Been waiting for months for the PS+ port to show up. It was trademarked sometime ago, and I was really excited to revisit this one. This was definitely one of the most technically impressive titles for the PSP back when it came out, and I remember having a lot of fun with it. The funny thing is that I couldn't remember if I actually finished it or not. And after this latest playthrough, I'm pretty sure that I did. I just forgot because the game kinda gets more forgettable as it goes on.

But I'm getting a bit ahead of myself. There's one thing that I would like to stress first: don't play this on Hard! It's way less fun than on Normal. The enemies hit too hard, and they're also very spongy. It leads to frustrating moments more often than not.

A big part of that is because of how the gunplay works. Since it's originally a PSP game, there are design decisions that comply with the limitations of the control scheme. The game is mostly about how you maneuver around cover, dodging projectiles like a bullet hell game, while still keeping your lock-on reticule on the enemies that deserve the most priority. The guns that you'll use the most have bullet spread that gets worse if you keep firing for too long, so you're encouraged to burst fire.

A unique feature of the original game is that you can use a Dualshock 3 as a controller, and that feature is what drives the control scheme on this PS+ version. Problem is, the lock-on is not accessible in this mode, and the analog aim controls are, at best, pretty sluggish, even after I tweaked the settings. I recently played Resistance 3 just to compare, and it feels so much better even without tweaking the controls. Here, it always feels like you're fighting against the controls on some level, especially when you're fighting the more nimble enemies. This is, thankfully, not too big of a problem on Normal, because it's quite forgiving, but it's still worth a heads up.

In the main campaign, you'll be going through the ruins and lairs of Europe that has been infested and rebuilt to the Chimera's needs. Level design wise, it definitely gets same-y pretty quick, since most of it are small tunnels and corridors. It's nowhere near as exciting as, let's say, Resistance 3's trek through post-Alien invasion America, which at least had way more setting variety. Most of the "puzzles" and objectives are pretty basic too. I can forgive the more limited level sizes since it's a PSP game, but they can do better on the rest. I do admit that the collectibles are well hidden, and satisfying to find.

Speaking of, the collectibles are mostly extra lore notes about various aspect of the world, and honestly, I like reading these way more than experiencing the main story. An example of this is regading Grayson's character: in the story he's mostly portrayed as an asshole that doesn't really have anything interesting about him, but the collectibles can sometimes show a more personal side of him that makes him much more likeable. The main story simply fails on most of what it tries to do, while the collectibles deliver interesting perspectives and details of the world that we don't get to actually experience in gameplay.

Now, I do realize that this review has been mostly me badmouthing this game. But I do enjoy it overall, despite all its flaws. I just like messing around with all the guns in this game, Bend did a decent job of continuing the series' staple of having fun weapons. I love that you can literally dodge projectiles in slow-mo with the sniper. And the manual redirect ability for the missile launcher is pretty sick. I also liked the enemy variety here, even if the game kinda loses steam with the encounter designs later on.

Playing this game (and also dipping back to Resistance 3 for a bit) made me realize how cool Resistance is as a series. It might not seem that cool, looking from the outside, but Insomnia poured a lot of thought creating this 1950s Alien Invasion story that manages to feel distinctive and evocative enough, while wearing its influences on the sleeves. I particularly see a lot of Half-Life 2 influence in this game (just look at the Rotterdam levels, heavy City 17-vibes), seems like Bend are big fans of that game haha. Anyway, I would love to see this series return. Lots of old Sony franchises worth reviving, and this is one of them.

P.S. one of the last cutscenes in the game was so horribly compressed and blurry, that it reminded me of the cover art of Germs: Nerawareta Machi. I thought it was neat haha