[Mechanical R]

F.E.A.R.


Published by: Vivendi Games
Developed by: Day 1 / Monolith Productions
Genre: First-Person Shooter
Number of Players: 1-2
Release Date:
US: October 31, 2006
Europe: November 10, 2006
Also Available On: PC, PlayStation 3


Features: 16:9 Support, 720p Support, Dolby Digital 5.1, Xbox Live, Memory Unit, Custom Soundtrack, Downloadable Content


Little girls with long black hair hit our screens and soil our pants...


-Overall: This game isn’t necessarily a must own for all Xbox 360 owners, but it’s a damn good game to have in your collection. Not only is the storyline unique and the atmosphere keeping even the steady of us quivering our trigger finger but its just an enjoyable game to play for either the serious gamer or the casual pick-up-and-play kind. Those of you who have played or own Condemned however, will thoroughly enjoy this.

-Music/sound: The weapons sound just how they should. These days its hard to find a gun in a game that doesn’t sound exactly how it should. The background music consists of eerie sounds to just add to the atmosphere the game builds. Although one thing I saw a lot is that sudden music (which is played in game in time with a ‘jump’ scene. Is often either played a second too soon, or the place is so dark you couldn’t tell something had happened. This often happens when a figure walks by a door or pokes its head around a corner, chances are if you missed it happening for whatever reason, the music will ruin it for you and you’ll know what to look for.

-Graphics: Graphics are really well done, it does have a ‘Half Life’ feel to it after all it being done by Sierra but its still a really good job putting the Next Gen graphics to great use. Elements are often the hardest things to create in a virtual world. Fire is used a lot in F.E.A.R. and its some of the best fire effects you’ll see, in any game this year. By seeing a screenshot or two, you’ll also have realized this game isn’t for the faint hearted. This game is one of the most gore filled you’ll get with blood spurting out of gun-shot wounds. Being able to decapitate or dismember enemies or even turn them into a cloud of thick blood and organs (all which cover the surrounding walls) and that’s only the shotgun. Other guns like the ‘Penetrator’ fires what could only be described at ‘metal stakes’ when shooting this the killing shot will throw the enemy backwards and pin him to the nearest wall or whatever is behind him, putting the physics into good use also. Body physics on enemies and your character are realistic with bodies flying from explosions and guards shooting their guns in the air as they fall. A plasma gun found late into the game strips enemies of skin and muscle to leave only a skeleton, charred, and if all is quiet…sizzling.

-Gameplay: The controls are relatively easy to get hold of, the addition with ‘Slo-Mo’ is your typical bullet time feature, only you don’t slow down as much, everything else does, as this slow motion feature is to your characters ‘heightened reflexes and senses’. Granted, your no Mr. Anderson, but it sure does help a 1:6 ratio. Its either you, or them. The path is pretty linear with the occasional moment of having to run around with your disastrous headlamp to find a way around some sort of obstacle. I say disastrous, I actually mean horrifically useless. A simple press of the D-Up and your path is lit up for you to see in those more than often dark areas. Only problem, it doesn’t seem to work quite well, it switches off after 45 seconds or less, leaving you in the dark to recharge it, granted it only takes a few seconds to recharge, but being apart of a national organization specifically built to be ready for paranormal encounters, a fully operational torch would be something on the Christmas list. Oh Santa?

-Storyline: To me, the storyline hasn’t quite made sense. Some guy named Fattel has cloned a battalion of soldiers. He controls them telepathically to aid him in his search to ‘free’ this little girl in red. From what I’ve discovered playing through, she’s not the kind of ghoul you want to sit down and chat with. Though the story isn’t told completely to you, and some of the times where they talk you can’t quite hear them through the coms clearly, the objectives are simple. You’re at point A. Go to point B to follow someone, search for something, or help someone. You’re more than happy to blast your way through to where you need to be. The only thing between you is a good 50+ men and some freaky encounters with something paranormal (I.E. Flashbacks or strange disintegrating people or that damn little girl and her flamey angst.

-Replay value/play time: With the 11 Intervals (Levels) this game will keep the average player going for a week or so depending on how much they play it. A hardcore gamer it’ll last them a day or two. Despite the objectives being straight forward, it does have its moments where you’re having to restart from the same checkpoint a few times. As well as the campaign there’s a really well made Online game. With a variety of maps and all the guns there to keep you company, along with achievements which require 50 kills with each weapon per achievement. The maps are also quite fun to play around with. There’s also an ‘Instant Action’ mode, which is basically a Quick start game, where you start in certain areas featured in the Campaign and go through in a time limit killing tons of enemies they throw at you, almost like a survival but your actually following a path and not staying in one place, there’s about 5 maps to this with a number of extra difficulties. A few of the achievements can add to length also with 2 achievements, 1 requiring you to go through the game with NO slo motion. And 1 requiring NO health boosts (These are things you find hidden in little areas of the game that sometimes aren’t easy to find, the will add 5% to your health each time starting from 100).

-Conclusion: Calling out all gamers who like something different, enjoy something to scare them and have a good loyal dry cleaners who doesn’t mind washing your underpants. This game is something to have in your collection. You may fly through the campaign relatively easy but the online is something that has me still loading this game back up time after time.

XBLA Gallery, F.E.A.R. screenshots

Official F.E.A.R. website

[L0CI]

Moved to the reviews section, nice review and many thanks for the contribution

My little add: I've owned this game since release day and to be honest I've overlooked it in favour of COD3 and, more recently, GoW. What I can say however is, now that FEAR has managed to claim a little more of my time, I'm actually enjoying it more than either of those games I just mentioned...

[rockzilla]

L0CI, on Dec 6 2006, 11:55 PM, said:

I'm actually enjoying it more than either of those games I just mentioned...

Bloody Hell! I have always liked the look of it and planned to get it around Febuary, once I have finished the afore mentioned games, and R6V and Lost planet, and viva..and and and and, too many games!

[(MRC)M@Ginty]

Overall a very good review.

Just to fill you in on the story, If you dont want to know the plot DO NOT READ THIS!








SPOLIER alert!
The little girl is called Ulma (might be the wrong spelling) and she is the product of an experiment to create super-soldiers. She was impregnated (artificially i hope) and gave birth at the age of 14. The character you play is actually her son and due to the experiments on Ulma you have uncharted reflexes and speed (for a limited time using the adrenalin bar). Fattel it turns out is your brother and the second child of Ulma, he is a psychic commander with a full battalion of soldiers that he controls telepathically. Thile this is only the very basics of the story the details are filled in along the way. Checking awnsering machines and accessing computers tells you everything you need to know about the story.

The 360 offering is the same as on the PC (the 360 has an extra instant action mode), and appart from having to use the far more inferior pad to control movement it should deliver the same outstanding experience that have won it acclaim on the PC.

[L0CI]

rockzilla, on Dec 7 2006, 09:21 AM, said:

Bloody Hell! I have always liked the look of it and planned to get it around Febuary, once I have finished the afore mentioned games, and R6V and Lost planet, and viva..and and and and, too many games!

I advise you do, it's well worth picking up . The enemy AI is fairly well done and while they still suffer from the odd 'stand still while being shot at' moment, the clone squads do seem to work as a team in keeping you pinned down while a sneaky flanking manouvre is attempted, for example. You wonder where those extra few clones went that were in the room in front of you? They've backtracked halfway around the level to shoot you in the "naughty word alert" while you're busy . The weapons are enjoyable and it's always good fun to listen to the enemys plans over the comms before lobbing a grenade around the corner, switching on slo-mo then lifting the remaining one or two 10 feet through the air with a shotgun... all while enjoying the slow motion screaming going on in the background. You definitely know you're holding a gun in this game .

[R31DY]

It has THE BEST offline story (when I say that I mean the story line, AI, guns and atmosphere) of any action game on the 360. The only better offline game so far has to be Oblivion.......but that's not an action game . When you've completed it you feel as though you've just played through a 10 hour horror movie, Awesome!

[LegacyAxis]

I must admit I am a big fan of this game but I haven't played the story game much, I've been drawn to the online sessions cause their so much fun and with GOW and R6 Vegas now in my collection I can see it taking a back seat,

going to have to put some time aside for it tho