Easily has the most dialogue and clear motivations among protagonists out of the trilogy and its to the game's benefit. The first two games generally involved plucky young girls trapped in unforeseen circumstances. Just walk out! You can leave! If it sucks, hit da bricks!
But The Tormented focuses on something human and commonplace: grief and how we cope with it. It gives the entire franchise's characters some focus to resolve their pain, while still telling a great original horror tragedy. This all-encompassing grief truly haunts the heroes, metaphorically and literally, and its much harder to escape. And it becomes much more relatable horror as a result. How do you fight GRIEF?
It just works! I don't think its as scary or tragic as 2 or as foundational as 1, but its one of the most rounded of the franchise. This trilogy should be celebrated.
But The Tormented focuses on something human and commonplace: grief and how we cope with it. It gives the entire franchise's characters some focus to resolve their pain, while still telling a great original horror tragedy. This all-encompassing grief truly haunts the heroes, metaphorically and literally, and its much harder to escape. And it becomes much more relatable horror as a result. How do you fight GRIEF?
It just works! I don't think its as scary or tragic as 2 or as foundational as 1, but its one of the most rounded of the franchise. This trilogy should be celebrated.
Happy 18th anniversary to Fatal Frame III: The Tormented. The timing of this review was purely coincidental!
Iconic as Crimson Butterfly is, this one, for me, takes the cake. I found the SH4-esque home setting to have the most unnerving scares (the feet!); the story does a good job of intertwining characters from previous games into a new and engaging story predominantly about the three G’s: Guilt, Grief and… Ghosts. The characters and environments radiate more depth and detail than before - the ghost faces are terrifying up close. The utterly timeless gameplay mechanic of the camera obscura remains unchanged, but if it ain’t broke…
A couple of gripes keep this from the full 5 stars. The level design can sometimes appear samey - I enjoyed getting familiar with the layout and navigating the various hidden passageways but sometimes it’s hard remembering which brown, washed out room is which, making for a lot of frustrating back and forth. The enemy boss fights overlap a delicate line between satisfyingly challenging and just plain annoying - those fucking flying Priestess Girls UGH.
But even at its most testing, the strange atmosphere and PS2 charm kept me coming back. And even now upon completing the game I find the urge to revisit the Mansion of Sleep and uncover numerous secrets I will have missed. I myself have become tormented.
Iconic as Crimson Butterfly is, this one, for me, takes the cake. I found the SH4-esque home setting to have the most unnerving scares (the feet!); the story does a good job of intertwining characters from previous games into a new and engaging story predominantly about the three G’s: Guilt, Grief and… Ghosts. The characters and environments radiate more depth and detail than before - the ghost faces are terrifying up close. The utterly timeless gameplay mechanic of the camera obscura remains unchanged, but if it ain’t broke…
A couple of gripes keep this from the full 5 stars. The level design can sometimes appear samey - I enjoyed getting familiar with the layout and navigating the various hidden passageways but sometimes it’s hard remembering which brown, washed out room is which, making for a lot of frustrating back and forth. The enemy boss fights overlap a delicate line between satisfyingly challenging and just plain annoying - those fucking flying Priestess Girls UGH.
But even at its most testing, the strange atmosphere and PS2 charm kept me coming back. And even now upon completing the game I find the urge to revisit the Mansion of Sleep and uncover numerous secrets I will have missed. I myself have become tormented.
Personal Rant:
Having been 5 months since my dad died, this game has been a personal purgatory to me. Wanting to see a loved one again is what makes crying so damn hard but it won't bring them back.
Instead I have to look to the now and the future.
Keep on living, even with the pain.
Actual Review:
This game is the definition if dreams could kill you in your sleep.
Rei is my most favourite character in the franchise and I will not take any exceptions. I understood her pain and grief in wanting things to stay the same but deep down, we have to move forward, carrying the memories of those who we love and never forget them.
Also Kei sections are a literal pain like ugh hate that fucking fetch quest of the pieces also hurray for more Miku 8D
Having been 5 months since my dad died, this game has been a personal purgatory to me. Wanting to see a loved one again is what makes crying so damn hard but it won't bring them back.
Instead I have to look to the now and the future.
Keep on living, even with the pain.
Actual Review:
This game is the definition if dreams could kill you in your sleep.
Rei is my most favourite character in the franchise and I will not take any exceptions. I understood her pain and grief in wanting things to stay the same but deep down, we have to move forward, carrying the memories of those who we love and never forget them.
Also Kei sections are a literal pain like ugh hate that fucking fetch quest of the pieces also hurray for more Miku 8D
This review contains spoilers
What a rollercoaster. When playing Fatal Frame 3, at times I felt this is one of the best games I've ever played, other times I felt the game was a drag that I wanted to get through asap and everything inbetween.
The setup is the best one yet, the game opens up with the main character, Rei, getting up from a car crash which takes her fiancé's life, we then cut to her working as a freelance photographer when she sees a vision of Yuu and follows him into the manor of sleep. The setup establishes the themes that permeate throughout the rest of the game like Grief, Guilt and Loss and I also find it neat how this time, it makes sense for the main character to be well versed in using a camera. This stuff is great, but the best parts of the story for me are when you explore the apartment and really see how empty and meaningless Rei's life became after Yuu's death. The core of this plot is incredibly strong and I do like the stuff with Miku experiencing survivor's guilt too. The supernatural aspects like the tattooed priestess' being harvesters of sorrow and how Reika was awakened from her slumber were pretty solid aswell. One of my favourite parts of the game was learning about how the manor of sleep affects people in the real world, making them sleep more and more as they're lured deeper into the manor until they disappear entirely. There's a lot of things I enjoyed about this games story, but the thing that hurts it is how much detail the game tries to cram into notes and it is beyond excessive. It's not uncommon for notes to be 10 or more pages long and they often elaborate on things that are completely trivial like explaining song lyrics. They're meant to flesh out the story but all these really do is detract from the stuff I cared about and the plot can feel downright muddled at times. Despite this, the game manages to absolutely nail the ending. Rei spends the whole game chasing Yuu as he walks away from her and even after seeing what going too far into the manor does to people like Miku, she still insists on going after her dead loved one. Then, Yuu finally turns around and lets Rei know that she has to continue living her life, to carry on his memory as he literally takes away her pain in the form of the tattoo curse. The entire ending just gave me goosebumps, something that very few games do.
I mentioned in my earlier reviews how I found 1s combat to be frustrating whereas 2s was too easy, 3 hits the right balance as enemies are faster than in 2 but don't teleport too much. The combat is a bit of a mix of the past games with damage being based again on how long you hover the capture circle over the ghosts but you can still wait for enemies to get close and land a Fatal Frame shot if you want to play the game like 2. The game also doesn't bombard you with healing items, I only had around 3-5 at my disposal in each chapter so I still felt that tension when having to fight a ghost. Another really cool addition is that now you can also toggle through different film types with the d-pad instead of having to open up the menu every single time which helps combat encounters flow better.
This game also probably has my favourite sound design thus far. A lot of the sounds just stick out to me a bit more than in the past games, notably the crackling static sounds of some enemies like the tattooed woman or the needle woman, or the insanely loud heartbeat sounds that occur when you're looking in through a peep-hole. The sounds can be ear-grating at times but in a weird way, I think this works. It's a horror game, it's not meant to make you feel good when playing it, and the annoying sounds just add to the stressful atmosphere for me.
This is also easily the scariest game yet. There are a good few times I yelled out loud because the scares got me that good and then I proceeded to smile right after because the scare was just crafted so well. There are too many to point out but some of my favourite would be how if you take a photo of the back of the ghost in the Kimono, she'll jump right into your face. The reason this one works so well is because prior to this, I spent 2 games taking photos of ghosts and usually when they have their back to you, that means they're harmless and you can take a photo of them for free points and then this one flips that entire mechanic on its head. Another one of my favourites is in the projector room and how if you play the Unknown tape, it'll just play a reel of the projector room itself and you see a ghost appear on it. I also like the more subtle scares with the apparitions that appear in Rei's house, especially the ones that show up in the bathroom. The cutscenes are also the scariest ones yet, especially the iconic one that happens after Rei wakes up in one chapter. I also really like the interior design of the manor, aside from blood stains, you also get imprints of faces on the walls and even limbs sticking out of them. I can gush about the scares in this game all day honestly and there's a lot I missed in the form of optional ghosts but they're easily the highlight of the game for me.
With all this praise you'd think this is easily my favourite of the series and at parts I felt like it was, but this games fatal flaw, its achiles' heel, its hamartia is how it's structured. The only area you explore in this game outside of Rei's house is the manor of sleep and it is ginormous. With each chapter, the area gets bigger and the backtracking takes longer and it is less and less clear on where to go. I tried being super patient with the game and going at a slow pace but that didn't help much, getting through this game is simply exhausting and a big reason why is due to how long it is. Fatal Frame took me 7 hours, 2 took me 9, this game took me 14 and the majority of it I've already forgotten about because it just felt like padding. The game doesn't really justify it's length at all with how repetitive it is, one of the most egregious examples would be the ghost in the Kimono room, I swear, you have to fight her about 6 times throughout the game. What makes it worse is the fact that the game has multiple characters, outside of Rei you'll be playing as Miku and Kei. Each character has separate upgrades you can buy for them but Rei is the one you'll be using the most so you're best off saving all your points to use on her, the problem is though that this makes Miku's and especially Kei's chapters feel worse to play. In their chapters you'll visit areas that are just copy and pasted from Fatal Frame 1 and 2. Sure, there is a reason for this since the manor of sleep is meant to be an amalgamation of memories that haunt the people that inhabit it, but from a gameplay perspective it still just feels like cheap way of extending gametime. Miku and Kei have unique gameplay mechanics that differentiate them from Rei, Miku can have an additional charge of the camera obscura stored to do massive damage, she can slow down enemies with the press of the circle button and she can crawl through tight spaces where she may fight a woman under the floorboards which might just be the scariest ghost encounter in the series for me. Kei on the other hand.....well he can hide with the circle button but that does nothing and you're better off just running past any enemy you see because Kei does piss poor damage and the times you're forced to defeat all the ghosts in a room with him before you can proceed are probably the worst parts of the game for me. It also doesn't help that I don't really give a shit about Kei as a character, he's Mio and Mayu's uncle and it's why he goes through areas from the second game in his chapters but I thought 2 had such a good, standalone story that I didn't really care for seeing it getting needlessly expanded upon through his character. You also don't see him until the latter half of the game, prior to that he only exists in letters so it's harder to care about him.
Some other things bother me too, from the lag that happens when you try opening a door in the PS2 version, to the controls being different and requiring some adjustment, to how film 14 resets with each chapter which makes saving them up feel meaningless. There's really more to criticise about this game than there is to praise, and yet the things that stick with me and leave a lasting impression are the things that the game does well. The story, the themes, the scares, the ending are what I think about days after beating it. This is definitely in the same realm as games like Silent Hill 4 and Vagrant Story for me, a game marred with flaws, but one that remains fascinating throughout and for everything it does wrong, it's still a game I'm glad I played even if it's definitely a one and done for me.
The setup is the best one yet, the game opens up with the main character, Rei, getting up from a car crash which takes her fiancé's life, we then cut to her working as a freelance photographer when she sees a vision of Yuu and follows him into the manor of sleep. The setup establishes the themes that permeate throughout the rest of the game like Grief, Guilt and Loss and I also find it neat how this time, it makes sense for the main character to be well versed in using a camera. This stuff is great, but the best parts of the story for me are when you explore the apartment and really see how empty and meaningless Rei's life became after Yuu's death. The core of this plot is incredibly strong and I do like the stuff with Miku experiencing survivor's guilt too. The supernatural aspects like the tattooed priestess' being harvesters of sorrow and how Reika was awakened from her slumber were pretty solid aswell. One of my favourite parts of the game was learning about how the manor of sleep affects people in the real world, making them sleep more and more as they're lured deeper into the manor until they disappear entirely. There's a lot of things I enjoyed about this games story, but the thing that hurts it is how much detail the game tries to cram into notes and it is beyond excessive. It's not uncommon for notes to be 10 or more pages long and they often elaborate on things that are completely trivial like explaining song lyrics. They're meant to flesh out the story but all these really do is detract from the stuff I cared about and the plot can feel downright muddled at times. Despite this, the game manages to absolutely nail the ending. Rei spends the whole game chasing Yuu as he walks away from her and even after seeing what going too far into the manor does to people like Miku, she still insists on going after her dead loved one. Then, Yuu finally turns around and lets Rei know that she has to continue living her life, to carry on his memory as he literally takes away her pain in the form of the tattoo curse. The entire ending just gave me goosebumps, something that very few games do.
I mentioned in my earlier reviews how I found 1s combat to be frustrating whereas 2s was too easy, 3 hits the right balance as enemies are faster than in 2 but don't teleport too much. The combat is a bit of a mix of the past games with damage being based again on how long you hover the capture circle over the ghosts but you can still wait for enemies to get close and land a Fatal Frame shot if you want to play the game like 2. The game also doesn't bombard you with healing items, I only had around 3-5 at my disposal in each chapter so I still felt that tension when having to fight a ghost. Another really cool addition is that now you can also toggle through different film types with the d-pad instead of having to open up the menu every single time which helps combat encounters flow better.
This game also probably has my favourite sound design thus far. A lot of the sounds just stick out to me a bit more than in the past games, notably the crackling static sounds of some enemies like the tattooed woman or the needle woman, or the insanely loud heartbeat sounds that occur when you're looking in through a peep-hole. The sounds can be ear-grating at times but in a weird way, I think this works. It's a horror game, it's not meant to make you feel good when playing it, and the annoying sounds just add to the stressful atmosphere for me.
This is also easily the scariest game yet. There are a good few times I yelled out loud because the scares got me that good and then I proceeded to smile right after because the scare was just crafted so well. There are too many to point out but some of my favourite would be how if you take a photo of the back of the ghost in the Kimono, she'll jump right into your face. The reason this one works so well is because prior to this, I spent 2 games taking photos of ghosts and usually when they have their back to you, that means they're harmless and you can take a photo of them for free points and then this one flips that entire mechanic on its head. Another one of my favourites is in the projector room and how if you play the Unknown tape, it'll just play a reel of the projector room itself and you see a ghost appear on it. I also like the more subtle scares with the apparitions that appear in Rei's house, especially the ones that show up in the bathroom. The cutscenes are also the scariest ones yet, especially the iconic one that happens after Rei wakes up in one chapter. I also really like the interior design of the manor, aside from blood stains, you also get imprints of faces on the walls and even limbs sticking out of them. I can gush about the scares in this game all day honestly and there's a lot I missed in the form of optional ghosts but they're easily the highlight of the game for me.
With all this praise you'd think this is easily my favourite of the series and at parts I felt like it was, but this games fatal flaw, its achiles' heel, its hamartia is how it's structured. The only area you explore in this game outside of Rei's house is the manor of sleep and it is ginormous. With each chapter, the area gets bigger and the backtracking takes longer and it is less and less clear on where to go. I tried being super patient with the game and going at a slow pace but that didn't help much, getting through this game is simply exhausting and a big reason why is due to how long it is. Fatal Frame took me 7 hours, 2 took me 9, this game took me 14 and the majority of it I've already forgotten about because it just felt like padding. The game doesn't really justify it's length at all with how repetitive it is, one of the most egregious examples would be the ghost in the Kimono room, I swear, you have to fight her about 6 times throughout the game. What makes it worse is the fact that the game has multiple characters, outside of Rei you'll be playing as Miku and Kei. Each character has separate upgrades you can buy for them but Rei is the one you'll be using the most so you're best off saving all your points to use on her, the problem is though that this makes Miku's and especially Kei's chapters feel worse to play. In their chapters you'll visit areas that are just copy and pasted from Fatal Frame 1 and 2. Sure, there is a reason for this since the manor of sleep is meant to be an amalgamation of memories that haunt the people that inhabit it, but from a gameplay perspective it still just feels like cheap way of extending gametime. Miku and Kei have unique gameplay mechanics that differentiate them from Rei, Miku can have an additional charge of the camera obscura stored to do massive damage, she can slow down enemies with the press of the circle button and she can crawl through tight spaces where she may fight a woman under the floorboards which might just be the scariest ghost encounter in the series for me. Kei on the other hand.....well he can hide with the circle button but that does nothing and you're better off just running past any enemy you see because Kei does piss poor damage and the times you're forced to defeat all the ghosts in a room with him before you can proceed are probably the worst parts of the game for me. It also doesn't help that I don't really give a shit about Kei as a character, he's Mio and Mayu's uncle and it's why he goes through areas from the second game in his chapters but I thought 2 had such a good, standalone story that I didn't really care for seeing it getting needlessly expanded upon through his character. You also don't see him until the latter half of the game, prior to that he only exists in letters so it's harder to care about him.
Some other things bother me too, from the lag that happens when you try opening a door in the PS2 version, to the controls being different and requiring some adjustment, to how film 14 resets with each chapter which makes saving them up feel meaningless. There's really more to criticise about this game than there is to praise, and yet the things that stick with me and leave a lasting impression are the things that the game does well. The story, the themes, the scares, the ending are what I think about days after beating it. This is definitely in the same realm as games like Silent Hill 4 and Vagrant Story for me, a game marred with flaws, but one that remains fascinating throughout and for everything it does wrong, it's still a game I'm glad I played even if it's definitely a one and done for me.
The best of the series, the worst of the series.
This is a frustrating review to write, new highs find company with old lows in the PS2 saga's final haunting. For the first 6 or so chapters this was an almost pitch perfect execution and understanding of what makes Fatal Frame great. Not content with just making you fear the decrepit, darkly storied, cursed mansions and shrines of old; Fatal Frame 3 wants to make you afraid of your own home with all it's modernity and flush lighting serving no comfort. I really loved the manor/house structural back & forth here, the digital cleaness of Rei's residence contrasts the filmic, grainy, sordid Manor environs to brilliant effect. It feels deftly inspired by Silent Hill 4: The Room, and unfortunately it harbors many of it's ills too.
The first 3 chapters with main character Rei are fantastic; exploring the strange and eerie Manor of Sleep to some excellent pacing and atmosphere, paired with a much more personal tale of regret, love and loss. Rei's boyfriend, Yuu, just having died in a car accident prior to the beginning of the game, the visage of his being beckons her deeper into a realm in-between life and death. Her regrets of words not spoken pushing her forward towards a point of no return, all in the hopes of getting the chance for one last goodbye. An altogether more emotionally resonant narrative that soon falls victim to being bogged down by rampant exposition and exhaustive backtracking reminiscent of all the worst parts of its predecessors.
In chapter 4 you're introduced to a series first; character focused chapters! A nice surprise that soon starts to reveal itself as an almost cynical means of padding its length as the majority of these chapters devolve into macguffin hunts and exposition extravaganzas. Starting with Miku, the protagonist of Fatal Frame 1, we're immediately met with familiar grounds as the game plops us in the foyer of the original game's mansion, and as someone who still holds the first game higher than the rest this was a lovely callback. Then we're introduced to Kei, the Uncle of Mio & Mayu from Crimson Butterfly, these chapters are all dreadful. Introducting silly stealth mechanics that are better ignored than utilized and featuring some absolutely infuriating encounters exaggerated by Kei's pathetic camera strength in relation to everyone else. These chapters serve to waste time and not much else, they could've all been cut resulting in an undeniably leaner game. Hes the only character in the trilogy I ran out of Type 14 film for, a trail of pure repetition.
Sadly drops ball halfway through in a similar fashion to it's SH4: The Room inspiration. Pacing hits a brick wall, story loses that emotional mystique, devolving into standard Fatal Frame folklore genericism. Progression becomes less about moving forward in the manor and more about completing arbitrary fetch quest tier tasks as a means to end a chapter and return to Rei's plot depository present; picking up a deluge of text files, all of them about as uninteresting as the notes in 1&2. An inelegant, brash execution of a great idea. Worth noting Miku's chapters end on a high note harkening back to the personally tuned set-up of the beginning which I won't spoil... And that's how The Tormented achieves a playtime almost double the length of the previous 2 games, which where both already approaching bloated territory themselves despite only being around 10 hours! These games would do well to call it quits closer to the 8 hour mark, if you ask me.
The combat this time feels a lot smoother, being able to switch film in the camera on the fly via the Dpad was a proper hallelujah moment. At it's best in the early stages of the game it's the snappiest it's ever felt, satisfying and as intended. Tweaked out a lot of the previous sluggishness, falls apart in tight environments though. Ends on a lengthy boss fight a tad on the repetitive side but serviceable enough, honestly though any encounter that lasts longer than a minute in this series I'm mentally tapping out of. A lovely, touching final cutscene just about managed to leave me glad I saw it through to the end. Effectively ties a nice bow on the theme of love lost it was going for, because what is a ghost if but a memory?
Ultimately it's a crying shame this series cant be content on relying on the strength of it's atmosphere and eerie mystique. Choosing each time not to tighten up and exercise brevity, but to inflate; devolving into galavanting back and forth through the same areas ad nauseam, hoping at some point you get compliant with its drip fed, samey back stories and lore dumps. I was so deeply infatuated with everything this game was doing at the start, so excited to come here and gush about one of my new favourite horror games before the overwhelming taste of sourness crept in. I'll likely have to skip playing the 4th game myself as it requires a wiimote even through emulation, Maiden of the Blackwater from most accounts is the worst offender of practically all my criticisms of this series so that'll be something!
This is a frustrating review to write, new highs find company with old lows in the PS2 saga's final haunting. For the first 6 or so chapters this was an almost pitch perfect execution and understanding of what makes Fatal Frame great. Not content with just making you fear the decrepit, darkly storied, cursed mansions and shrines of old; Fatal Frame 3 wants to make you afraid of your own home with all it's modernity and flush lighting serving no comfort. I really loved the manor/house structural back & forth here, the digital cleaness of Rei's residence contrasts the filmic, grainy, sordid Manor environs to brilliant effect. It feels deftly inspired by Silent Hill 4: The Room, and unfortunately it harbors many of it's ills too.
The first 3 chapters with main character Rei are fantastic; exploring the strange and eerie Manor of Sleep to some excellent pacing and atmosphere, paired with a much more personal tale of regret, love and loss. Rei's boyfriend, Yuu, just having died in a car accident prior to the beginning of the game, the visage of his being beckons her deeper into a realm in-between life and death. Her regrets of words not spoken pushing her forward towards a point of no return, all in the hopes of getting the chance for one last goodbye. An altogether more emotionally resonant narrative that soon falls victim to being bogged down by rampant exposition and exhaustive backtracking reminiscent of all the worst parts of its predecessors.
In chapter 4 you're introduced to a series first; character focused chapters! A nice surprise that soon starts to reveal itself as an almost cynical means of padding its length as the majority of these chapters devolve into macguffin hunts and exposition extravaganzas. Starting with Miku, the protagonist of Fatal Frame 1, we're immediately met with familiar grounds as the game plops us in the foyer of the original game's mansion, and as someone who still holds the first game higher than the rest this was a lovely callback. Then we're introduced to Kei, the Uncle of Mio & Mayu from Crimson Butterfly, these chapters are all dreadful. Introducting silly stealth mechanics that are better ignored than utilized and featuring some absolutely infuriating encounters exaggerated by Kei's pathetic camera strength in relation to everyone else. These chapters serve to waste time and not much else, they could've all been cut resulting in an undeniably leaner game. Hes the only character in the trilogy I ran out of Type 14 film for, a trail of pure repetition.
Sadly drops ball halfway through in a similar fashion to it's SH4: The Room inspiration. Pacing hits a brick wall, story loses that emotional mystique, devolving into standard Fatal Frame folklore genericism. Progression becomes less about moving forward in the manor and more about completing arbitrary fetch quest tier tasks as a means to end a chapter and return to Rei's plot depository present; picking up a deluge of text files, all of them about as uninteresting as the notes in 1&2. An inelegant, brash execution of a great idea. Worth noting Miku's chapters end on a high note harkening back to the personally tuned set-up of the beginning which I won't spoil... And that's how The Tormented achieves a playtime almost double the length of the previous 2 games, which where both already approaching bloated territory themselves despite only being around 10 hours! These games would do well to call it quits closer to the 8 hour mark, if you ask me.
The combat this time feels a lot smoother, being able to switch film in the camera on the fly via the Dpad was a proper hallelujah moment. At it's best in the early stages of the game it's the snappiest it's ever felt, satisfying and as intended. Tweaked out a lot of the previous sluggishness, falls apart in tight environments though. Ends on a lengthy boss fight a tad on the repetitive side but serviceable enough, honestly though any encounter that lasts longer than a minute in this series I'm mentally tapping out of. A lovely, touching final cutscene just about managed to leave me glad I saw it through to the end. Effectively ties a nice bow on the theme of love lost it was going for, because what is a ghost if but a memory?
Ultimately it's a crying shame this series cant be content on relying on the strength of it's atmosphere and eerie mystique. Choosing each time not to tighten up and exercise brevity, but to inflate; devolving into galavanting back and forth through the same areas ad nauseam, hoping at some point you get compliant with its drip fed, samey back stories and lore dumps. I was so deeply infatuated with everything this game was doing at the start, so excited to come here and gush about one of my new favourite horror games before the overwhelming taste of sourness crept in. I'll likely have to skip playing the 4th game myself as it requires a wiimote even through emulation, Maiden of the Blackwater from most accounts is the worst offender of practically all my criticisms of this series so that'll be something!
They called it "The Tormented" because they couldn't call it "Super Fatal Frame Ultimate: All Stars".
Everyone is here lol
Everyone is here lol
These 10 ghosts caught on camera will DEFINITELY give you nightmares
yeah this one aint it unfortunately. the map is way too big for its own good and the game is basically oops all backtracking in said gigantic map. Doesn't help that everything is samey and confusing which makes getting lost really easy. The combat isn't that much better than the previous games and it felt like a lot of enemies were damage sponges that mostly loiter around without attacking/giving you opportunities to attack. It was certainly cool to see a fatal frame game with a more internal conflict but it is still pretty much your standard cult shit goin wrong type beats. The final boss was the cherry on top with how it has a dumb semi-predictable instant kill move that can ruin an entire run. On the bright side of things though, this game was really impressive on a visual/graphical standpoint. Not only does it support progressive scan (something that very few PS2 games actually do) but the actual in-game visuals and lighting look fantastic for the PS2, honestly on par with the xbox ports of the first 2 games which is absolutely wild to me. But alas, i still did not really fw this game as much as I would have hoped to, which is a real shame. :(
FF3 é brabo, continuou muito bem com a proposta de dar medo ao explorar os locais.
>> Prós
• JOGABILIDADE.
• HISTÓRIA.
• CENÁRIOS : A ambientação é bem assustadora e perfeita para o game.
• TEMÁTICA DE HORROR : Fantasmas japoneses, n preciso falar de mais nada.
>> Contras
• Nenhum.
>> Prós
• JOGABILIDADE.
• HISTÓRIA.
• CENÁRIOS : A ambientação é bem assustadora e perfeita para o game.
• TEMÁTICA DE HORROR : Fantasmas japoneses, n preciso falar de mais nada.
>> Contras
• Nenhum.
Existe 2 motivos para o pessoal dizer que Fatal Frame 2 é o melhor da franquia:
1 - Foi o jogo que fez a galera entrar na franquia.
2 - É o único jogo da franquia que jogaram.
Fatal Frame 3 consegue ser muito melhor que o segundo jogo, aceitem isso, reunir os protagonistas dos jogos anteriores e acrescentar na história do 3 é uma das melhores coisas já feitas neste jogo, deixaram o jogo um pouco mais difícil comparado ao 2 que é um passeio no parque, e não tinha nada muito complicado para se lidar, os puzzles também são bem fáceis, no terceiro jogo existem fantasmas BEM IRRITANTES de se enfrentar, e alguns puzzles que exige usar um pouco da sua cabeça, o jogo tem problemas com fantasmas repetidos, recursos escassos e um backtracking chato, mas consegue ser melhor que o segundo jogo.
CHANGE MY MIND.
1 - Foi o jogo que fez a galera entrar na franquia.
2 - É o único jogo da franquia que jogaram.
Fatal Frame 3 consegue ser muito melhor que o segundo jogo, aceitem isso, reunir os protagonistas dos jogos anteriores e acrescentar na história do 3 é uma das melhores coisas já feitas neste jogo, deixaram o jogo um pouco mais difícil comparado ao 2 que é um passeio no parque, e não tinha nada muito complicado para se lidar, os puzzles também são bem fáceis, no terceiro jogo existem fantasmas BEM IRRITANTES de se enfrentar, e alguns puzzles que exige usar um pouco da sua cabeça, o jogo tem problemas com fantasmas repetidos, recursos escassos e um backtracking chato, mas consegue ser melhor que o segundo jogo.
CHANGE MY MIND.
Fatal Frame 3 probably has the best narrative in the series, and it has a lot of cool ideas going for it, but is stretched way too thin for it's own good, with the back half feeling really tired. Five-to-eight hours is sorta the golden ratio in terms of length for most classic horror games of this ilk, but this clocks in at around 15 hours, and unlike it's sequel which was about the same length, does very little to warrant that runtime (or whatever the GAMER™ equivalent to that word is).
That being said, it's totally worth enduring the slog for an ending that emotionally hits way harder than a Fatal Frame game aught to.
That being said, it's totally worth enduring the slog for an ending that emotionally hits way harder than a Fatal Frame game aught to.
Probably the best and most compelling story out of all of them, and is consistently Fatal Frame throughout. Have to knock it down half a star though because navigating the mansion a million times over can get a little tedious.
pedrada demais
Toujours la même chose que les deux précédents épisodes mais cet épisode arrive à une forme d'aboutissement dans la narration, la gestion de la peur qui le rend attachant à mes yeux.
Rei my beloved
A seasoned understanding of the series strengths, Fatal Frame 3 contains some of the best scares of the trilogy, with a good dosage of effective and earned jumpscares and subdued moments of increasing unease and tension developed through the masterful environmental storytelling and its ever present voyeuristic fixed camera, additionally course correcting the lack of challenge from FF2 with a much more scarce availableness of ammo and health aids that hearken back to the last tense hours of FF1.
Taking survival's guilt as its core premise, FF3 is a more introspective journey than its more fetishistic predecessors, antagonizing its main character Rei with grief through unsettling hauntings that invade the player's safe space long after your wanderings inside the nightmarish Shintoistic mansion game world, in a similar fashion to what Silent Hill 4 succeeded with its titular room and ultimately the unique aspect that makes FF3 stand out from the remaining series.
It's shame that FF3 spends so much of its time with Rei out of the spotlight in service of other playable characters. It certainly benefits the now familiar setting of the series, as it creates some of the more understated hair raising moments from the mere act of opening a door to suddenly find yourself in an area from FF1 or FF2, while also elevating its dream mansion with a maze-like set of hallways and rooms that have a propensity to make you feel lost.
But the overbloated runtime plagues the game with patience testing backtracking that turn the dread of familiarity betrayal into exhausting fetch quests that have you passing through the same static corridors more than enough times, a feeling exacerbated for players who have done the FF song and dance before FF3. And the added characters introduced with the intent to connect all 3 FF games into one over-arching story rob Rei's inner turmoil of a more deserving focused storyline.
It doesn't contain the brevity of FF1 nor the cohesiveness of FF2, and it definitely starts to feel like a dead end to a series that would expand into even more polarizing and acquired taste sequels. But it ties the trilogy neatly with sorrowful bow, as it manages to combine the core themes of the series with a more grounded and personal ghostly tale that provides the series with a poignant and oddly satisfying happy closure to a series so defined by its tragic haunting tales.
Taking survival's guilt as its core premise, FF3 is a more introspective journey than its more fetishistic predecessors, antagonizing its main character Rei with grief through unsettling hauntings that invade the player's safe space long after your wanderings inside the nightmarish Shintoistic mansion game world, in a similar fashion to what Silent Hill 4 succeeded with its titular room and ultimately the unique aspect that makes FF3 stand out from the remaining series.
It's shame that FF3 spends so much of its time with Rei out of the spotlight in service of other playable characters. It certainly benefits the now familiar setting of the series, as it creates some of the more understated hair raising moments from the mere act of opening a door to suddenly find yourself in an area from FF1 or FF2, while also elevating its dream mansion with a maze-like set of hallways and rooms that have a propensity to make you feel lost.
But the overbloated runtime plagues the game with patience testing backtracking that turn the dread of familiarity betrayal into exhausting fetch quests that have you passing through the same static corridors more than enough times, a feeling exacerbated for players who have done the FF song and dance before FF3. And the added characters introduced with the intent to connect all 3 FF games into one over-arching story rob Rei's inner turmoil of a more deserving focused storyline.
It doesn't contain the brevity of FF1 nor the cohesiveness of FF2, and it definitely starts to feel like a dead end to a series that would expand into even more polarizing and acquired taste sequels. But it ties the trilogy neatly with sorrowful bow, as it manages to combine the core themes of the series with a more grounded and personal ghostly tale that provides the series with a poignant and oddly satisfying happy closure to a series so defined by its tragic haunting tales.
I'd like to consider this the "No Way Home" of the Fatal Frame as it involves all 3 protagonists in a certain way that connects all their stories which I think is pretty damn cool and how they remember and react to being in the past events. The duality of being able to walk around your house and occasionally how obscure and creepy things can occur depending on where you looked around in the house and how far you were progressing through the story and then going to bed to enter the manor of sleep was really cool and kind of reminded me of how "Silent Hill 4: The Room" operated. After playing Crimson Butterfly I did not think this would surpass it, however, it certainly did! It usually is rare for games like these to actually get a scare and reaction out of me, but this and Crimson Butterfly pulled it off and got me good and I loved that.
I have even been guilty of putting this series off until the past recent years and I believe others feel the same way when thinking or hearing about a game where you "take pictures" of ghosts. I'm very glad I took the leap to try this series out and I do believe it can stand toe-toe with silent hill and others in a sense and it is very fun and creepy to play! Becoming a fan of this series is great and I hope others give it the ol' college try too! Looking forward to the 4th installment coming over here next year!
I have even been guilty of putting this series off until the past recent years and I believe others feel the same way when thinking or hearing about a game where you "take pictures" of ghosts. I'm very glad I took the leap to try this series out and I do believe it can stand toe-toe with silent hill and others in a sense and it is very fun and creepy to play! Becoming a fan of this series is great and I hope others give it the ol' college try too! Looking forward to the 4th installment coming over here next year!
If you liked 1 and 2, for sure you're going to like 3.
Funny similarities with Silent 4: The room (which I happened to beat just before this one):
–There is a "weird world" (The Dream Palace here) and the "normal world": your apartment.
–You switch between one and other by waking up.
–Candles to keep ghosts away.
This already makes it quite different to 1 and 2 and I love the apartment interchapters where you investigate with the help of Miku.
The game has a lot to tell and it's really cool the way that you keep notes that summarize what you have discovered, I've spent a lot of time reading with delight. I feel that's not necessary to beat the game if thats what you want to do, but the third installment has imo the most comprehensible story and the one where you can empathise the most with the main character, Rei. It's a game about loss and you can feel Rei's gloom.
Also tries to mix it with both 1 and 2 and it's really cool when you visit locations that look familiar.
I didn't like combat very much, too based on fatal frame and pressing the button at the right moment for my likings, but it's not really relevant.
Very beautiful and haunting game. For sure you have to play this one if you enjoy horror. I don't think it's the scariest of the 3 (I'll give that achievement to the second) but it's really scary anyways. Great ending for the PS2 saga.
Funny similarities with Silent 4: The room (which I happened to beat just before this one):
–There is a "weird world" (The Dream Palace here) and the "normal world": your apartment.
–You switch between one and other by waking up.
–Candles to keep ghosts away.
This already makes it quite different to 1 and 2 and I love the apartment interchapters where you investigate with the help of Miku.
The game has a lot to tell and it's really cool the way that you keep notes that summarize what you have discovered, I've spent a lot of time reading with delight. I feel that's not necessary to beat the game if thats what you want to do, but the third installment has imo the most comprehensible story and the one where you can empathise the most with the main character, Rei. It's a game about loss and you can feel Rei's gloom.
Also tries to mix it with both 1 and 2 and it's really cool when you visit locations that look familiar.
I didn't like combat very much, too based on fatal frame and pressing the button at the right moment for my likings, but it's not really relevant.
Very beautiful and haunting game. For sure you have to play this one if you enjoy horror. I don't think it's the scariest of the 3 (I'll give that achievement to the second) but it's really scary anyways. Great ending for the PS2 saga.
The story gets convoluted by trying to tie the previous two games together when they clearly weren't supposed to be connected, but it's the scariest of the three.
1984 be like "Fatal Frame 2 is better than 3, Fatal frame 2 is better than 3!"
Despite the overall improvements in gameplay and structure from the first two, the one thing I liked the most here was the part where I wasn't capturing the ghosts. Walking around Rei's disheveled home and seeing her commenting on how she can't go to certain areas of the house and do certain things without remembering her dead husband perfectly encapsulates the feeling of grief over the loss of a loved one, which adds to and further fleshes out the themes of greater sacrifices and the supernatural's inability to let go of life introduced in the first two games, this shit most likely hits different when you've had someone close to you dying recently but I can still appreciate what they were going for. Survival horror doesn't get much better than this.
Was going to add half a star to it but it was the longest FF out of the trilogy and it certainly felt like the longest, I could also do without Kei and his garbage ass camera obscura, you know this is a girly girl game for girly girls when the only guy you get to control has the ability to hide from ghosts while the others slow down time and have fully decked out ghostbusting equipment.
Despite the overall improvements in gameplay and structure from the first two, the one thing I liked the most here was the part where I wasn't capturing the ghosts. Walking around Rei's disheveled home and seeing her commenting on how she can't go to certain areas of the house and do certain things without remembering her dead husband perfectly encapsulates the feeling of grief over the loss of a loved one, which adds to and further fleshes out the themes of greater sacrifices and the supernatural's inability to let go of life introduced in the first two games, this shit most likely hits different when you've had someone close to you dying recently but I can still appreciate what they were going for. Survival horror doesn't get much better than this.
Was going to add half a star to it but it was the longest FF out of the trilogy and it certainly felt like the longest, I could also do without Kei and his garbage ass camera obscura, you know this is a girly girl game for girly girls when the only guy you get to control has the ability to hide from ghosts while the others slow down time and have fully decked out ghostbusting equipment.
My favorite things about this game: Coming back to Rei's house after stressing about in the dream manor. Miku's lonely "It's raining again...". Just exploring in the foreboding silence of the house. Safety proving treacherous. Nothing like it.
The dick couldn’t have possibly been that good to make her go through all that.
… unless 👀
… unless 👀
Fatal Frame 3 is interesting in that rather than follows the same story formula as one and two,it deviates itself by making the story more deep and personal,by how the characters dealing with their own guilt and grief while also tried to tie all stuff from previous games as normal as possible,it is also the scariest Fatal Frame i've played so far(1,2,4)and the atmosphere and sound design just elevates this even more.
The Gameplay is easily the best in the series so far as the core combat is more akin to 1 but the upgrade function is more akin to 2 thus creates this perfect flow of combat that will never get old.
I honestly couldn't say that was major flaw for me,as i had a blast playing this from start to finish but if there's some stuff i'm not particularly fond of its gotta be the final boss and the combat sometimes just feel not as tight as it used to.
Fatal Frame III The Tormented is an amazing game,it features the best stuff from previous games while manage to create its own identity that was distinguishable enough,one of my new favorite horror games and might tied with Dead Space 1 as my favorite horror game of all time.
The Gameplay is easily the best in the series so far as the core combat is more akin to 1 but the upgrade function is more akin to 2 thus creates this perfect flow of combat that will never get old.
I honestly couldn't say that was major flaw for me,as i had a blast playing this from start to finish but if there's some stuff i'm not particularly fond of its gotta be the final boss and the combat sometimes just feel not as tight as it used to.
Fatal Frame III The Tormented is an amazing game,it features the best stuff from previous games while manage to create its own identity that was distinguishable enough,one of my new favorite horror games and might tied with Dead Space 1 as my favorite horror game of all time.
This took me way too long to finish, mostly because this is by far the longest game in the series, which is actually it's only big weakness, the game drags a bit as it goes on, especially as it links the trilogy together in initially tenuous, but eventually satisfying ways. But on the flipside I could explore this house forever, and every 10 minutes it feels like I'm finding out some interesting information or seeing a cool new ghost with what is always a great backstory. The only other weakness I have is that I was hoping this game would be the one to really play around with having more environments, with the whole travelling to places via dreams thing, but it's all in the house. And don't get me wrong, the house is an incredible setting and every room has a story and a palpable atmosphere, but I would have liked to see some of the places from the town in FF2, or just somewhere new.
This game takes the Fantastic atmosphere, enemies and unique combat from the last two games and turns it up to ten, this is one of those great trilogies where it just gets better and better as it goes on.
The arcade-style combat which is the series USP is expanded on hugely here with different characters having unique moves, an expanded combo system and new lenses that create all new interesting combat opportunities on top of what was added from the first game in the second. And it ups the ante of the arcadey score-based combat whilst keeping it as the most genuinely frigtning combat in maybe any game out there. The ghosts in this one are still scary, from the skeletons that leap at you to the little girls who hammer nails into your feet, there's always something new and it's always scarier than the last new ghost you saw.
The paralells between silent hill and this become the most apparent in this game, the third tying back to the first, the silent hill 4-esque apartment, and how that apartmment is used in the story. That's just a little observation but one I couldn't stop thinking about. My point is that this is just a better version of Silent Hill 4.
This is easily the best in a consistently great trilogy and one of the best survival horror games ever made, I'm absolutely floored by it, even though it took me something like 2 months to beat.
This game takes the Fantastic atmosphere, enemies and unique combat from the last two games and turns it up to ten, this is one of those great trilogies where it just gets better and better as it goes on.
The arcade-style combat which is the series USP is expanded on hugely here with different characters having unique moves, an expanded combo system and new lenses that create all new interesting combat opportunities on top of what was added from the first game in the second. And it ups the ante of the arcadey score-based combat whilst keeping it as the most genuinely frigtning combat in maybe any game out there. The ghosts in this one are still scary, from the skeletons that leap at you to the little girls who hammer nails into your feet, there's always something new and it's always scarier than the last new ghost you saw.
The paralells between silent hill and this become the most apparent in this game, the third tying back to the first, the silent hill 4-esque apartment, and how that apartmment is used in the story. That's just a little observation but one I couldn't stop thinking about. My point is that this is just a better version of Silent Hill 4.
This is easily the best in a consistently great trilogy and one of the best survival horror games ever made, I'm absolutely floored by it, even though it took me something like 2 months to beat.
How do you deal with grief? A very hard question. All the character interaction are fun. The house creeps me out. The whole dream idea is really cool and works well. Final boss sucks ass, I think the game is too long. Miku <3
A step up mechanically from before with the best combat mechanics of the trilogy. Ghosts are more aggressive and try to break your line of sight more which I love. I also think its setup does Silent Hill 4's gimmick better than Silent Hill of having your apartment get slowly less and less safe with time and the scares around that are genuinely good. Where I think it falters is in exploration since the Manor of Sleep is fucking HUGE making navigation with this slow ass movement a pain in the ass. I also am not a fan of the character hopping for gameplay, especially cause Kei is the worst. Still a good game if a bit long.
I think "The Tormented" actually refers to me, the player.
Smart on gameplay, smart on the writing, smart in the horror. Oh boy this one is good
My favourite Fatal Frame so far. It does a good job of connecting 1&2, (which I was not expecting) but also having it's very own identity with the first ever "normal" house segments where you're able to interact with a cat, talk to Miku who lives with you, develop film, and then go to sleep, where your nightmares take you into the spooky mansion.
Sometimes the game would have the protagonist wake up at very interesting parts, which got annoying over time, but overall I enjoyed the variety.
You should certainly play 1&2 before this one, but this was my favourite so far.
Sometimes the game would have the protagonist wake up at very interesting parts, which got annoying over time, but overall I enjoyed the variety.
You should certainly play 1&2 before this one, but this was my favourite so far.
Foi o primeiro da franquia que eu joguei. Quase infartei em todas as vezes que joguei mas gostei muito, acho a história muito boa.