Resistance 2

[vanquish]

I downloaded the R1 demo, and thought it was ok.

i was put off by the enemy death animations, and all the silly guns that shoot slow glowing orbs through walls and stuff.

I also thought for a shooter, it didn't have much 'feel', in that the aiming and controls were a bit off, and the guns lacked 'punch', and felt toylike. Like the carbine, where it would go forward and back really fast when you were shooting, it looked silly.

Compared to Uncharted, which although more of an adventure game, had much better shooting.

I also disliked the whole modern technology in the 50s thing, and some of the art in R2 like the guys with combat suits and huge black spectacles look strange.

So have they fixed these problems with R2?
I was watching some vids of its multiplayer and it looked like complete chaos.

Can 60 players be on the screen at once? Or are they sectioned off into battling squads, in separate sections of the same map.

I'm getting GOW2, and probably Killzone 2 (where the weapons/shooting has good 'feel'), should I get R2 as well? Or should I buy BK3 instead.

[deepbrown]

Gamespot - 9
IGN - 9.5
Eurogamer - 9
1up - B+ (is that an 8.5 or 9?)
Gamespy - 4.5/5
Gamesradar - 9

That'll do pig, that'll do.

[Rotmm]

1up - B+ (is that an 8.5 or 9?)

It's an 8.3

[djskribbles]

according to gamerankings, it's an 8.5.

[patsu]

i really wish they would make the server browser better. there's no connection quality meter and no way i've found to filter results so you don't have to scroll through them all.


You can sort the result list using any of the columns. I forgot what key to use though.

i was put off by the enemy death animations, and all the silly guns that shoot slow glowing orbs through walls and stuff.


That my friend is called the Auger. It's not silly by any measure. The Auger is one of my favorite guns in R1. If you learn how to use it well, you will be feared in maps with walls and corridors. ^_^


Compared to Uncharted, which although more of an adventure game, had much better shooting.


Different experience. I don't think you can compare them. R1 is more arcady and fast pace. If you learn the R1 weapons, fighting is more varied. In addition, R1's biggest draw is the multi-player mode.


I also disliked the whole modern technology in the 50s thing, and some of the art in R2 like the guys with combat suits and huge black spectacles look strange.

So have they fixed these problems with R2?

Characters in Hollywood movies may look stranger. But in general, Insomniac has rebalanced the weapons in R2. You still have Auger but the firing rate is faster and it's more powerful now. Many say R2 feels more like CoD, for better or worse. It's somewhere between R1 and CoD4.


I was watching some vids of its multiplayer and it looked like complete chaos.


The battles can be chaotic, but it's somewhat up to you to manage the battlefield, especially in co-op.


Can 60 players be on the screen at once? Or are they sectioned off into battling squads, in separate sections of the same map.


Haven't played 60P game yet. You should be able to run into each other on the giant map. In 8P co-op, I have fought against 40+ enemies at the same time.


I'm getting GOW2, and probably Killzone 2 (where the weapons/shooting has good 'feel'), should I get R2 as well? Or should I buy BK3 instead.

No idea.

Gamespot - 9
IGN - 9.5
Eurogamer - 9
1up - B+ (is that an 8.5 or 9?)
Gamespy - 4.5/5
Gamesradar - 9

That'll do pig, that'll do.

Yes, Insomniac has delivered a great game. To put things in perspective, I am "complaining" only because I know they can do even better than that. However to be fair to them, they managed to complete a 60P competitive, 8P co-op and a 10 hour SP campaign within 2 years (in parallel with another game).

[obonicus]

according to gamerankings, it's an 8.5.

And 1up itself supposedly objects to their letter score being turned into a number.

[deepbrown]

It's an 8.3

Must be 8.5 - forgot there's an A- as well.

And 1up itself supposedly objects to their letter score being turned into a number.

Yes...but you know what Metacritic is like. They create scores when none is given.

[DrJay24]

It's an 8.3

That would be a B- in the schools I went to. :wink:

[deepbrown]

That would be a B- in the schools I went to. :wink:

And at a UK University, 70/100 is an "A"

[SonComet]

Played through chapter 6 earlier today, saving chapter 7 for tomorrow. This game is incredible. Keeps getting better and better.

[thambos]

You can sort the result list using any of the columns. I forgot what key to use though.

sorting is not filtering :wink:

filtering is better because you don't have to scroll through the list. still haven't found a way to display only connections w/ low ping.

[tha_con]

I'm in Burbank! Just waiting to go to dinner :D

[patsu]

sorting is not filtering :wink:

filtering is better because you don't have to scroll through the list. still haven't found a way to display only connections w/ low ping.

Resistance has always abstracted that layer of information away.

Doesn't "Play" work for you ? That's what I usually do. The server will try to do the best matching. The game doesn't lag anyway.

In R1, you can choose to include "regional" players only. Is there such an option in R2 ?

[patsu]

I have completed the game. Pacing is great. Length is just about right.

Many will complain because:
* Shield is way too short. Die easily. Hard to Rambo.
* R1 Weapon Wheel should be present since the game is more difficult than R1.

Epic story and imaginative encounters. Although most (all ?) bosses are not difficult to take out, the game can be frustrating at times (2-3 times for me). Game has unpolished elements here and there (most likely due to lack of time).

With these shortcomings in mind, I actually enjoyed it as much as R1.

[Cheezdoodles]

It's an 8.3

hmm

FEDCBA = 6

100\6 =16,66667 % per letter

16,6667 * 5 = 83.3333

The "+" has to account for something, 8,5 looks about right.

[Cheezdoodles]

And at a UK University, 70/100 is an "A"

Really? A is 90% or better in norwegian schools.

30-50% is often considered an F thought, so i have no idea how they came up with their numbers ;)

[patsu]

Hah, it's futile to translate letter scores to numeric ones if we don't know what the original grader has in mind.

The score doesn't explain everything anyway. :)

In terms of memorable moments...

1. The Chicago bridge battle (I hope I remember the location name correctly)

2. Final boss defeat and escape sequence; plus Hale's fate.

3. Mother Spinner. I didn't know it was a boss fight and was sight-seeing. Then I decided to look up and got a shock when I saw Mother Spinner staring at me from a very close distance. :lol:

I was frustrated by the Swarm initially, hated it but figured out the solution accidentally ^_^.

[deepbrown]

Really? A is 90% or better in norwegian schools.

30-50% is often considered an F thought, so i have no idea how they came up with their numbers ;)

At my uni it was impossible to get higher than 80/100. If you were given a score higher than 80, it was lowered to 80. And I'm talking about University, not school.

[Cheezdoodles]

Im also talking about uni

[Arwin]

If I remember correctly, the year that I studied at Stockholm University they had a system where you could get max 8/10 (or some equivalent letter) for your first version, and you always had to do a rewrite regardless of how good that first version was. Not sure though if that could get you up to 10/10.

Kind of off topic though ... as long as metacritic is consistent it doesn't matter much.

I actually enjoyed it as much as R1.

Ok, then I'm thinking I'll like the single player campaign too. The game will stay on my list, though not in a hurry (LittleBigPlanet, Motorstorm 2, and who knows GH4). Good thing for me though that the game doesn't come out yet for a while here, that makes it even easier to resist ... ;)

[tha_con]

I honestly don't miss the weapon wheel. The 2 weapon system, and weapon distribution in R2 really gives each weapon a valuable feel, and you really have to consider the pros and cons of each weapon (i.e. do I really need a marksman in this narrow corridor? will this magnum be a good idea in this open canyon full of enemies?).

[patsu]

Ok, then I'm thinking I'll like the single player campaign too.

As long as you don't mind "harsh" FPS. I have seen some people complaining about "cheap" AI and frail shield. So you'll have to react quickly.

The game has 4 difficulties (Casual, Normal, Hard/Difficult and Super Human). The last one is unlocked only after you beat Hard. I heard the higher difficulties are not much harder than Normal. In fact, some claimed that Normal in R2 is like Difficult in R1 (probably because of the limited Shield).

Several also complained that the AI only goes after you instead of your team mates. It happens sometimes, but not always. Know that if you play on Casual, you get better Shield and the enemy AI focuses less on you. You can switch between difficulty half way. So choose freely and don't let the Casual difficulty fool you.

I am going to play MP next and LBP. Will definitely come back to Hard again once I become better in competitive.

[DrJay24]

The AI does not ignore your teammates, they do if you start killing them. I've stood back and watched fights between the two AI groups. In fact one part I could not participate in due to lack of ammo, so I just took cover and watched.

I just left Orrick, the SP is up there with HL2 IMO, not many shooters reach that level.

I also love the visceral feeling of shooting the enemy. There bodies react well to bullers and the head shots and gibbing makes it feel like you are really hitting something and not just draining a hidden HP number then watching them fall when they reach zero.

[patsu]

The AI does not ignore your teammates, they do if you start killing them. I've stood back and watched fights between the two AI groups. In fact one part I could not participate in due to lack of ammo, so I just took cover and watched.

In general, you are correct. However, there are 2-3 fights in subsequent levels where they do go after you only. Once you have spilled blood, your teammates watched and fired at their leisure. :) But that's not the entire R2 gaming experience of course. Only in those limited stages. Insomniac could have justified the action by making some enemy characters remember Hale due to past encounters (but they didn't).

I took it as a challenge and tried to live up to Hale's reputation. But with a weak Shield, I can see why some people b*tched about the move.

Throughout the game, my teammates did get ambushed, attacked, swarmed, and/or slaughtered. They were also helpful in taking out tough enemies (as tough as multiple Titans ! ^_^).


I just left Orrick, the SP is up there with HL2 IMO, not many shooters reach that level.

I also love the visceral feeling of shooting the enemy. There bodies react well to bullers and the head shots and gibbing makes it feel like you are really hitting something and not just draining a hidden HP number then watching them fall when they reach zero.

My favorite has to be the Auger. The Belllock is nice (The secondary fire seems very powerful). I want to try Splicer more too.

EDIT:
I honestly don't miss the weapon wheel. The 2 weapon system, and weapon distribution in R2 really gives each weapon a valuable feel, and you really have to consider the pros and cons of each weapon (i.e. do I really need a marksman in this narrow corridor? will this magnum be a good idea in this open canyon full of enemies?).

When taken in isolation, I agree with you. But R2 has a weak Shield. It needs to be compensated by a better offense. Otherwise, it is a difficult game like right now (and will limit its audience).


EDIT 2:
Damn it, the more I talk about it, the more I want to go back and re-fight some of the levels I could have fared better. I am a much better player near the end.

[tha_con]

I have no idea what you're talking about when you mention Shield, unless you're talking about health.

[patsu]

Yes, health. My bad. I forgot Hale is a half-alien that can regen. >_<

Btw, GAF has turned more positive after more people completed the SP campaign. Will see how long this lasts. Like I said, the negative points are not strong enough to kill the game, but being an Insomniac fan, I hope for a "perfect" game (Getting the last 0.5 - 1.5 points out of 10.0).

They are starting to get into MP now. Aeon712 had 17 people on the party last night until 2:30am. I will soon become one of them.

[tha_con]

Okay, gotcha. In that respect, I do agree, health in R2 on Normal and Difficult settings depletes rather quickly (especially during boss battles). Still, I feel myself playing much more thoughtfully in R2 as opposed to R1, where I was a walking tank, and most of my weapons could take out a brigade of Chimeran forces without a hitch on Superhuman.

I feel the differences are great, but I like them.

As for GAF, I really think it's the same case with any game of this caliber. When a game receives a great amount of "hype" and anticipation, it will fall victim to the backlash.

I will more than likely play with GAF folks, but there is no way I'm giving up my clan, not in a million years! I was lucky to get this clan name, and I will forever keep it :P

[patsu]

Oh yeah ?! What's your clan name ?

[tha_con]

Oh yeah ?! What's your clan name ?

ProjectAbraham :grin:

[patsu]

See you on the battlefield.

XXOO

[tha_con]

See you on the battlefield.

XXOO

I'm hoping to crush some Insomniacs today at the Community day, show off my "skills"...hopefully they don't destroy me!

[patsu]

I see, so you're in SoCal ? Please try to get some update from them regarding errr... future R2 updates :)

[patsu]

I played 16P competitive with the GAF clan yesterday. I must say it's very polished now. It's the first time my K/D ratio went positive (22 - 14).

It felt like the old R1 competitive again, except that the subtle gunplay mechanics are different. :(
I don't mind the differences now that everything is spit-shined, but I hope they fix the gun firing effect somehow. Firing a weapon in R2 MP feels somewhat "light, muted and detached". Fortunately, they fixed grenade throwing (It was gimped and somewhat broken in the beta).

I used to miss the weapon spawns, but if the battle is large, it's rather easy to pick up assorted weapons from dead players. This only works if there are plenty of players though (unlike the beta).

I think gunsight zooming is counter intuitive in a run-and-gun game. I don't see R2 competitive player moving in slowly, everyone was running around. May be that's why I was able to get more kills since I used the gun sight more this time. I find it awkward. If my K/D ratio continues to go up, I might file this under my FPS "skills".

Overall, I had some surprising fun. It's great to see clan mates running off together in the game. Fix the "detached" firing and I may play competitive more often. Right now, I am busy levelling up my co-op characters. ^_^

[patsu]

tha_con, you might be surprised to see Kittonwy's impression of R2. He completed SP yesterday: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=13546805&postcount=2724

Here'z my two centz:

Graphics:

Some levels like Louisiana the lighting works, in Orick it works anytime you're seeing the light through the foliage, the houses outside when in shadow you get this bluish-grey shade that looks good, in the other levels not so much, especially SF and to some extent Chicago. In the Iceland indoor levels the lighting was pretty flat. It does not help that while Hale's flashlight can cast shadows, that a lot of shadowing was missing from the sun or overhead lights. Maybe it's the limitation of the engine due to having to push 60 players. My advice is always when you are forced to have objects lacking shadows, either make the light come from above and just shadow the characters and bake the rest or make it dark enough that yes you can notice some shadowing of the characters but it's not lit enough so the player won't assume objects in the level need to be shadowed. The gun is what the player sees all the time, so it's kind of strange going through a dark patch and the gun remains lit exactly the same way sometimes.

The character shadowing of the sentinels work very well. The environmental shadowing... what environmental shadowing?

Motorstorm 2 has pretty much shown how HUGE an impact HDR lighting and proper shadowing can have on the visuals of the game. In R2 there was never any epic mid-day sun-bleached scenes, things are still a tad soft bloomy sometimes. Technical art just feels rushed for the most part, there are some great stuff there and not so great stuff there. Textures are hit and miss sometimes, either the tech art team didn't have enough time or Insomniac Games needed a better tech art team.

In R2 some levels look pretty, some not so much. Sometimes it's better not to have an object that looks ugly and stick out. Things still look a bit too clean, for cities that have been attacked, buildings need to look broken and burnt. Moar fire plz. Bigger explosions plz.

The water physics was just janky sometimes, great transparency but the reflection just wasn't there most of the time, it's getting there but it needs work.

Audio:

The music pretty much does its job, it's great mood music, I guess it's just not something one can put on a soundtrack, it's probably just not great soundtrack music like the HALO3 soundtrack or the UNCHARTED!!!111!!!http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v500/EvilTaru/angry.gif soundtrack, it's hard to find an individual piece that I would want to listen to over and over.

Very good gore sounds when things blow up or when you score a headshot in SP.

Gameplay:

In general the SP gunplay against regular enemies is a lot of fun, they're not the smartest enemies around but they do use cover effectively, they just don't go around and flank very much on difficult, but they do rush, a lot of the time I basically just picked them off from a distance, it would be great if I had to stick and move from one cover spot to another and the enemies would keep me moving to a safer place. The bosses are pretty simple, the leviathan and goliath fights were kind of a joke, and the titans aren't really very intimidating, I would rather if they just don't use the cannon and just chase after the player trying to pound the crap out of the player with a one hit kill, smashing cars and boxes to the side. The boss fights could use more clever patterns and weakspots. The chameleon is really not a necessary enemy, it's mostly annoying, might as well cloak the regular chimeras in the later levels if you want to surprise the player. All in all it was a very fun campaign, very well paced, could use more levels where the player can try to stay low and run from cover to cover to flank the chimeras, towards the end of the game there's some of that but the game needed more. Enemy AI needs to respond to the player obviously but needs to be distracted enough by friendly AI to provide the player the opportunity to flank more. Friendly AI is actually pretty good, it's probably better that the friendly AI would distract the enemies rather than just kill them.

MP can be fun playing with friends, especially the first couple of nights when one time Aeon went something like 1-9 and I told him he was playing like Spartan and he could go hang himself but then he was such epic fail that the rope would probably break and he would just fall on his ass. Text chat is greatly missed. It's just so much more fun typing "ur mom >:|" than actually SAYING UR MOM.

Co-op is always fun, a great time sink for sure, quite a bit of cheap enemy spawns but I doubt people will care, the three classes work extremely well, once again it could use better enemy AI. Still a tad too many disconnections. The playable characters don't look too cool though.

Mechanics-wise, one-on-one is still a bit of a crap-shoot, if you're on top of someone with a carbine you'll probably win, with a marksman probably not because individual shots don't do as much damage and there is too much reloading to really keep plugging the damage. Bullseye is useless for tagging at this point due to the lack of accuracy. Ironsight accuracy and precision still needs to be higher because it still feels a bit like I'm fighting with my reticle. Still some balancing that needs to be done. Either make flanking more of a win or make it so that skill can allow a player to recover from an attack, right now it's still a bit too much in-between.

Story:

Hale's character is better, the other sentinels needed more fleshing out but weren't, especially Capeli, more chatter and banter would have been good, dressing them up to reflect their different personalities would have been good, Warner and Hawthorne just didn't have much personality.

The overall package is pretty great, I can see myself putting in a lot of time in it, just not the awesome-looking game that would blow people's minds, it needed some truly epic and memorable scenarios.

9/10

RAWR2.http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v500/EvilTaru/Indifferent2.gif

I agree that text chat should be in. It's more fun than voice chat for making (bad) jokes.

[tha_con]

I talked to some IG folks about Text Chat, and it basically boiled down to useable screen space. There is just too much going on pre-game for them to add in a text chat. The screen would become cluttered and full.

I agree, and disagree, on some points Kittonwy made. I think a lot of his complaints are minor and not important, he thinks they are more important than I do. Just a difference of opinion (that, and I'm super biased).

[patsu]

I talked to some IG folks about Text Chat, and it basically boiled down to useable screen space. There is just too much going on pre-game for them to add in a text chat. The screen would become cluttered and full.

This is not a real reason right ? Showing the text chat in a pop-up window should not be difficult or cluttering. It's more likely a resource issue than a screen space issue.

[Cornsnake]

I talked to some IG folks about Text Chat, and it basically boiled down to useable screen space. There is just too much going on pre-game for them to add in a text chat. The screen would become cluttered and full.

Poor excuse, Rfom did have it after all. The lobby is big step backwards IMO. They had one of the best game lobbies around, but they traded it in for something similar to the barely working CoD4 lobby.

[2real4tv]

I been playing the R2 campaign and Iam loving it I think the graphics are pretty good and the IQ is ace.

[patsu]

If Insomniac is reading this, after experiencing all the game modes, the only changes needed are these (besides tuning weapons):


* Make it easier (like R1 "Normal").

R2 pacing is great, but is unnecessarily more difficult due to various design decisions. A cheap way is to change "Casual" to "Normal" (so on and so forth).

Alternatively, if Insomniac can give us a longer health bar, many people will feel more liberated to try different strategies. In addition, for old timers, I believe most of the R1 gameplay changes (missing 4-stage health bar, removed weapon wheel, more obvious CoD4-like infinitely spawned enemies) would matter less. Even the invisible Chameleon encounters may become more intense and interesting *if* it needed to (shift and) take a second strike to take us down.


* As for missing text chat, will Playstation Home integration help ? (because it has text chat built-in and supports open game launching).

Voice comm should not be the only communication mechanism. Even if everyone has headset, not everyone wants to talk. Text chat is a more casual and arguably more funny medium to tell jokes -- especially for a large turn out. The persistency of messages also allows us to know the clan members more. Talking is too fast and confusing sometimes.


I been playing the R2 campaign and Iam loving it I think the graphics are pretty good and the IQ is ace.

Yes, it is impressive. The game is dynamic and choked full of different enemies. You'll need to look for the flaws when in-game. The more obvious points are the in-transit levels (i.e., walking between 2 battle fields).

To be frank, I am almost as satisfied with R2 as I was with R1 now. The above changes will make me feel that R2 is the greater successor of R1 (The difficulty will prevent me from trying "too different" strategies during replay).

[Mize]

I'm mostly through campaign now and I'd say it's a very different game than R1 to be honest. It's much more frantic and death is unavoidable many times (IMHO). I think the graphics are a good upgrade for sure, but I'd say the SP game comes across as though they were trying to add some touches of GoW1 to RFoM. Not a bad thing mind you, but a different game.

My biggest gripe - and this one is a HUGE gripe - is that baddies ONLY pursue me! They'll run right past all my teammates and go after me. This is absurd since we're all supposed to be Sentinels! The only time a Chameleon has ever attacked anyone else is in the preset first encounter for pity sake!

Overall I'd give it a 8.5/10 if not for the horrible enemy AI. Inclusive of that I give the SP 7/10.

[DrJay24]

The only time a Chameleon has ever attacked anyone else is in the preset first encounter for pity sake!


In Brice Canyon they attack your teamates unless you get close. I watched it last night when I played.

[Mize]

In Brice Canyon they attack your teamates unless you get close. I watched it last night when I played.

I must have missed that...I was hanging back sniping and they came only for me...and the zombie guys (whatever they're called) will run right past everyone for me. There's a scene where you and your team are on this control platform with zombies coming from all sides and they all come for me! I have to run in front of my guys to get them to shoot them! :)

[Oboro Shogun]

I gotta say I think the visuals of this game are some of the most impressive I've ever seen. Compare open levels in this to the open levels in Gears and R2 is noticeably more impressive. The scale of the game is huge, the framerate is very steady and the game feels very organic to me. I don't think this game is getting enough credit for it's visuals. The scene where you come out into the open area in San Fransico with the Chimeran fleet in the air over the Golden Gate Bridge was so beautiful. It felt like the first time I came out of the tunnels in Oblivion.

[patsu]

If you are far enough (but close enough to trigger them), Chameleons will in fact go after other soliders in Bryce. You have to take it out fast before its kills them. The Chameleon will come after you when the soldiers have moved on to the next area, or when you're too close.

I must have missed that...I was hanging back sniping and they came only for me...and the zombie guys (whatever they're called) will run right past everyone for me. There's a scene where you and your team are on this control platform with zombies coming from all sides and they all come for me! I have to run in front of my guys to get them to shoot them! :)

I believe the Grims will go after you and only you in 2 areas: The Chicago alley and the platform you mentioned. In other levels, they will ambush, surround and attack the Sentinels as well as you.

I heard someone said the automated bots and Stalker may focus on you too (e.g., right after the Chicago bridge). I think this is because they want to force you to take the planned game path. There is a much better way to complete that stage rather than fighting in the open against 3 Stalkers and multiple flying bots at the same time.

Now that I have completed the SP campaign, I feel like going back to replay it asap. I think the game is much more enjoyable during replay because you are familiar with the level as well as the overall combat system.

[Mize]

I heard someone said the automated bots and Stalker may focus on you too (e.g., right after the Chicago bridge). I think this is because they want to force you to take the planned game path. There is a much better way to complete that stage rather than fighting in the open against 3 Stalkers and multiple flying bots at the same time.

I didn't find that part terribly challenging (on Normal) since you have LARKs out the wazoo.

Funniest bug I found is when I came out of the theatre and there were no bosses - none! and nothing to do and no way out...my fellow sentinels and I just ran around trying to figure WTF we were supposed to do! So much for "we got incoming!" A save and reload fixed it.

[patsu]

I didn't find that part terribly challenging (on Normal) since you have LARKs out the wazoo.



Yes, I assume you fought from the left building ? Some people tried to take on 3 Stalkers head-on in the open and died within 2 seconds.



Funniest bug I found is when I came out of the theatre and there were no bosses - none! and nothing to do and no way out...my fellow sentinels and I just ran around trying to figure WTF we were supposed to do! So much for "we got incoming!" A save and reload fixed it.

Heh, I encountered bugs like this in the co-op beta. Have not run into any weird scenario in the release yet.

[Mize]

Yes, the enemies that way just looked more "reasonable" based on how little ammo I had left after those shielded bots. All in all I really liked "Chicago."

I'm wondering how much I have left since I've never seen a list of chapters or complete walkthrough. We just blew the AA and got the order to retreat from Daedalus' tower.

[patsu]

Hmm... I can't remember anymore.

All I could recall was I bashed through the Chimeran defense and won. :lol:

May be 3 more levels ? (I think that's what the GAF folks said, but I am not sure).

[Mize]

What's your guess on how many hours it took you? I think I'm about 8 hours in. Maybe 8.5. I guess I have to go buy Gears 2 soon :)

[patsu]

Most people said 9-10 hours. I have no idea how much time I spent. My play time was spread across multiple sessions (The last one lasted 6 hours).

EDIT: Oh yes, don't forget to try the multi-player modes when you have the time.

[tha_con]

Poor excuse, Rfom did have it after all. The lobby is big step backwards IMO. They had one of the best game lobbies around, but they traded it in for something similar to the barely working CoD4 lobby.

Dude, you're insane. The lobby is hands down the BEST there is on the market, and not ONE lobby comes close.

Text chat is old school, and not needed, period. Folks bitch without voice chat, but then bitch when text chat is out. Amazing.

[chambers]

I was really looking forward to this game, but after finishing it and testing out the multiplayer for several hours I think it's overhyped.

Here are my gripes with the game:

-The "epic" boss battles are all staged fights with simple interactions and little if any room for variation
-the difficulty isn't balanced well (I played on normal and died a lot, which isn't typical for me)
-the coop is too much like an rpg and far too repetitive
-the 60 player skirmish battles feel too small and from what I can tell only consist of capture or protect and kill or protect
-they left out offline campaign coop
-it was often a chore to find the right weapon for the next battle (should have kept the weapon wheel)
-the graphics have improved little in 2 years and the colors they used just look horrible to me

I know this won't change anyone's opinion of the game, but I just wanted to let people know who are thinking about buying it to try it first.

[dabomb665m]

I personally think the graphics are much improved. No matter what it seems the framerate is rock solid. Sometimes I can't believe the amount of stuff going on at the same time. When those zombie things run at you they are all different heights and sizes and the whole screen is literally filled with them. In the chicago level they even get "gibbed" and leave meat marks on the walls , later falling to gravity... all while literally 40+ still swarming at you. I've gotten many Wow moments in terms of graphics in R2... not so much in R1. I remember R1 wowed me only near the end with the indoor chimera structures with lighting and particles. Before that it looked very bland.

Unfortunately I also have the same gripes as others here. The game seems to only target the AI at you for the most part. I'm playing on normal and I see it a LOT. On one of the levels you try to save the african american sentinal (forget his name) and you get swarmed by the zombies.... I swear they never attacked him. They would all just run straight for me. It looks a little ridiculous because there would be literally a line coming at me while the other sentinal just watches (sometimes not even shooting because I had to retreat so much that he's not programmed to go to my location). There was also one level where Hale has to flank a group being pinned at a bridge... as soon as I got to the flank position behind them and fired the first round, THE WHOLE GROUP turned to shoot at me. It was one of those WTF moments haha. It also doesn't help that Hale dies so fast now.

Anyway, I'm looking for players online. What was your PSN again patsu? If anyone wants to add me I'm Backspace.

[patsu]

I was really looking forward to this game, but after finishing it and testing out the multiplayer for several hours I think it's overhyped.

Here are my gripes with the game:

-The "epic" boss battles are all staged fights with simple interactions and little if any room for variation

Agreed ! Except that what's "epic" about R2 are the big battles, like the Chicago bridge, the 8P co-op. The boss battles only served to break up the FPSes. Some are interesting but they are lost opportunities regardless.


-the difficulty isn't balanced well (I played on normal and died a lot, which isn't typical for me)


Yes, it's more difficult than R1 mainly because of Nathan's "short" health. What did you have the most difficulty with ? I didn't die a lot but the difficulty slowed down my progress because I had to play defensively.


-the coop is too much like an rpg and far too repetitive


Yes and no. The enemy AI will become more aggressive at higher level, team composition and dynamic may also change the gameplay. The dynamic map creation doesn't change game as much as I like though... because the enemies still spawn from the same locations.


-the 60 player skirmish battles feel too small and from what I can tell only consist of capture or protect and kill or protect


What do you mean "too small" (Too few people, or map not big enough ?)

Resistance is most enjoyable with a clan. I have only played TDM and co-op with them so far, but it was fun (Not as entertaining as R1 but still good). Like R1, the experience is lag free. The only shortcoming right now is the limited game mode, and weapon feel: They are not as satisfying when fired.


-they left out offline campaign coop
-it was often a chore to find the right weapon for the next battle (should have kept the weapon wheel)


No. It is too easy to pick the right weapon. Just use the one right before the encounter.

-the graphics have improved little in 2 years and the colors they used just look horrible to me


It's inconsistent but I think they have improved greatly in the technical sense. The art direction still suffer like in R1.


I know this won't change anyone's opinion of the game, but I just wanted to let people know who are thinking about buying it to try it first.

As always...
but no redeeming points ?

Unfortunately I also have the same gripes as others here. The game seems to only target the AI at you for the most part. I'm playing on normal and I see it a LOT. On one of the levels you try to save the african american sentinal (forget his name) and you get swarmed by the zombies.... I swear they never attacked him. They would all just run straight for me. It looks a little ridiculous because there would be literally a line coming at me while the other sentinal just watches (sometimes not even shooting because I had to retreat so much that he's not programmed to go to my location).

I think his name is Warner. I remember that part but have a totally different experience from you. In my playthrough, I let Warner walk first. He was ambushed, attacked and swarmed. I had to back off because Warner could only handle 2-3 Grims at most. The Grims divided into 2 groups: The small group went after him; the rest came after me. Died 3 times (mostly because of my own grenade >_<).

There was also one level where Hale has to flank a group being pinned at a bridge... as soon as I got to the flank position behind them and fired the first round, THE WHOLE GROUP turned to shoot at me. It was one of those WTF moments haha. It also doesn't help that Hale dies so fast now.


Is this the Chicago bridge level ? After the Hellfire turrets were taken out by air strikes. The enemies are fine while on the bridge. But at the end of the bridge, they may fire exclusively at you to force you to go through the intended game path. Once you're on the right path, they will continue to fight the other soldiers.


I know of another 2 "Hale magnet" problems. It's in a closed room after disabling the AA gun, and the Chicago alley

These are the 3 places I know that had the problem. I don't see them in other areas. Of course, you may have discovered new ones.


Anyway, I'm looking for players online. What was your PSN again patsu? If anyone wants to add me I'm Backspace.

patsu

[dabomb665m]

I think his name is Warner. I remember that part but have a totally different experience from you. In my playthrough, I let Warner walk first. He was ambushed, attacked and swarmed. I had to back off because Warner could only handle 2-3 Grims at most. The Grims divided into 2 groups: The small group went after him; the rest came after me. Died 3 times (mostly because of my own grenade >_<).



Is this the Chicago bridge level ? After the Hellfire turrets were taken out by air strikes. The enemies are fine while on the bridge. But at the end of the bridge, the Stalkers may fire exclusively at you to force you to go through the intended game path. Once you're on the right path, they will continue to fight the other soldiers.

I know of another "Hale magnet" problem. It's in a closed room after disabling the AA gun.

These are the 3 places I know that had the problem. I don't remember having the problem in other areas. Of course, you may have discovered new ones.



patsu

I do think that playing differently will yield different results. Mine was just so one sided that I couldn't help but notice. I died quite a few times there and didn't try different approaches so that's probably why it stuck to me(the part with Warner).

As for the flank... I don't quite remember the stage because I've been burning through it. It's the part where you finally get to the back of the bridge and you take an elevator down. You see a full group of chims vs humans on the bridge and as soon as you shoot, they all turn around. It almost looked like an MMORPG where you aggro a bunch of linked mobs.

There is another part that has that problem that I noticed in the chicago level where warner needs you to kill some of the chims with augers and you snipe them. I believe there are 3 or 4 of them but as soon as you snipe one they all turn and shoot you... ignoring warner.

Like I said though, it wouldn't be that much of an issue if health was just a TAD higher. Not by much... but sometimes I feel like if I were in the fight for just 2 more seconds I wouldn't have died a horrible death or run out of ammo in that particular scene.

Oh ya another thing, I understand the game mechanics of placing those indestructable fish-chims... but being indestructable is just awkward seeing how HUGE chimeras can be killed as you progress. I have no problems with the invisible guys though, I think I only died once to those throughout the game.

[patsu]

As for the flank... I don't quite remember the stage because I've been burning through it. It's the part where you finally get to the back of the bridge and you take an elevator down. You see a full group of chims vs humans on the bridge and as soon as you shoot, they all turn around. It almost looked like an MMORPG where you aggro a bunch of linked mobs.

There is another part that has that problem that I noticed in the chicago level where warner needs you to kill some of the chims with augers and you snipe them. I believe there are 3 or 4 of them but as soon as you snipe one they all turn and shoot you... ignoring warner.


:lol: I can't remember anymore. I only encountered it 2-3 times as listed in my last post. The rest were "normal".


Like I said though, it wouldn't be that much of an issue if health was just a TAD higher. Not by much... but sometimes I feel like if I were in the fight for just 2 more seconds I wouldn't have died a horrible death or run out of ammo in that particular scene.


Yap ! I am going to replay it on the same difficulty level because there are a few places I want to play differently (e.g., in the Theater full of Grims, the Marauder, the Chicago bridge).


Oh ya another thing, I understand the game mechanics of placing those indestructable fish-chims... but being indestructable is just awkward seeing how HUGE chimeras can be killed as you progress. I have no problems with the invisible guys though, I think I only died once to those throughout the game.

Yes, this is one of the issues with polishness. They should have made the fish guy dive to avoid further fire.

The Chameleons are fun for the most part. I wish they can do more next time.

[ultragpu]

Finally got the game today, only up to Orick level so far and Im totally enjoying it! Every level has its own wow moments but nothing quite beat the San Fran level and you all know where im talking about! I spent almost 20min just dwelling around and sight seeing, no game has captured the "end of world" feel as much or epic as that level, there i said it! Ok, save for some sparse indoor scenes. The Orick level is so beautiful and unless the game goes horribly wrong from that point i really dont see why so much hate on the graphics.

[DrJay24]

Finally got the game today, only up to Orick level so far and Im totally enjoying it! Every level has its own wow moments but nothing quite beat the San Fran level and you all know where im talking about! I spent almost 20min just dwelling around and sight seeing, no game has captured the "end of world" feel as much or epic as that level, there i said it! Ok, save for some sparse indoor scenes. The Orick level is so beautiful and unless the game goes horribly wrong from that point i really dont see why so much hate on the graphics.

Wait until Chicago, best level so far and one of the best FPS levels ever.

[patsu]

Dude, you're insane. The lobby is hands down the BEST there is on the market, and not ONE lobby comes close.


I don't think Cornsnake is wrong. Yes, R2 lobby is great compared to other voice-based lobbies but it has lost functionalities compared to R1.


Text chat is old school, and not needed, period. Folks bitch without voice chat, but then bitch when text chat is out. Amazing.

They are for different folks and different needs. The text chat allowed me to build relationships with new people in the clan. A lot of politically incorrect jokes or "dumb" sound (like RAAWR !) do not come out right in voice comm, but they can be very funny in a large chat room with smilies and all.

Over time, it just pull the team together. Other games may not encounter this "issue" because they did not reach the deep community aspect of R1. Real-time voice comm can be confusing in a 20-men party too.

Finally got the game today, only up to Orick level so far and Im totally enjoying it! Every level has its own wow moments but nothing quite beat the San Fran level and you all know where im talking about! I spent almost 20min just dwelling around and sight seeing, no game has captured the "end of world" feel as much or epic as that level, there i said it! Ok, save for some sparse indoor scenes. The Orick level is so beautiful and unless the game goes horribly wrong from that point i really dont see why so much hate on the graphics.

Like R1, the game picks up its pace gradually. You'll find more interesting and epic fights ahead of you. :-) Just be careful/defensive/conservative to avoid needless death (a few are unavoidable).

There are small inconsistencies in many places that may break the immersion, and quite a few lost opportunities for more in-depth story telling and gameplay; but as it stands today it's still a great albeit somewhat difficult shooter.

[Npl]

Dude, you're insane. The lobby is hands down the BEST there is on the market, and not ONE lobby comes close.

Text chat is old school, and not needed, period. Folks bitch without voice chat, but then bitch when text chat is out. Amazing.Have you ever thought of people not fluid in english?
Reading and writing a foreign language is one thing, speaking (audible) and especially understanding (multiple) talking people is something else.
Of course you could limit yourself to people speaking your own language, but thats a quite big restriction.

[Cornsnake]

Have you ever thought of people not fluid in english?
Reading and writing a foreign language is one thing, speaking (audible) and especially understanding (multiple) talking people is something else.
Of course you could limit yourself to people speaking your own language, but thats a quite big restriction.

This is a big problem here in europe, for clanwars at least. We play against clans from all over europe, so most aren't native english speaking. Hardly speaking english combined with poor sound quality over the headsets will make it very difficult to organise things. And getting everyone in a party to stop talking if something important needs to be told probably won't happen.

But I'd like even more things back. In lobby messaging is faster and easier then using the PSN messaging. The separate friendslist, so I can add anyone without having to consider if I actually play with them in the future. And I can keep my only R2 friends in there. I can fill up my 100 friends in the PSN list if I add everyone in the Rfon friends and clan list.

[betan]

Text chat, in-game messaging, separate "recently played" tab, all better return.

I also really like game specific friendlist, but have no hope for its return. It's understandable though.

R1 was excellence wrt online service, I expected nothing less from R2. :|

[patsu]

Em... you better expect something different and voice-oriented. There are new functionalities because of the more sophisticated game modes. The signature lag-free and smooth gaming is still there. But some nice touches have been lost.

If I am allowed only one patch in my life, I know where it would go to.

[djskribbles]

Just got my copy today, along with Far Cry 2. I'm just a few minutes in, but I think the controls and visuals have improved quite a bit. One thing I didn't like about the first Resistance was the color choices... they were very boring and colorless. Textures, lighting, colors and scale are all better imo.

Question regarding the resolution (I don't know where to post this now) but a few people said Resistance 2 is 1280x704 (or something along those lines) with black borders on the top and bottom, but I'm playing on my LCD with "Just Scan" mode and I don't see any borders. So is it rendering at full 1280x720, or did they just simply stretch the image a tad?

[patsu]

Hmm... I have seen some R2 1280 x 704 screenshots before. So the mode should still be around.

[djskribbles]

I don't think theres a mode to change. In case you didn't know, "Just Scan" mode is Samsung's 1:1 pixel mode. When I play games like Ratchet, I see borders, but I don't see borders in Resistance 2.

[patsu]

I fired up R2 (Replaying on Difficult). The in-game scene looks the same size as the (720p) cutscenes. Might want to drop Quaz51 a note to ask him for his expert opinion. He may not see your post here.

[DrJay24]

Insomniac has an impressive resume of hits, and Resistance 2 clearly has earned a spot on that list. This is a game that manages to improve upon its predecessor in every conceivable way. Even though the game's campaign is a bit dry, the competitive multiplayer action and the addictive co-op will keep this game disk in PS3s for some time to come. Guerrilla Games is going to be hard-pressed to top this with Killzone 2, set to be released in early 2009. We're willing to go on record as saying that this game is better than Gears of War 2 in many ways, and could very well be the best shooter of the year.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20081110-resistance-2-gives-ps3-devs-a-blueprint-for-online-play.html

Good review.

[chambers]

Agreed ! Except that what's "epic" about R2 are the big battles, like the Chicago bridge, the 8P co-op. The boss battles only served to break up the FPSes. Some are interesting but they are lost opportunities regardless.

Yes, it's more difficult than R1 mainly because of Nathan's "short" health. What did you have the most difficulty with ? I didn't die a lot but the difficulty slowed down my progress because I had to play defensively.

Yes and no. The enemy AI will become more aggressive at higher level, team composition and dynamic may also change the gameplay. The dynamic map creation doesn't change game as much as I like though... because the enemies still spawn from the same locations.

What do you mean "too small" (Too few people, or map not big enough ?)

Resistance is most enjoyable with a clan. I have only played TDM and co-op with them so far, but it was fun (Not as entertaining as R1 but still good). Like R1, the experience is lag free. The only shortcoming right now is the limited game mode, and weapon feel: They are not as satisfying when fired.

No. It is too easy to pick the right weapon. Just use the one right before the encounter.

It's inconsistent but I think they have improved greatly in the technical sense. The art direction still suffer like in R1.

As always...
but no redeeming points ?


Patsu there are many sections where a bunch of enemies are on screen and that is impressive for the most part, but on the 8 player coop it just bored me to death. Every enemy in the coop takes ridiculous amounts of ammo to kill even when all you do is shoot them in the head and they rarely rush or flank the players. The map variety is also very limited.

As for where I died a lot, it was throughout the entire campaign tending to be when the game threw a bunch of enemies at me. I think the short health, slow regen, and enemies only targeting Hale just make the game very unforgiving on any difficulty. The boss battles were for the most part the easiest part of the game.

When I said skirmish 60 player felt to small I was referring to the way the maps and the objectives keep the game broken up into just one or two squads against each other for most of the game.

There were several times when I had to run off in search of a weapon because it wasn't in the obvious spot prior to an encounter.

I agree with you 100% on the art direction and I appreciate your thoughtful input. All in all I think I'm done with the game and am looking forward to Mirror's Edge. Anyone in Virginia want a used copy of R2 on the cheap?

[patsu]

Patsu there are many sections where a bunch of enemies are on screen and that is impressive for the most part, but on the 8 player coop it just bored me to death. Every enemy in the coop takes ridiculous amounts of ammo to kill even when all you do is shoot them in the head and they rarely rush or flank the players.

I don't think every enemy takes ridiculous amount of ammo to kill. The drones, Grims, regular hybrids and Ravagers are not difficult to lay down on a one-on-one, and one-against-many situations. The Steelhead, Alpha Grims, Titans, Stalkers can be annoying when you're playing as a low level soldier (Takes too long to kill). You'll need to team up to retire them.

As your level advances, they will die faster. At the same time, the AI will improve noticeably. You'll see them rush, flank and team up against the human players across greater distance. In fact, they will hunt you down one by one if you're too dispersed. The Steelheads can also see you even if you hide without firing. This is where things become MUCH more interesting for me. At the same time, it will become harder to complete co-op. As they say, "Don't pray too hard, you might get it". What you saw may not be representative of the final co-op gameplay.

The map variety is also very limited.

I think the map variety is more than sufficient. I played the beta for about a month on just 1 co-op map, and still see some rare map variation towards the end. It's the enemy spawns that should be varied.


As for where I died a lot, it was throughout the entire campaign tending to be when the game threw a bunch of enemies at me. I think the short health, slow regen, and enemies only targeting Hale just make the game very unforgiving on any difficulty. The boss battles were for the most part the easiest part of the game.

I am replaying on Difficult (and I am not a great FPS player. My R1 K/D is only about 1.1). I agree wholeheartedly with you that the freaking health bar is too short. I think Resistance forces you to think fast. I find myself retreating and making use of the terrain and choke points very often.

I am still experimenting with the "AI focusing on Hale" problem. It only happened to me 3 times in "Normal" (I usually hang behind the Sentinels).


When I said skirmish 60 player felt to small I was referring to the way the maps and the objectives keep the game broken up into just one or two squads against each other for most of the game.


I think there are not enough players yet. Most people are tied up in different games this fall.


There were several times when I had to run off in search of a weapon because it wasn't in the obvious spot prior to an encounter.


Yes, happened to me twice against Titans. Like you, I do wish the wheel make a come back (or lengthen our health bar). The ALT fire of various weapons are pretty useful in R2, but I didn't get to play with them too often. Had to switch weapons frequently.

[djskribbles]

I'm a couple of hours in so far, and man is this game intense. I'm playing on casual and it seems like it's like R1's second difficulty (forget what it was). Theres no dull moment so far, it's just straight up action.

Like I said before, everything seems like it was improved over the first, from the visuals, cutscenes, sound, controls and gameplay. Some of the levels are right up there with the best visual moments in any video game i've played so far. I just love how the game plays... Insomniac has done a great job with the controls and the pacing.

[patsu]

I'm playing through "Difficult" now. I was told "Normal" is the same as "Difficult" except for tougher mini-bosses (e.g., Titans). It certainly feels that way. In fact, I died less in "Difficult" just because I know what to do.

[ultragpu]

Just finished the game on casual difficulty and HELL YEAH what an experience that was. This is the epic war game i've been waiting for, i totally dig the Grim hordes, beautiful Redwood forest, huge bosses especially Leviathan and the sheer scale of San Fran Bay. The Grim horde has gotta be one of the best thing happened to the franchise, the sheer grim counts displayed on screen and rushing at ya was totally insane! They should've made a mini game out of them. Im not so fond of the interior level design though, some of them seemed really repetitive and not visually pleasing. And the Canyon level has gotta be the least impressive one so far.
Now an iminent R3 should feature longer and more creative boss fights, better interior design and more levels of San Fran bay and Chicago quality. Again hats off to IG.
thought i'll share two awsome pics with you guys.
http://tinypic.com/view.php?pic=14b6b7a&s=4
http://tinypic.com/view.php?pic=sw6077&s=4

[rounin]

I just got this game as well (my playstation handle should be ryuu525).

Just tried to play some co-op online. At first it was working (last night and part of this morning). But then afterwards the lobby system seemed to have stopped working when I left for work this morning. When I go to Find Game, it just sits there for a while and then exits...

Another thing is, my friend also got Resistance 2 yesterday and for some reason when I go to Allies (triangle) and click on his profile, it says that his account does not exist or something similar. Any idea why?

[tha_con]

I just got this game as well (my playstation handle should be ryuu525).

Just tried to play some co-op online. At first it was working (last night and part of this morning). But then afterwards the lobby system seemed to have stopped working when I left for work this morning. When I go to Find Game, it just sits there for a while and then exits...

Another thing is, my friend also got Resistance 2 yesterday and for some reason when I go to Allies (triangle) and click on his profile, it says that his account does not exist or something similar. Any idea why?

Unfortunately it takes a little while for everything to propagate. On occasion it can take an hour or so for someones account to hit the server.

[patsu]

They were working on the servers last night.

[rounin]

They were working on the servers last night.

No wonder. I certainly hope it was something to do with that. Sometimes when I was sorting the servers, it would hardfreeze on me too!

Certainly did not leave a good impression on me...but I'll give it a chance.

[patsu]

Ha ha, you should not see crashes in this game. There may be some small presentation issues but I have not encountered freezes yet. Like in R1, I expect Insomniac to releases 2-3 patches to further tune and add more game modes to the MP games.

[rounin]

Ha ha, you should not see crashes in this game. There may be some small presentation issues but I have not encountered freezes yet. Like in R1, I expect Insomniac to releases 2-3 patches to further tune and add more game modes to the MP games.

Really? I think I've tried to sort the servers 6 times in total between last night and this morning and 4 times out of the 6 it froze >.<

In other news, does splitscreen online co-op have issues?? I've was unable to get this working. It always gave me network connection problems.

[patsu]

I was refering to the normal circumstances. ^_^

The servers are still under maintenance. I just tried. :(
(It didn't crash, just returned an error).

But you're right, it should not crash for you even when the servers are down. Are you in EU ?

[inefficient]

Just beat the game. Loved the ending.

The game starts out on training wheels, which I think most hardcore gamers will not like. The first 5 hours or so of the game was a dreary guided tour at a theme park type ride on rails. Just being lead around by the nose. I hated it.

But it slowly starts to open up and get more and more challenging and fun. Instead of monster closets you get more much interesting battlefield conditions and strategy starts to come in to play.

By the end of the game it was full on awesome. Punctuated by a perfect ending.

[patsu]

The servers are still under maintenance. I just tried. :(


It's up ! Rather snappy too. Hopefully it stays that way.

[rounin]

It's up ! Rather snappy too. Hopefully it stays that way.

Sounds good ! Can't wait to try it when I get home.

[tha_con]

http://blog.us.playstation.com/2008/11/11/insomniac-games-opens-its-doors-for-fans/#comment-127551

Watch the end. It's awesome. So awesome.

Oh, wait, no, it's just me. I sure did say awesome a lot....totally not awesome.

[patsu]

Sounds good ! Can't wait to try it when I get home.

I heard there are still some problems. Will be on myself within the hour.

http://blog.us.playstation.com/2008/11/11/insomniac-games-opens-its-doors-for-fans/#comment-127551

Watch the end. It's awesome. So awesome.

Oh, wait, no, it's just me. I sure did say awesome a lot....totally not awesome.

Ah yes, Jstevenson mentioned that you were interviewed in the video. Ha ha, hello there !

[tha_con]

haha, yea, I saw that he gave me a shout out on GAF. "Awesome".

[SonComet]

Ha ha, you should not see crashes in this game. There may be some small presentation issues but I have not encountered freezes yet. Like in R1, I expect Insomniac to releases 2-3 patches to further tune and add more game modes to the MP games.

You occasionally get freezes in the campaign if you die and hit a major event shortly after the checkpoint. When jumping over the barrier on the chicago bridge fight (midway through), my game froze for several seconds. Happened in a few other areas too. Never seems to happen unless I die first.

Other glitches I ran into consisted of the NPCs not doing their scripted functions. But if you shoot them or melee them enough they sometimes snap out of it and let you continue with the game without reloading the checkpoint.

I've played through R1 twice, RCF 3 times, and R2 twice now and it seems like R1 had the least glitches and rough spots to me of the 3. I just played through it the 2nd time before playing R2, so I don't think it's just the passage of time that's given me this impression, but who knows.

[patsu]

You occasionally get freezes in the campaign if you die and hit a major event shortly after the checkpoint. When jumping over the barrier on the chicago bridge fight (midway through), my game froze for several seconds. Happened in a few other areas too. Never seems to happen unless I die first.

I remember what you are talking about now. Sometimes (only once or twice for me), the game would block while the level is still being loaded (when I respawned). That's not crashing though. The game resumed after about 2 seconds or so.


Other glitches I ran into consisted of the NPCs not doing their scripted functions. But if you shoot them or melee them enough they sometimes snap out of it and let you continue with the game without reloading the checkpoint.


Hah, that would be sloppy. I am lucky enough not to run into it (yet).


I've played through R1 twice, RCF 3 times, and R2 twice now and it seems like R1 had the least glitches and rough spots to me of the 3. I just played through it the 2nd time before playing R2, so I don't think it's just the passage of time that's given me this impression, but who knows.

Experienced quite a few glitches in the betas. The final game has been kind to me so far (Other than the gameplay-related and visual design issues highlighted in this thread). The server was brought down 2-3 times for maintenance so far too.

[djskribbles]

Man this truly is a beautiful looking game. If it really is using QAA, it must have improved a lot because it doesn't look blurry to me at all, yet it looks so clean. The lighting, color choices and art direction are much better. I haven't noticed ANY framerate drops or tearing either. Some of the textures are a little low res, but for the most part, they have really improved on the textures too. I also can't get over how good the controls feel... they are the best out of any shooter I've played so far. I've been playing for about 9 hours now and I think I'm nearing the end and there still hasn't been a dull moment... the pacing is great. There were a few frustrating parts that kind of pissed me off, and one part that wouldn't allow me to advance so I had to kill myself and redo the section to get to the next checkpoint. The game is also pretty hard at times, even on casual. But overall, this is a HUGE improvement over the first Resistance in every way and could quite possibly be my GOTY.

[rounin]

I heard there are still some problems. Will be on myself within the hour.

Thank you for adding me on PSN.

Yeah, initially it was pretty good. I was able to use the player sort in the online co-op lobby quite a few times, but later on in the night just when I thought the problem was completely gone, my PS3 froze again haha. Weird because I thought the OS had its own dedicated SPU to run on. Maybe the lag on the servers crashed the networking component running on the OS? hmm.

Anyway the servers seem to be getting a little better everyday (even though I just got it 2 days ago now) and I have high hopes I can play it with my girlfriend on splitscreen online when she gets her tmw night.

[patsu]

Weird because I thought the OS had its own dedicated SPU to run on. Maybe the lag on the servers crashed the networking component running on the OS? hmm.

I think parts of the OS run in the SPUs and PPUs (There was a B3D post on it). In any case, the netcode might be game specific.

I finally got my invisibility capability back :cool: Also completed a new co-op level (Finally !). Game is insane in 8P co-op when everyone coordinates well together in a Chimeran blitz.

[patsu]

Hmm... wrong game (Was posting to LBP thread but it ended up here)

[rounin]

Some of the videos in this game really remind me of HalfLife.

[tha_con]

Some of the videos in this game really remind me of HalfLife.

People have been saying this for ages, and frankly, I don't see it.

Then again, I rarely compare games to each other and try to take each as it's own experience, comparing, IMO, is a waste of time.

[rounin]

Sorry, when I said videos, I meant graphics, as I have the game and played it. Thank you for sharing your opinion though.

[Neb]

Some of the videos in this game really remind me of HalfLife.

The look/graphics of HL2 perhaps.

[tha_con]

Sorry, when I said videos, I meant graphics, as I have the game and played it. Thank you for sharing your opinion though.

In that case, the quality of the character models in some instances certainly seems comparable, but the feel and art direction don't really match up to me (in most occasions).

[rounin]

The look/graphics of HL2 perhaps.

I certainly made a lot of mistakes in my original post didn't I. I meant Halflife2 of course.:grin:

[patsu]

Are you in Orick now ?

[rounin]

Yes. How did you know?

[patsu]

Some of the videos in this game really remind me of HalfLife.

You told us so.

[rounin]

hmm.. upon further evaluation I'm in the mothership now and it gives me a Halo/Resistance1/Unreal feeling. I guess all games sometimes feel similar with others...

Overall very impressed with the visuals thats for sure.

[djskribbles]

How can you make a FPS without copying another in some shape or form?

After finishing the campaign, I agree with you though... some parts reminded me of HL2, R1, UT3 etc.

[Oboro Shogun]

Anyone else getting 0 completes showing up for them in their profile despite finishing the game?? I've beaten it twice now, once on Difficult and once on Superhuman and I'm still getting a 0 in my profile. I've got the game completion trophy and the Superhuman OMGWTFBBQ trophy so the system has credited my completions that way at least.

[AntShaw]

I haven't had a chance to give my impressions yet, but playing through the Single Player Campaign solo so far. This game is FUN! I enjoy the single player campaign much more then R1. I couldn't finish R1, it felt a little tedious toward the middle. But right now I am in Chicago, and I have always been left yearning for me. I look forward to finishing the game.

I got into the R2 beta and played the 8 player co-op which was mega fun. I look forward to getting into that after I finish up the campaign. I played a couple of the 60 man games and they just wern't as fun for me.

Overall I think the gameplay and flow have been fantastic! Very well paced, with some serious action at times. Fun Boss battles. Graphics are pretty stunning at times, while being rather pedestrian at times as well.

A few buddies and I enjoyed playing split-screen co-op on R1. We haven't started yet for R2, but this is also something I look forward to as well.

[Mize]

I never finished R1 either (my last save it right near the end with the two squid things and numerous snipers), but I did miss the vehicles from R1 in R2. As much as I miss having those vehicles, I've found R2 more fun overall but probably a bit less immersive than parts of R1. You definitely die much more in R2 and then learn where the bad guys (especially the annoying chameleons) are going to be in successive respawns.

Anyway, I think I'm only 20-30 minutes of play from the ending...then it's on to Gears2. I probably ought to give MP a try too.

[rounin]

A few buddies and I enjoyed playing split-screen co-op on R1. We haven't started yet for R2, but this is also something I look forward to as well.

I enjoyed co-op in R1. But the co-op in R2 will probably leave you disappointed as it did to me. It does not go through the SP campaign in splitscreen. Rather its just a bunch of stages (maybe 8) with objectives that you play with a player in 'co-op'.

I hope there will be a patch that allows us to play through SP campaign with another player in splitscreen coming...

[AntShaw]

I enjoyed co-op in R1. But the co-op in R2 will probably leave you disappointed as it did to me. It does not go through the SP campaign in splitscreen. Rather its just a bunch of stages (maybe 8) with objectives that you play with a player in 'co-op'.

I hope there will be a patch that allows us to play through SP campaign with another player in splitscreen coming...

Thats unfortunate. So the Campaign Split-Screen co-op doesn't allow you to play through the entire single player campaign?

If its objective base, then do you earn experience like the 8 player co-op?

[DrJay24]

Thats unfortunate. So the Campaign Split-Screen co-op doesn't allow you to play through the entire single player campaign?

If its objective base, then do you earn experience like the 8 player co-op?

The co-op is 2-8 players, though 2 player might be hard. You and a buddy can go online and join six others for the full experience. They should patch in campaign co-op, along with a brightness slider and the weapon wheel as an option. They are getting beat up in the reviews over these things, they shouldn't be so stubborn.

[rounin]

Thats unfortunate. So the Campaign Split-Screen co-op doesn't allow you to play through the entire single player campaign?

If its objective base, then do you earn experience like the 8 player co-op?

The short of it is there is no such thing as campaign split-screen co-op in R2. :sad:

[AntShaw]

The short of it is there is no such thing as campaign split-screen co-op in R2. :sad:

OK. Thats what I was trying to get at. Bummer. As fun as the 2-8 player co-op is. I enjoy the campaign slightly better. Bummer.

[Scott_Arm]

The short of it is there is no such thing as campaign split-screen co-op in R2. :sad:

Lame. I'll have to let my brother know in case he decides to pick it up. That was just about the only reason he bought the first one.

[obonicus]

Lame. I'll have to let my brother know in case he decides to pick it up. That was just about the only reason he bought the first one.

1up was speculating that they may add it later on in the product lifecycle, based on Insomniac's support for R1, but they're probably just guessing.

[tha_con]

Adding in split screen co-op isn't something you just do over night.

1up is retarded, honestly none of them are really as 'in the know' as they lay claim to. That much was made obvious when I went to Insomniac Games and got some behind the scenes talks.

The folks at 1up are either naive, or ignorant.

[22psi]

Hey guys, interested in this game. Should I play the first before playing the 2nd? Thanks!

[obonicus]

Adding in split screen co-op isn't something you just do over night.

1up is retarded, honestly none of them are really as 'in the know' as they lay claim to. That much was made obvious when I went to Insomniac Games and got some behind the scenes talks.

The folks at 1up are either naive, or ignorant.

Please enlighten us. Or are you under NDA?

[DrJay24]

Hey guys, interested in this game. Should I play the first before playing the 2nd? Thanks!

Yes. They are both great, but not very similar to each other. The first starts very slow, like a COD game. The second is pretty balls to the wall throughout, though the best levels are in the second half.

The main problem you may have is getting used to the weapon wheel and health bar and then losing them in the R2. Also play casual in R2 unless you like a challenge, Hale does not have much health.

[tha_con]

Please enlighten us. Or are you under NDA?

No, I'm not.

Basically, the game streams data to load up the next area. When you start adding in other players, you have to worry about a player being too far away, and the game not being able to load all of the data for both players. You also have to worry about scripting, since R2 is heavily scripted, adding a second player could ruin the scripting and campaign all together.

There is a lot more that is involved, not just rendering the same scene twice, etc. It's pretty complex.

[rounin]

Unless I'm mistaken, those challenges they already faced or have faced. The streaming is already faced in split screen co-op. As for the scripting they already had a solution to that in R1.

[tha_con]

The Co-op maps have significantly different texture work and geometry compared to Single Player.

Also, R1 didn't have scripting like R2, and you could break R1 by splitting up and waiting for enemies to appear. There were enemies that would not respond to fire until you got to a certain trigger point, player 2 could kill them before the AI even triggered.

Quite frankly, the challenges from R1 to R2 are very different, how you could not see that, I don't know.

[patsu]

I don't think they can add co-op to the single player campaign. The boss fights (e.g., Leviathan) wouldn't work.

[Nesh]

Hey guys, interested in this game. Should I play the first before playing the 2nd? Thanks!
Whether you buy both or just R2 wont ruin your experience with R2.

[betan]

Split screen (SP campaign) coop will not happen and I personally enjoy coop in R2 more than R1 (coop).
They can rework current coop for 2 player offline if the demand is high, but I doubt that too. I saw a lot of split screen coopers online yesterday.

So I finished the campaign. Gfx are way underrated, and I blame the kitty guy. I watched gamersyde videos before playing, and I too thought the indoors were lame, outdoors were OK.
Now that I played the game, while there are a couple of really lame stuff indoors (like monitors and switches), the graphics are consistently great save maybe the Canyon. Water animation and interaction is best, although looks a little muddy time to time. Streaming is excellent, so are checkpoint restarts (with at most a couple seconds of blank screen).

As for gameplay, weapons are greatest ever. I have never seen a game with so many fun weapons. The last champion was R1 naturally. It's unfortunate that two out of three of my fav weapons from R1 didn't make it.
Bullseye tagging is now almost useless. Likewise for Laark altfire, which is only useful for a swarm of drones. To be fair, that was really an awesome show, but no excuse for removal of original heatseakers. Bullock was fun in MP, unnecessary in SP.

Fortunately the remaining of the three, Auger, is back and even better. Magnum is the best pistol, maybe even the best weapon ever, and Marksman, to my surprise, is a lot of fun for shooting at running hybrids. Wraith, Splicer, and Fareye are also welcome, though the last one took a little hit compared to the original for some reason.

The wheel is greatly missed. It's really painful to throw out so many fun weapons. I don't buy the balancing shit bit. Two weapon system is for "other" games, not Resistance.

Minibosses of the original all took a hit, partially thanks to slightly misplaced obsession with scale. Titans and Stalker encounters were much more fun in the first one. Now totally gimped Laark is forced to you to take a large number of them on a single encounter.

Which brings me to my biggest problem with the game. It's all about taking damage. The new health system, while most natural for Hale, totally ruined some great aspects of R1. There is little you can do to avoid bullets at medium range. Chimera bullets are fast, accurate and powerful. I don't really mind dying (and felt like R2 difficulty was just right), so powerful is fine, but playing while screen is constantly flashing red and Hale making "Agh, Ugh" noises is not fun. As if the upgrade of Hybrid Bullseye was not enough, they added enemies carrying laser turrets and increased number of minibosses. On the plus side, large number of minibosses indeed often makes you feel cornered and hopeless, but the way you end up getting out of the situation is far from satisfactory.

Another side effect the new health system is lack of scary moments. In R1, you don't carry healthpacks (naturally) and quite often continue with one or two bars, at which point even the smallest enemy can be deadly. If it was up to me, I would reduce the health regen speed significantly, halve the Chameleon damage, but increase the number of them. Water encounter was great.

Humor also was absent because of the depressing mood they were after. Insomniac said they had been trying hard not to insert jokes in the first one, luckily a couple of them had slipped by. No such luck this time. The English soldiers are greatly missed. :(

Anyway, while medium range combat fails short of what R1 did, short and long range combat makes up for it. All in all, anything that involves large number of Chimera totally delivers. That's the right notion of scale.

As for story and storytelling, I totally loved them. Gameplay to cutscene transitions are greatest. I guess some may be bothered by lack of control in FP camera, but for me it's much more convenient than Half Life's storytelling. Characters are totally unmemorable (including the new Hale) which is considerable worse than what R1 did. But I'm totally OK with that, considering the direction they took. Make no mistake I do miss the English, I'm just OK with those particular characters being unmemorable. ;)

I don't agree with the comments that the game needs a little more polish. All the problems I have with the game are because of fundamental design choices they made. Besides that, their production workflow is clearly working, and they still managed to produce a huge game withing short amount of time. It's really unbelievable.

What I do feel is that Insomniac don't play to their strengths, except for weapons. All the gameplay changes seem to be influenced by other popular games. They have a scifi setting, awesome tech and greater freedom compared to a game like CoD or Killzone. They are not doing what they did with Ratchet 2/3.

In short, it's still the best shooter I have played in a long time, but it's not the game I was hoping for after R1.

[Vic]

6/10 in Edge magazine, ouch. Has anyone read the review?

[patsu]

...Impressions...

Pretty much spot on...

except that I rate Auger higher than Magnum ^_^

6/10 in Edge magazine, ouch. Has anyone read the review?

Nope, but I'd imagine if they only focused on the negative points, then that score is possible.

[Kittonwy]

Pretty much spot on...

except that I rate Auger higher than Magnum ^_^



Nope, but I'd imagine if they only focused on the negative points, then that score is possible.

There were just too many flaws for a mag like Edge to pick on, so much of that were due to design decisions which to this day I still don't understand, frankly the game could have used more design muscle from the Q4B team instead of having the Q4B team crank out a downloadable episode.

[patsu]

Yes, if one only looks at the negative points, then it's certainly a depressing picture. The game is entertaining and impressive in many ways, but lacks polish.

I completed "Difficult" last night. Hopping back into co-op again.

A lot of the story flaws existed in R1 as well (That's why some rated R1 as "generic"). Gameplay-wise, like Sony, they decided to abandon their success and went in a new direction. It doesn't always pan out.

I am curious now that you have tried KZ2. How would you rate R1 against KZ2 ?

Also is there anywhere online to check out the R2 concept art ? You mentioned in GAF that the art direction in the R2 art book is good but the technical realization failed. I would be interested to have a look.

[Shifty Geezer]

Can we redirect R2 versus KZ2 talk to a new thread please? I appreciate the choice gamers have, but the overlap shouldn't be spread across both threads.

[Kittonwy]

Yes, if one only looks at the negative points, then it's certainly a depressing picture. The game is entertaining and impressive in many ways, but lacks polish.

I completed "Difficult" last night. Hopping back into co-op again.

A lot of the story flaws existed in R1 as well (That's why some rated R1 as "generic"). Gameplay-wise, like Sony, they decided to abandon their success and went in a new direction. It doesn't always pan out.

I am curious now that you have tried KZ2. How would you rate R1 against KZ2 ?

Also is there anywhere online to check out the R2 concept art ? You mentioned in GAF that the art direction in the R2 art book is good but the technical realization failed. I would be interested to have a look.

It's NOT Sony's fault Insomniac decided to completely change the way the game plays, things like poor ironsights implementation and the way the MP maps were designed, the poor way the boss fights were designed really can't be blamed on Sony. Visually it's COMPLETELY Insomniac's fault that the lighting and shadowing was not up to par because Sony's own edge tools supports HDR and self-shadowing and it would have made a HUGE difference. I think it's just a problem of setting the wrong priorities when deciding which features the rendering engine can support in R2 because a good lighting model should have been at the top of that list after R1 and R&CFTOD.

As far as the KZ2 beta is concerned I like it better than R1, with R1 it's all hip shooting with the carbine or tagging with the bullseye and then gaf clan group sniping, here you can do long range kills with the standard rifle and hip shoot all you want and while there are sniper spots, it's never safe in one spot, it's set up in such a way that it's always possible for one to get flanked, it really teaches the player to play smart, and the maps while more intricate than R1 maps (and WAY better than R2 maps), are relatively easy to memorize.

Not sure if anyone has posted the concept art online, I think some of them like the kraken boss in the concept art looks HUGE and epic compared to the actual boss in the game. The giant tower climber boss I thought was pretty good but it doesn't really have weakspots per se and having the leapers in the fight as well was definitely annoying. The problem with some of these bosses was that it's hard for the player to get the sense that the player is hurting the boss, more visual feedback was seriously needed.

[tha_con]

This aint GAF... :roll:

You could have fooled me. All I read is ridiculous complaints about things that are really miniscule.

Seems like it is exactly what GAF is. A bunch of people who only play high profile games, and talk tech like they 'know' what they are talking about, spitting out acronyms and what not.

The game plays well, looks great, runs well, and has great replay value.

It's just tiresome, I *thought* I had found a community where I could get away from all the tiresome nit picking and elitist attitudes...I guess I may have been wrong.

[Asher]

Aside from the gameplay (which I can't critique yet, only about 45 mins in), I'm very disappointed by the graphics. The flickering shadows are all I ever notice -- it'd be better if they just weren't there at all. It doesn't help I've played some other games recently (which I will not name to prevent this from being a "versus" thread) which look far more impressive.

The level designs also could use more polish so far...

Edit: The San Francisco-invasion part was just awesome. Why couldn't the rest of the game look like this?

[Vic]

Nope, but I'd imagine if they only focused on the negative points, then that score is possible.

Yeah I'm still going to get this game. Looking at other reviews, it seems hard to see how Edge could give this score, though tradionally they are quite tough.

Still more interested in this than Far Cry 2 and COD 5. Really dont think its a 6 if its better than the first game.

[BoardBonobo]

You could have fooled me. All I read is ridiculous complaints about things that are really miniscule.

Seems like it is exactly what GAF is. A bunch of people who only play high profile games, and talk tech like they 'know' what they are talking about, spitting out acronyms and what not.

The game plays well, looks great, runs well, and has great replay value.

It's just tiresome, I *thought* I had found a community where I could get away from all the tiresome nit picking and elitist attitudes...I guess I may have been wrong.

Sometimes is does seem that nobody actually plays games anymore. They just gather in corners of the internet and talk about screenshots. And with this gen is seems to have become especially prevalent.

I will be buying R2 no matter what, I bought R1 and loved it. I'll buy R2 and make up my own mind. Just the same way I followed Halo through to the last instalment (which turned out to be a big let down in the end). I'm still waiting for Serious Sam III and hold a torch for Duke Nuke'em.

As for the Edge review, they seem to have been particularly tough on PS3 exclusives. Maybe they just have too high a set of expectations?

In the mean time I enjoy watching folks gather and mass debate over a load of meaningless drivel. It's far more fun than playing the game in real life.

[patsu]

It's NOT Sony's fault Insomniac decided to completely change the way the game plays, things like poor ironsights implementation and the way the MP maps were designed, the poor way the boss fights were designed really can't be blamed on Sony. Visually it's COMPLETELY Insomniac's fault that the lighting and shadowing was not up to par because Sony's own edge tools supports HDR and self-shadowing and it would have made a HUGE difference. I think it's just a problem of setting the wrong priorities when deciding which features the rendering engine can support in R2 because a good lighting model should have been at the top of that list after R1 and R&CFTOD.


Oh no, I am not saying Sony caused this at all. Sony sometimes "abandoned" an existing successful formula and then got distracted with other new ideas. ^_^


As far as the KZ2 beta is concerned I like it better than R1, with R1 it's all hip shooting with the carbine or tagging with the bullseye and then gaf clan group sniping, here you can do long range kills with the standard rifle and hip shoot all you want and while there are sniper spots, it's never safe in one spot, it's set up in such a way that it's always possible for one to get flanked, it really teaches the player to play smart, and the maps while more intricate than R1 maps (and WAY better than R2 maps), are relatively easy to memorize.

Okay, that means Insomniac's judgement isn't off. They needed to evolve R1. The R2 online co-op is a major leap forward. The MP headed in a different direction (follow market leader) but ended up disappointing existing fans despite quantitative improvement. The SP lacks polish in many areas, most likely due to resource issues.

I agree with you that some of these challenges are at the design level (They had to rework from scratch since R1 formula was thrown out).


Not sure if anyone has posted the concept art online, I think some of them like the kraken boss in the concept art looks HUGE and epic compared to the actual boss in the game. The giant tower climber boss I thought was pretty good but it doesn't really have weakspots per se and having the leapers in the fight as well was definitely annoying. The problem with some of these bosses was that it's hard for the player to get the sense that the player is hurting the boss, more visual feedback was seriously needed.

Agreed !

I fault the art direction because I think they are operating at the artistic level but not enough at the "macro" level. It's hard to describe, but after seeing their concept art, I may be able to express myself better. :(
Not that I'm better of course, but I just want to point out what's missing from my point of view.

[DrJay24]

Edit: The San Francisco-invasion part was just awesome. Why couldn't the rest of the game look like this?

For the most part it looks better. You basically played the wost looking part of the game, the inside of the SF facility. Chicago, Iceland, Louisiana, etc. all look great.

Indoor parts of R1 and R2 are the worst looking in general.

[Asher]

There's some major game design issues from what I can see.

There's WAY too many instances of "surprise deaths", or one-hit kills...I'm playing on Normal and this is just way too hard for "Normal". Little things like you turn a corner and something instantly "de-cloaks" and kills you in one shot. Over and over. Then you respawn and just know something's there to kill it. Very poor design, it's not fun at all.

Some of the boss battles are just ridiculous. Saps the fun out of it. Then when I turn it down to Easy difficulty, 90% of the baddies are way too easy...

[tha_con]

I think the problem is playing High Profile games only turns you into a jaded gamer. That's my POV and I'm sticking to it.

Personally, I never had a problem with chameleons, you hear their moan at least 5 seconds before they attack, then they stomp toward you and the screen shakes, and then you can see their figure moving forward before they uncloak. There was one instance where I died because I expected 1 and 2 showed up (in Utah).

Honestly, my biggest grip would be the instances where you are forced to get into a shooting contest with some enemies without any cover. But, in those areas, you are fighting enemies where cover simply wouldn't make sense.

To each their own, I've played far far far worse, so those of you saying it's flawed or lacks polish...well you absolutely have to be 'jaded', basically isolated to only high profile games, and you really don't know how bad it can be.

[Asher]

I know how bad it can be, I usually avoid those titles. These games are not cheap at $60 a piece, especially considering how short the single-player campaigns are in them. I just expect more, and usually get more.

It's not a bad game, but I'm not into the multiplayer and the co-op mode for R2 is crippled...so I'm not too impressed with $60 for a short single-player campaign with some rather obvious issues from my perspective.

Re: The chameleons...maybe it's a problem with my setup but I definitely don't hear the moan 5 seconds before. I hear something but it's always under a second before only (It just happened again minutes ago). Just now, I'm in Bryce Canyon...was zooming in and sniping when all of the sudden I heard the groan and before I could even unzoom I was killed in 1 swipe. Then I respawned and as I was walking to another spot to snipe from, one came out of nowhere with less under a second's notice and i couldn't aim properly in time, so I died in one hit again.

[tha_con]

I know how bad it can be, I usually avoid those titles. These games are not cheap at $60 a piece, especially considering how short the single-player campaigns are in them. I just expect more, and usually get more.

It's not a bad game, but I'm not into the multiplayer and the co-op mode for R2 is crippled...so I'm not too impressed with $60 for a short single-player campaign with some rather obvious issues from my perspective.

Re: The chameleons...maybe it's a problem with my setup but I definitely don't hear the moan 5 seconds before. I hear something but it's always under a second before only (It just happened again minutes ago). Just now, I'm in Bryce Canyon...was zooming in and sniping when all of the sudden I heard the groan and before I could even unzoom I was killed in 1 swipe. Then I respawned and as I was walking to another spot to snipe from, one came out of nowhere with less under a second's notice and i couldn't aim properly in time, so I died in one hit again.

In Bryce canyon you don't hear the Chimera, but all of your soldiers do shout "Chameleon!". It even kills a man down at the bottom of the gully before it comes for you.

It's not a 1 hit kill though, you have to hit the Chameleon with a few shots with the bullseye or carbine before it goes down.

That said, I played the demos for Conflict: Denied Ops, and tried out Brothers in Arms: Hells Highway, R2 is not that bad. Compared to stuff like Blacksite: Area 51...yea, it's a good game.

If you REALLY want to see some bad design, play Vampire Reign. You'll puke, it's THAT bad.

[Asher]

In Bryce canyon you don't hear the Chimera, but all of your soldiers do shout "Chameleon!". It even kills a man down at the bottom of the gully before it comes for you.

It's not a 1 hit kill though, you have to hit the Chameleon with a few shots with the bullseye or carbine before it goes down.

That said, I played the demos for Conflict: Denied Ops, and tried out Brothers in Arms: Hells Highway, R2 is not that bad. Compared to stuff like Blacksite: Area 51...yea, it's a good game.

If you REALLY want to see some bad design, play Vampire Reign. You'll puke, it's THAT bad.

I definitely did not see a Chameleon kill anyone, I didn't know they were there til I was killed instantly. And it is definitely a 1-hit kill on me, as soon as they get within striking range I am dead.

Which difficulty did you play on?

[scificube]

In the quieter areas you should hear birds chirping every time a Chameleon is nearby. This is muffled in areas with a lot of action. In those areas you should still hear load footsteps approaching you 2 or 3 seconds before a chamelon strikes. These footsteps are always accompanied by the screen shacking to let you know an attack is coming.

In the open areas Chameleons you are made aware of Chameleons being in the area by one them attacking one of your comrades in front of you. Still if you outrun your comrades then you can run right into them.

The audible cues seem to be giving some people trouble. Perhaps a longer fade in interval from a distance would have been better. The Chameleon could stay just as deadly but give it slightly more health since people could "see" it coming for a longer time and thus are apt to pump more bullets into it. Perhaps people are just too trained to take visual cues over audible cues.

[ultragpu]

It's NOT Sony's fault Insomniac decided to completely change the way the game plays, things like poor ironsights implementation and the way the MP maps were designed, the poor way the boss fights were designed really can't be blamed on Sony. Visually it's COMPLETELY Insomniac's fault that the lighting and shadowing was not up to par because Sony's own edge tools supports HDR and self-shadowing and it would have made a HUGE difference. I think it's just a problem of setting the wrong priorities when deciding which features the rendering engine can support in R2 because a good lighting model should have been at the top of that list after R1 and R&CFTOD.
I certainly agree that the game would benefit from HDR or an unified lighting/shadow system, but whatever approach they used here was still pretty good and it does dynamic light & shadow to a certain degree "a feature completely devoid of from another recent AAA title". Personally R2's lighting engine has amazed me more often than not considering the rest of package, if it wasn't for some iffy indoor sections then i dont think you'll hate it that much.

[patsu]

It's not a bad game, but I'm not into the multiplayer and the co-op mode for R2 is crippled...so I'm not too impressed with $60 for a short single-player campaign with some rather obvious issues from my perspective.


R2 has a superb co-op mode (but then you're not into multiplayer ^_^).


Re: The chameleons...maybe it's a problem with my setup but I definitely don't hear the moan 5 seconds before. I hear something but it's always under a second before only (It just happened again minutes ago). Just now, I'm in Bryce Canyon...was zooming in and sniping when all of the sudden I heard the groan and before I could even unzoom I was killed in 1 swipe. Then I respawned and as I was walking to another spot to snipe from, one came out of nowhere with less under a second's notice and i couldn't aim properly in time, so I died in one hit again.

That's probably because you were moving forward and sniping at the same time ?

The Chameleons in Bryce appeared way earlier than other Chameleons because one of them would attack your soldiers first, unless you were in front of the soldiers or were busy sniping. Usually you do get ample warning (a few seconds). Your bass audio setup is probably at fault if you don't.

The Chameleons in Louisiana will fight with your soldiers if you don't venture too far in front. The Chameleon(s) might lose too. :)

I just found out late last week that the Chameleons also appear in the co-op levels (sometimes). I was surprised to see them at first. They were not one-hit kill monsters. So you can try to dodge and fight them with fellow human players. I heard there is a Marauder somewhere in co-op but have not run into it yet.

[Shifty Geezer]

It's just tiresome, I *thought* I had found a community where I could get away from all the tiresome nit picking and elitist attitudes...I guess I may have been wrong.It's a discussion board where people are free to express their opinions of the games. I think the problem here isn't elitist attitudes, but Insmoniac's reputation. They are regarded as creme-de-la-creme, and a game that isn't a high achievement from them comes for a lot more criticism. This isn't to say every response to R2 is a balanced opinion, and some may by reacting to changes or style or whatever, but they are free to do so.

Your response should be to politely disagree and present reasons why. No need to get het-up and potty-mouthed over people having a different opinion to you, even if you do think their focus is misplaced. After all, if they talk themselves out of a great game, it's their loss. ;)

[Cornsnake]

The beta showed a Marauder ribbon for the co-op, so there should be one in there.

[Betanumerical]

Does anyone know if the online servers are region locked?, because I'm thinking of buying the 'Asian' version of the game and would like to play with friends in Australia/America/Europe.

[_phil_]

Visually it's COMPLETELY Insomniac's fault that the lighting and shadowing was not up to par because Sony's own edge tools supports HDR and self-shadowing and it would have made a HUGE difference

That's BS, the real problem is that some artists are very good and a lot are pretty bad.
Insomniac simply lacks the strong art team and cohesive art direction their engine deserves (really impressive,IMO).
99% of R2 visual flaws are artist weakness ,such are color harmonisation ,lighting inconsistencies ,or bad texture choices.
Color harmonisation and texturing choices/design are a very big part of artist-driven scene lighting.

[DrJay24]

I definitely did not see a Chameleon kill anyone, I didn't know they were there til I was killed instantly. And it is definitely a 1-hit kill on me, as soon as they get within striking range I am dead.

Which difficulty did you play on?

I watched the Chameleon fighting my guys during that part, maybe it's not totally scripted and that's not a bad thing.



It's not a bad game, but I'm not into the multiplayer and the co-op mode for R2 is crippled...so I'm not too impressed with $60 for a short single-player campaign with some rather obvious issues from my perspective


Crippled? Co-op has been R2's selling point for months now, have you tried it? That's like saying L4D is crippled, it only has 4 player co-op. I'm thinking reading a few reviews might have saved you $60.

[tha_con]

I definitely did not see a Chameleon kill anyone, I didn't know they were there til I was killed instantly. And it is definitely a 1-hit kill on me, as soon as they get within striking range I am dead.

Which difficulty did you play on?

No no, they are always a 1hit kill, but YOU can't kill them with 1 hit, it takes multiple rounds from a bullseye or carbine (like 3 or something?).

[scificube]

No no, they are always a 1hit kill, but YOU can't kill them with 1 hit, it takes multiple rounds from a bullseye or carbine (like 3 or something?).

You can one hit kill them with the Rossmore or a melee attack but I wouldn't suggest the later especially on the higher difficulty settings.

[Asher]

R2 has a superb co-op mode (but then you're not into multiplayer ^_^).



That's probably because you were moving forward and sniping at the same time ?

The Chameleons in Bryce appeared way earlier than other Chameleons because one of them would attack your soldiers first, unless you were in front of the soldiers or were busy sniping. Usually you do get ample warning (a few seconds). Your bass audio setup is probably at fault if you don't.

That's probably it. I live in an apartment building with thin floors and usually play at night, my subwoofer is almost off...my volume is fairly low to begin with. The audio levels seem to be inconsistent in this game, I can barely hear the guys talking (which is usually important) but then it becomes too loud when we're fighting. When we're fighting and the guy is talking, all I can hear is the fighting and a muffled voice...

[Asher]

Crippled? Co-op has been R2's selling point for months now, have you tried it? That's like saying L4D is crippled, it only has 4 player co-op. I'm thinking reading a few reviews might have saved you $60.
Can you play through the single-player campaign with another person? From what I see, that is not an option a la Halo 3, Gears of War 2, Resistance 1, etc. I thought it was standard by now...

The co-op play that it came with is not something I'm interested in (I saw something about picking classes?) and it doesn't seem to support the campaign story. I usually play through these games cooperatively with my SO and have a blast with it, being forced to play it by myself wasn't nearly as fun and it felt, well, crippled to me.

I haven't tried the other cooperative and I haven't been tempted to. Is it fine in split-screen?

As for reviews, I hate reviews. They're mostly PR garbage. I usually wait for word of mouth from friends, but I played Resistance 1 and liked it and I was already at EB picking up Gears of War 2, so I thought I'd pick up R2 while I was there. Maybe playing Gears of War 2 first was a bad idea...

[DrJay24]

PR garbage is what you needed then, the co-op has always been separate from Hale's campaign. The co-op can be played offline and online splitscreen, but I'm not sure if two players will be too much fun, it's made for 3-8 since you will be missing one class out of the three. Online with seven others it's a total blast.

My last game we were fighting the boss mob for the level (giant Titan). I fell off the edge of a platform on the wrong side of the action, but then I was the only guy alive. This allowed everyone to respawn and we ultimately won the scenario with me getting the killing shot on the big guy.

[Asher]

PR garbage is what you needed then, the co-op has always been separate from Hale's campaign. The co-op can be played offline and online splitscreen, but I'm not sure if two players will be too much fun, it's made for 3-8 since you will be missing one class out of the three. Online with seven others it's a total blast.

My last game we were fighting the boss mob for the level (giant Titan). I fell off the edge of a platform on the wrong side of the action, but then I was the only guy alive. This allowed everyone to respawn and we ultimately won the scenario with me getting the killing shot on the big guy.


That's a shame -- I don't like to play online with randoms and no one else I know has a PS3. Oh well.

[djskribbles]

Can you play through the single-player campaign with another person? From what I see, that is not an option a la Halo 3, Gears of War 2, Resistance 1, etc. I thought it was standard by now...
What else does? Not many games, thats for sure... it is far from a standard and it depends on the game/story.

[patsu]

That's a shame -- I don't like to play online with randoms and no one else I know has a PS3. Oh well.

You can still play co-op with your buddy in R2 (split screen mode). It's not the campaign story, but a different experience.

If you want to, both of you can join a larger party at the same time. Your screen names will be Asher and Asher(2), or some variation of these 2.

[tha_con]

Just finished playing with a Party of 6, still cannot see how people do not enjoy this.

Asher, you really need to give in and play with people on the forums. I see no reason for you to not play the co-op just because none of your "real" friends have it. There are plenty of really great people here who play co-op fairly often, and I think you could enjoy it if you'd just give it a chance instead of simply writing it off like you have.

[Asher]

What else does? Not many games, thats for sure... it is far from a standard and it depends on the game/story.
Halo 3, Call of Duty: World at War, Gears of War 1/2, I'm pretty sure the original Resistance did as well. It's pretty much a staple in AAA-class FPS games these days.

Just finished playing with a Party of 6, still cannot see how people do not enjoy this.

Asher, you really need to give in and play with people on the forums. I see no reason for you to not play the co-op just because none of your "real" friends have it. There are plenty of really great people here who play co-op fairly often, and I think you could enjoy it if you'd just give it a chance instead of simply writing it off like you have.
I'm sure everyone is fun to play with. It's just an aversion I have to playing with people I don't know in real life -- you know how people can be online. I'm sure the B3D community is far better than most, so maybe I will give it a shot sometime. But I'm willing to bet the amount of people here who want to play co-op R2 in a few months will be fairly slim -- and that's the next time I'll get to it. Too many other games in the meantime..

[patsu]

Halo 3, Call of Duty: World at War, Gears of War 1/2, I'm pretty sure the original Resistance did as well. It's pretty much a staple in AAA-class FPS games these days.


Yes, but none of them offer the 8P co-op in R2. Some of the R2 boss fights don't translate well to more than 1 player.

Besides split-screen, if you friend has a PS3, you should be able to play R2 co-op over the net too. So you don't have to worry about the total number of players on R2 online.

[Arwin]

It seemed that playing with the medic and spec ops together should get you fairly far (I tried that in the beta with controlling both of them by myself, and with some strategy I at least made it to the first objective :D), but maybe I'm wrong ...

[djskribbles]

Halo 3, Call of Duty: World at War, Gears of War 1/2, I'm pretty sure the original Resistance did as well. It's pretty much a staple in AAA-class FPS games these days.
You already listed H3, GeoW and R1. :P
Far Cry 2, Dead Space, BioShock, Battlefield Bad Company, Orange Box, Call of Duty 4, Dark Sector - all don't have a coop mode. Plus as others have already mentioned, coop wouldn't have worked well in R2.

[Asher]

You already listed H3, GeoW and R1. :P
Far Cry 2, Dead Space, BioShock, Battlefield Bad Company, Orange Box, Call of Duty 4, Dark Sector - all don't have a coop mode. Plus as others have already mentioned, coop wouldn't have worked well in R2.
I don't consider FC2, Dead Space, Battlefield Bad Company or Dark Sector AAA games.

BioShock would've just been too weird with co-op or multiplayer of any kind.

Orange Box is full of a bunch of dated games, sans Portal which doesn't make sense for co-op.

Call of Duty 4 didn't have it, but the latest version of the series does so there goes that point...

And I disagree that it wouldn't have worked well in R2. It would've worked just fine, just like it does in Gears of War and Halo.

I'm just saying it's something I would have enjoyed a lot. I'm far from the only person who would think that. Just because "not all games" have it doesn't mean it's fine not to have it. Co-operative play is in these days, online or offline, and it's disappointing that they just implemented the solution where you can't really just sit down with your partner or buddy and play the game together. You need to invite a bunch of other people to your "living room" (virtual or otherwise) to do it, which is less fun for me.

[Mize]

Just finished R2 (had to take a few days off for that whole life thing) and have to say it was an excellent, highly playable FPS. I'm very intrigued by people's interpretations of the ending , particularly what the sky showed right before the final shot...it looked like a large round dark area...hmmm...

[betan]

Asher, the discussion is going way off topic, SP campaign would benefit from splitscreen coop at the cost of gfx, streaming, and possibly some gameplay for scripted boss fights and final section (think HL2 coop if you haven't played that much of SP). It's not there, it won't be coming, I feel for you.

That said, if you want to play split screen coop in R2, I really cannot imagine any excuse for not playing the coop campaign (admittedly somewhat poor label), just think it as a game with dynamic and sometimes random squad AI.

The coop teamplay structure is so simple, most of the time you don't need to listen to any chatter from online players, contrary to seemingly popular belief. Not that voice chat is not a plus, it's just not essential.

If you already made up your mind that's not for you either, just sell the damn game.

[tha_con]

I don't consider FC2, Dead Space, Battlefield Bad Company or Dark Sector AAA games.

BioShock would've just been too weird with co-op or multiplayer of any kind.

Orange Box is full of a bunch of dated games, sans Portal which doesn't make sense for co-op.

Call of Duty 4 didn't have it, but the latest version of the series does so there goes that point...

And I disagree that it wouldn't have worked well in R2. It would've worked just fine, just like it does in Gears of War and Halo.

I'm just saying it's something I would have enjoyed a lot. I'm far from the only person who would think that. Just because "not all games" have it doesn't mean it's fine not to have it. Co-operative play is in these days, online or offline, and it's disappointing that they just implemented the solution where you can't really just sit down with your partner or buddy and play the game together. You need to invite a bunch of other people to your "living room" (virtual or otherwise) to do it, which is less fun for me.

So then tell me how the Leviathan fight would pan out? Would he grab both of you and you both have to shoot him in the mouth?

How exactly would the end sequence work? It would be STUPID.

How exactly would the fight with the Kraken be any fun with 2 people blasting away at it, with zero tension?

How exactly would fit another character in the game without it being ham fisted, seeing as how you have different people around you at different times. Please, explain THAT to me. It would have been stupid.

Either way, it's pretty obvious at this point that you are refusing to see any side but your own, further debate on this topic is pointless.

[DrJay24]

I'm just saying it's something I would have enjoyed a lot. I'm far from the only person who would think that.

But it was never going to have it, they made it clear a long time ago. They put their energy into the 8 player co-op, something no other game has. Frankly if I had to have one I'd take the 8-player. Going through the SP with a friend might be fun once, but the 8-player co-op gives many more hours of play time with the three classes and 30 levels per class. You chose to read zero reviews, you are out $60, lesson learned.

I've played through Gears, Halo 3, Aof2, etc. with my buddy - that was a fun 6-10 hours per game. Now we will spend 30+ hours in R2 co-op with scary strangers online in addition to a great SP offline. I'm happy with that.

[tha_con]

So has anyone unlocked the Magnum yet as a medic? I'm curious to know how many shots you can lay down without them detonating / disappearing...

It could be useful for a medic to lay say, 12 magnum rounds in the head of a Titan and then detonate, I think that would do a lot of damage, and net a nice amount of xp.

[Asher]

But it was never going to have it, they made it clear a long time ago. They put their energy into the 8 player co-op, something no other game has. Frankly if I had to have one I'd take the 8-player. Going through the SP with a friend might be fun once, but the 8-player co-op gives many more hours of play time with the three classes and 30 levels per class. You chose to read zero reviews, you are out $60, lesson learned.

I've played through Gears, Halo 3, Aof2, etc. with my buddy - that was a fun 6-10 hours per game. Now we will spend 30+ hours in R2 co-op with scary strangers online in addition to a great SP offline. I'm happy with that.

I'm sure the devs are too. I guess the sales will tell, but so far it doesn't look like it is the most popular decision.

I actually don't know too many people who enjoy playing cooperatively with strangers, and I also don't know too many people who have seven other friends with PS3s that can coordinate and play games together. It seems like it'll be a pretty niche thing, though it is commendable that they are trying it. It's not that the strangers are scary, it's that it's not nearly as fun playing with twelve year old children calling me faggot than it is playing with old friends.

As for it "never going to have it", that's irrelevant. I don't follow these kinds of games at all while they're in development. There's no point until they're out. I admit I should've done more research first, I probably would not have purchased it had I known about the design the cooperative play. But that's just me...

So then tell me how the Leviathan fight would pan out? Would he grab both of you and you both have to shoot him in the mouth?

How exactly would the end sequence work? It would be STUPID.
To be honest it was pretty stupid to begin with. I don't see how it is any more stupid to pick up two people and then throw them precisely in a well-scripted location than it is to pick up one. I was rolling my eyes pretty vigorously at the time already, picking up two people wouldn't make it any worse.

As for the end sequence --
If you're referring to the "shoot the orb to electrocute the baddie" part, that's easily done co-op. If you're referring to the "get out before the station blows up part" -- have you ever played Halo 1? That end part of Resistance was completely identical to Halo 1's ending, except Halo 1's had a bit more of a sense of speed and excitement with the Warthog. It's absolutely doable in coop. One of my favourite coop gaming memories was driving the Warthog across the self-destructing Halo while my friend manned the gun on the 'hog clearing a path...

[tha_con]

I'm sure the devs are too. I guess the sales will tell, but so far it doesn't look like it is the most popular decision.

I actually don't know too many people who enjoy playing cooperatively with strangers, and I also don't know too many people who have seven other friends with PS3s that can coordinate and play games together. It seems like it'll be a pretty niche thing, though it is commendable that they are trying it. It's not that the strangers are scary, it's that it's not nearly as fun playing with twelve year old children calling me faggot than it is playing with old friends.

As for it "never going to have it", that's irrelevant. I don't follow these kinds of games at all while they're in development. There's no point until they're out. I admit I should've done more research first, I probably would not have purchased it had I known about the design the cooperative play. But that's just me...


To be honest it was pretty stupid to begin with. I don't see how it is any more stupid to pick up two people and then throw them precisely in a well-scripted location than it is two pick up one. I was rolling my eyes pretty vigorously at the time already, picking up two people wouldn't make it any worse.

As for the end sequence --
If you're referring to the "shoot the orb to electrocute the baddie" part, that's easily done co-op. If you're referring to the "get out before the station blows up part" -- have you ever played Halo 1? That end part of Resistance was completely identical to Halo 1's ending, except Halo 1's had a bit more of a sense of speed and excitement with the Warthog. It's absolutely doable in coop. One of my favourite coop gaming memories was driving the Warthog across the self-destructing Halo while my friend manned the gun on the 'hog clearing a path...

and you don't think it's detrimental to the story to have two people with "super powers" going through the story, with the second player having absolutley no relevance to anything what-so-ever?.

I'll just say I disagree, you're basically referencing a bunch of poorly done splitscreen co-op games that are tired and thoughtless, and completely writing off a new idea that you haven't even tried. Utterly ridiculous.

Also, your generalization of the community is ridiculous. It's really not that hard to play a game and find a handful of people that are great fun to play online with.

Did I just read that you called it a niche thing? I'm sure you thought World of Warcraft would also be a 'niche' thing? I mean, that has what, Guilds of 40+? Those people are doing massive raids, and look at the install base for WoW.

Niche. Heh.

[Asher]

and you don't think it's detrimental to the story to have two people with "super powers" going through the story, with the second player having absolutley no relevance to anything what-so-ever?.
It wouldn't bother me in the slightest. The story in R2 was derivatively corny as it was, that's not why I played the game. If it bothered you, you wouldn't need to play it. Alternatively, you could design around the problem like they did in Fable II -- the other guy doesn't need to be a super-power person, he can be a regular soldier with a subset of the abilities. It doesn't really matter. You act like it's impossible to do, and it's not. It'd just take more design thought and resources to do, which is a legit complaint, but it's something I'd still prefer to be in games.

I'll just say I disagree, you're basically referencing a bunch of poorly done splitscreen co-op games that are tired and thoughtless, and completely writing off a new idea that you haven't even tried. Utterly ridiculous.
It doesn't have to be split screen. You can do online coop play...

And they're not poorly done. You're right there's no point to debating this if you think the cooperative play in the Halo and Gears of War series was "poorly done".

The fact is my SO sat around and watched me play a game that they could've joined in on and was used to being able to join me with on competing games. You can point me to the 8-person online coop as the best thing since sliced bread, but that changes it from being an intimate two-player experience to a more anonymous squad-based online thing, usually with strangers. They're not comparable, IMO.

[Carl B]

I finished the game early last week, but have held off posting on it until now. I was a huge Resistance 1 fan I should mention, and a huge fan of Resistance 1 multiplayer as well. R2 is a great game, but it is a different game. And as someone expecting a sequel, well, it didn't really feel that way for the vast majority of the game. By the end of course I was intimately familiar with the new mechanics and was invested in the plot, but I feel there are definite leaps/breaks from R1 tradition - if you can call a single game tradition - that makes me feel as if they had compiled a list of all the things that would make the best FPS experience ever, and decided that somehow, no matter what, these ideas were making their way in. I think it's a worse game for it honestly, and think they would have done great with simply the engine revamp and carrying forward with R1 stylistically into this next iteration.

I have to say also that I love the whole Resistance storyline/plot; I didn't feel entirely satisfied honestly with how much (or how little) I learned in R1, and I feel less satisfied here. I just feel that somewhere in the mix here, there should have been some briefing/debriefing moments, something to put things on - pause - and let the player soak in some of the 'big picture' intensity. If nothing else, I'm just honestly curious as to the state of the effort, and though I love the intel finds and the radio shows, the plot revelations via companion conversation didn't work too well for me. Example: "doesn't this make you wish for the days when they needed conversion centers Lieutenant?" Uh, ok, so the entire premise of the first game is brushed over with this one line? I liked the conversion centers! I think they went to this though (non centers), because of course it was on their list of 'awesome things to include.'

Great graphics, truly wonderful sound. A great game. But so many times I felt I was playing a different idea, just dependent on what was going on. Also the multiplayer, I do have to say, I was a gigantic R1 MP fan. I'm not super vocal about it like Patsu and others are, but I earned my (literal) stars, y'know? What made it great was that it was distinct also - if you said Resistance-style MP, that meant something. It did have its own style. This is still great MP, but I feel it's a different style.

Honestly IMO they should have released R2 w/R1 style multiplayer, and then maybe released a second "World of Resistance," or "Call of the Resistance" (catch that obvious allusion there) game that did the online co-op, and changed up the multiplayer to the new experience. I think that R2 would have been received better initially - and initially is crucial - and the second ancillary game would have sold quite well, and have been judged on its own merits for what it was clearly trying to achieve, rather than for what was changed from R1.

The series is obviously, hopefully, headed for a third game. I'm honestly surprised at the final plot twist, and I do hope that somewhere in the mix with all this, they map out the Resistance plot/timeline in greater detail. I can't hope that the third game will do a better job than the preceding two in this regard, so as a bonus for finishing that third game or something, that the comprehensive overview of the Chimeran situation and the human efforts against it be detailed.

[betan]

I have been playing MP lately and my biggest problem is deciding whether I should play coop or competitive, which is a very much welcome problem, and a first for me. The idea that they should have instead shipped seperate games is almost offensive. :)

As for the SP and competitive changes, as much as I loved R1 SP and had finished it more times than any other SP since Quake days, R1 didn't get the praise it deserved. It's totally understandable for IG to make radical changes to the game. Too bad, too many of the SP campaign changes are for the worse.

I also don't get the pun "Call of (the) Resistance" to be honest. The similarities of competitive MP to CoD(4) are minor, as minor as the difference between any FPS. More importantly, what MP brings to the table is way bigger than what it borrowed from other games (more so than R1).

[Carl B]

I have been playing MP lately and my biggest problem is deciding whether I should play coop or competitive, which is a very much welcome problem, and a first for me. The idea that they should have instead shipped seperate games is almost offensive. :)

As for the SP and competitive changes, as much as I loved R1 SP and had finished it more times than any other SP since Quake days, R1 didn't get the praise it deserved. It's totally understandable for IG to make radical changes to the game. Too bad, too many of the SP campaign changes are for the worse.

I also don't get the pun "Call of (the) Resistance" to be honest. The similarities of competitive MP to CoD(4) are minor, as minor as the difference between any FPS. More importantly, what MP brings to the table is way bigger than what it borrowed from other games (more so than R1).

You're free to disagree of course, I'm not saying that "I'm right," and other opinions would be wrong. :)

But I do think that R1 style MP, which, remember... R1 may not have sold insane numbers, but it sold a lot of games, and a lot of us are fond of R1 style MP... would have aided the initial reception/uptake of the game. If the co-op and squad-based multiplayer had been offered as a downloadable $15/20 add-on with nice plot tie-ins and some other veneering, I think it would have done quite well. And more importantly in terms of the entire experience, I think that people that bought R2 expecting something would have more received what they were expecting, and people enticed by the new MP would still be given that option. I think the sales would have been higher for the initial game, and of course strengthened further by the add-on. Also, I think that some R2 MP holdouts might be more easily enticed to try the new experience if it was billed in that "brand new" format.

As for the Call of Duty allusion, it was just an allusion - I wouldn't get too worked up. It's the same type of allusion that Insomniac likes to use in their game titles anyway though, which is why I think it would work, and make the concept immediately understood and accessible.

[DrJay24]

I actually don't know too many people who enjoy playing cooperatively with strangers

I'm sure you will have the same criticism with Gear's 2 Horde mode and Left4Dead. I'm not sure why you are hung up on a play mode that was not advertised and is no means standard at this point. The game isn't for you, time to get this thread back on track, R2 isn't Halo 3 and I for one am very happy about that.

[tha_con]

Why are people still comparing this game to Call of Duty? Because you see experience points pop up after a kill? It is NOTHING like CoD. NOTHING.

[Carl B]

Why are people still comparing this game to Call of Duty? Because you see experience points pop up after a kill? It is NOTHING like CoD. NOTHING.

The point is, why are you seeing experience points pop up at all? Why are there classes? Why is it squad-focused? None of that, IMO, has anything to do with what made R1 MP what it was, and for someone looking for R1 MP to be extended through into this game, it's simply not what was hoped for. It's a fundamentally different experience, and one that if you use R1 as the benchmark, I would call 'un-Resistance' in nature. If people like me, who loved the original game MP, were alone in our thinking... well, this wouldn't be a contentious issue at all. But it is contentious, and that tells you something.

[obonicus]

The point is, why are you seeing experience points pop up at all? Why are there classes? Why is it squad-focused? None of that, IMO, has anything to do with what made R1 MP what it was, and for someone looking for R1 MP to be extended through into this game, it's simply not what was hoped for. It's a fundamentally different experience, and one that if you use R1 as the benchmark, I would call 'un-Resistance' in nature. If people like me, who loved the original game MP, were alone in our thinking... well, this wouldn't be a contentious issue at all. But it is contentious, and that tells you something.

Does COD4 have classes? I've played it only a little bit in 2007, but I had the impression it was more like CS, in terms of how you choose equipment. R2 coop is very much 'resistance's coop'. Nothing else on the market is like it, either console or PC; a fast-paced, many-weapon-carrying MP game is unique on consoles, but also sounds a lot like Quake or UT (but probably dialed-down).

[Carl B]

Does COD4 have classes? I've played it only a little bit in 2007, but I had the impression it was more like CS, in terms of how you choose equipment. R2 coop is very much 'resistance's coop'. Nothing else on the market is like it, either console or PC; a fast-paced, many-weapon-carrying MP game is unique on consoles, but also sounds a lot like Quake or UT (but probably dialed-down).

It does have classes, but that's neither here nor there. The issue is not how similar is R2 MP to other games' MP (I never mentioned COD4 incidentally), the question is how similar is R2's MP to R1's - I would say very dissimilar. I think people here are getting way way defensive/antagonistic about this issue, for reasons I don't understand. To reject that this has been a mixed-review shift in product offering, IMO, is simply to deny reality. You can disagree with why those views are held, but you can't possibly disagree that those views *are* held. And it's not just by game sites or this and that reviewer, but by die hard R1 fans (myself).

It's not a matter of whether what is being offered is unique, good, or enjoyable, it's a matter of whether one thing was expected (reasonably so I would say) and another received.

[tha_con]

The point is, why are you seeing experience points pop up at all? Why are there classes? Why is it squad-focused? None of that, IMO, has anything to do with what made R1 MP what it was, and for someone looking for R1 MP to be extended through into this game, it's simply not what was hoped for. It's a fundamentally different experience, and one that if you use R1 as the benchmark, I would call 'un-Resistance' in nature. If people like me, who loved the original game MP, were alone in our thinking... well, this wouldn't be a contentious issue at all. But it is contentious, and that tells you something.

1) The experience points are a reward system, and I would attribute that to RPGs in general much faster than I would attribute it to call of duty, even then, that doesn't alter the gameplay at all, you take away the visual pop up, and the game still plays the same, moot point.

2) Classes are only in co-operative play. There are no classes in multiplayer. There are also no classes in Call of Duty 4. There are different configurations of weapons, that you can tweak and customize, this is not exclusive to Call of Duty, and games like Socom and Rainbow Six have been doing this for ages. Again, moot point.

3) It is squad based to help organize the game, it has more to do with iterating on your existing technology. The original Resistance was great, but you were playing with a team of 20 people, and you could hardly get organized on a team that large. Playing on a smaller team of 5 is significantly easier to work with and organize, and also helps to distribute the 'flow' of the battle so it is spread out among the map.

4) it is a different experience. R1 was very "old school" and for R2 to be successful, it will have to be different. R1 was largely critisized for it's elements that can be attributed to early shooters, things like weapon pick ups and run and gun gameplay.

Say what you will, but for the average consumer, R2 is a better game, and far more accessible. Trying to lessen the choices made by Insomniac by worthlessly comparing it to another successful shooter like Call of Duty is a bit over the top, in my opinion.

My humble opinion, of course :razz:

[Cheezdoodles]

1up was speculating that they may add it later on in the product lifecycle, based on Insomniac's support for R1, but they're probably just guessing.

That is very very very very very unlikely

[obonicus]

It does have classes, but that's neither here nor there. The issue is not how similar is R2 MP to other games' MP (I never mentioned COD4 incidentally), the question is how similar is R2's MP to R1's - I would say very dissimilar. I think people here are getting way way defensive/antagonistic about this issue, for reasons I don't understand. To reject that this has been a mixed-review shift in product offering, IMO, is simply to deny reality.

Actually, I don't care either way, I never played R1 beyond a few minutes and didn't care much for skirmish mode in R2, so probably won't go back. I was referring to your 'why are there classes' comment, which only applies to coop, and you seemed to place it as a way of R1 losing individuality. I say it's the opposite; there is nothing on the market like R2's coop, for better or for worse.

I'm certainly not qualified to talk about the competitive MP -- I just found descriptions surprisingly similar to UT or Quake, which really isn't an MP flavor you get much on consoles.

[Carl B]

4) it is a different experience. R1 was very "old school" and for R2 to be successful, it will have to be different. R1 was largely critisized for it's elements that can be attributed to early shooters, things like weapon pick ups and run and gun gameplay.

R1 may have been criticized for that - initially - but it was exactly that old school "deathmatch is fun again" gameplay that had me and thousands of others playing it for years after launch. Since I have to imagine that the existing R1 userbase will form the core of the R2 ownerbase as well, it would seem to me obvious enough to focus less on the reviews of two years ago and more on the idea of here's a facet that the userbase loves, and these are the reasons why.

Say what you will, but for the average consumer, R2 is a better game, and far more accessible. Trying to lessen the choices made by Insomniac by worthlessly comparing it to another successful shooter like Call of Duty is a bit over the top, in my opinion.

Where this is occurring, I don't know.

[tha_con]

It's not necessarily coming from you, though your "Call of Resistance" certainly struck a nerve. It's just something I've heard going through the Beta up until release. The changes Insomniac made were largely made, as far as I can tell, to make the game more accessable to the end user, keeping a larger user base for a longer period of time, hopefully lowering the amount of used sales for this title.

It's a business industry, and Insomniac likes money, I'm sure there are more people looking for a game like Resistance 2 than there are people looking for a game like Resistance 1.

[Carl B]

It's not necessarily coming from you, though your "Call of Resistance" certainly struck a nerve.

Call of the Resistance - and I think it's just plain catchy a title. :)

It's just something I've heard going through the Beta up until release.

If you're hearing that constantly though, maybe it's time to stop thinking that everyone's got it wrong, and that maybe instead there's *something* to it.

The changes Insomniac made were largely made, as far as I can tell, to make the game more accessable to the end user, keeping a larger user base for a longer period of time, hopefully lowering the amount of used sales for this title.

It's a business industry, and Insomniac likes money, I'm sure there are more people looking for a game like Resistance 2 than there are people looking for a game like Resistance 1.

IMO nothing could be more accessible than R1 death match gameplay. You come in, you find a game, you blast away. If there are more people looking for R2-style gameplay vs R1 style gameplay IMO it would be hard to determine, because R1 is noteworthy on its emphasis on the solo deathmatch experience. The speed was awesome. Maybe everyone wants teamwork, squad-based play, and slower run-n-gun these days - I don't know. If that's the appeal here in R2, then no matter the differences real or otherwise, you're going to get the comparisons to the other games leading in that space. That R1 might be best compared to Quake or somesuch IMO is a clarion call as to the degree to which the core deathmatch space has been ignored for the past several years, so ancient are the comparison titles, and that's what made R1 MP awesome. If R2 is being compared to COD4, then it need be for no other reason than it's perceived to be attractive to the same type of gamer as is COD4.

[betan]

R1 may have been criticized for that - initially - but it was exactly that old school "deathmatch is fun again" gameplay that had me and thousands of others playing it for years after launch. Since I have to imagine that the existing R1 userbase will form the core of the R2 ownerbase as well, it would seem to me obvious enough to focus less on the reviews of two years ago and more on the idea of here's a facet that the userbase loves, and these are the reasons why.


Here is the thing. R1 matchmaking suffered a big hit after the release of CoD4 (then recovered briefly then went dead again. I really don't know how Patsu was able to play after that.)
That says something about either size or preference of the core players.

I'm not defending R2 here, I'm defending IG's need for change.

Now, personally, I obviously loved R1 TDM, and was really upset after being forced to play CoD4.
As someone who tried a lot of shooters and got a shooter fatigue in search of R1 fun, I feel like R2 is the game that's by far closest to it in terms of the my gunplay style. I still mostly run and gun, tag and snipe. The only difference is I'm being forced to use ironsight for tagging way more than R1, but people were complaining about bullseye tagging in R1 anyway.

As for experience points poping up, and classes in R2, we had score points before and exact same number of classes (0 or 2 depending on your point of view) in R1.


IMO nothing could be more accessible than R1 death match gameplay. You come in, you find a game, you blast away.


Funny, yesterday I was thinking how much easier it's to get into in R2 than R1. I was still having trouble remembering which weapon spawns where in Manchester 40.

In R1 it was the weapon spawn points that made the whole strategy aspect in DM and TDM. Now there are far more options but they are also very high level, nothing a beginner needs to concern him/herself with.

[Shifty Geezer]

tha-con : I don't get your complaint with other people's complaints! Consider Burnout, an arcade racer. If the next Burnout were to go with more realism, to be more like GT, because that's a bigger franchise, would that be a good thing? Yes, more people like the GT style game, but they are already being served by GT (and other simulation racers). Is it worth the fans of the the arcade racer losing the arcade racer entirely? If you already have a fanbase, isn't it a good idea to serve them what they want, at least if they are sizeable and profitable? You can extend the business idea to why everyone isn't making shooters. If FPSes are the most highly selling, profitable titles, why make any other game? Why make VF if it's going to appeal to a smaller audience? Why not make Virtua Fighter VI a shooter, alienting the existing VF fans but appealing to a larger audience in general? Why not make Halo into a waggle-controlled minigame experience, appealing to a larger audience? Why not make the next Ferrari a small, economical town-car as that would be far more appealing to the masses?

These are unrealistic extremes, but hopefully they illustrate the point that changing a recipe that already has a lot of fans is going to upset them. Even if the new recipe is good, and will be appreciated by new customers, you lose the old fans. In Resistance's case it had a few million players who are now presented with quite a different game, and if they don't like the changes, they don't. That's normal. If someone replaces something you love with something new, it's never going to go down well.

"Where's my old teddy, the one i had since I was 2?"
"I chucked it out as it was old and dingy looking, and bought you this much nicer talking teddy instead."

Not good! It sounds like Insomniac have lost their old fans, and now have to struggle with the competition to win new customers who already have a wealth of choice. It'll be interesting how well R2 does.

[tha_con]

Here's the thing, R2 is proof positive easier to get into.

Fewer shots required to down a foe (and the difference between headshots and body shots had been tuned so super good players who get lots of headshots don't have massive advantage). The weapon pick up camping is completely gone, replaced by a "pick how you want to play" system that rewards players for their playstyle, rather than their ability to get to a weapon spawn point before the other team.

Squad based play makes it easy to organize team, and helps to keep encounters down to smaller sizes so players aren't getting bombarded by tons of gunfire.

The ability to pick any weapon you want allows players to fall into their 'niche' with the game, quickly discovering if they are a carbine player, if they prefer medium ranged marksman play, sniper, or just a combination of massive damage weapons like the splicer and bellock. It really does cater to the player far more than R1 ever did.

Shifty - You have my apologies, I'm pretty passionate about Resistance, and it just bothers me to see so many people ripping on the game because it's not a rehash of it's predecessor. Especially when those people are likely to complain about the lack of progression in any given series, etc. A lof of the folks saying "Oh R2 is just CoD4" are the same people who were complaining that Halo 3 was "Halo 2.5" etc. It's just really really tiresome and disrespectful, IMO, to the guys who worked hard on this product.

Like I stated before, I think it has more to do with message board gamers in general secluding themselves to high profile titles only, thus having a very 'hard to reach' standard, and these games that are great get ripped apart, without a passing notice to how bad it COULD have been.

That said, your example was very extreme. The changes made to R2 aren't so great that an R1 player can't pick it up and play it. It didn't "alienate" anyone, IMO, it just tuned an already existing product to be more accessible to new players, compared to the previous product (R1 in this case). R2 still has a great deal in common with R1, while introducing a lot of new mechanics, and doing away with some old ones.

[Carl B]

I'm pretty passionate about Resistance, and it just bothers me to see so many people ripping on the game because it's not a rehash of it's predecessor.

Those people are just as passionate about Resistance is what you need to understand. No one wishing for its predecessor is not a fan of it, know what I mean? I *want* the bullet storms, the head shots, the speed, the quick kills. It rewards becoming a more able player in ways that XP points and weapon loadout options don't. You are, literally, a better player - and it means something.

Like I stated before, I think it has more to do with message board gamers in general secluding themselves to high profile titles only, thus having a very 'hard to reach' standard, and these games that are great get ripped apart, without a passing notice to how bad it COULD have been.

I think you need to get over this illusory bugbear of yours concerning gamers, message boards, 'other titles,' and contrasts. You can be certain that Insomniac, for instance, has played/explored a number of the high profile titles that are out there. If you disdain other players playing "mainstream" titles, do you disdain developers playing each others' games? Or checking out the competition? I think like most things, you are better served by having played more rather than less.

This may seem like from another world, but I recall a recent Project Runway episode, where the competitor was told that her creation resembled another famous designers; her response was equal parts 'so what?' and 'I'm not familiar with their work.' To which the judges response was essentially, if you aren't familiar with their work, you should be, if this is the industry you wish to be active in.

That's not anything at Insomniac, but rather towards your idea that folk hurt themselves by comparing one product to another. How, as a human being, can you not compare your experiences? To which the answer is not: have fewer experiences.

Anyway, for my part, I don't own any FPS' for the PS3 other than Resistance, and Resistance 2 - that shows you the extent of 'hardcore' I am for this game in terms of it being all I need. When I talk about my preferences for MP, it has nothing to do with any coloration stemming from other titles, because I haven't played those to begin with. It stems from changes to Resistance and within that context alone. R1 is a game that me and my former roommates played for hours and hours, both splitscreen in the same room (death match and co-op both), or online. I even created a different player account for them on my PS3 that's how often they were on this thing. When I recently got one of these friends a PS3 for his wedding, the first game he wanted to borrow? R1 - and this nearly two years after its launch.

*********************************

I'm going to be spending a large amount of time over the next couple of days on R2 MP and Co-op, just because that's next up for me to do anyway. Honestly when I posted about the game a page or two ago, a discussion on MP wasn't what I was looking for. I'm not trying to tear it down whatsoever; by the same token, if my views are considered 'wrong,' I'm of course going to defend them. ;)

I would honestly rather be talking about the SP campaign, and what others felt in terms of the pacing, structure, scope, and presentation.

[tha_con]

I think you took my comment in reference to gamers playing high profile games the wrong way.

Basically, having played ONLY high profile games, you ONLY see one side of the fence, and the bar between good and great seems to be enromous.

If a lot of those gamers would spend a few minutes to really look at all the bad games that are available out there, and try them out, it kind of narrows the gap between "good" and "great" and makes it significantly more reasonable.

Basically I think these gamers have been playing only high profile games for so long, they result to splitting hairs to find flaws and problems with a game, just to do so.

[betan]

tha_con, as a fellow Resistance fan, I'm puzzled by your continues efforts to compare R2 to low profile (aka "bad") games. :)

[tha_con]

tha_con, as a fellow Resistance fan, I'm puzzled by your continues efforts to compare R2 to low profile (aka "bad") games. :)

It's not that I'm comparing it at all. I'm just saying that when you only play high profile games, you start splitting hairs to justify the price. Like this:


Great Game
=
=
=
=
=
=
=
Good Game
--Nothing Follows--

The gap between the two seems large, because people complain about little things like lighting on bricks, locations, graphics, etc.

But then, to those who play a wider spectrum of games, the gap looks more like this:

Great Game
=
=
Good Game
=
=
=
=
=
=
=
=Bad Game
--Nothing Follows--

Basically, you have played *really* bad games, so you know that the small stuff everyone is sweating here, really isn't a big deal at all, it's just getting blown out of proportion.

Basically, if you're used to wearing bronze jewelry your whole life, then you won't be able to tell a huge difference (or care if there is one, for that matter) between a "good" diamond, and a "great" one.

But if all you've ever worn is Diamonds your whole life (high profile games) then you start to notice small things that suddenly make a "good" diamond "terrible". See what I'm saying?

Hopefully I didn't lose you in this crazy theory of mine.

[Cheezdoodles]

Basically, you have played *really* bad games, so you know that the small stuff everyone is sweating here, really isn't a big deal at all, it's just getting blown out of proportion.

Look. Many people have relatively little time on their hands, when they got the time to play, they want to play great games. They will compare all games, to other great games.

Because thats what we play.

Seriously, games are SUPPOSED to be compared to the best games out there. Just like all products are compared to the best products in of their type and price range.

If you where going to buy a car, would you buy the car that is better than a Lada, or the car thats better than a BMW?

See where this is going?

Further, im getting sick and tired of hearing these rants about how all these flaws in games should be overlooked because somebody likes it. You like it fine, others dont, let us discuss it. Dont tell me to overlook flaws in games just because there is a gazillion crappy games out there. I have no interest of playing crappy games, i play good games, if the game is not good, then i rather waste my time on something else!

If you want to run around comparing R2 to SoF: payback or some other crappy games, be my guest.

Dont tell me that we should overlook any flaw in any game you like just because there are worse titles out there. Of course there are worse titles out there, but generally, when people want to buy a game, they want to buy the best game possible in a genre they like.

Oh and btw, CoD4 DOES have classes, but you can create them to your own needs. (hence the "Create a class" option at lvl 4). It also has predefined classes like assault, sniper, etc.. It may not be your traditional way of thinking of classes, but it definately has them. Thats not the point of this post.

The point of this post is that games ARE SUPPOSED TO BE COMPARED TO THE BEST GAMES OF ITS GENRE. Thats the way it is. They all cost $60 bucks, if you have the choice between buying a crappy game for $60 or a great game, if your rational, you will choose the great game.
The second point of this post is that trying to stop people from critizising and discussing a game, aspecially by saying that, well there are a tons of crappy games out there, compared to that, its great, is not exactly a great argument, and it makes you look rather silly.

[DrJay24]

Oh and btw, CoD4 DOES have classes, but you can create them to your own needs.

R2's classes are not some load out like COD4 or SOCOM, they are classes like in the MMORPG sense. There is a healer class, DPS class and tank class. I don't think COD4 has any influence in it, no shooter does, it's more like how EQ or WoW works.

[Kittonwy]

tha-con : I don't get your complaint with other people's complaints! Consider Burnout, an arcade racer. If the next Burnout were to go with more realism, to be more like GT, because that's a bigger franchise, would that be a good thing? Yes, more people like the GT style game, but they are already being served by GT (and other simulation racers). Is it worth the fans of the the arcade racer losing the arcade racer entirely? If you already have a fanbase, isn't it a good idea to serve them what they want, at least if they are sizeable and profitable? You can extend the business idea to why everyone isn't making shooters. If FPSes are the most highly selling, profitable titles, why make any other game? Why make VF if it's going to appeal to a smaller audience? Why not make Virtua Fighter VI a shooter, alienting the existing VF fans but appealing to a larger audience in general? Why not make Halo into a waggle-controlled minigame experience, appealing to a larger audience? Why not make the next Ferrari a small, economical town-car as that would be far more appealing to the masses?

These are unrealistic extremes, but hopefully they illustrate the point that changing a recipe that already has a lot of fans is going to upset them. Even if the new recipe is good, and will be appreciated by new customers, you lose the old fans. In Resistance's case it had a few million players who are now presented with quite a different game, and if they don't like the changes, they don't. That's normal. If someone replaces something you love with something new, it's never going to go down well.

"Where's my old teddy, the one i had since I was 2?"
"I chucked it out as it was old and dingy looking, and bought you this much nicer talking teddy instead."

Not good! It sounds like Insomniac have lost their old fans, and now have to struggle with the competition to win new customers who already have a wealth of choice. It'll be interesting how well R2 does.

Frankly it's not like some of us can't stand changes to the IP, I think if R2 MP competitive plays like a dream people wouldn't be complaining, it's just how things are now that people are upset about. I think some of us just wanted a better game than the one Insomniac delivered. But hey there's always co-op.http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v500/EvilTaru/Indifferent2.gif

[betan]

R2's classes are not some load out like COD4 or SOCOM, they are classes like in the MMORPG sense. There is a healer class, DPS class and tank class. I don't think COD4 has any influence in it, no shooter does, it's more like how EQ or WoW works.

To be fair, the discussion is about competitive MP, for which R2 offers a selection of gameplay related customizations, mainly primary weapon and a berserk (which happens to be somewhat similar to radar/air support in CoD 4).

CoD 4 offers customization for primary/secondary weapons, their upgrades and three perks which all together make up a class. While I'm not comfortable with the terminology, especially in case of R2, I wouldn't go as far to say CoD4 didn't influence R2 MP.

[SonComet]

I'm sure you will have the same criticism with Gear's 2 Horde mode and Left4Dead. I'm not sure why you are hung up on a play mode that was not advertised and is no means standard at this point. The game isn't for you, time to get this thread back on track, R2 isn't Halo 3 and I for one am very happy about that.

It's funny that you brought up this point. I'm one of those people that won't play an online game unless at least one other real life friend is in the game. I've played Horde Mode in GeoW2 a couple of times. But only because the other 4 players were real life friends from work. I'm not buying L4D because the people I know are buying it for the PC or 360 and so I'll have a much less likely chance of getting together a full team to play it with. I refuse to play R2 co-op because I'm literally the only person I know who owns the game. Even though I know quite a few people with PS3s. I would play co-op if I had even just one real life friend in the 8 man group with me, lol. I know you may think people like me are crazy, but I just don't get any pleasure from playing with strangers.

[tha_con]

Look. Many people have relatively little time on their hands, when they got the time to play, they want to play great games. They will compare all games, to other great games.

Because thats what we play.

Seriously, games are SUPPOSED to be compared to the best games out there. Just like all products are compared to the best products in of their type and price range.

If you where going to buy a car, would you buy the car that is better than a Lada, or the car thats better than a BMW?

See where this is going?

Further, im getting sick and tired of hearing these rants about how all these flaws in games should be overlooked because somebody likes it. You like it fine, others dont, let us discuss it. Dont tell me to overlook flaws in games just because there is a gazillion crappy games out there. I have no interest of playing crappy games, i play good games, if the game is not good, then i rather waste my time on something else!

If you want to run around comparing R2 to SoF: payback or some other crappy games, be my guest.

Dont tell me that we should overlook any flaw in any game you like just because there are worse titles out there. Of course there are worse titles out there, but generally, when people want to buy a game, they want to buy the best game possible in a genre they like.

Oh and btw, CoD4 DOES have classes, but you can create them to your own needs. (hence the "Create a class" option at lvl 4). It also has predefined classes like assault, sniper, etc.. It may not be your traditional way of thinking of classes, but it definately has them. Thats not the point of this post.

The point of this post is that games ARE SUPPOSED TO BE COMPARED TO THE BEST GAMES OF ITS GENRE. Thats the way it is. They all cost $60 bucks, if you have the choice between buying a crappy game for $60 or a great game, if your rational, you will choose the great game.
The second point of this post is that trying to stop people from critizising and discussing a game, aspecially by saying that, well there are a tons of crappy games out there, compared to that, its great, is not exactly a great argument, and it makes you look rather silly.

Now tell me how you really feel.

It's whatever man, I think you're jaded, so be my guest to continue seeing the world through your foggy glasses. R2 is a great game.

If anyone looks silly, it's the people saying things like "well R2 looks okay, but it doesn't have the same lighting as x game, or it doesn't have the same special effects as y game" without discussing any trades offs. THOSE are the silly (I would have said stupid) people.

[djskribbles]

I don't care what anybody says, I think R2 looks awesome and it was one of the best games I've played this year. I don't think I've ever played a game this action packed before. I was on the edge of my seat the whole time. And the sound in this game is one of the best (if not the best) i've ever heard. I think this game has 7.1 uncompressed PCM just like the first, but the sound is a lot more dynamic than R1. I have my PS3 running through my Pioneer VSX-1018AH receiver and it sounds amazing.

[BoardBonobo]

I don't believe that there is such a thing as a fair comparison for games now. It all boils down to who's got the loudest voice about the game they like on the platform they prefer. And all arguments end the same, mines bigger than yours blah blah blah etc.

I really enjoyed R1, I'm really looking forward to R2. I was really looking forward to Halo 3... I am enjoying GOW2 but not as much as I'd like. Maybe R2 will be a disappointment, but it won't be because of a flickery pixel, a flat cabbage, or a change of direction. If I fail to enjoy playing the game it's because the game is no fun, or not something I can extend the game ethos to. And that is a purely personal experience.

Besides which it's only out in America so far, there's a whole wide world yet to make up their minds about it. How about we wait and see?

[JPT]

I am looking forward to the SP ie the story, that is what I liked about R1. I never got into MP, same with competetive MP in the beta, but co-op was great fun, with players that played it "correctly".
So roll on 26th of nov

[tha_con]

I am looking forward to the SP ie the story, that is what I liked about R1. I never got into MP, same with competetive MP in the beta, but co-op was great fun, with players that played it "correctly".
So roll on 26th of nov

I think you should definitely prepare for a shocker. Unlike R1, a lot of the story in R2 is delivered via viral sites and intel (especially intel through Co-Op). A lot of the history of the war and other events are scattered through these sites and the intel, and it's not so much like R1, where everything was wrapped up in a neat package.

Personally, I liked the approach, I felt it was more 'engaging' for me to get into instead of just listening (I learn through both visual and auditory cues).

But, if you want to get the WHOLE cake, be prepared to play some co-op.

[TPtB]

Frankly it's not like some of us can't stand changes to the IP, I think if R2 MP competitive plays like a dream people wouldn't be complaining, it's just how things are now that people are upset about. I think some of us just wanted a better game than the one Insomniac delivered. But hey there's always co-op.http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v500/EvilTaru/Indifferent2.gif

Oh hey Kittonwy, it's me TPitBull from that match we had yesterday in the KZ2 beta :smile:

I know it's probably silly of me, but it was important for me to let you know. I have no mic, and your PSN friend list is full, so I had no other way. Basically I was in that game where I teamkilled you by mistake when you were trying to defuse the bomb in search and destroy.

And I heard you through your mic, I noticed you even sent out a kick vote! :eek: I was dying to tell you that I killed you by mistake because I thought you were the saboteur guy on the other team. Again, excuse me for my blindness, lol.


Anyway, to stay on topic I don't have Resistance 2 yet, not sure about the multiplayer but single player is interesting. Someone spoiled me already though!

[RenegadeRocks]

Can anyone confirm if R2 co-op is region locked or not? i might end up with an AMerican copy, so need to know!

[tha_con]

I don't think it's region locked at all.

That said, after playing more KZ2 last night, I think it's just not as good as R2, from a gameplay perspective. It looks good, but it played like a heavier CoD4.

I don't get how people complain about R2 being "CoD4" when KZ2 is essentially that. And why are people complaining about the 2 weapon system only going on to say KZ2 is awesome?! Not to mention the fact that playing last night we managed to corner the entire opposing team in their spawn points within about 5 minutes of the match starting.

Seriously, the HDR isn't that important. KZ2 is good, but dammit, it's not nearly as good as R2.

Edit: My apologies for some of the comments I made. I just find it extremely ridiculous that some people would chastise Insomniac games for their choice to go to a 2 weapon system and remove spawn points, and then praise Killzone 2s gameplay, when it also has a 2 weapon system and no spawn points.

[JPT]

I don't get how people complain about R2 being "CoD4" when KZ2 is essentially that. And why are people complaining about the 2 weapon system only going on to say KZ2 is awesome?!

Could it be because, they where looking for more of the R1 experience when playing R2 and not a very changed R1?

[tha_con]

Could it be because, they where looking for more of the R1 experience when playing R2 and not a very changed R1?

I doubt it. They all say "if I wanted to play CoD, I'd play CoD". Then you catch them in the Killzone threads...and "omg I love this!".

Honestly, they gameplay hasn't changed drastically, there were tweaks, but it's fundamentally the same experience. At it's core it still plays and feels like Resistance, I'm just disappointed the fanbase is so fickle, even though they are a minority, but are so caught up in themselves they think they are in the majority.

[patsu]

Because part of R2 still retain R1 design elements. It is not CoD. Adopting some of CoD4 elements may require more surgery.

R2 has MUCH more monster types than R1. Many are unbalanced against the player. The weapon wheel makes the fight more apt and interesting.

R1 is more arcady/heroic. People expect to run out in the open, strafe fire and kill everyone else. R2 requires cover constantly due to the short health bar. Does KZ2 have very short health bar ? (I have no idea)

R1 is also unique because of other design choices like having a distinct Chimera player type in MP.

I believe it's how the elements are packaged together. Despite the above issues in SP, R2 co-op is a winner because different player roles/weapons made up for the wheel and encourages us to co-operate more. You also get healed by the Medics relatively quickly. R2 co-op is arcady/heroic against smarter and smarter AI. You are constantly on the move, changing strategy to try to flank the AI (because they have far greater numbers). That's why I am still playing R2. ^_^

[tha_con]

Because part of R2 still retain R1 design elements. It is not CoD. Adopting some of CoD4 elements may require more surgery.

R2 has MUCH more monster types than R1. Many are unbalanced against the player. The weapon wheel makes the fight more apt and interesting.

R1 is more arcady/heroic. People expect to run out in the open, strafe fire and kill everyone else. R2 requires cover constantly due to the short health bar. Does KZ2 have very short health bar ? (I have no idea)

R1 is also unique because of other design choices like having a distinct Chimera player type in MP.

I believe it's how the elements are packaged together. Despite the above issues in SP, R2 co-op is a winner because different player roles/weapons made up for the wheel and encourages us to co-operate more. You also get healed by the Medics relatively quickly. R2 co-op is arcady/heroic against smarter and smarter AI. You are constantly on the move, changing strategy to try to flank the AI (because they have far greater numbers). That's why I am still playing R2. ^_^

Here's where I disagree with you:

o The Co-op isn't arcadey or heroic. It's the same as Single Player in many ways. Cover is almost always required, because if you run out without cover, you will ultimately die. Medics can't simply run into a mob of enemies and kill them, because they will likely die. The reason they survive is because the Soldiers are providing some cover with their shield. Spec Ops tend to generally be around Soldiers or Cover, tossing out ammo. The difference in feel is because of the class system, but at it's core, Co-Op has a lot of the same elements of the SP, in that cover is required and you can't just pray and spray.

o The unique Chimeran class in R1 was removed because it wasn't balanced, period. The fact that you had to cool down from rage really didn't mean much when you're playing with an organized team who can alternate who is / isn't on rage. It simply wasn't balanced, and the decision to remove it was the right one. Balance is far more important than being unique. Even then, it is still unique because you still have the hybrid vision (without the ridiculous damage boost).

o R1 rarely felt like a struggle because you were a walking tank. Honestly, R1 was a breeze on any difficulty but Super Human, and you could just use your weapons to make up for your health. R1 actually had a significantly HARDER health system, requiring players to stay in cover more becuase you only regained a part of the health, and you were often left back tracking to find health kits. R2 eleminates that problem and gives you full health, but also removes your weapons so you don't feel like a walking tank. Part of the problem with R1 was the amount of ammo / weapons you could hold, which made you FEEL like you had a lot of health, etc, because you could dish out a large amount of damage via alternate fires quickly without leaving cover often, or getting too close.

o There is not one enemy type that I feel is unbalanced. Except maybe the furies. I've already discussed my thoughts on the Chameleons, and they are certainly not that bad, especially if you've been through the game once. It's funny, because everyone was complaining about how "stupid" they were since they always game from the "same direction". Now they're complaining because apparently they were wrong, and it's exactly what the hell they were asking for. Absolutely ridiculous. The fact that headshots in this game are FAR more lethal than R1 makes it loads easier. I can mob out a great amount of chimera with a Bulleye MKII or Carbine from decent distance by aiming for the head, you can even take out ravegrs with a few hits to the head with those weapons, or one shot with the Marksman.

I don't know, I disagree with so many points, I really feel that a lot of the complaints stem from hive mind. There are many more high profile games that had far more problems with design (CoD4 comes to mind) but didn't receive half of this 'hate' from forum gamers (note: casual gamers love it, and I'm positive they far outweigh the internet casuals who spend their time on forums like these).

I apologize if any of this seems brash or rude, you know I've got nothing against you :) Or anyone else, I simply don't feel that a lot of the complaints are justified when they are passed over in other high profile games. I could point out flaws in many of those titles, but it simply wouldn't be right, since I still enjoyed many of those games as well.

[patsu]

:lol: The never ending battle of R1 vs R2.

Medics in co-op is much more resilient than Nathan in SP. I have literally taken out mobs of enemies by strafing. That's because the Pheonix heals the player and chains its damage through multiple enemies. I only took cover occassionally (or in-passing) but the Pheonix is always firing to auto-heal. Your teammates will distract the Chimeras and take some of the hits for you too. That's why some Medics fought in front of the soldiers (coz they know they won't die easily). Usually, a Medic can survive for a long time as long as he knows where the enemies are. If he's flanked or surprised from behind, then he will most likely die quickly like Nathan in SP.

It's true that R1 Chimera is unbalanced, but then again, you alternate between human and Chimera, so the final score usually balances out. As I played longer, I switch between Arc Charger, Dragon, Auger, Rossberg and the primary weapon in the middle of a fight. You can take out enemies faster that way, even against Chimeras.

In any case, I don't want to drag this religious war on.

The original point was R2 SP took some CoD elements but it did not spend enough time digesting the additions into its core. R2 Co-op managed to assimilate the CoD elements better. R2 Competitive is a different game altogether.

[tha_con]

:lol: The never ending battle of R1 vs R2.

Medics in co-op is much more resilient than Nathan in SP. I have literally taken out mobs of enemies by strafing. That's because the Pheonix heals the player and chains its damage through multiple enemies. I only took cover occassionally (or in-passing) but the Pheonix is always firing to auto-heal. Your teammates will distract the Chimeras and take some of the hits for you too. That's why some Medics fought in front of the soldiers (coz they know they won't die easily). Usually, a Medic can survive for a long time as long as he knows where the enemies are. If he's flanked or surprised from behind, then he will most likely die quickly like Nathan in SP.

It's true that R1 Chimera is unbalanced, but then again, you alternate between human and Chimera, so the final score usually balances out. As I played longer, I switch between Arc Charger, Dragon, Auger, Rossberg and the primary weapon in the middle of a fight. You can take out enemies faster that way, even against Chimeras.

In any case, I don't want to drag this religious war on.

The original point was R2 SP took some CoD elements but it did not spend enough time digesting the additions into its core. R2 Co-op managed to assimilate the CoD elements better. R2 Competitive is a different game altogether.

The thing is, what did R2 take from CoD single player?

I don't recall any never ending enemy spawn points in R2, conversely, I don't remember any epic boss battles in CoD4.

Honestly, to this very day, I see absolutely nothing similar between Resistance 2 and CoD4, aside from experience points, and berserks being "similar" to perks (though they are nothing alike, as a perk is constant, and a berserk is like the bonus you get for kills).

[patsu]

The thing is, what did R2 take from CoD single player?

I don't recall any never ending enemy spawn points in R2, conversely, I don't remember any epic boss battles in CoD4.

Honestly, to this very day, I see absolutely nothing similar between Resistance 2 and CoD4, aside from experience points, and berserks being "similar" to perks (though they are nothing alike, as a perk is constant, and a berserk is like the bonus you get for kills).

Never ending enemy spawn (until you hit the "check points") is indeed in R2. The Chicago bridge level is one notable example.

The removal of the weapon wheel is another.

I would rate the berserk as an influence although R2 has its own twist there.

The slower pace in R2 beta was initially credited to CoD-like change but Insomniac sped it up before release.

Chimeran rage could be removed because Insomniac felt it was unbalanced. But it did make R2 play more like CoD4 (or any other FPSes) as a side-effect, which is unfortunate.

[tha_con]

Never ending enemy spawn (until you hit the "check points") is indeed in R2. The Chicago bridge level is one notable example.

The removal of the weapon wheel is another.

I would rate the berserk as an influence although R2 has its own twist there.

The slower pace in R2 beta was initially credited to CoD-like change but Insomniac sped it up before release.

Chimeran rage could be removed because Insomniac felt it was unbalanced. But it did make R2 play more like CoD4 (or any other FPSes) as a side-effect, which is unfortunate.

You must have played a different Chicago Bridge level, because there is, in fact, a finite number of enemies there. I've played it 4 times. It's just like Mainstreet in Idaho, there are a LOT of enemies, but they are most certainly finite.

Also, I could argue that all of those other elements, aside from berserks perhaps, are present in many other shooters. Rainbow Six Vegas was slow. As was Bioshock. No one compared the game there. I would also argue that perhaps the two weapon system was more of an influence of Halo than it was CoD4, because playing through the H3 campaign and R2, it's very easy to see similarities.

Again, I attribute the "comparison" only to the EXP and Berserks. Both of which are just superficial, IMO. Maybe I'm on a mission to defend the game (who am I kidding, I am) but it most certainly takes from a LOT of shooters, but it takes the least from CoD, IMO.

[patsu]

About the Chicago bridge level, what will happen if you don't grab the LAARK ?

I have the impression that the enemies and the human soldiers just keep spawning. I ran out of patience, grabbed one and ran back ^_^

Also, I could argue that all of those other elements, aside from berserks perhaps, are present in many other shooters. Rainbow Six Vegas was slow. As was Bioshock. No one compared the game there. I would also argue that perhaps the two weapon system was more of an influence of Halo than it was CoD4, because playing through the H3 campaign and R2, it's very easy to see similarities.

Again, I attribute the "comparison" only to the EXP and Berserks. Both of which are just superficial, IMO. Maybe I'm on a mission to defend the game (who am I kidding, I am) but it most certainly takes from a LOT of shooters, but it takes the least from CoD, IMO.

If you take all the changes together, CoD sounds like the most matched. 2-weapon alone is too generic to attribute it to one FPS.

[tha_con]

About the Chicago bridge level, what will happen if you don't grab the LAARK ?

I have the impression that the enemies and the human soldiers just keep spawning. I ran out of patience, grabbed one and ran back ^_^



If you take all the changes together, CoD sounds like the most matched. 2-weapon alone is too generic to attribute it to one FPS.

If you don't grab it, then you eventually kill all the hybrids, and then the hellfire turrets are taken out by air strike. Following that, you will naturally push forward, which then triggers the Drones to come. Now, there is scripting in the level that is triggered at certain points, but there is always a finite number of enemies.

Actually, I take that back, there is ONE sequence where there are inifinite enemies. When you are escaping from the ship after Orick, and you are cornered by the Chimera while another Sentinel gets the door open. But that lasts for about 30 seconds, and then the door opens and you continue on your forward push away from the chimera (but that's not really like CoDs SP campaign).

I think we should just agree to disagree in this friendly debate, reference the CoD comparisons. Honestly, I think CoD took a lot of great elements from other shooters and combined them. Points have always been in first person shooters online, CoD made them visible. Ranks have also been there, CoD4 just gave them a progress bar after the match.

The one thing CoD did different was gradual progression through your weapon and upgrade availability. As you leveled up, you gained access to new items. Though, in Resistance 1, as you leveled up, you also gained access to new custom items for your character, you could say CoD4 was an evolution of that very same concept.

:)

[liolio]

It looks like EDGE didn't like the game at all, a tough 6/10
http://www.edge-online.com/magazine/review-resistance-2

[Phil]

I'm glad to read I'm not the only who dislikes the game and the direction it has taken.

I just bought Call of Duty 5 last week and I'm honestly not sure I'm interested in R2 because of it anymore. It's that good (or R2 that bad)... :(

[Shifty Geezer]

Edit : copied from KZ2 thread.
No, that's not it at all. People gave R2 heat because of how it changed from R1 -- many thought that it wasn't broke and didn't need fixing. C'mon, you know this, this discussion has been rehashed endlessly.You're right, it has been discussed endlessly, until now where I put my foot down with a firm hand and end it. No more dumb R2/KZ2 rants. Stick to discussing what you do/don't like about each game on its merits in its thread. Anyone having trouble with this will be given a free holiday to get a handle on themselves. Thanks.

[BoardBonobo]

It looks like EDGE didn't like the game at all, a tough 6/10
http://www.edge-online.com/magazine/review-resistance-2

That wasn't really much of a review when you look at it. Definitely not up to Edges usual in depth standard, it strikes me that the reviewer approached this with their mind made up already and gave it the most perfunctory write up possible.

[Arwin]

Let's not get tempted into discussing reviews. ;) At least not in this thread.

[BoardBonobo]

I wasn't going to discuss it!! That would be suicide, I am just surprised it even qualifies as a review.

[tha_con]

No, that's not it at all. People gave R2 heat because of how it changed from R1 -- many thought that it wasn't broke and didn't need fixing. C'mon, you know this, this discussion has been rehashed endlessly.

No, it needed to be fixed. Prior to the forced bundles that SCEE and SCEJ put together, RFOM was not a successful franchise, not nearly as successful as Insomniacs past products (Ratchet and Clank, Spyro, etc). This is especially jarring when you consider the folks that bought the PS3 at launch were LOOKING for games like this.

It had elements from shooters from 1999. Weapon spawns? Check. Walking Tank? Check. Run and gun? Check.

Basically, it was everything that no one was really looking for at the time (talking purely multiplayer here). This is an industry where you have to adapt and change to remain successful. It is a drastic change, but I can promise you the franchise is significantly more accessible to the end user now, and will do better on it's own, compared to the first Resistance title (excluding bundle sales).

For me, it IS people picking and chosing what they do and don't like. To say you hate a 2 weapon system, and then say you love x game? To say you hate slow gameplay, but then praise y game? Or even talk about the objective based gameplay, but then love a game that presents one objective for each gameplay type, etc...it's just crazy to me.

I've come to the conclusion that at this point, it's more about the graphics than it is anything else. Because the game still plays a great deal like Resistance, it's more balanced, and the maps have MUCH better design. I just see improvements all over the board...and they're still getting hammered by "hardcore" fans.

[patsu]

The way I see it... both sides have their points.

It is in general okay to change the formula even. But Insomniac needed more time polishing the game, assimilating new features, or giving it more depth. I hope they are doing just that as we speak. Some of the changes were not developed far enough to stand out. They have been very close to the user community so far. A few of their staff even played with us.

Really look forward to the next few patches.

[DrJay24]

I read there was a a patch this morning, anyone know what it did?

[obonicus]

No, it needed to be fixed. Prior to the forced bundles that SCEE and SCEJ put together, RFOM was not a successful franchise, not nearly as successful as Insomniacs past products (Ratchet and Clank, Spyro, etc). This is especially jarring when you consider the folks that bought the PS3 at launch were LOOKING for games like this.

You can't tell people that their opinion is wrong. If people thought it didn't need to be changed, it didn't need to be changed for them. If you wanted to branch out and get other people, don't complain when your initial demographic doesn't care for the direction you took. It's not like we cut Nintendo any slack for this sort of thing.


I've come to the conclusion that at this point, it's more about the graphics than it is anything else. Because the game still plays a great deal like Resistance, it's more balanced, and the maps have MUCH better design. I just see improvements all over the board...and they're still getting hammered by "hardcore" fans.

You can come to any conclusion you want. People have told you why they don't like it and you refuse to believe them, and what's most vexing is that now you're actually hating on other games because people aren't crazy for the game you like.

[tha_con]

I'm not hating on any games, not at all. I did point out some things I found funny, when people are putting Insomniac up on the whipping stone, and then saying they love another game that has some similar charactersitics. It just shows how fickle folks can be.

Also, I think it is appropriate to point out that people are willing to critisize this game for it's changes, while praising another game that features extremely similar traits. I find it absolutely essential to point out that someone loves / likes another game that has a 2 weapon system, is slower, heavily relies on Iron Sights, etc, but then runs all over this title for the exact same reasons.

Quite frankly, it's attitudes like that, that put Insomniac in this position, where they either kept the gameplay they had (likely losing a lot of people to CoD, Halo, KZ2, etc) or trying to move forward and make progress with their shooter. They were 'screwed' no matter what they do, because the "fans" would have found SOMETHING to complain about.

That, and it seems everyone spends far more time these days (at least on forums) talking about what they don't like or how terrible a game was, or it's the complete opposite, they talk about how fantastic a game is, and ignore absolutely everything bad. It's like hive mind.

R2 has it's problems, none of which make it a terrible game. The same can be said for CoD, Bioshock, Halo, even Far Cry and Fallout 3, most recently.

[Kittonwy]

I think it all comes down to execution and how the weapons and aiming feel both in terms of aiming from the hip and aiming with ironsights, hip aiming simply doesn't feel accurate enough at close range and ironsights aiming doesn't really extend far enough for the carbine and the bullseye. The carbine was very much THE all purpose weapon in R1 but in R2 it has basically lost a lot of its identity with the introduction of the marksman and the lost of the carbine's range, the bullseye on the other hand is simply extremely gimped and robbed of its biggest strength which is allowing the player to tag effectively. Both weapon balance and map designs need to be addressed in R2. In terms of Skirmish one squad simply does not know what the big picture is or what the other squads are doing in order to co-ordinate at a higher level. It's not the babysitting that I have a problem with, it's the lack of opportunity for higher co-ordinations by more organized players and clans. Co-op on the other hand has been and is still very much fun.

[Phil]

I find it ironic of all the talk about how R2 has become a better more accessible game, yet when you read around the web (not just this forum), it's a reversed picture with more people criticizing it for its supposed benefits rather than loving it. That should be giving some hints.

And dismissing bundle sales of RFOM to downplay its success is rather weak. Many of the potential buyers didn't need to buy the game because they got it through the bundle. On the contrary, many owners that got the game through the bundle got to see this new series. If R2 becomes a more successfull game, I see most of it attributed to the success of RFOM and Insomniacs reputation as well as the larger install base on the PS3.

[Arwin]

I noticed that Resistance is 48 euro on Play.com ... will look at mediamarkt if its a similar price, but otherwise I may get it from there as that's a very fair price.

[patsu]

I read there was a a patch this morning, anyone know what it did?


Today's patch was a minor patch to fix a few things and get ready for Europe. We're currently working on a larger patch that we'll fill you in on when we're ready to release.

Patch 1.30 Changelist:

- Corrected text for various language translation errors
- Fixed an issue where controller rumble was getting turned off indefinitely
- Removed non-functioning option to promote a clan leader
- Fixed network error when viewing player stats from the leaderboard screen
- Ranked games default to one round
- Players will receive a message if the game ends while they are in the staging screen
- Fixed an issue where players that cancelled out of matchmaking while searching would end up getting put into a game
- A few other minor fixes

Source: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=13766037&postcount=5024

[DrJay24]

I finished the campaign last night, I loved the last level. The ending was a surprise, I'd love to see a episode 1 in six months to clarify things. Overall the SP was one of my favorite FPS games. The action is intense, the scope is a mix between survival horror and epic war. The voice acting was good, but the chars were not very likable, except the attachment to Hale. There were no Alyx or Dog type characters. I miss the narration from R1, it's hard to get a big picture when you see everything through Hale's eyes.

Chicago stands as one of the best FPS levels of all time, it has everything. I also loved Louisiana and Mexico.

If they make a R3 they can take some of the overblown critism and make a true masterpiece. Less cheap deaths, more HPs for Hale, bring back the weapon wheel and co-op campaign. Also the indoor parts were dark and the lighting was off. The outdoor were great looking and the frame rate help no matter hat was on screen, not bad for a true HD game with AA.

Now I need to level up in co-op, I think my top guy is only level 5.

[tha_con]

I am voluntarily dismissing myself from this thread permanently. I can't take it.

[Asher]

If they make a R3 they can take some of the overblown critism and make a true masterpiece. Less cheap deaths, more HPs for Hale, bring back the weapon wheel and co-op campaign. Also the indoor parts were dark and the lighting was off.

Agree 100%. A lot of character that was in R1 was missing in R2, and all of these played a role in holding back what should've been a better experience.

[BoardBonobo]

My copy has dispatched! Should be here tomorrow.

[inefficient]

For me the only thing better about R1 over R2 was the competitive MP.

Otherwise I like R2 more in every other aspect.

Pretty tired of competitive MP FPS games anyway. So R2 coop stuff is a very refreshing change. And there really isn't any other game to compare it to. It's so original and fresh. You know I think I could be perfectly happy if R3 was a MP coop only game.

[slider]

My copy has dispatched! Should be here tomorrow.

Mine too. Race you to the end... if you dare. (Only kidding, I suck at gaming.)

[patsu]

R2 coop stuff is a very refreshing change. And there really isn't any other game to compare it to. It's so original and fresh.

Yes, I <3 the creativity behind R2 Co-op. Although there is room for improvement (just because this is the first of its kind), I think it's a strong start.

AntShaw tried to get me into a game but I didn't see his message early enough. How's your game coming along, AntShaw ?

[Archgamer]

Co-op is fun as hell. But it also gets a bit repeatitive. Once you play them enough times, you'll soon be able to map out your objectives and where the enemies respawn from by memory. It sort of kills the excitement.

Have anybody encounter the Marauder in Co-op? I did once on Bryce Canyon but that is a very rare occurance.

[patsu]

Co-op is fun as hell. But it also gets a bit repeatitive. Once you play them enough times, you'll soon be able to map out your objectives and where the enemies respawn from by memory. It sort of kills the excitement.

Yes, I think this is the most glaring weakness. Insomniac should vary the spawning location. Even if it's the same objectives, the differences in enemy spawns and tactics will spice things up.

Have anybody encounter the Marauder in Co-op? I did once on Bryce Canyon but that is a very rare occurance.

Yes, it's rare. I also only saw the Chameleons once.

[betan]

Co-op is fun as hell. But it also gets a bit repeatitive. Once you play them enough times, you'll soon be able to map out your objectives and where the enemies respawn from by memory. It sort of kills the excitement.


The missions depend on number of players and their levels. I still see new objectives and more importantly new enemy waves often (followed by a quick death).
If you repeatedly play the same objectives I suggest you create custom games with different number of players, or simply keep an eye on other players' levels.

Have anybody encounter the Marauder in Co-op? I did once on Bryce Canyon but that is a very rare occurance.

I encounter them often. Is this a trophy question?

[patsu]

I encounter them often. Is this a trophy question?

It's probably related to the maps you end up playing in Co-op. I have been assigned the same maps rather often.

There are some variation in enemy spawns but they pretty much spawn from the same known locations for me so far.

[betan]

It's probably related to the maps you end up playing in Co-op. I have been assigned the same maps rather often.

Naturally, but it also depends on player level (and some purely random factor).
There are at least 3 maps I encounter chameleons almost every single time. Bryce Canyon, where you saw it once, for example is one of them.

There are some variation in enemy spawns but they pretty much spawn from the same known locations for me so far.

Spawn points are fixed, whether they are used, what spawns and when they spawn changes.
BTW, knowing what's going to spawn where is very valuable if you are a spec ops with decent level. In any case, I can guarantee you guys haven't played most of the configurations yet.

[patsu]

BTW, knowing what's going to spawn where is very valuable if you are a spec ops with decent level. In any case, I can guarantee you guys haven't played most of the configurations yet.

This I agree ! (There are a lot of configurations).

But for the few configurations I have played ("Play" assigned them to me), I now know mostly what gets spawned, where and at what time. The variation here isn't great enough.

Co-op is still a mighty fine game though.

[Antan]

Just picked it up and initial impressions are very positive. Plays great, looks great (clearly a step up from R1), sounds great. Ticks all my boxes.

[Arwin]

What I understand is that the enemy types you see are partly dependent on how good you play ... so it's very possible that some players will see the special, harder, bigger faster badder chimera more than others. ;)

[patsu]

They are spawned based on player levels. But the spawning follows a very predictable pattern. As betan pointed out, you may get extra waves. However whatever comes before the new waves are pretty much the same.

You won't get flanked, ambushed in the old waves because you'd know how the flow goes. Occasionally, you do get different monsters coming out from the same location. That surprised us somewhat but would be A++ if they can vary the spawn location/pattern a little bit more.

The map configurations are varied enough as it stands. The Co-op is amazing because it's totally new (out of the box even). Fine-tuning the subtle but important details will help to establish Insomniac's lead in this area.

EDIT: I want to add that sometimes even though I know where and when the enemies will likely appear, it's still challenging (and FUN !) to fight the Chimeras. The best example is the Orick hilltop. The battle was so chaotic and dynamic that it's like fighting another human clan. Most other encounters are more limited. The aliens were either rooted at their spawn location, enclosed by a room, or follow a scripted path (mostly).

[Archgamer]

What I understand is that the enemy types you see are partly dependent on how good you play ... so it's very possible that some players will see the special, harder, bigger faster badder chimera more than others. ;)

Does this mean I will see a Leviathan in Co-op someday? :twisted:

[BoardBonobo]

My copy arrived today and so far it's got a great big yes from me. Tomb Raider is history. Overall it looks, plays, sounds better (as you would expect) but it also seems alot more polished than i thought it would be after reading some of the write ups on the web (not even thinking about Edge there...)

[patsu]

Then you will enjoy the game tremendously. Perhaps the patches have plugged some of the holes. I think there are still some gameplay related points that will show up later in the game, *if* you mind those issues. But like I said, the game is still reasonably solid. We are after the remaining 0.5 to 1.5 of the missing points (out of 10.0).

[Antan]

Almost finished the game and have enjoyed it greatly. Still not tried any of the co-op/online portions . From my point of view, having nearly finished, the Edge score seems very very harsh. for me the single player is worth at the very least an 8. I never really came across any glaring control issues, gameplay issues. Level design is pretty solid with Chicago been the best. Gfx wise ive been suprised at how much they crammed in without taking a hit in framerate, though i think the resolution isnt 720 native, seems to me to be in the COD4 area. I hope come the inevitable Resistance 3 we see a fancy new engine, or an even more optimzed version of this. Improvements i would like to see is in the partical fx area, and better lighting (though this does a pretty good job, but having seen MS2`s lighting engine i shudder to think what an FPS game with that quality of lighting could do!). On the whole though im happy with how Res 2 turned out.

[Arwin]

Resolution is probably 704 but your thinking CoD4 probably because Insomniac typically uses Quincunx?