Now playing – Terminator: Resistance

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Well, that was unexpected. In no way am I going to toot the flute for Terminator: Resistance as a game of true quality, and I’d struggle to defend it against many of the issues raised by its (many) detractors, but the fact of the matter is: I just played through the whole game, start to finish, and the additional Infiltrator mode, got a platinum trophy for my efforts and – most importantly of all – enjoyed it.

It’s the most 6/10 game ever made, of course. Resistance is a lesson in how to do things absolutely adequately without actually stepping out of any comfort zones. If the game’s file name in Unreal Engine was ‘FPS template’ I wouldn’t be surprised. If it had tried to surprise me at all in its couple-dozen hour runtime, I would have… well, I would have been surprised. I was not surprised by the game. I was not surprised by what I did, by where I went, by anything surrounding the actual moment-to-moment mechanics.

I was, however, surprised by the atmosphere. The feel. The clear passion Polish developer Teyon has for the Terminator franchise is evident throughout the game, from picking up Phased Plasma Rifles (“Hey, just what you see, pal”) through the song playing on the stereo you find as part of a side mission, into the soundtrack as a whole – it screams Terminator, and anyone with a mild obsession with the first two films of this franchise that definitely only includes two films (and one TV series) will be spoiled.

Because, see, we’re starved for Terminator games that do what they should do: be more like Bethesda’s DOS Terminator games from the early-mid-nineties. Resistance isn’t as good as those classics, but it does a half-decent impression, and when you’ve no other options, a half-decent impression is good enough. A few drops of tepid water will taste like the nectar of the gods if you’re thirsty enough, after all.

It’s a contained hour or so mission with a roguelike aspect to it – you die, you’re done – that sees you finding intel, discovering more and more human bases, weapons stashes, food supplies, and more to kill or otherwise destroy. It’s a fantastic change of pace and the sort of thing that makes you wonder if it’d work as a whole game. Best of all, you can do it all with classic Terminator red-o-vision engaged. All together now: “I need yore cloze, yore bootz, und yore moderzycle.”

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