News Terminator: Resistance an FPS with RPG elements.

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

Terminator: Resistance is a single player first-person shooter developed by Teyon. It features an original story based on the film rights for legendary motion-pictures The Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgment Day. It takes place in a post-apocalyptic Los Angeles, nearly 30 years after Judgment Day, and expands upon the Future War glimpsed at in the iconic films from James Cameron, The Terminator and Terminator 2: Judgment Day.
Terminator: Resistance introduces a new hero, Jacob Rivers, a soldier in the Resistance Pacific Division. Despite the fact that Jacob is just a private, he’ll soon discover that he’s been targeted by the latest threat from Skynet and marked for termination!
Skynet may be destined to lose this war, but at what cost to Jacob? Experience the events leading up to the decisive final battle, smash Skynet’s Defence Grid and help decide the fate of mankind in the war against the machines!
Key Features

• Resist the machines – Fight against a selection of iconic enemies from the films, including the T-800, as well as a host of enemies that are brand new to the Terminator universe.
• Equip an arsenal of plasma weaponry – Run and gun or sneak and hack through sprawling environments! The world isn’t as forgiving as it used to be so you’ll need to search for scraps to trade and craft.
• Choose the kind of hero you want to be – Level-up your skills while exploring post-apocalyptic Los Angeles. Complete story missions to rise through the ranks of the Resistance as well as side-quests to help your friends.
• Change the fate of mankind – Protect a motley crew of survivors, each with their own motivations and backstories. The actions you take throughout the game will impact their survival and change the ending you get.

Blizniak is vindicated! I'm curious why this wasn't present at E3 nor Gamescom. Announcing a Terminator FPS game literally 2 months before release is... certainly an interesting marketing strategy.

Some people are sceptical about the game because the studio behind it made a number of so-so rail shooters over the years, including the Rambo game, but I don't see any point in holding that against them. Poland has some excellent talent, and I for one miss the days of ambitious AA FPS games. Looking at the trailer and the description, this game is giving me some heavy, heavy Homefront: The Revolution vibes. The visual design/art style is similar, and the protagonist even wears fingerless gloves. (I honestly had to check that the game hadn't licensed HFTR's assets or something, but they're clearly original upon closer inspection.) The game is either open world or hub-based by the sounds of it.

I'm cautiously optimistic. Hopefully we get some raw gameplay footage soon.

Screenshots:

Terminator: Resistance announced for PS4, Xbox One, and PC

Publisher Reef Entertainment and developer Teyon have announced Terminator: Resistance, a single-player first-person shooter based on the Terminator movie franchise for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and…

gematsu.com

 

[teezzy]

Lol wut

 

[Kvik]

How deep are the RPG elements we talking about here? If we can "sneak and hack", immersive-sims style, I'm all for it.

 

[gabbo]

The t800 crawling at the 36 second mark of the trailer looks a bit oddly animated, but graphically it does look quite nice. And much like any time that score kicks in, i want to believe it's going to be good.

And we're entering a new cycle of good licensed games, i can't wait

 

[Blizniak]

Reef is just weird like that. They sat on Rambo dlc for over a year before finally releasing it, it was done and ready soon after launch. I reckon they probably didn’t want to get overshadowed by all the other announcements but this a really short marketing period for a budget title from development hell. Perhaps they just decided to not invest much more into it, who knows.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

A Polish website named gry-online has played the game. Some Google Translate excerpts.

The terminator of the Krakow studio Teyon is 100% single-player FPS with stronger than usual RPG elements , branching story and partly open boards. At first glance, the game reminded me of the last Homefront , at the same time, for some reason, reminiscent of native Dying Light , although there are neither zombies nor parkour.

You play the role of a resistance fighter whose unit was killed by robots. While searching for other human units, he finds a small group of warlike survivors and sets off on a journey with them, which evokes quite explicit associations with the great game Metro: Exodus . Also in Polish production, our comrades will organize a kind of mobile base.

This is a fairly classic shooter, in which the most important thing is to look for covers, remember about first aid kits and hit the robots' weak points . It is nice to watch the bullets rip fragments of metal covers from Skynet's "minions", although the shooting itself is just fine. I didn't see anything revealing about it - just good craft work. At later stages, sneaking and shoulder-to-shoulder combat with companions controlled by a computer will also occur. There will also be crafting and gathering, and if we still lacked, from time to time we will make decisions that will affect the course of events.

I recommend reading the full article since they go into some detail about their thoughts on the game's budget limitations and whether Terminators are still scary the way they were in the 1980s.

Terminator: Resistance – już graliśmy i odpowiadamy na 7 ważnych pytań | GRYOnline.pl

Polacy ze studia Teyon zmierzą się z legendą lat 80. – z Terminatorem. Wiedzieliśmy o tym od dłuższego czasu, a dziś możemy wreszcie opowiedzieć o grze o podtytule Resistance, w którą mieliśmy okazję już zagrać.

translate.google.com

I also found a HQ version of the game's (not final) cover artwork on HOME | TerminatorResistance

The t800 crawling at the 36 second mark of the trailer looks a bit oddly animated, but graphically it does look quite nice. And much like any time that score kicks in, i want to believe it's going to be good.

And we're entering a new cycle of good licensed games, i can't wait

I think that raw gameplay footage will clear a lot up. Fortunately, the game is releasing in 2 months so we likely won't have to wait long. It's interesting, though. The new (rather good) Blair Witch game is by Polish developer Blooper and was announced a week before release. Hopefully this is a similar pleasant Polish surprise. Apparently Reef have had exclusive rights to Terminator games since 2013. This game has been in development in some fashion for a long time. But since it's running on Unreal 4, and it looks suspiciously like Homefront: TR, IMO that means that this version began development post-2016.

 

[ISee]

Hmm. I'd love to learn more.

 

[gabbo]

A Polish website named gry-online has played the game. Some Google Translate excerpts.

I recommend reading the full article since they go into some detail about their thoughts on the game's budget limitations and whether Terminators are still scary the way they were in the 1980s.

Terminator: Resistance – już graliśmy i odpowiadamy na 7 ważnych pytań | GRYOnline.pl

Polacy ze studia Teyon zmierzą się z legendą lat 80. – z Terminatorem. Wiedzieliśmy o tym od dłuższego czasu, a dziś możemy wreszcie opowiedzieć o grze o podtytule Resistance, w którą mieliśmy okazję już zagrać.

translate.google.com

I also found a HQ version of the game's (not final) cover artwork on HOME | TerminatorResistance

I think that raw gameplay footage will clear a lot up. Fortunately, the game is releasing in 2 months so we likely won't have to wait long. It's interesting, though. The new (rather good) Blair Witch game is by Polish developer Blooper and was announced a week before release. Hopefully this is a similar pleasant Polish surprise. Apparently Reef have had exclusive rights to Terminator games since 2013. This game has been in development in some fashion for a long time. But since it's running on Unreal 4, and it looks suspiciously like Homefront: TR, IMO that means that this version began development post-2016.

So, lower budget quasi-open world FPS with kinda scary terminators. I mean, it's a pretty even handed article, but it gives me reason to be excited for now.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

A very brief clip from the game with no audio. Literally everything about this game screams, "Loved Homefront: TR a whole bunch." Which is not a bad thing, of course. The thing that stands out is the Uzi looks a bit stiff when fired from the hip. However, the game is definitely being made by people who care about Terminator 1, or at least care about its aesthetics. The primary reason to have an Uzi in a game like this is because the Terminator used one in the film. They have the rights to Terminator 1/2, and this means they're using a lot of elements from the first film in particular.

For instance, the T-800 design in the game is quite obviously lacks Arnold's likeness, but it is wearing a version of his Terminator 1 costume. Which is a bit strange if you think about it. The Terminator arrived in the 1980s and stole that outfit. There's no actual reason for it to wear that particular outfit besides fan service.

So, lower budget quasi-open world FPS with kinda scary terminators. I mean, it's a pretty even handed article, but it gives me reason to be excited for now.

I figure the game has the potential to be a decent modernized version of Terminator: Future Shock, without the frustrating difficulty curves and general mismatch of ambition and design constraints.

Future Shock deserves to be way better known than it is, incidentally. It was several years ahead of its time. The game was a landmark achievement for Bethesda. The first game Todd Howard worked on, too.

 

[gabbo]

A very brief clip from the game with no audio. Literally everything about this game screams, "Loved Homefront: TR a whole bunch." Which is not a bad thing, of course. The thing that stands out is the Uzi looks a bit stiff when fired from the hip. However, the game is definitely being made by people who care about Terminator 1, or at least care about its aesthetics. The primary reason to have an Uzi in a game like this is because the Terminator used one in the film. They have the rights to Terminator 1/2, and this means they're using a lot of elements from the first film in particular.

For instance, the T-800 design in the game is quite obviously lacks Arnold's likeness, but it is wearing a version of his Terminator 1 costume. Which is a bit strange if you think about it. The Terminator arrived in the 1980s and stole that outfit. There's no actual reason for it to wear that particular outfit besides fan service.

I figure the game has the potential to be a decent modernized version of Terminator: Future Shock, without the frustrating difficulty curves and general mismatch of ambition and design constraints.

Future Shock deserves to be way better known than it is, incidentally. It was several years ahead of its time. The game was a landmark achievement for Bethesda. The first game Todd Howard worked on, too.

Liking Homefront:TR isn't a bad thing, so long as they learned from its shortcomings for this.
I'm all for fan service if it doesn't get in the way of the gameplay or make it self a centerpiece - a t800 wearing some stolen from Bill Paxton T1 gear is low impact enough to make you smile, but not worry too much about why its wearing 50 year old punk clothes

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

Found some more screenshots on GamePressure covering various aspects of the game. They seem to have sourced them from that Polish site.

Lockpicking:

Hacking (Frogger, I guess?):

Dialog: (Budget constraints are instantly clear here.)

Inventory Stuff + Weapon Upgrades:

Something that I notice is that the environments don't look super open in any of the screenshots. My gut instinct is that it's not a conventional open world but something more constrained. Interconnected areas that are wide, and probably non-linear because this game seems oriented around exploration, sidequests, and stuff like that. But I don't think you'll have huge explorable vistas, but rather bite sized sections.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

 

[gabbo]

Graphic shortcomings aside, every thing I see about this game adds to my hope that it will be good.

 

[arts&crafts]

This sounds better than expected, definitely keeping an eye on this.

 

[fspm]

You visit the store page, spend 10 seconds there and the last option is what you do next.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

Gameplay footage is coming tomorrow.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

Someone ripped the gameplay footage from the stream and posted it. Framerate is wobblier than the original livestream most likely due to misencoding, but it's bearable.

IMO, the game looks.., decent? A mostly linear stealth infiltration mission isn't really the best way to show the game off, but it strikes me as reasonably well put together. It is clearly low budget, and it has a vaguely PSP game-esque feel to its interface design. I heard from playtesters that it was "a huge improvement over Rambo", and... yea, it certainly is.

The scanning vision thing that shows hostiles through walls is a bit concerning. I'm worried that players might spend literally hours with their screen tinted a sickly green because they're afraid of walking around a corner and getting immediately murdered by a Terminator. But paradoxically I'm pleased by how lethal the Terminators are. They see you, they open fire, you die. Most Terminator games have treated T-800s as not really a big deal. In this game they will pulverize you. That said, I would like to see how the game looks in open combat. If the game's combat is crappy, it could undermine the entire experience.

It's interesting that they have Robert Patrick's likeness for a corpse you find sitting in a chair. I wonder if they have any other classic character likenesses.

Hope they release more gameplay footage soon. I'm a big fan of showing people how the game opens.

 

[gabbo]

While stealthing away from a/several T800s seems like a bad idea (as opposed to outright running), I do still like what I'm seeing. This is low key becoming a game I'm really looking forward to.

 

[Deleted member 113]

I miss low budget, "clunky", licensed games, so I'm looking forward to this one.

What I wouldn't give for a new Robocop game.

Heck, I would even welcome a re-release of the previous PC game:



But, 8-bit/16-bit movie adaptations where the best.
They took whatever property they could find, turn it into a platformer or side-scrolling action game (8-bit) or beat'em up game (16-bit), and they all played mostly the same.
As a sucker for beat'em ups, it was a good time.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

I gotta admit, they chose a pretty bizarre "first look" demo.

You literally can't hear the music, can't hear the dialogue, and any atmosphere the game is trying to build as you creep around hacking robots and avoiding Terminators is dissipated by the EXTREMELY LOUD BACKGROUND NOISES, and people talking REALLY LOUDLY because they need to be heard over the EXTREMELY LOUD BACKGROUND NOISES.

Also, they chose a section of the game with no combat. A lot of people equate combat and gameplay. I don't quite agree with that, but 25 minutes of exploring an abandoned building with zero combat and zero dialogue trees is probably not the best way to demo your FPS/RPG hybrid. "How does the combat look/feel/sound" is literally the first thing a lot of people are gonna be looking for.

Also, the contrast looks weirdly blown out. We have leaked screenshots from the game. We know how its colour grading and lighting looks. But this footage looks really strange.

 

[Anteater]

This gives me early 360/ps3 vibes, I'd play it.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

Devs have released 10 minutes of gameplay from the opening. (With a lot of cuts, presumably to hide spoilers and show different game mechanics.)

IMHO, this looks like a genuine dark horse if the entire game holds up as well as these ten minutes do.

 

[Big_Al]

Looks like a fun B budget kinda game, the type you would have seen a lot on the PS2 (well a bit higher budget than those). Definitely interested to see how it holds up with the final release. The only thing actively annoying me in that footage is the guns not spitting out shell cases when being fired.

 

[gabbo]

Devs have released 10 minutes of gameplay from the opening. (With a lot of cuts, presumably to hide spoilers and show different game mechanics.)

IMHO, this looks like a genuine dark horse if the entire game holds up as well as these ten minutes do.

It's a small thing, especially for a small team, but the voiceover... man, it's cringe-worthy. The gameplay, what was shown in succession looked like old school shooter fun. If the can nail the gunplay and get the terminator soundtrack right, I don't care so much about the rest

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

It's a small thing, especially for a small team, but the voiceover... man, it's cringe-worthy.

Which voiceover? Or do you mean the voice acting in general? Because I thought the voice acting was generally fine. The actor for the young boy isn't super great, but it's not Metro: Last Light constipated, either. The female resistance leader heard in the reveal trailer is Claire from Crysis 3/random female resistance fighters from Homefront. I heard the voice acting for this was all recorded in the UK, so like Homefront I'm expecting British actors playing Americans, and possibly a bit of cast overlap with HFTR.

That said, maybe I'm biased. I thought most of the voice acting in HFTR was excellent, but some people felt it was terrible.

The only thing actively annoying me in that footage is the guns not spitting out shell cases when being fired.

That is a really weird oversight/bug. Unless it's intentional, which would be weirder.

 

[freshVeggie]

Not expecting anything earth-shattering, just hoping it won't be a dumpster fire.
The recent video wasn't that hot though. Neither enemies nor levels look fun.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

Not expecting anything earth-shattering, just hoping it won't be a dumpster fire.
The recent video wasn't that hot though. Neither enemies nor levels look fun.

The level design strongly reminds me of Homefront: The Revolution's DLC, or Metro: Last Light. The make-it-or-break-it thing for me is how branching pathways are handled, and how the game's quest design works. If you get multiple quests and the level sections loop around, meaning you can explore freely and find lots of lore journal entries and stuff, that's great. If it's "walk down this pathway, explore a more open area, come back", that's significantly worse.

As for enemies and combat, the game is giving me a strong System Shock-lite vibe. And that could be a problem. Prey 2017 was a nearly perfect take on the formula, and quite a few people found it boring. (Why am I walking around hitting shadow spiders with a wrench? People think this is GOTY?) Heck, some people found System Shock 2 boring (Why am I walking around hitting monkeys with a wrench? People think this is GOTY?), and there isn't some huge hype wave behind the upcoming System Shock 3. What I fear is that the game might be too similar to System Shock for audiences wanting something less... plodding, but not enough like System Shock for the System Shock fanbase. (It also seems to have some BioShock inspired elements, such as a photography mechanic, evidenced by the achievement "Researcher: Take at least a ‘good’ photo of an enemy.")

In a nutshell, the potential problem is if this game lacks the INTIMACY of a proper System Shock-like game. That sense of looking in every nook and cranny, exploring and understanding a thoughtfully designed 3D space that feels hand-crafted and meaningful. We have hacking and lockpicking. There are breakable walls, ala modern Deus Ex games. But do these skills allow us to access interesting side content (journal entries, sidequests, etc), or are they merely "take the door vs take the vent" stuff? Do our skills meaningfully translate into narrative consequences? Do we face situations where we have to leave someone behind because we don't know how to pick a high level lock? Does the game have a sensible approach to XP and leveling, or can we upgrade all the skills trivially, making the choices redundant?

 

[gabbo]

Which voiceover? Or do you mean the voice acting in general? Because I thought the voice acting was generally fine. The actor for the young boy isn't super great, but it's not Metro: Last Light constipated, either. The female resistance leader heard in the reveal trailer is Claire from Crysis 3/random female resistance fighters from Homefront. I heard the voice acting for this was all recorded in the UK, so like Homefront I'm expecting British actors playing Americans, and possibly a bit of cast overlap with HFTR.

That said, maybe I'm biased. I thought most of the voice acting in HFTR was excellent, but some people felt it was terrible.

That is a really weird oversight/bug. Unless it's intentional, which would be weirder.

Sorry, yes I meant voice acting. The boy awful, which kinda tainted the whole thing, but again it's a small complaint overall.

The level design strongly reminds me of Homefront: The Revolution's DLC, or Metro: Last Light. The make-it-or-break-it thing for me is how branching pathways are handled, and how the game's quest design works. If you get multiple quests and the level sections loop around, meaning you can explore freely and find lots of lore journal entries and stuff, that's great. If it's "walk down this pathway, explore a more open area, come back", that's significantly worse.

As for enemies and combat, the game is giving me a strong System Shock-lite vibe. And that could be a problem. Prey 2017 was a nearly perfect take on the formula, and quite a few people found it boring. (Why am I walking around hitting shadow spiders with a wrench? People think this is GOTY?) Heck, some people found System Shock 2 boring (Why am I walking around hitting monkeys with a wrench? People think this is GOTY?), and there isn't some huge hype wave behind the upcoming System Shock 3. What I fear is that the game might be too similar to System Shock for audiences wanting something less... plodding, but not enough like System Shock for the System Shock fanbase. (It also seems to have some BioShock inspired elements, such as a photography mechanic, evidenced by the achievement "Researcher: Take at least a ‘good’ photo of an enemy.")

In a nutshell, the potential problem is if this game lacks the INTIMACY of a proper System Shock-like game. That sense of looking in every nook and cranny, exploring and understanding a thoughtfully designed 3D space that feels hand-crafted and meaningful. We have hacking and lockpicking. There are breakable walls, ala modern Deus Ex games. But do these skills allow us to access interesting side content (journal entries, sidequests, etc), or are they merely "take the door vs take the vent" stuff? Do our skills meaningfully translate into narrative consequences? Do we face situations where we have to leave someone behind because we don't know how to pick a high level lock? Does the game have a sensible approach to XP and leveling, or can we upgrade all the skills trivially, making the choices redundant?

I don't think we're going to get much more than the vent v door, to use your example. I highly doubt we're going to see much in the way of narrative consequence for different skill setups. I would love to be wrong, but im not getting that vibe from what's been shown.

 

[prudis]

steampage + combat gameplay

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

The game is out on Steam. Looks like they pushed release forward a few hours. Reviews and impressions will trickle out over the next day or so, I figure. The console releases/physical releases are coming in December for the US, November 22 for Australia, plus a mixture for other non-European countries. (I saw a placeholder at EB games yesterday here in Aus with a Nov 22 date.)

Gmanlives seems quite impressed.

I imagine whatever AngryJoe says about the game will shape the conversation. If he doesn't like the game, it definitely won't help its sales. But if he does like the game, his millions of fans will take notice, which could definitely help it when it launches on consoles in the US next month. Teyon are seemingly extremely conscious of AngryJoe, and they reportedly sent him an email saying that his (incredibly vicious) review left a strong impression on their team and they hope he is pleased with their new game. Which is 50% sucking up, 50% hat in hand humility.

Resistance also directly references the "HE'S A MAN, NOT A GOD" meme that AngryJoe spawned.

I've very pleased that initial impressions seem positive. Looking forward to playing it within the next few days.

 

[Nzyme]

92% positive reviews from 25 people who took the gamble

Could this be the first good terminator game - out of nowhere?!

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

Some reviews have been trickling out.

IGN disliked it, with a 4/10.

Terminator: Resistance Review - IGN

Terminator: Resistance’s authentic looks fail to disguise its uninspired design and forgettable action.

ign.com

VG247 also disliked it, with a 4/10.

Terminator Resistance review: I need your cloaks, your hoofs and your unicycle

Do you remember in The Terminator where John Connor kills a T-800 with a knife? Me neither.

www.vg247.com

Playstation Universe liked it quite a bit, with 7/10.

Terminator: Resistance PS4 Review - PlayStation Universe

Judgment Day has arrived - read our Terminator: Resistance PS4 review to see what we thought of this latest attempt to license the Terminator IP.

www.psu.com

I can't help noticing they seem to have primarily sent out PS4 copies to reviewers? Because all the reviews seem to complain about the PS4 version having some performance issues. The PC version is reportedly excellent apart from ultrawide. In fact, you've got people on Steam complaining that the Recommended settings are too high because the game is running unexpected well on their machines.

Gonna be interesting to see how the user scores and the critical scores and the youtuber reviewer scores hash out over the next several days. (I'm also interested in differences in perception between PC and console audiences.) The initial Steam impressions have been glowing, currently sitting at 89% positive. But that could fall. After all, the kind of people likely to be buying the game are likely to be predisposed towards Terminator. As more people give it a go, dissatisfaction will become more evident.

At the same time, this looks like a game that will land extremely well with a niche audience. The fate shared by all too many Eastern European FPS games. (I remember when cult classic Cryostasis got a review from PC Gamer that called it "as appealing as frozen dog droppings."

Something that disappoints me a little is that literally none of the professional reviewers I've read so far have made the connection between Terminator: Future Shock and Terminator: Resistance. Exploring how it works as a spiritual successor, what it does better, what it does worse -- that's important stuff. I have the nagging feeling that if you handed IGN's reviewer Terminator: Future Shock, they'd probably think it was shit. Not that I'm trying to discredit their argument -- after all, VG247's feelings align with theirs. They didn't enjoy the game, and that's fair enough. But I think this is a situation where the only people who've played Future Shock, and will use it as a reference point for their review, are gonna be Youtubers.

This annoys me is because if the user scores and YTer scores are dramatically higher than the IGNs and such, it will fuel the "professional reviewers are out of touch" hostility that has become increasingly common.

For me, I've watched an hour or so of gameplay, and it seems extremely up my alley. I'm planning on buying it tomorrow or the day after. I'm glad that the game is resonating really positively with a lot of people, and I'm sure I'll be among them, but it does seem like a shame the game likely won't click with the professional criticsphere.

edit:

Also, the VG247 review has a weird, weird tone of hostility.

At this point, and as if to really destroy any pretence of this being a Terminator game at all, you’re handed knives. These are Terminating Knives. Yep, you can sneak up and one-hit kill a Terminator. With a knife. Just like the movies.

I'm pretty sure Terminator Knives are single use items that electrocute Terminators. I saw the description pop up in a video I saw yesterday. The knife is literally glowing with blue sparks. Killing or disabling Terminators using a massive jolt of electricity is something that has appeared in Terminator media before. I remember the friendly female Terminator in Sarah Connor Chronicles using electrical cables to disable Infiltrators. I kinda feel like there's a disconnect between the interpretation of the Future War (which is heavily based on Future Shock's) and the Terminator game some of these reviewers wanted or perhaps expected.

Also:

Early missions push you to use stealth as you creep past turrets and spider-bots, the lamest of enemies.

I mean... the Spiderbots are literally taken from Terminator 2's concept art for the future war. T-800s are relatively rare in the Terminator universe. In Future Shock you primarily fought spider bots, flying enemies, etc. It's like this particular review wanted a game pretty much exclusively about T-800s. And I think the game does stumble a bit in how it transitions from T-800s being unkillable terrors to the player mowing them down with plasma weapons. I think that's a fair criticism. But this particular reviewer accuses the game of:

It begins as hardly a Terminator game at all, and when the iconic T-800 robots do turn up, its budget screams The Protectinator, starring Alvin Schwarzenedder, directed by Jake Cameroon.

I mean, the game begins with a pitch perfect vision of the Future War where you fight enemies authentically recreated from Terminator 1/2 materials.

Bashing the game for "hardly being a Terminator game at all" is mindboggling, to be honest. For all its faults, not being an authentic Terminator game is NOT one of them. It's the most faithful and loving portrayal of Terminator ever seen in a game. The game hits the right notes right off the bat. This is the first Terminator media since Salvation with authentic Terminator designs. It is deeply rooted in the source material. And its video predecessor. It's like bashing Alien: Isolation for "hardly being an Alien game at all" because you don't see a Xeno for like an hour and most of the game is spent walking around and looting and crafting and stuff.

 

[prudis]

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

The game has been out for 5 days now, and while it isn't selling super well, it is doing extremely well in Steam reviews.

The complaints are pretty much universal. The game needs to be more difficult. Because it's too easy, some of the core mechanics feel redundant. People are asking for either a Ranger Mode-style difficulty or for the difficulty itself to be bumped up. Despite this, people are happy with the game. And I'm very happy for Teyon that although they failed to win over critics, they won over a community that was deeply sceptical after Rambo.

I think that Terminator is the game that demonstrates the value of Steam reviews and Steam forums for smaller developers in particular. Yes, there are risks. Some games get sabotaged by negative reviews. Good games. But games only have two real routes to success. One is a shitload of marketing money. (Which Teyon/Reef does NOT have.) The other is organic grass roots fandom. And Steam reviews and forums are where organic communities form.

I would not have blamed Teyon/Reef in the slightest for taking Epic's money if it had been offered. I have no beef with timed launcher exclusivity. However, imagine if Terminator was an Epic exclusive and didn't have Steam reviews. Imagine if it didn't have a forum. The average person would look at professional reviews, and see the game sitting at 50/100 on MC for PS4. (PC doesn't have enough reviews for an MC score.) They'd look at the 8.3/10 MC User score, and that would give them pause because that is a shockingly good MC score. But MC can easily be astroturfed. Nobody takes it seriously. For better or worse, Steam reviews are the honest opinions of actual customers. Steam reviews paint a picture of Terminator: Resistance that tells you how Terminator fans feel about the game. And it's a rosy picture.

The people who benefit from not having user reviews and community forums directly attached to the game, in the long run, are companies that use marketing to push their game to audiences instead of organic word of mouth. A company like Rockstar, for example, does not benefit from people sharing their honest opinions about Red Dead Redemption 2's PC port. People are buying that port, probably in their millions, due to marketing and brand power. Almost nobody is buying Terminator: Resistance due to its non-existent marketing and non-existent brand prestige. They are buying the game because the first batch of buyers looked back and gave a thumb up. And so did the second. And so did the third. Their thumbs up is couched in caveats like "6/10 if you're not a Terminator fan, 8/10 if you love Terminator" kinda rhetoric. It goes without saying that a huge amount for the love this game is receiving from fans is due to its handling of the Terminator license. It has what is possibly the best rendition of the Terminator theme song. Scratch that. It has TWO of the best renditions of the Terminator theme in one game. Maybe three if you count the version that plays during the final assault. That's how much this game drips with love for its source material.

From the moment the game boots, there is a sense that the team behind this game loves Terminator. They don't just love Terminator, they UNDERSTAND Terminator in a way that most of the films didn't. The game's attention to detail is on par with Alien: Isolation. The time machine in Resistance is a faithful recreation of the time machine seen in the original concept art, a detail literally none of the Terminator sequels got right. They've worked with their limited budget, and limited resources to craft a sincere prequel to Terminator.

At this point, I hope they listen carefully to feedback and refine the game to make it better. Improve the difficulty, improve the ingame economy, add some recoil to the projectile weapons, stuff like that. People love the game as it is. They'll love it even more if Teyon swiftly address their complaints.

 

[lashman]

The game has been out for 5 days now, and while it isn't selling super well, it is doing extremely well in Steam reviews.

... and it's not going to start selling any better - they raised prices in most of the poor countries yesterday

 

[gabbo]

... and it's not going to start selling any better - they raised prices in most of the poor countries yesterday

major steam sales around the corner, that might help

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

... and it's not going to start selling any better - they raised prices in most of the poor countries yesterday

According to SteamDB, the only countries that have seen a price increase (that I could find) are Argentina and Turkey. Terminator: Resistance · AppID: 954740 The Turkish price went from 28.78USD adjusted to 34.93USD adjusted. Argentina went from 16.75USD to 24.98USD. That's still quite a bit lower than the 40USD base price, which is itself lower than the 60USD they're charging on consoles for some weird reason. Mexico, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, etc are all the same price as before.

 

[lashman]

That's still quite a bit lower than the 40USD base price

yes ... but people in those countries earn MUCH less on average (especially Argentina) ... and trust me - ARS$ 1500 for a game like that is waaaaaaaaaay too much

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

yes ... but people in those countries earn MUCH less on average (especially Argentina) ... and trust me - ARS$ 1500 for a game like that is waaaaaaaaaay too much

Yea, I see where you're coming from. I remember a similar situation with Far Cry 5, where they boosted the price from 650 to 1200 ARS.

ARGENTINA Price increased !! = NO buy :: Far Cry 5 General Discussions

Without warnings the price is now the double and nobody at Ubi can explain why. From $650 (AR$) to $1.200 (AR$) what were they thinking...?

steamcommunity.com

Someone should probably make a thread on Steam or ping the publisher on Twitter. The annoying part of the situation is that so many major publishers charge steep prices in Argentine (the price of the new Star Wars game is rather eyebrow raising, IMO), so it can't really be framed as "Here are the typical prices", because a lot of them suck. I guess the more sensible petition would be that the price increase feels unfair in context. The price increase doesn't really benefit anyone. Especially not Reef.

 

[lashman]

Someone should probably make a thread on Steam or ping the publisher on Twitter. The annoying part of the situation is that so many major publishers charge steep prices in Argentine (the price of the new Star Wars game is rather eyebrow raising, IMO), so it can't really be framed as "Here are the typical prices", because a lot of them suck. I guess the more sensible petition would be that the price increase feels unfair in context. The price increase doesn't really benefit anyone. Especially not Reef.

that's the thing, though - they already know that ... they KNOW those prices are beyond ridiculous ... they have been doing this (raising prices) for years now ... and people have been telling them not to do it also for years now

so they ABSOLUTELY know what people think about this ... the thing is - they don't care

even with MS - people had to scream at them to fix the Gears 5 price, and they eventually fixed it ... for like 3 or 4 regions ... and left most of the other ones (including Argentina) untouched

and i can guarantee you it was the same exact person (or team, at least) setting prices for all MS games - that's how steamworks accounts work for publishers ... only a few people have access to that stuff

also, about ubi - they raised the prices of ALL their games for Argentina (and a few other poor countries) earlier this year ... so they absolutely know what they're doing, they just don't give a fuck

 

[MJunioR]

Someone should probably make a thread on Steam or ping the publisher on Twitter. The annoying part of the situation is that so many major publishers charge steep prices in Argentine (the price of the new Star Wars game is rather eyebrow raising, IMO), so it can't really be framed as "Here are the typical prices", because a lot of them suck. I guess the more sensible petition would be that the price increase feels unfair in context. The price increase doesn't really benefit anyone. Especially not Reef.

People do make threads, believe me. but then you have a bunch of shitheads making excuses and saying that publishers are just doing the 'fair' thing. I'm not saying that this is Reef's case, but as lashy said, companies like Ubi (Ubi is the worst of them all, they had face to update some pre-2015 games just because), SEGA, Square, 505 and MS fully know what they are doing when setting these prices.

Anyway, we had recent case regarding a community asking a publisher about price increases. SEGA increased Total War prices on a bunch of countries, people went on /r/totalwar, they got this answer from a rep:


The OP got downvoted for replying this answer, people finding excuses to the increase got upvoted. While on Steam forums you won't see your post becoming invisible due to downvotes, it still is tiresome having to make a thread for every major release and then having to read shitty takes, including those from people that wouldn't think twice before using a VPN to take advantage of a pricing error. Hell, I might be remembering wrong but last year someone made a thread about pricing on a Bamco game and a certain group of individuals started spamming his Steam profile with insults.

And answering your previous post, I personally don't trust Valve. Artifact has horrible regional pricing and I won't be surprised if HL:A has bad pricing too.

Edit: just saw that I posted this on the Terminator thread instead of the regional pricing one - sorry for derailing things folks.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

The American console version has been delayed again. Seems to be one of those cases where the physical distributor has hit a snag, and they're contractually obligated to delay digital releases in the region to ensure parity.

Also, the PC version received a patch today. It has only been a week, so changes are relatively light. But a lot of people were asking for ultrawide and inverted mouse aim. Also, I assume they've been trying to fix stability on AMD CPUs.

• Added support for Ultrawide resolutions
• Added option to invert Y-Axis for mouse aiming
• Various stability improvements
• Minor bug fixes

Plus trading cards.

Steam :: Terminator: Resistance :: Events

steamcommunity.com

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

I asked Teyon about the status of the next patch. (Which appears to include a difficulty overhaul, and potentially more.) They responded, "We are working on it right now and hopefully will be able to release it in January."

The American console release is January 7, 2020. I figure they're trying to fit as many improvements into this patch so that they can roll it out across all platforms in time for the American console release. The American console market is pretty big, and if the game launches in America with the key design flaw everyone agrees on (that the game is piss-easy) fixed, it'll be really good. It'll be well received regardless, but if they can fix the difficulty and maybe tinker with the gunplay a bit and stuff like that, it'll be even better received.

 

[Deleted member 113]

I just purchased the game, and I look forward to give it a go.
I'll probably wait until early January, to see if that patch is released.

 

[unknownhero]

Honestly, jank and voice acting aside, this game delivers! I laughed at the 4/10 reviews up there, Probably had a AAA game mind set and shit. I felt that the devs actually did a pretty great job in making it feel like you were in the future war and also has nice nods to the first two terminator movies. Like I said, it's not perfect but it is a far cry from their rambo game. In fact, it has to be one of my favorite movie franchise based games to date. It's a must buy for terminator fans!

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

It's been a very long time coming, but the promised patch finally dropped on Steam. The patch is PC-only currently, but "we'll keep everyone updated on future console patches too."

Additional Languages

• Russian subtitles and text are now supported
• Japanese subtitles and text are now supported
• Simplified Chinese subtitles and text are now supported

Balance

• General enemy AI Improvements and fixes
• Enemies will behave differently based on difficulty selection
• Improved general balance of difficulty levels.
• Loot found will now differ depending on the difficulty
• Weapon stats will differ between difficulties
• General weapon stats have been slightly modified
• Skill tree variables have been slightly modified
• Rail plasma weapons (Snipers) now consume 5 ammo rounds per shot, instead of 1
• TC16 plasma weapons (Semi-Auto rifles) now consume 2 ammo rounds per shot, instead of 1

Video/Graphics

• FOV (Field of view) slider added to video options
• FidelityFX (AMD) option added to video options (Contrast-Adaptive Sharpening and upscaling)
• Immersion Upgrades - HUD modification options added. You can now enable/disable individual HUD elements to make the game more immersive
• Improved support for Ultrawide resolutions
• Level lighting & post-processing improvements
• Chromatic aberration toggle added to video options
• Other small graphics improvements and tweaks

Gameplay

• Player movement/locomotion has been slightly improved

Other

• Save backup system added to help prevent data being lost
• Numerous crash fixes
• Other small bug fixes and improvements

Steam :: Terminator: Resistance :: Game Update - Balance, Immersion and Localisation

Patch notes for the most recent title update with highly requested improvements and updates.

steamcommunity.com

Extremely promising stuff. The game's difficulty issues were the biggest complaint, and the fixes sound extensive. The PC QoL fixes are awesome.

 

[gabbo]

It's been a very long time coming, but the promised patch finally dropped on Steam. The patch is PC-only currently, but "we'll keep everyone updated on future console patches too."

Additional Languages

• Russian subtitles and text are now supported
• Japanese subtitles and text are now supported
• Simplified Chinese subtitles and text are now supported

Balance

• General enemy AI Improvements and fixes
• Enemies will behave differently based on difficulty selection
• Improved general balance of difficulty levels.
• Loot found will now differ depending on the difficulty
• Weapon stats will differ between difficulties
• General weapon stats have been slightly modified
• Skill tree variables have been slightly modified
• Rail plasma weapons (Snipers) now consume 5 ammo rounds per shot, instead of 1
• TC16 plasma weapons (Semi-Auto rifles) now consume 2 ammo rounds per shot, instead of 1

Video/Graphics

• FOV (Field of view) slider added to video options
• FidelityFX (AMD) option added to video options (Contrast-Adaptive Sharpening and upscaling)
• Immersion Upgrades - HUD modification options added. You can now enable/disable individual HUD elements to make the game more immersive
• Improved support for Ultrawide resolutions
• Level lighting & post-processing improvements
• Chromatic aberration toggle added to video options
• Other small graphics improvements and tweaks

Gameplay

• Player movement/locomotion has been slightly improved

Other

• Save backup system added to help prevent data being lost
• Numerous crash fixes
• Other small bug fixes and improvements

Steam :: Terminator: Resistance :: Game Update - Balance, Immersion and Localisation

Patch notes for the most recent title update with highly requested improvements and updates.

steamcommunity.com

Extremely promising stuff. The game's difficulty issues were the biggest complaint, and the fixes sound extensive. The PC QoL fixes are awesome.

Theyre really gioing above and beyond what id expect from this kind of title - those additional options are calling out for a replay.

 

[Aelphaeis Mangarae]

I found an interesting Japanese article posted today.

It was revealed that the domestic PS4 version of the FPS "Terminator: Resistance" set in the future war that is glimpsed in the movies "Terminator" and "Terminator 2" will be released on August 27.

映画『ターミネーター』が原作のFPS『Terminator: Resistance』国内PS4版が8月27日に発売へ

映画『ターミネーター』と『ターミネーター2』で垣間見られる未来の戦争を舞台にしたFPS『Terminator: Resistance』の国内PS4版が8月27日に発売予定であることが判明。楽天ブックスやヨドバシカメラで予約が始まっています。

gamestalk.net

What this means in practical terms is that the console versions are going to receive the overhaul patch soon-ish. Japanese localization was added in the big March update. Logically, to release in Japan, they need to patch the game. Also, I'm under the impression that Japanese CERO ratings have been stalled for a few months, which might explain the August release date in Japan.

It's been really annoying wanting to recommend the game to people, but with the caveat of "buy on PC, and if you don't have a PC, wait for the console version to get patched at some point in the distant future". Because the patched and unpatched versions are so different mechanically, it's hard to discuss the game in shared settings, too.

They've also been steadily working on another patch for the PC version. Terminator: Resistance · AppID: 954740 Curious to see what another 2 months of polish brings. It has been 6 days since the last SteamDB update, and that kind of pause tends to indicate that they're waiting to deploy the patch. Possibly the wanted to deploy whatever changes they've made to all platforms simultaneously.

 

[Blizniak]

I found an interesting Japanese article posted today.

映画『ターミネーター』が原作のFPS『Terminator: Resistance』国内PS4版が8月27日に発売へ

映画『ターミネーター』と『ターミネーター2』で垣間見られる未来の戦争を舞台にしたFPS『Terminator: Resistance』の国内PS4版が8月27日に発売予定であることが判明。楽天ブックスやヨドバシカメラで予約が始まっています。

gamestalk.net

What this means in practical terms is that the console versions are going to receive the overhaul patch soon-ish. Japanese localization was added in the big March update. Logically, to release in Japan, they need to patch the game. Also, I'm under the impression that Japanese CERO ratings have been stalled for a few months, which might explain the August release date in Japan.

It's been really annoying wanting to recommend the game to people, but with the caveat of "buy on PC, and if you don't have a PC, wait for the console version to get patched at some point in the distant future". Because the patched and unpatched versions are so different mechanically, it's hard to discuss the game in shared settings, too.

They've also been steadily working on another patch for the PC version. Terminator: Resistance · AppID: 954740 Curious to see what another 2 months of polish brings. It has been 6 days since the last SteamDB update, and that kind of pause tends to indicate that they're waiting to deploy the patch. Possibly the wanted to deploy whatever changes they've made to all platforms simultaneously.

There's DLC in the works as well. Teyon is one of the companies with Series X devkits so you can figure out what that means

 

[gabbo]

Is it too much to hope that we get an expansion or a sequel?
[UWSL]...or preferably a Robocop game based on the original Verhoeven film please [/UWSL]