DogsWithoutWings.com Blog

Yes kids, before your time we didn't have this automatic health regeneration stuff. The whole purpose of the game was not to get shot, at all. Now you just run into a room guns blazing, then you rest for 5 seconds to heal your wounds like Wolverine. But back in the Contra days, bullets could be dodged, like the hero had permanent bullet time. So this type of gameplay seemed fair (yes, Contra didn't have health packs). Resistance does a regeneration/health pack hybrid that can be frustrating on the harder difficulty levels.

There are 4 levels of health, regeneration only takes you to the top of that level. Each health pack takes you back up one level. Not so bad? It is. Even on normal difficulty it only takes a few shots to remove 2-3 levels of health. Then you are back to playing hide and seek, taking one shot before waiting 5-6 seconds to recharge. The sequel actually abandoned this for the Gears of War style red screen when you are hurt, which made it a much more enjoyable game to play.

Maybe today's gamers are spoiled, but I don't miss heath packs either. I even returned Prince of Persia because there was too much backtracking to collect orbs, but that is for another article. Easy to learn, hard to master. Do it the Nintendo way.