Confirmed: Resistance Retribution is awesome

PSP may not have had an overwhelming amount of surprises at E3 this year, but one announcement can make up for an otherwise tame conference. Resistance Retribution is on its way to becoming one of the best games on PSP, bar none.

Simply listing all of Resistance's features doesn't convey the simple fact that Resistance Retribution is a lot of fun. Being able to switch to an auto-target and manual aiming mode on the fly is what really makes Resistance as playable as it is. It may seem strange at first, but pressing the Left button on the D-Pad to toggle between manual and auto aim comes rather easily. The proximity of the Left button in relation to the L shoulder button makes it an intuitive change. We were able to take cover, pop out and take out a few enemies, and then aim at a few snipers afar without struggling at all. Once again, Bend has crafted a control scheme that takes PSP's limitations into consideration.

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At this point it should go without saying that the graphics of Resistance Retribution are stellar. However, it's hard to convey how smoothly the action runs on the PSP. We didn't run into any dips in framerate, in spite of the number of enemies and particles being rendered on the screen. It's incredible to see how much power the team at Bend has managed to squeeze out of the system. It really has us wondering if they've managed to get everything possible out of PSP (we cannot imagine games looking better than this).

Although we were unable to play the multiplayer, we were thoroughly impressed by the single player demo. Even the load times appear to be rather respectable. While the game is loading, players will be treated to a mission briefing which gives them everything they need to know about the upcoming level. A small change like that shows the developer's insight into the PSP. Too bad we'll have to wait until 2009 for what will undoubtedly be one of PSP's finer games.