F.E.A.R.

The sound is just fantastic. In 5.1 surround the positional effects are just great. On more than one occasion I brushed past a can or paint pot only to have it clatter to the ground behind me a few moments later causing my heart to leap and swing around gun at the ready to face a perceived threat. The music is fantastic too, although you can’t really call it music, more like sound effects or ‘ambience’. Dull, dark repetitive tones repeat themselves over and over, and really contribute to the eeriness of the game, and enhance the sense apprehension as you progress, building and dying back to create tension. The cinematics too contribute greatly to the atmosphere of the game. Some rather gruesome flashbacks and snippets of past events, as well as alternate reality scenes complete with hallways filled with blood really grab your attention and draw you into to the game world.

These ‘dream’ style sequences get more and more frequent as the game draws to a close and the last couple of levels hit a terrifying peak – my spine was shivering the whole way through the final level. In fact, you are a braver man than I if you manage to finish the game without a sick feeling in your stomach, a palpable sense of relief and a pair of extremely sweaty paws. All this sounds very good, although I do have one major criticism of F.E.A.R. – lack of variety.

There are very few environments, and the game mostly takes place in either offices or basements. While this works with the atmosphere Monolith are trying to create, it would have been nice to get outside for a breath of fresh air, or a change of scenery in a couple of levels. Even an action sequence other than the set-pieces would have been nice. Imagine some kind of car chase down the streets in slow motion – now that would have been something. It would also have been nice to see more variety in enemies. While those present in F.E.A.R. are really rather excellent, some of the best ones (my favorite being the guys wearing some kind of optical camouflage) don’t appear too often, and in general you are facing off against the same type of soldier throughout most of the game. Again, something new here would have been nice from time to time. Another little niggle is your team mates – if you can call them that. They are obviously more aware of the severity of the situation than you, seeing as they always seem to find a reason not to follow you into the action. So, don’t expect fancy team work – you are pretty much on your own the whole way through, bar the odd short appearance of one operative or another. If Monolith decide to follow up F.E.A.R. with a sequel, then it would be nice to see a couple of levels involving friendly NPC’s and a little team work. On the whole though, this is a minor criticism of what is in general a fantastic and compelling single player experience.