F.E.A.R asks a simple question: what if a John Woo movie was a first person shooter?
In that sense, F.E.A.R not only answers that question, but gives an answer so good you'd be hard-pressed to find any alternative that is somehow better.
Everything, from the enemy AI (which is mostly programmed to appear smarter than it is, but is still engaging and works incredibly at that) to the level design (which while visually bland is perfectly handcrafted to make the AI function on all cilinders and give you multiple ways to deal with each encounter>) to the visuals (initially the game doesn't seem that impressive on this front but the lighting and environmental damage is still second to none and while leave you dead in your tracks to admire it at times) to the gunplay works to make one of the best first person shooters you'll ever experience.
You haven't lived until you've jumped and kicked a dude in mid-air, shotgunned some other sod right after, somehow separating his head from the rest of his body (?) and thrown a grenade into a doorway, catching a third dude trying to flank you and leaving nothing but a red mist and crimson splatters on the wall, bullet holes and broken equipment in your wake, all the while you were in slow-motion.
Where F.E.A.R falters quite a bit is, ironically enough, the horror. If you think skeletons radgolling from the ceiling with the same gravitas a middle school play is scary, F.E.A.R is the most terryfying game ever, but otherwise the moments that will get you are few and far between and are mostly attributed to more organic gameplay moments than scripted scares. The story also feels like a background to the action rather than something to be invested in.
If you love the FPS genre you own it to yourself to play F.E.A.R at least once in your life.
In that sense, F.E.A.R not only answers that question, but gives an answer so good you'd be hard-pressed to find any alternative that is somehow better.
Everything, from the enemy AI (which is mostly programmed to appear smarter than it is, but is still engaging and works incredibly at that) to the level design (which while visually bland is perfectly handcrafted to make the AI function on all cilinders and give you multiple ways to deal with each encounter>) to the visuals (initially the game doesn't seem that impressive on this front but the lighting and environmental damage is still second to none and while leave you dead in your tracks to admire it at times) to the gunplay works to make one of the best first person shooters you'll ever experience.
You haven't lived until you've jumped and kicked a dude in mid-air, shotgunned some other sod right after, somehow separating his head from the rest of his body (?) and thrown a grenade into a doorway, catching a third dude trying to flank you and leaving nothing but a red mist and crimson splatters on the wall, bullet holes and broken equipment in your wake, all the while you were in slow-motion.
Where F.E.A.R falters quite a bit is, ironically enough, the horror. If you think skeletons radgolling from the ceiling with the same gravitas a middle school play is scary, F.E.A.R is the most terryfying game ever, but otherwise the moments that will get you are few and far between and are mostly attributed to more organic gameplay moments than scripted scares. The story also feels like a background to the action rather than something to be invested in.
If you love the FPS genre you own it to yourself to play F.E.A.R at least once in your life.