"There is nothing to fear, but F.E.A.R. itself..."

Labelled a "classic in the making" by several gaming magazines and websites, Monolith's new FPS-Horror game definitely lived up to my expectations and then stomped them into the ground, and left me desperate for more.

STORY: 10/10
You're the new guy at the F.E.A.R. team, "First Encounter Assault Recon". Some heavy stuff is going down at a military facility with psychic experiments. A man, Paxton Fettel, was genetically engineered to be a psychic commander of "Replica Soldiers", mindless beings that are totally controlled. He breaks down, breaks out, kills alot of people, and it's your job to go in and take him down. Throughout the game, and there is a fair lot of game to go through, there's twists, turns, revelations, and a hella lot of scares. It kept me hooked enough to take a sick day to finish it... and I don't regret losing a day's pay.

GRAPHICS: 9/10
Brilliant graphics; set a new standard. My system had to have them toned down a bit (I run a 3.2ghz,512ddr-ram,radeon9600XT), but it was still amazing. The requirements are incredibly demanding, however, which is a minus for people who don't have a total high-end system. All the basic graphics (characters, weapons, environment) are complemented by the fantastic special effects of explosions, electricity, and other things you see later in the game. And the "visions" your character has are done very well, achieving the right feeling.

SOUND:10/10
The scenes were totally set by the environment and background noises, and all the weapon noises sounded perfect. Enemy dialogue is even spot-on, with them reacting to what you actually do, and not just spouting random lines programmed in. They scream in terror when you throw a grenade, beg for reinforcements when you kill off most of their squad, and converse with one another. (Two were hiding behind cover from me once, and one said, "He's there. Move out!", and the other replied in total terror, "No ****ing way!") All the sound is interactive and really immersive. The rest of the voice actors do an awesome job.

CONTROLS: 10/10
Throughout the game, I didn't change a single button of the controls, and they felt fine to me the whole way through. If they don't feel right, however, they can be extensively modified in the options menu, so in essence, there is nothing wrong with them.

GAMEPLAY: 9.5/10
The developers of this game promised so much, and delivered even more. The controls and aiming all react perfectly, the weapons handle great with functioning recoil, there's a few "mini-puzzles" to do for things like locked doors and all that, you get a SloMo function that adds a new dimension to gunning down your enemies, but the real meat of the gameplay is fighting the enemy.

The A.I. in this game is beyond compare to any other shooter. Quake 4, Doom 3, Call of Duty 2 (demo), none of these can compare. Whereas enemies from other shooters follow the typical rule of "swarm, charge, or superpowerful enemies", F.E.A.R. enemies are out to get you in ways that work. I've been boxed into corners to be grenaded, I've been lured around corners to stare right at a shotgun barrel, I've had to chase guys up and down ladders, and I've often had to flee and re-think my strategies. Played on normal difficulty, mind you. I would expect it to be frustrating, but it's exhilarating to take on enemies that crawl under vehicles, dive through windows, and generally follow strategies that are really impressive. Maybe when I use these examples, they're not coming off as very "strategic" things, but when you see some of the things these enemies do, you're pushed to the limit to beat them because they never get stale.

Multiplayer is great fun. It's fast and furious, it doesn't take much to kill or be killed, and you're much better off to work with tactics than run-and-gun, no matter how fun the firefights are. You get your DM, TeamDM, CTF, Elimination, and TeamElimination modes, and they can all have the "SloMo" spin out on them - somewhere, in the map, there will be the SloMo powerup (with a waypoint marker so everyone on the game can track it down), and whoever gets it can use the SloMo when it charges up. Overall, the weapons are somewhat balanced, but there are those that believe some weapons are broken in multiplayer. I'm tempted to disagree with that - I constantly get beaten by my friend who uses pistols against my G2A2.

OVERALL: 9/10
A fantastic game that achieves what it aimed for and goes even further. Fast and furious firefights are balanced out by the insanely creepy atmosphere and scares you get on the way through. It doesn't quite reach a full 10 because, as with any game, there's a couple nagging faults you notice through the game that could be improved. That doesn't take away from the game much at all, but it would be nice to touch up such things.

A brilliant game. Congrats to Monolith for their work.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 10/21/05