Fatal Frame 4 is like a breath of fresh air after playing Fatal Frame 5, it feels more survival horror, but still has a hint of what 5 is going to be.
Story is your standard Fatal Frame, folk ritual gone wrong, and now a place (this time an island) is haunted by ghosts. This time the story is focused on amnesia on all 3 protagonists, and their goal is mainly trying to recover their memory, and maybe get rid of whatever problem the island has.
Combat is divided into 2 systems, Camera Obscura and Spirit Flashlight.
The camera works mostly the same as the previous entry, but this time you have an infinite type-07 film (the weakest one), this is huge, because technically you can spend an infinite amount of time trying to kill a ghost without even needing to worry that your ammo will run out. You don’t even need to try to get an effective shot every time to conserve ammo like in the previous game, sure getting an effective shot made the encounter faster but if you don’t want to risk getting hit for Fatal Frame Shot, then just shooting with max charge is a viable strategy too. This problem persists even in the Nightmare difficulty.
The flashlight is even more broken, there’s no need for ammo, you can shoot your most powerful shot infinitely. Although you do need to recharge if you are shooting continuously, which is easily overcome by just putting the flashlight down for a few seconds (not even a second on max upgrade) and then putting it up again.
There are also collectibles in the form of ghosts and dolls, the dolls I don’t really see a point of honestly. But the ghost is still fun to collect, even if most of them are literally just in front of you. The annoying one is the blossomed one, some enemies (wraiths) can blossom when their health gets low enough, this blossoming form is counted as a different entry in the collectible list. But it happens at random, if you kill the wraith before it can blossom, then all you can do is reload the previous save file. This is most annoying to get with the Spirit Flashlight, because the flashlight has a really high damage, and with max upgrade, it can potentially 2-hit kill most ghosts even on Nightmare. If the ghost doesn't blossom on the first hit, then all you can do is reset.
Overall, still a fun game, not really scary but does have a few scary jumpscare moments, the final boss isn’t as threatening as Reika or Sae even though she chased you in some parts of the game too. Combat is fun but I still don’t like the infinite ammo thing. Ultimately, it’s a lot better than 5, but still not as good as the previous trilogy (though I do miss the wet system from 5).
Now, I want a port/remake of the original trilogy.
Story is your standard Fatal Frame, folk ritual gone wrong, and now a place (this time an island) is haunted by ghosts. This time the story is focused on amnesia on all 3 protagonists, and their goal is mainly trying to recover their memory, and maybe get rid of whatever problem the island has.
Combat is divided into 2 systems, Camera Obscura and Spirit Flashlight.
The camera works mostly the same as the previous entry, but this time you have an infinite type-07 film (the weakest one), this is huge, because technically you can spend an infinite amount of time trying to kill a ghost without even needing to worry that your ammo will run out. You don’t even need to try to get an effective shot every time to conserve ammo like in the previous game, sure getting an effective shot made the encounter faster but if you don’t want to risk getting hit for Fatal Frame Shot, then just shooting with max charge is a viable strategy too. This problem persists even in the Nightmare difficulty.
The flashlight is even more broken, there’s no need for ammo, you can shoot your most powerful shot infinitely. Although you do need to recharge if you are shooting continuously, which is easily overcome by just putting the flashlight down for a few seconds (not even a second on max upgrade) and then putting it up again.
There are also collectibles in the form of ghosts and dolls, the dolls I don’t really see a point of honestly. But the ghost is still fun to collect, even if most of them are literally just in front of you. The annoying one is the blossomed one, some enemies (wraiths) can blossom when their health gets low enough, this blossoming form is counted as a different entry in the collectible list. But it happens at random, if you kill the wraith before it can blossom, then all you can do is reload the previous save file. This is most annoying to get with the Spirit Flashlight, because the flashlight has a really high damage, and with max upgrade, it can potentially 2-hit kill most ghosts even on Nightmare. If the ghost doesn't blossom on the first hit, then all you can do is reset.
Overall, still a fun game, not really scary but does have a few scary jumpscare moments, the final boss isn’t as threatening as Reika or Sae even though she chased you in some parts of the game too. Combat is fun but I still don’t like the infinite ammo thing. Ultimately, it’s a lot better than 5, but still not as good as the previous trilogy (though I do miss the wet system from 5).
Now, I want a port/remake of the original trilogy.