Eagerly awaited first person shooter Resistance 2 is gearing up to invade PLAYSTATION 3 – want to find out more about the game that’s breaking new FPS gameplay ground?
"We want to constantly reward the player. You don't have to kill someone to gain points - we want this to be an inviting, engaging experience. We don't want it to be just for core game players."
These are the words of Ryan Schneider, Community Director of Insomniac Games. And with Resistance 2 almost ready to unleash itself on the public, there's plenty to discover about the first person shooter that is on everyone's lips.
Resistance isn't futile
After a rip roaring release on PLAYSTATION 3, Resistance: Fall of Man gathered many fans with its high production values and slick FPS action. Its sequel sees the return of Sergeant Nathan Hale in his valiant fight to protect mankind from the invading Chimera, monstrous creatures looking to destroy all who stands in their way. With the main protagonist and antagonists back in action, Resistance 2 is aiming to go even further than its best-selling predecessor.
"Scale is a big deal to us," says Schneider. "The size of the enemies, the size of the environments, the diversity of the environments... and your place as this one solider against this massive invasion in an overrun United States." And in terms of sheer physical expanse, R2 is keeping its promise of going large, with the single and multiplayer maps between two and four times bigger than the first game.
This is added to the fact Insomniac's title not only packs a massive competitive multiplayer mode for up to 60 players, but also a co-operative campaign for up to eight players - something that still stands as a truly ground-breaking feature.
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Ambitious? Schneider thinks so - and is confident the development team has got everything to fulfil Resistance 2's potential. "Any time you make a game as large as R2, it's really about making sure you can pull off what you set out to do, and we changed our production process," he explains.
"We had a longer pre-production process and a lot of prototyping going into development, which helped us determine what we could actually achieve, and we've been very lucky we haven't had to cut as much as we have in the past where we've had huge plans and trimmed back. This time we tested our vision and we're ready to deliver on it."
Better yet, it's not just Insomniac's desire to make a game of such size and ambition, the developer is also determined to keep it as open, friendly and intuitive as possible, from gameplay to presentation.
The R2 social
A big part of making Resistance 2 so welcoming is its approach to online functionality, tied into its accompanying website, myresistance.net. Schneider unveiled more information about the service in its relation to the game. "We're really bringing social networking features into what would normally be a competitive statistic tracking site and two examples would be combat badges and the ticker.
"Combat badges are like a digital football or baseball card where you'll get a visual snapshot of how you participate in the R2 universe. If you like to blog or you're a forum poster, they'll be icons for that. If you're a single player and you beat the game on Superhuman [difficulty level], if you're co-op focused, if you like to snipe, there will be an icon for all those things. It's really a great way for people to get a visual idea of how you participate in the R2 universe.
"The ticker is like a news activity feed, but it's more customisable, with game related content, developer and user generated updates. So our overall philosophy with the community is sort of a name in lights approach. Our feeling is that when you get involved in something you're passionate about you want to see how you relate to that universe. We want you to feel special as part of our universe."
You've got a friend - or 60 - in me
If you think Resistance 2's 60 player bonanza may devolve into a mass brawl due to sheer numbers, never fear - Insomniac has that covered, too. "We want to create massive battles and greater intimacy - which may seem like an oxymoron," explains Schneider. "Well, when you have 60 player battles in multiplayer like we do, which is truly groundbreaking, we wanted to make sure the experience didn't break down into chaos.
"We wanted to focus the action, so the way we're doing that is by using dynamic objectives as well as rival squads. Rival squads are five people that you will track and be assigned to compete against in skirmish mode, for instance. You'll be focused against these same people in intense firefights, but at the same time you'll be participating in a much larger battle. So you'll know what to do at any point based on the dynamic objectives, you're also going to be looking out for a small group of people that you're competing against and at the same time you'll feel like you're fighting in a large epic battle.
"Teamwork and progression are watchwords on the multiplayer aspect, and our basic philosophy there is that it's more fun working together when you're trying to accomplish something."
Are you eXPerienced?
There's a strong element of individuality in the game as well, which ties in nicely with the stat tracking. There are over 100 visual combinations (consisting of human and Chimera features, such as head and body parts) when creating your own custom character, and Berserk powers that give you a temporary boost in battle (such as Leadership Aura, which enhances your teammates' experience points) - the latter combined with the available weapons on display allow for over 125 different combinations to exploit.
To keep a constant link between all the modes of Resistance 2 - that's single player, online co-op, and competitive modes for on and offline players - your stats will be given a combined overall military style rank across your entire game, regardless of what mode you favour. "It works differently for each mode, but for competitive and co-op there will be 30 levels of progression based on classes, completing objectives, kills, that sort of thing," says Schneider.
"So you'll gain XP in each mode and then we'll combine it into a super ranking and then post on myresistance.net. Of course it wouldn't be an Insomniac game without skill driven points, so we'll have over 160 Trophies, medals and ribbons."
Fire it up
With its myriad of features and steely resolve to let you take advantage of them all while bringing as many friends along for the ride, Resistance 2 is shaping up to be an epic experience. Giant Goliath robots, fantastic new weapons such as the deadly circular blade, Splicer, and Magnum revolver to fend off the gruesome Chimera, a massive range of modes, an extensive community section, and even some offline projects are promised to flesh out the universe. Keep the crosshairs steady on this one...
