Opening words: Hand held. OMG. Really? This good? This good? for real? Nintendo ds? GARBAGE. No other hand held can do something that looks this good on a hand held. This game is great. But annoying at times.
Single Player: 9.4
Of all the most recent shooters I have played, the stories have been, ok or bad. This one on the other hand nails it. A great story, Likable characters, good story telling(something that was really lacking on resistance 2 on the ps3, the psp version kicks the crap out of the single player in r2). The pacing is perfect. This was developed in a way that worked for long stints of playing, or just turning it on for 5 or 10 minutes and putting it down. I played this a little before I would go to bed. I would lay on my stomach and play it before for a few minutes before I would go to sleep. So i played it over a long time, 5 minutes here, 5 minutes there. Took me a long time to beat, It’s only about 12 hours if you play it straight through. The Psp is not a system you sit down and play for hours and hours. Atleast not me. Its a pick it up here and there and play system. This game is perfect for this. Some of the levels and parts were so hard. Really. I mean got me steaming mad hard on the normal difficulty. So it is challenging, which is good, because these days most games are to easy.
Multiplayer: 9.1
This is great fun. It has the modes from the ps3 version of r2. This really kicks ass, its easy to get on and play too. I was really impressed. This has the socom dancing on dead bodies stuff to, and death taunts! Really cool. You can even get a medal for teabagging. LOL You can also revive fallen comrades. Free for all, Team Death Match, Capture The Flag. Assimilation pits one player as a member of the Cloven against the Maquis(all other players). When the cloven kills, they Marquis are assimilated into the Cloven, then the Maquis unit dwindles more and more. Who ever has the least amount of people has the more powerful team. Who ever has less in their brood, will be able to deal more damage and take more hits. Very cool. There are a lot of clan functions! Very cool. This is the most robust online game on the PSP. It is amazing. There is a great ranking system here too, 12 ranks, and 22 medals.
Presentation: 9.0
Great art, Great bad guys. Great story telling, even though it is kind of story board and in game style acting. There are cut scenes, and they use movies, not the engine, but it doesn’t look that much better than the in game engine. Voice acting is great. Menus are good, easy to get online. Everything here is spot on.
Visuals: 9.4
For a hand held? This is the best so far. Compared to ps3, not so much. But compared to the DS, or the Iphone. LOL this blows that crap out of the water. Some of the monsters are huge. Some times there are a ton of enemies on the screen and the engine doesn’t glitch and drop frames. It’s solid. Impressive, really, this pushes the psp harder than any game I have seen yet for it. Well, God of war is really great too. So its close.
Audio: 8.5
Great, for a hand held, crisp. Great music that is paced just right, builds tension perfectly. Sounds great. More of a classical sounding sound scape. Loved the voice acting. The Main character was great. Nothing annoyed me. Great!
Game Mechanics: 7.5:
This is where the game is a little odd. I have tried to play games on the psp before, Like socom. Socom was not fun on the psp as of yet, maybe the new one will be. But in all honesty, This game plays like an over the shoulder grande theft auto 3. With auto lock on. That you can control by moving your aim slightly here or there. I prefer over the the shoulder and over the back like socom to first person any day of the week now. Seriously. It is why I enjoyed this a lot more than both resistance games on the ps3. Any how, you move with the analog stick. You aim with the O X Square and Triangle buttons. It took me a while to get used to. I finally did, but there is no real precision at all like the dual analog stick set up on the ps3. You would reload, change weapons, zoom, and action with the D-pad. The game paced well, so you could do these things with the d-pad. The r button fires, and the l button is usually an ALT fire mode. The guns in this are pretty good, most all the guns from the PS3 versions are here. So it delivers in the fire power department. You must know this though, one of the things I really hate about these resistance games is that you usually have to unload half a clip into any enemies before they will finally fall. I am so used to and love the way socom plays. 3 or 4 bullets and you are toast in that game. These games feel way more arcade like because of this. Once you get the hang of it, I do the socom back and forth dance while shooting(can’t do this on any resident evil games, cause they suck) this makes it pretty fun, dodge and shoot. REAL SKILLZ.
Replay: 9.0:
The multiplayer really is the kicker here. Seriously, With leveling up, and medals its just right. I really think that is what keeps me coming back to it. Even with socom and all the other shooters I own on my ps3. There is something about playing games on my tummy for 10 minutes before I go to bed that really hits the spot. Love it.
Total Score: 9.4 out of 10:
Final Words: This is the best shooter on any hand held. Seriously, Epic story telling, great game play, great graphics, great sound, great characters. I totally recommend this. The PSP with god of war, this, and burnout, is really the best hand held gaming on the market. It delivers ps2 and some ps3 gaming on a small screen. I hope PSP is announced with dual analog controls and a touch screen and backward compatible. OWNAGE! I love the psp, and the ps3. Click Here to buy Resistance Retribution for the Playstation Portable(PSP).
