Terminator: Resistance – Useful Tips and Tricks

Skill points and how to invest & best ending guide!

Tips and Tricks

Here’s my logic, built in favor of better payoffs down the line at the expense of tougher fights early on.

Fast Learner – This should always be your biggest priority. Always take each rank as soon as they become available (Levels 1, 6, and 12). This way you get the maximum value out of the perk and you can reach the extremely valuable Rank 5 perks of other Skills (like 50% cheaper crafting) even sooner in the game.

Backpack – A fairly high priority. Carrying capacity is critical to carrying all your gear and making money.

Lockpicking – Also a priority. Good for maxing loot and it’s also a source for XP. Often new weapons and other gear are first available through locked doors. And personally I just cannot stand being locked out of areas. The good news is that locked doors usually appear in “open world” areas, so most of the time you can hold off on leveling up this skill until you’re wrapping up your work in that area.

Hacking – Like Lockpicking, but since the mechanic isn’t introduced until roughly 1/3 into the game, you shouldn’t be putting points into this early on. (Note that you get less XP for hacking turrets than destroying them, but a single hacked turret can be great for baiting enemies and killing them for XP and loot while saving ammo.).

Toughness – It’s hard not to like straightforward damage reduction, and it’s very worthwhile later in the game when you’re facing more head-on fights. I also really like the health regen at Rank 5, though by the time you can get it it’s not really as useful as it would have been earlier in the game. This should be a priority if you like shootouts, but if you prefer stealth and ambush gameplay you can hold off a bit on this (That said, stealth and ambush is the better tactic early on, so don’t be afraid to hold off on this until later in the game.).

Crafting – I like to put a single point into this early on for pipe grenades and then mostly ignore it until I’m close to Level 24 and can unlock the Rank 5 perk for 50% cheaper crafting.

Explosives – It’s the superior Combat skill in my opinion, and only takes three points to max out. Doesn’t need to be an immediate priority, but I like to max this out when laser traps start appearing to get the full value. Really, though, don’t neglect this too long; Skynet’s machines are tough and explosives are the best way to fight them.

Weapons – The perks of this skill are diverse and worthwhile, but I would say it’s often lower priority than many of the other perks. I wouldn’t bother taking Rank 1 at all until you’re ready to take Rank 2 right afterwards, but the shotgun has a fairly long life in this game and getting early access to plasma is a good deal, so it’s rarely a wrong choice to throw a point into this skill at any time.

Stealth – An easy pick for the least useful skill. The visual detection buff is mediocre, temporary target marking isn’t very useful when you have ultravision goggles for free from the beginning, and faster crouch-walking is nice but three skill points is a tall ask for just that. None of the perks benefit you in terms of extra XP, resources, or even damage output. It helps make Terminator knives more viable.

Enemies

Skynet will throw every machine it has at you. You’ve seen most of them before.

• Spider Scout – The easiest enemy you’ll face. 2-4 pistol shots will destroy these. Will always be more than 1 in an area.
• Armored Spider – Spider Scout’s big brother. There are crits on its front red-eye and on its back.
• Scout Drone – Flying machine that surveys areas. Easy to kill.
• Armored Drone – Same as Scout Drone but will have armor that it opens and closes. More defensive.
• Silverfish – Worm-like machines that hide in “plain sight” and act as landmines or homing landmines. If it sees you or you startle it, it charges at you and explodes. Easy to kill if it’s not moving.
• Plasma Turret – Immobile machines that fire at you. The 1st ones you see will have Red Plasma ammo and be easier than their big brother, Violet Plasma turrets, which are more defensive and stronger. They can’t hear anything, though. Most of them I hacked during the campaign as they really help to turn the tide and reserve ammo if you run low.
• T-800 – Very tough if we’re talking bullets. Plasma ammo will destroy them in seconds. Do not face them head-on without them. Carries 1 Red Plasma Rifle.
• T-808 Flamer – T-800 but with a flamethrower as its weapon. Shooting in its abdomen area (sometimes) or its back usually blows up the tank on its back.
• T-820 – More armor than T-800. Carries 1 Violet Plasma Rifle.
• T-825 – Identical armor to T-820. Carries 2 Red Plasma Rifles.
• T-825V – Same armor as T-825. Carries 2 Violet Plasma Rifles.
• T-850 – Very tough regardless of any weapon you use (until you get Violet Plasma weapons)
• T-47 – A big Mech-like machine. 1st ones you see will have miniguns, and the others with “Plasma” in front of T-47 will have Red Plasma weapons. When its health gets to about 75%, it will start firing rockets. You’ll see a red targeting laser when it is about to. Get behind cover. Its face is a good crit to keep aiming at.
• HK Aerial – Classic Hunter Killers. Has Red Plasma weapons and rockets. Any plasma weapons or rockets can hurt it, but I wouldn’t shoot Red Plasma weapons at it. It’ll take a long time.
• HK Tank – The building-sized machines with the traction of a tank. Has 4 machine guns. All of its working lights are crits, and so is the red spot on its back. Shooting its upper body with a rocket will stun it for 5 seconds.

Weapons

Miscellaneous Weapons

• Termination Knife – The only way to stealth-kill Terminators.
• Laser-Guided RL-43 – Rocket Launcher. Has a laser sight that guides the missiles. You’ll be using this against the HK Tank, HK Aerial, and whatever else you want to use it for.

Offensive Slot Throwables

• Laser Trap – Device that creates a laser and explodes upon anything that breaks its line of sight.
• Sticky Bomb – Plant these C4-like items in an area and you can detonate them all at the same time.
• Pipe Grenade – The basic grenade of the game. Does a lot of damage.
• Can Grenade – The big brother of pipe grenades. More powerful, but rarer.
• Sound Decoy – Use these to attract Silverfish in the area to it. If they didn’t move toward the sound decoy when you throw it, it’s not close enough.

Defensive Slot Items

• Medkit – Heals you. Medkit 1 heals you a little, and Medkit 2 heals a lot.
• Slow-Mo Stimulant – Slows time temporarily for about 20 seconds. I didn’t use any stimulant.
• Painkilling Stimulant – Increases endurance for 30 seconds.
• Speed Stimulant – Increases running speed for about 30 seconds.

General

Make use of ultravision – I walk around periodically stopping and doing a 360 scan of the area with ultravision. When I spot an enemy I do some scouting before taking it on to see what the approaches are and what backup it has. Generally I like to get a lot of cover and fall back positions for anything from the Spiders up. For the spiders I make sure I’ve got a good 20 feet between us and I don’t even bother approaching the Silverfish.

Looting – Loot absolutely everything. Look for the truck trailers that have a circled X on the back and bust them open with pipe bombs for plenty of resources and possibly some ammo and explosives. Put some of your upgrade points in to lock picking and hacking so you can get through doors and then later the Skynet crates.

Explosives – The pipe bomb starts off fairly weak and only gets worse until it is basically entirely replaced by the plasma grenade, but it is super useful for taking out small groups of spiders, small groups of silverfish and even for stunning a terminator momentarily for you to get your hits in. It can also make a dent in the bigger spiders. When you get the plasma grenade

Crafting – If you’re looting everything you should be able to go in to each mission with at least a couple of pipebombs, later the plasma grenades. You’ll also want to be crafting lock picks and med kits.

Weak spots – Generally if there is a red glow on an enemy, shoot that bit. For example, the larger spiders have a red area on their back as their main weak spot as well as their eye. Terminators are basically just the head and being easy to down with explosives so you can blast them while they’re on their back.

Turrets/hacking – When you get the hacking tool, you generally don’t want to destroy turrets. Get as close as you can without them having direct line of sight on you and switch to Ultravision so you can watch until they turn their arc away from you then run over to them so you’re directly behind them and hack them. The part where you meet your first terminator you can clean house if you’ve hack all the turrets. There is even a part where you’re supposed to hide an wait for a half dozen termis to walk past you but if you’ve hacked the turrets you just have to sit and wait for them to get mowed down.

Upgrades – When you get your first laser weapon (not too long after you meet your first Terminator) make sure to pay attention to the upgrades. If you’ve looted everything up to that point, you should be able to put 15/20 extra damage points and between 15/30% extra ammo. You need to keep on top of this as well because you’ll pick up better quality upgrades as you progress.

How to Unlock The Best Ending

Steps to getting the good ending:

• Early in the game, Ryan will want a tape recorder. So, be sure to find him one.
• Dr. Mack will give players an option to go on a mission to find a chip. Be sure to do it.
• A conversation with Erin will entail on her trying to figure out what happened to her husband. Tell her that he went to Mexico.
• Let Baron kick Ryan out by not helping him.
• Give Dr. Mack the chip after stealing it.
• Tell Jennifer and her brother to “leave the bunker” during the last conversation with her.