[Zack]

The Prologue:
Three weeks ago, I borrowed a couple of action games from this guy, Justin, who is one of my friends, and works with me at the Breckenridge Stadium 12 Theater in Little Rock. The games he let me borrow were Max Payne 2, and F.E.A.R., the newest game from one of my favorite developers, Monolith. Monolith has made some excellent action games throughout the years, like for example The Operative: No One Lives Forever, No One Lives Forever 2: A Spy in H.A.R.M.S. Way, and Tron 2.0, all of which I own. I first played Max Payne 2, and I really enjoyed playing it, but at the same time I thought it was way too tough (I kept dying a lot towards the end). Then last week, I decided to try out F.E.A.R. As excited as I was to play this game, I was worried that my computer wouldn't be able to play it very smoothly, because I had learned that it needed at least a 3ghz machine, for the recommended system requirements. But as soon as I started it, I was pleased to see that it would automatically analyse your computer to see what would be the proper settings to play the game. That was already a big plus to me. After I set the controls to the way I preferred, I happily started it up. I also played it in 800x600 resolution, and it played very buttery-smooth.

The plot:
In case if you've been wondering what F.E.A.R. stands for, it's "First Encounter Assault Recon." The F.E.A.R. squad is a group of professionally trained soldiers that deals with paranormal activities, such as evil spirits and ghosts. Think of Ghostbusters, only grimmer and darker. You play a newly recruited nameless, and faceless soldier who has joined the F.E.A.R. squad. The reason you have been chosen to join the squad is because you have incredibly fast reflexes, and you can use those reflexes to help the squad out when they are in heated firefights. A soldier named Paxton Fettel, has for some unknown reason, gone insane, and is controlling an army of cloned soldiers by telekinesis. He and his men storm a high-tech lab facility called "Armacham", and take hostages, but no demands are made. A Special Forces unit goes to the Armacham building to find out what is going on there, and they all suddenly disappear without a trace. So, The F.E.A.R. squad is sent on a mission to find out what happened to the Special Forces Unit, and also find Paxton, and eliminate him, so his psychic link to the cloned soldiers will be destroyed. What starts a simple mission to kill a very evil person turns into a nightmare, as the recruit not only has to defend himself from the cloned soldiers, while on the mission to find Paxton, but he also encounters a deadly supernatural creature that looks like a human girl, and has the ability to mess people's minds up, and even tear them apart, too.

The Synopsis:

I finished playing F.E.A.R. last night, about 11:40p.m., and I have to say that it is the best game I have played so far this year! Everything about it is awesome. The combat is exciting and frenetic, and the cloned soldiers seemed to act like real people because they were always in teams when I fought them. They would always try to flank me, whenever I stayed in one position, and vice-versa. The physics in the game are really good. Whenever, you fire a gun in the action sequences, huge bullet holes will get torn into the wall, and dirt and dust will spill all over the area you're in, causing your vision to get blurry, which might give the cloned soldiers the chance to attack you if you're not careful. The soldiers will also fall down like rag dolls in a very realistic way when you kill them. The recruit's incredibly fast reflexes is what Monolith calls "Slow Mo", and it's basically a new version of the Bullet- time used in the Max Payne games (I would know because I got the chance to use it a lot in Max Payne 2). When you press the button you've assigned to activate the Slow Mo feature, everything slows down suddenly, even the cloned soldiers who attack you. You can then run around the screen firing your guns wildly at any enemy that is trying to kill you, until either the meter that measures how much time you have left to use the Slow-Mo empties out and has to recharge, or do a melee attack on them if they get to close. You can also do a melee attack on the enemies without the Slow-Mo, too.

The Melee attacks you can do on enemies is WICKEDLY COOL! You can headbutt a cloned soldier with the gun you're using, or jump in the air and do a martial arts kick at their face. I felt like laughing the first time that I did a martial arts kick on a cloned soldier, because it was just so awesome to see that happen. So, I'm going to put this smilie on here just to show you what it felt like to watch that happen Overall, I often used the walls as cover when I fought the Cloned Soldiers, and used the Slow-MO only when I really needed to. So, to make a long story short, I did a little of both.

The graphics were awesome, too, and looked very realistic, especially the character models for the members of the F.E.A.R. Squad. I have to agree, though that there didn't seem to be much variety in the gameplay levels because they always took place at these high-tech looking buildings, and they were always set at night. But that's just a minor complaint.

F.E.A.R. isn't just all-out-action, although there is plenty of shooting sequences to justify calling it a First-Person Shooter. It's also the scariest game I've ever played, because of how successfully Monolith managed to combine creepy horror with the shooting sequences. Almost everything that happens in the game is completely unexpected. The game urges you to explore your surroundings, while taking a little breather from the tough fight you might've had with a group of cloned soldiers, and while that happens, you may see the character you're playing suddenly start hallucinating, seeing things that shouldn't be there. Without spoiling anything, the end level was the freakiest level I have ever played in an action game. There's also a surprise twist towards the end of the game that you may not see coming.

The Overall Verdict:

So, that's the review of F.E.A.R. As I said earlier, this is the best game that I've played so far this year, even though it was released in 2005. It's super scary, it's got great shooting action with A.I. that's on the level of Half-Life 2 and it's got a good amount of exploration. Three elements succesfully combined together in one game, WOW! I must heavily applaud Monolith for being brave enough to make a brand new and original game for gamers who are fans of action games. That said, I must say that the game isn't perfect but what game is? It's fairly short, and it will take you probably about 15-20 hours to finish playing (that's how long it took me to play it). It also has a character that you hear a lot in recorded messages, but never get to see in person. The ending was awesome, but it seemed to not be fully complete, like it had intentionally left room for a sequel. Finally it felt like there wasn't much variety in the levels. You were basically by yourself the whole time fighting the bad guys, and I think it would've been better to have at least two or three other members of the F.E.A.R. squad fighting by your side. Other than that, there's nothing else I can think of to complain about. I strongly recommend that fans of First-Person Shooter Games play this game. It was unlike anything I've ever played, and I absolutely loved it.

4 1/2 out of 5 Stars is my overall score for this game.

I hope you enjoyed reading the review for this game as much as I enjoyed writing it. Feel free to write any comments on this review if you want too.

[avatar_58]

Since the beta FEAR became one of my fav shooters, right up there with the original doom and half-life 1. The combat was very original, with the melee, slow-mo and special effects.

GOTY 2005 in my opinion. This year that honour goes to Oblivion unless a game down the line can change my opinion....and at this point thats hard to believe.