“Battlefield 3″ or “Modern Warfare 3”? Which one, when it comes out in the next couple months, will be more deserving of shooter fans’ hard-earned cash? Well, it might be time to declare an early winner: “Resistance 3.” How does the third installment of the PlayStation 3 series separate itself from the back? One word: guns. Not since 2001’s “Serious Sam” has one game had so many fun weapons.
Take the handgun, usually a perfunctory starter weapon that’s used in the first level and never again. In “Resistance 3,” your revolver fires small mines that you can detonate all at once with the press of a button. This gives the gun a dual functionality: Turn enemies into mobile bombs, or set up a defensive permimeter by embedding mines at the entrance of a room. It seems at every turn, the folks at developer Insomniac asked themselves how they could make the game more fun, what extra step they could take to make their game unique.
This approach extends to multiplayer. Other shooters force you to play online as one of several archetypes, from medic to sniper, each with their own weapon setups. But what if you don’t like the grenade or sidearm that the sniper type must use? In “Resistance 3,” there are no distinct classes — it’s all mix and match according to your own tastes, allowing for a much more diverse and personalized online experience.
| ‘Resistance 3’ |
| » System: PS3 |
| » Price: $59.99 |
| » Rating: 4 out of 5 stars |
Sometimes, though, Insomniac mistakes exoticism for fun. Can we please dispense with the gun that lets you see — and shoot — enemies through walls? You shoot them from behind cover, and they just stand there, seemingly waiting to be killed. What challenge is there in this? Shooting through walls wasn’t fun in 2000’s “Perfect Dark,” and it’s not fun today.
The third act of “Resistance 3” is also a misstep. It introduces an exciting new enemy, true, but a sudden attempt at a darker tone ends up just silly and depressing.
Despite these flaws, “Resistance 3” is a fun, refreshing break from the legions of humorless blockbusters struggling to outclone each other, and will very likely end up the best shooter released this year.
