F.E.A.R. Preview

On the surface, F.E.A.R. seems to be a marketing man’s dream. It ticks all the right boxes: bullet time, Japanese horror, all out action. All hot properties at the minute and the kind of elements that sell games. Unfortunately, the game doesn’t even need to be that good in order to take advantage of these aspects, so when early reports first came in, I have to admit that I was sceptical. I needn’t have been, as although F.E.A.R. could have indeed rested on these features, instead it blends them into one of the most accomplished FPS games I’ve ever played.

The demo which Vivendi showed us was from about half way through the game and gave us a good idea of what to expect from the full title. The first thing that we noticed was the visuals- they are stunning, and Monolith have promised that it won’t take some kind of monster PC to make it look this good either; always a welcome piece of news. Anyway, the demo thrusts you right into the action, with multiple enemies coming at you almost straight away. It’s here that you notice how intelligent the AI actually is. Unlike other games, the way the AI operates in F.E.A.R. means that 3 or 4 troopers could easily take you down, purely due to their teamwork. They react intelligently to threats and manoeuvre in an intelligent fashion to take you out. It’s a real challenge, but one that’s extremely satisfying to deal with.

The game is peppered with these encounters, making progress extremely risky. Fortunately for you, the main character has the ability to slow down time for a handful of seconds, greatly improving your chances. Indeed, everything about this ‘bullet-time’ mode works perfectly. Even the ‘clink’ of the bullet casings as they land on the floor sounds superb. It really shows the amount of work that Monolith have put into the game and their eye for detail. In fact, if this combat was all the game had to offer I’d say we’d be delighted. But no, there is an extra angle to the game that really elevates it above the rest.

You see, F.E.A.R. is primarily set in a huge futuristic building which has seen some strange goings on in the past – many people have died in mysterious circumstances. You’ve heard it all before, right? But this isn’t your traditional monster in the building routine; this is something that goes a lot deeper. Drawing its influences from The Ring and The Grudge, amongst many other Japanese films, the central terror in F.E.A.R. seems to be a little girl in a red dress. Indeed, even in the limited demo we played, her two appearances got the heart pounding. Looks like this is another one that won’t get played with the headphones on…

This game is already one of the most fun FPS games to play on the PC and it has stacks more scares than Doom 3. It looks, however, like a game that will refine the genre rather than try anything new, but when it plays this well, who cares? We eagerly await the final game.