Glad to know I can ignore the recruit system. I will play through the game now. I just thought you would lose out on key weapons and such without using the recruit system. If not then I will continue through the game.

I barely used it, but its a great addition IMO if you want to experiment with more gameplay variaty ;)

You will lose key weapons. You will lose your ability to scout for new locations. If you don't recruit, you're going to need a guide so you can put your spies in the right location to gain necessary intel to further the game. If you want to skip the process, then at least use the cheats to get the boss characters, as you're going to need a few people. Many boss fights are purposely difficult because they expect you to run through a few people while wearing the boss' power down as the bosses do not regenerate their power as long as you have men in your mission left(up to 4).

If you want an easier way to recruit that isn't so time consuming, don't drag bodies back to the truck. Knock out someone, and box yourself right there. Retrieve one of your other men from the truck area and get them to the area where your former guy is before the bad guy wakes up and drag that guy a few feet to the box where your partner is. You call the codec and they both return to the truck while you continue the mission.

Also if you travel with your PSP a lot, each WiFi spot in the world has a different character you can recruit simply by going to the WiFi section of the game and tapping the O button to build power.

Loved it. Recruiting can be kinda annoying, but I like the Pokemon collecting thing, so it was up my alley.