Terminator Resistance Review – I think this game’s a couple cans short of a six-pack

The last time I played a Terminator game, I had to use a bazooka sized contraption that you slung over your shoulder and proceeded to shoot things on screen.

It was called the Superscope and was Nintendo’s oddball attempt at a light gun for the Super Nintendo. The game was Terminator 2, despite the rubbish Superscope, the game wasn’t actually terrible.

It’s fair to say that there hasn’t been a decent Terminator game for us gamers to play since then, it’s even fairer to say there hasn’t been a decent Terminator film since T2. What has happened to this great franchise? Does Teyon’s new Terminator Game make up for lost time?

So here we have a new Terminator game, Terminator Resistance that was released around the same time as the new movie, Terminator Dark Fate, but has nothing to do with it. But like Dark Fate, Resistance ignores all the movies except the first two which as we know are the best. 

In Resistance you play walking cliche resistance fighter Jacob Rivers, who is the last survivor of the same resistance squad that John Conner was/is (I get confused) fighting for. Along your journey you will encounter other survivors and resistance fighters as you attempt to stop Skynet. Even though the story is not great, it does lead right up to the the start of the first Terminator movie so serves as a sort of decent prequel to the films.

However, that’s about as good as it gets. Developer Teyon has completely forgotten what makes a good Terminator film and that’s the feeling of isolation and being stalked by a near indestructible enemy, Resident Evil 3 done it, Alien Isolation done it, but what we have here is just a generic First Person shooter, and perhaps one hell of a wasted license.

The decision to make this a FPS war game is a strange one. You can tell right from the off that Teyon didn’t have the budget (or perhaps talent) to make a game of Modern Warfare scale and spectacle so surely making a game more confined and streamlined would have suited their skill set more? Still, the developers have done their best.

As you progress through the game you are more often than not teamed up with two companions, which helps push the game along. At times, some of the dialogue and back stories can get farily interesting, but nothing that’s going to stay long in the memory. The game allows you certain freedom when talking to the NPCs, and depending on your answers will open up extra side quests. It’s all very predictable but when asked if you would like to search for more survivors or just get the hell out of dodge, it’s nice that the decision actually adds something to the game in the shape of extra missions instead of just extra dialogue. It’s also quite open-ended so you can tackle your objectives in any order you like, but don’t be mistaken, it’s still more linear than a bar chart. It’s worth what little exploration there is though as the open-ended levels are filled with resources to collect that will help you level up and craft new gear, in that respect Resistance is a typical role-playing game and works pretty well. There is even a central base that you can return to after missions, to recover, craft and level up. I think our very own Sean described it as Fallout 4 lite.

In terms of content and ideas Resistance has it all, and stonking license to boot. But where the game really fails is in the most important aspect, the gameplay. The biggest problem is, it’s just not very good, and doesn’t feel very satisfying at all. Fighting it out against a laughable T800 should be hard work, a struggle. Something that you can get stuck into and feel victorious after. Instead destroying any of the variety of robotic enemies is ridiculously easy. The irony of course is that given the subject matter and the use of A.I and Skynet becoming self aware, the A.I in Resistance is terrible. Unless you’re on the most hardest of difficulty settings, you can just stand around and shoot, yes even with your bog standard pistols and machine guns. It’s all so easy with the robots exploding with alarming ease. It also makes the sneaking aspect of the game utterly pointless, because, what’s the point when you can just wade in guns blazing and not get a scratch.

This is what makes Resistance so annoying. It has all the elements of a decent story-driven FPS but it’s all done so poorly, Good ideas only take you so far but the game never pushes the boat out. It’s a by-the-numbers affair. The graphics are ok, the sound is ok the story is ok. It’s all just ok and nothing more. The only word that can really describe it is ‘meh’.

The biggest black mark on Terminator Resistance is that it’s a waste of a license. Everything is here and had the potential to be proper Terminator cannon being a ‘prequel’ to both films. Instead, we’re left with a game that if it was a colour would be grey. Just there, nothing special, nothing stand out, just part of the colour spectrum, and easily forgotten over brighter colours. (How’s that for an analogy?) however it has its moments and if you can find it for a few quid then it’s probably worth picking up otherwise it’s the perfect game for Xbox Game Pass or PlayStation Now.

Needless to say, you won’t be back.

Terminator Resistance is available now on PS4 (reviewed), Xbox One, and PC

Developer: Teyon
Publisher: Reef Entertainment

Disclaimer: In order to complete this review, we were provided with a promotional code from the publisher. For our full review policy, please go here. If you enjoyed this article or any more of our content, please consider our Patreon.