Resistance: Burning Skies

I was utterly surprised and impressed at how smooth the online matches were, and just how much I enjoyed it overall. For the first of its kind, Burning Skies does a hell of a job replicating the online multiplayer experience found on consoles-complete with lobbies, matchmaking, voice chat via Party, social aspects via Near, and leaderboards.

No, you won't find volumes of content or progressive new ideas, and the forced touchscreen controls are a minor strategic bungle. However, the well-paced single-player campaign is punctuated by a strong and varied weapon set and online multiplayer that hits an unprecedented level of quality for a handheld.

Dull levels and story, but unique guns and smooth controls make this easy to recommend. [August 2012, p.72]

Despite some annoying technical glitches, Resistance: Burning Skies stands as the best handheld FPS so far.

Despite some notable flaws, Resistance: Burning Skies is still a solid effort and a great start to twin-stick shooting action on PS Vita.

Its story unfolds at a good pace and looks great on the Vita. There's only one thing missing: the skies were never burning! Maybe a bit dark in places, but never burning. At some point I could have used a burning sky to lighten up the game.

Its insistence on your covering the screen in fingerprints is occasionally frustrating, but otherwise this suggests a very bright future for the FPS genre on Vita.

Not a showcase for Vita's visual powers, but hard proof it can handle full-fledged first-person shooters - another solidly rousing slice of Resistance. [July 2012, p.108]

Resistance Burning Skies is the first FPS on PS Vita to use the game controls of an handheld device successfully, despite not being as good as Uncharted Golden Abyss or WipEout 2048 in terms of quality. The IP would have been better if the developers proposed more innovations as regards the level design, but the principal elements of the Resistance franchise have not been forgotten, espcially its multiplayer mode. For its first entry on PS Vita, Resistance Burning Skies copes pretty well.

The hype machine put a lot on the shoulders of Resistance: Burning Skies and the initial multiplayer snags didn't help matters. Still, I have enjoyed it and I think anyone who likes the series will too.

For a portable shooter, it's really quite good but for a Resistance entry, one finds it somewhat lacking. Still, it's well worth a look.

In the end, Resistance: Burning Skies Review is a good first person shooter title for the PS Vita that although won't win any awards for originality, it still provides the player with a fun game with decent controls.

Resistance: Burning Skies is an admirable effort but ends of leaving a lot to be desired. The game may carry the popular Resistance name, but the experience certainly doesn't mimic the standard(s) set by that previous entries in the series. Still, this is solid proof that the FPS-genre can succeed on a handheld system.

Proof that first person shooters can work perfectly on portable consoles. The arsenal is as good as ever in the Resistance-series, but the campaign is quite short and forgettable.

Worthwhile for fans, but it's not up there with the rest of the series. [Aug 2012, p.70]

Burning Skies isn't a failure by any means. While the visuals won't sell you on the console's power like Uncharted: Golden Abyss, the campaign is filled with the big boss fights and unique weaponry you expect from the series. As long as you're not hoping for a console-quality multiplayer experience, Burning Skies should satisfy fans.

A conventional, by-the-numbers shooter that just about stands out for its enjoyable firefights, in both single and multiplayer, and for being the first handheld FPS to really work.

Burning Skies has many flaws, make no mistake about it. But despite all these flaws I've had quite a lot of fun with the game and I'll probably return to it many times, especially for the multiplayer.

A game especially oriented for hardcore gamers, with frantic action and a good multiplayer mode that will offer fun for hours, although we expected some more.

Resistance: Burning Skies is a good first person shooter title for the PS Vita.

Burning Skies does a decent job in terms of experimentation, thanks to the "hybrid" controls, but the graphics are worse than expected and the single player campaign does nothing new for the series.

While Burning Skies in fact proves that the Vita is capable of handling the First Person Shooter genre, the game in itself leaves much to be desired. A weak story, an uninteresting online multiplayer and an overall lack of polish keep it from reaching the lofty heights the franchise deserves.

Resistance:Burning Skies offers decent controls and pretty cool weapons. Although that's an accomplishment in itself, the game does nothing further to set itself apart and merely offers a mediocre experience.

Resistance: Burning Skies brings the series' strong points to a handheld with a good arsenal of weapons and lots of action. Other than that, the game achieves little.

The pitch-perfect controls and delightfully old-school multiplayer mode justify this game's existence beyond novelty.

There is potential here, some moments that show the capability of Vita to present a really good FPS experience, but those moments are undermined by important graphical glicthes, poor AI, bland story and and a too short campaign with basic multiplayer.

Resistance Burning Skies made us angry: expectations were high, and not all were disappointed, but the general impression is that with greater care and attention to detail, it could have easily become a must buy, bolstered by a well-designed control system, a large arsenal and a funny multiplayer. As it stands, however, is only recommended for fans of the genre or of the Resistance brand.

The FPS doesn't launch with much of a bang on the Vita. Resistance is a decidedly average game with major control and graphics issues that make it a chore more often that you'd like. The promise of competitive online is mostly squandered.

As a portable game, Burning Skies is adequate. But as the Vita's first true FPS and a member of the Resistance family, it's a conventional, predictable disappointment. [Aug 2012, p.84]

After the wonderful Resistance 3, this FPS franchise takes a nosedive. Yes, it's the "first true FPS on a handheld device", but that doesn't say much actually.

Resistance: Burning Skies had every right to be an excellent product from nihilistic, but the lack of innovation makes it feel like chewing gum.

A campaign ruined by the lack of a poor level design and a multiplayer unable to surprise gamers make Burning Skies a decent FPS and nothing more.

At first glance, a Great shooter with catchy story and interesting weapons and upgrades. Its cons are unveiled during play – AI, touch controls and "too narrow" level design. [June 2012]

Resistance : Burning Skies doesn't surprise in any way but its excellent playability and arsenal. The rest is basic, ordinary, and uninspired.

Nihilistic proves that ego-action finally can work rather well on mobile platforms – in theory. But as part of the Resistance franchise Burning Skies is rather disappointing. The formula has been boiled down to run of the mill action with unbelievable characters in rather bland surroundings and forced touch controls that will distract you more than they will help.

Resistance: Burning Skies can be linear and its mission objectives predictable, but it has the look and feel of a fully-fledged shooter, and that's something you won't find elsewhere. The visuals look almost on par with its PS3 forebears on the smaller screen and the gameplay endeavours match them in scope and intensity. In theory, it should be a classic, but a weak story and straightforward missions makes it only surface-deep.

It not only becomes increasingly repetitive as it nears the climax but also puts a significant strain on players' patience as Nihilistic injects enemies with a higher HP and more powerful weapons, rather than finding a more engaging way to challenge players. It's a jarring difficulty spike that almost undermines everything the game has so far accomplished as it impressively leaps from one set-piece to the next.

The shooting is top notch, but poor pacing and bland environments ensure you never engage with what's going on, and technical hiccups and formulaic game modes sour the multiplayer. This game proves the potential power of the genre on its device, but not the potential excellence of its own franchise.

Hardcore Resistance fans will no doubt like what Nihilistic have managed to get the Vita to do, but for everyone else this is little more than a competent, hard working game that ticks the right boxes but never really pushes the boat out. The graphics are hit and miss, the sound generally terrible and the controls need some work. But it's not a bad game.

As for the overall environments themselves, they definitely had some great ideas, but in the end they just don't seem to have the oomph to push you over the edge and be wowed by them.

Saying Burning Skies is a bit too linear for its own good would be a little bit unfair since the FPS genre has become synonymous with heavily scripted and action packed events. But that's exactly what is missing in Burning Skies: the action. [June 2012, p.84]

Burning Skies leaves little doubt that the Vita is a comfortable home for first-person shooters, but the platform's first FPS is disappointingly dated. Toothless enemies and simplistic level design make for tepid campaign action, and the solid multiplayer suite is too limited to be a big draw.

The story here is forgettable, the action is formulaic, and the multiplayer is simplistic.

Forgettable at best and a massive step backwards for a series that recently impressed so much. [Issue#219, p.70]

Familiar foes and even familiar ideas await to present a paint-by-numbers challenge. Despite occasional clipping, frequent atmosphere-breaking occurrences of bodies blinking out of existence, and an ally who literally warps to your next objective point, Burning Skies isn't a terrible game – it's just horribly average. Admirable ideas are matched by disappointing decisions. [July 2012, p80]

Resistance: Burning Skies should have been a must-have PlayStation Vita title, but in the rush to get the system's first dual analogue FPS out onto the market, Sony missed the Chimera's head with Riley's axe and chopped the legs right out from under it instead. It's discouraging to see, especially when Vita could greatly benefit from a solid first party release. The only thing burning in these Chimeran-infested skies here is a whole lot of wasted potential.

As a singleplayer experience, Burning Skies only manages to be mediocre with occasional surprises and fun. Flaws like overly relying on touch doesn't help either.

Resistance: Burning Skies is an excellent proof of concept. It is the tech demo that shows third-party publishers that first-person shooters can be achieved on the Vita hardware. It is by no means a crowning achievement. Instead, Nihilistic have opened the door for other, more accomplished developers to step through.

Developer Nihilistic seems settled on the idea that bringing Resistance to the Vita is an inherently bold and innovative move, and that doing anything truly interesting beyond that is unnecessary. It's not a strictly bad FPS, but it's so damn perfunctory, so set on ticking the absolute minimum number of boxes and moving on, it's largely boring and forgettable.

It's the little things that add up, one by one, to an often hypnotically bland, slapdash campaign. The core is sound enough, but Burning Skies is far too shabby in places for what is supposed to be the flagship first-party shooter on the Vita - indeed, the flagship shooter on handhelds, full stop.

Resistance: Burning Skies is a competent game that simply falls flat in just about every category. The shooting is mechanically sound, but never really interesting. The presentation is simply broken at times, and the cut scenes are downright embarrassingly low-resolution. The online is dismissive and the campaign is short and flat. It really feels like this is more of an example of what can be done with a shooter on the Vita, than a thought-out experience.

What happened? Boring graphics, too short a campaign and bad level design. Too bad.

Six hours of your life, roughly one hour per each level, will drain away, leaving you only with disappointment.

Resistance: Burning Skies feels like an unfinished proof of concept. It works, in that it functions and does what it promises to do, and even has some great ideas from a technical perspective, but the game that surrounds it never put me on the edge of my seat, or compelled me to play through it, unable to stop at a checkpoint and take care of important events in real life. It doesn't suck one in and its multiplayer, despite a level-unlock system and eventual access to the upgrades from the campaign, feels tinny and incomplete.

Sadly, Resistance's debut on the PS Vita is undone by the very concept it proves. In time, we may see first-person shooters thrive on this system, and that's a relief, but Burning Skies doesn't warrant a place among them.

It's technically flawed in some key ways, but the biggest sin that Resistance: Burning Skies commits is its top-to-bottom lack of ambition.

The series' modest ambitions are here scaled back to a glum inventory of FPS conventions, its spectacle dampened by hardware limitations and dormant art direction, and its platform-specific novelties largely revealed as fussy irritations, presumably born of a need to promote the struggling Vita's features.

First person shooters clearly do work on the PS Vita, but proving that fact is the only real achievement of this otherwise insipid portable experience.

The weapon variety that defines the series is flaccid at best, the story is forgettable, and the multiplayer isn't even as varied as the last handheld game in the series. It's hard to even recommend this one to gamers who've spent the last six years popping Chimera skulls.

Levels all feel constrictive, and the dour color palette doesn't help the dull nature of its locations. The start-to-sewer time is awfully short on this one.

Resist the urge to buy this game.