this game is not as good as a load of games that came out after it... well no shit. Eventually, the likes of Call of Duty and Gears of War would give us Ironsights, the sprint button, and the ability to take cover, which to be fair, Insomniac learnt the benefits of by the time it came to Resistance 2, which I'm about a third of the way through and rather enjoying. However, I have to score games according to how they play now, not how they played then, so Resistance: Fall of Man gets a 6 from me. If you have no plans to play the rest of the Resistance series, give this a miss, but considering I only paid £4.00 for it, it's hardly the biggest rip off in the world. Something of a bargain I'd say, and at the very least, its wheted my appetite for the two sequels, particularly Resistance 3 in all its stereoscopic 3D glory!

Speaking of which, Resistance 1 isn't the only game to bite the dust this week. Another Sony exclusive series has finally made its way to my screen in full 3D. Motorstorm: Apocalypse was the game I chose to be the middle man between Resistance 1 and Resistance 2, as I've decided to play a game in between each Resistance title in order to not get too bogged down with shooting four-eyed wankers in the face. I had a lot of fun with this one, and whilst it wasn't a perfect racing sim, being more "Mario Kart meets Doomsday" than "Forza Motorsport 4 meets The Road", it has a whole lot going for it. I played the campaign, which focuses on a racing festival organised by some chap called Big Dog (small penis syndrome ahoy), taking place in a post-apocalyptic city suffering from 2012 syndrome. The plot is wafer thin, but serves well to give the game some character over all the other Motorstorm titles, and follows three racers as society breaks down around them, which they don't give a flying piss about, because they're hurtling through falling skyscrapers and desolated subterranean trainlines. Handling is reasonable, which is to say you can control it, which is the least one could ask for. The only thing I would say is the game doesn't seem to be built for cornering, with neither brake really being too helpful when it came to hairpins. A better drifting feature might have been the way to go. Still, the bossting system added some excitement, as you try not to explode via overheating engine.
The final level of the Rookie's (Mash) portion of the campaign might just be the most fun I've ever had with an arcade style racer since Burnout 3: Takedown. Whilst most of the gameplay is flatout races and elimination rounds, there are some here and there which serve merely to progres the plot, and consequently, the destruction of the city. Mash's prologue takes place as the red flare goes up; a sign that the city is now proper fucked, and it is pretty much time to leave. This race isn't a race, it's a charge, as you and what seems like hundreds of your competitors storm your way through the falling city, finally making it to a destroyed bridge which wobbles and buckles as you fly across it, jumping finally onto the aircraft carrier that brought you there. It's the most tense two minutes of the whole game, and one I replayed several times for kicks.
I was goign to try out the multiplayer, but it seems no one was playing anymore, so that went out the window. So on Single Player alone, it's an 8 from me. It seems I give a lot of these 8's and 9's out I know, but then, these are games I've chosen to purchase and play.

Next time, definitly Resistance 2, and maybe something else, I don't know. I am hoping to get round to some non-backlog blogs, but with all the discussion of how shit Mass Effect 3's ending is, I'm not getting much inspiration. Also, Browser Games was hardly the most inspiring Topic of the Week. Maybe I'll just right a blog called "David Cage: Shut the fuck up!"

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